Earlier today, Entertainment Weekly released a badass new cover from their latest issue featuring the main villain, Kylo Ren, from ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens.’ 

EW also released 12 fantastic new stills featuring Finn (John Boyega), Rey (Daisy Ridley), BB-8, Han Solo (Harrison Ford), Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew), Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), General Hux (Domnhall Gleason) and Captain Phasma (Gwendoline Christie), C-3P0 (Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2.

Talking to EW, J.J. Abrams revealed that Ren is aware of the events that took place during the original Star Wars and is obsessed with Vader. Abrams also mentioned that Ren built his own lightsaber and that we will learn the origins of Ren’s mask. 

“The movie explains the origins of the mask and where it’s from, but the design was meant to be a nod to the Vader mask. [Ren] is well aware of what’s come before, and that’s very much a part of the story of the film. The lightsaber is something that he built himself, and is as dangerous and as fierce and as ragged as the character. As you see in the best of storytelling, and no doubt the best of Star Wars, these are tales in which an every person has to step up. And I think that what makes Ren so unique is that he isn’t as fully formed as when we meet a character such as Darth Vader. And I think that there are two sides to the Force. Both sides, arguably, would see themselves as the hero of their story, and I think that applies here.”

Kylo Ren isn’t his actual name, but a title that was given to him when he joined the group called Knights of Ren. The same way Sith Lords earn the title Darth. “He is a character who came to the name Kylo Ren when he joined a group called the Knights of Ren. He is not your prototypical mustache-twirling bad guy. He is a little bit more complex than that, and it was a great joy to work with Adam Driver on this role, because he threw himself into it in a deep and remarkable way.”

Screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan on Adam Driver’s performance, “I’ve written four Star Wars movies now, and there’s never been a character quite like the one that Adam plays. I think you’re going to see something that’s brand new to the saga.  He’s full of emotion.  No matter how we express ourselves in the world, whether we hide it and act very calm or whether we’re very out there and demonstrative, everybody’s roiling with emotion. And you want your characters to be that way, too. Then they have to deal with their emotions as best they can, with what they are. (Kasdan pauses as if he is on the verge of saying too much)…  I’d say that is as far as I’d go.”

During the interview, Abrams spoke about his initial hesitation to sign on to direct. Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy recalls, “In the context of talking about story and laying out what we were thinking, I said one thing to him: ‘Who is Luke Skywalker?’ He said, ‘Oh my God, I just got the chills. I’m in.’ I mean, it really was almost that quickly.” Kennedy adds, “The themes and ideas that we all continue to talk about are the themes and ideas that were the inherent in the original movies. We’re looking, obviously, for aspiration, for characters who are conflicted between good and evil, dark and light.”

Kennedy wasn’t the only one to encourage Abrams to take the helm, “You rarely get a chance to be involved in something that you would typically be an audience for. Katie, my wife, said, ‘If you want to do this and you don’t, you’re going to regret this.’ It was really about being willing to take that leap, and jump into the possibilities of what these characters are doing, and where they are.”

The Empire “has morphed into a junta known as The First Order, while X-Wing pilots like Oscar Isaac’s Poe Dameron now fly for a splinter group known as the Resistance.” Princess Leia (Fisher) is in possession of the lightsaber once possessed by her father, Darth Vader, which was later lost by Luke (Hamill) when Vader cut Luke’s arm off during the duel in The Empire Strikes Back.

There is more to Luke Skywalker, “There’s no question, the Luke we watched staring off at the twin suns of Tatooine in the original Star Wars is not the same Luke we last saw standing in the shadows of Endor while his victorious friends celebrated the fall of the Emperor, the death of Darth Vader, and the destruction of the second Death Star. War distorts any soul, and getting older always comes with compromises. Each one takes a piece of you — parts that can’t be replaced like a cybernetic hand.”

“The themes and ideas that we all continue to talk about are the themes and ideas that were the inherent in the original movies,” Kennedy said.

Screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan spoke about what drew him back to work for the Star Wars franchise again. “I thought, ‘Wow, okay, these people have lived — they’re in a different place in their lives, Han and Leia and so on. They’ve lived the same 30 years I have. What would that be like? How would you see things differently?’” Kasdan says. “And I was trying to figure out how I saw things differently, and one of the surprises is that you don’t learn all that much. You haven’t become much wiser than you were, and things are not clearer to you, and the world is just as confusing as it always was — and that’s a kind of lovely thing to get to write about again. Age does not necessarily bring wisdom; it just brings experience.”

Finally, Abrams announced that he won’t be returning to the franchise: “No, I’m not going to direct Episode IX, as much as I am deeply envious of anyone who gets to work with this group of people on the future movies.”

Directed by J.J. Abrams. Screenplay by Lawrence Kasdan and J.J. Abrams. Produced by Kathleen Kennedy, J.J. Abrams, and Bryan Burk. John Williams will also return as composer. Stars Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Andy Serkis, John Boyega, Domhnall Gleeson, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, Oscar Isaac, Max von Sydow, Lupita Nyong’o, Gwendoline Christie, Peter Mayhew, Kenny Baker, Simon Pegg and Anthony Daniels.

‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ opens worldwide on December 18, 2015.

[Via EW]