J.J. Abrams Made Hilarious ‘Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker’ Codenames For The Secret Characters
When you go into a project as big asStarWars, you have to be prepared for a life of secrecy. ButJ.J. Abramsknew that whole drill, having helmed 2015’sStar Wars: The Force Awakens. So when he and co-writerChris Terriocame intoStar Wars Episode 9, they came prepared with a few cheeky codenames. Abrams and Terrio createdStar Wars: The Rise of Skywalkercodenames for some of the secret characters whose mere presence would spoil the film.
In an interview withGQ Magazine, Terrio revealed the secret codenames he and Abrams had created to hide the presence of two characters inStar Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. While Emperor Palpatine would eventually be revealed in the trailers, there is at least one more character whose codename pretty successfully hid his appearance:
“The code for The Emperor was Trooper 13. Or if we were talking about Harrison [Ford] we would call him The Janitor. We felt that was a huge unresolved part of Kylo. The family sin. So closure was necessary for Ren to make peace with the memory with his father, so we called Harrison The Janitor because he allowed Ren to clean up, at least spiritually, some of the mess he’d made.”
The code name of The Janitor for Han Solo is kind of tongue-in-cheek considering Harrison Ford’s past career as a jack-of-all-trades while he was a struggling actor — he famously was working as a carpenter when he was cast by George Lucas for a role inAmerican Graffiti. Movie fans like to spin the tale that he was working as a carpenter or janitor on the set ofStar Warswhen Lucas noticed him and cast him as Han Solo, but he was merely astand-in for screen testsbefore getting offered the part. Still, that codename seems like a cheeky nod to Ford’s past career (maybe hewasa janitor at some point) or at least to the urban legends around his casting in one of his most iconic roles.
