Dark Rey’s Lightsaber in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker teases a more in-depth backstory from what we saw on the big screen. Star Wars fans were shocked to see the double-sided blade in the earlier promotional footage for the final installment in the Skywalker Saga. Everyone was wondering if Rey had really gone to the Dark Side. It was very intriguing, to say the least, and the visual was enough to prompt excitement on its own. However, the Lightsaber and Dark Rey are only in the movie for about 15 seconds and nothing is really explained.
The official Star Wars website recently shed some light on three of the major Lightsabers in The Rise of Skywalker, including Dark Rey’s, Leia’s, and Luke Skywalker’s iconic weapon. Lucasfilm Archivist Madlyn Burkert shows fans the three weapons and goes into detail about them. For something that was only on screen for 15 seconds in a Force vision, Lucasfilm spent a decent amount of time on Dark Rey’s Lightsaber.
Dark Rey’s Lightsaber has some qualities that are similar to Light Rey’s weapon. The Rise of Skywalker novelization reveals that Rey was working on a Lightsaber with a hinge far before she saw the Dark Rey version in the Force vision. When Rey was working on her weapon, she initially had thoughts about her staff, which was her previous weapon of choice. This explains the foldable double bladed version we see on screen, or at least where the idea came from. However, Lucasfilm chose to go in a different direction, says Madlyn Burkert. “Early designs envisioned the Dark side saber as being created from Rey’s staff, but it was decided that the weapon would have been too much in line with the Light side version of her character,” Burkert notes.
The red details on Dark Rey’s Lightsaber were no coincidence and were originally thought of as a nod to Darth Maul’s blade from the prequel trilogy. “There’s a lot of red details on this, and we often associate that color with the dark side, with the Empire or the First Order,” says Madlyn Burkert. When all is said and done, one can assume if Rey had turned to the Dark Side, she would have ditched her staff for her custom Lightsaber, which could have also had some help from Kylo Ren. They both have the crackly and spitting characteristics and it’s assumed he would have been happy to help.
In addition, Dark Rey’s Lightsaber had a pretty awesome feature that is barely shown in The Rise of Skywalker. The red double-bladed weapon doesn’t just flip around to look cool, it allows Dark Rey to trap Light Rey’s Lightsaber with a scissor-like action. Looking at Dark Rey’s Lightsaber further, it’s revealed that it has a black accent near the end where the blade ignites in the same shape as a detail found on one of Darth Vader’s Lightsabers. There’s a whole lot to unpack in the weapon, which could be a story told at a different time. You can check out the Lightsabers below, thanks to the official Star Wars YouTube channel.
