Although we've now seen three trailers for the upcoming Star Wars film, the plot of Rise of Skywalker is still very much shrouded in mystery. How does The Emperor return? Why are C-3PO's eyes red? And for god's sake, how did they get a bunch of horses onto the surface of a Star Destroyer? Though no one knows for sure, a surprising Easter Egg in the final trailer for Episode 9 may have unraveled a large portion of the conclusion to the Skywalker saga's plot. It all goes back to something called "The Dagger of Mortis."
Towards the end of the trailer, we see Kylo Ren and Rey seemingly teaming up to destroy the helmet of Darth Vader. We don't know where they are, but from the looks of the stark white exterior, and '70s-era sci-fi machinery, it looks like the duo may be in some sort of old school Imperial chamber. They strike at a podium holding the scorched artifact of Anakin Skywalker, and the whole thing bursts into pieces.
It's a mystery as to why the Force-sensitive pair is striking down this monument to Anakin Skywalker. And the mystery becomes even more profound when you see that Rey is holding what appears to be a knife of some sort. Fans of the Star Wars animated series know that there's only one very big important knife that matters to this particular spacefaring franchise – the so-called Dagger of Mortis, which appeared in the Clone Wars three-part episode, "Altar of Mortis."
"Altar of Mortis" follows Anakin, Obi-Wan, and animated series favorite, Jedi padawn Ahsoka, as they journey through a metaphysical realm between worlds. They encounter three beings in this realm – the Father, the Son, and the Daughter. The Son happens to wield a blade known as the Dagger of Mortis. It has the ability to vanquish immortal beings. Does a weapon like this sound like it could be significant to Rise of Skywalker? If Darth Sidious is involved, then I surely think so.
It's been rumored for a while now that an ancient Sith blade would factor into Rise of Skywalker. The leading prediction (or "leak") about the plot of the new film says that an old weapon will be uncovered by the Rebels, and it will have an inscription that C-3PO needs to translate. This would explain why it seems that the Poe, Rey, and Finn are wiping C-3PO's memory to restore some sort of initial software that could interpret such an message. The problem is, the Dagger of Mortis disappeared along with the planet when Anakin destroyed it in the end of the Clone Wars story.
If it really is the Dagger of Mortis that Rey has found, then it seems like the goal of the good guys in this film is pretty clear – stick that magic blade into Emperor Palpatine's face, and end his dark reign over the Force once and for all. If Rey and Kylo are able to pull this off, it could tie up the three trilogies pretty well. In the prequels, the Jedi were not able to destroy Sidious–in fact he fooled them all right in front of their faces. In the 1970s trilogy, Vader tried but, apparently, failed to kill Palpatine. And now, in this new trilogy, the Jedi have one last chance to take down the biggest bad of them all. The difference here? This time, they have a super-powerful weapon that can potentially wipe this immortal force of evil off the face of the Galaxy.
Rise of Skywalker comes out on December 20, 2019.
Dom Nero is a staff video editor at Esquire, where he also writes about film, television, tech, and video games.
