Episode VIII: John Boyega on Finn and Rey’s Status, Oscar Isaac on Film’s Nuance

Inching ever closer to the event horizon that is Episode VIII, we find ourselves surrounded on all sides by tiny little tidbits of news streaming out from the set. First up: some news for you shipper folk. John Boyega torpedoed a popular ship the other day, confirming the fact that Finn and Rey are just friends. In an interview with Variety, Boyega addressed a question regarding what the interviewer seemed to hope was a developing romantic relationship between the two characters. He said, “Yes, Finn and Rey–they’re just friends. Finn is a storm trooper, so he doesn’t really know what’s going on. So the romance thing is something that’s going to be interesting in the next installment. It’s not going to go the way you think it’s going to go.”

A bit disappointing to hear, to be sure, but who knows. It’s not like it can’t develop into something more later, perhaps. Hold out hope, and go down with that ship, folks!

Oscar Isaac has been all over the place promoting X-Men: Apocalypse, which comes out later this month. In those interviews, folks can’t seem to help but ask him about how Episode VIII is going. In a chat with Entertainment Tonight (via /Film), he mentioned universe newcomers Laura Dern and Benicio Del Toro, and what it was like working with them and Rian Johnson. As well, he continued to compare Episode VIII to an independent film, citing Johnson’s film style. He said, “Obviously it’s this huge, huge thing but it’s more about the quality of what it feels like to film specially with the new additions to the cast, like Laura Dern and Benicio Del Toro, they’re incredible actors and Rian [Johnson], his sensibility is one of smaller films. So, within all of the bigness and the epic scope of the film, it does feel like we’re getting to find some of that nuance and that intimacy.”

Since The Force Awakens did a pretty good job of establishing an excellent foundation for the rest of the movies, it makes sense that the next installments can afford the luxury of focusing on developing smaller, more nuanced stories. In a lot of ways, this idea tracks the original trilogy’s trajectory, what with the major Galactic Civil War developments happening in A New Hope, which sets up Empire Strikes Back‘s incredible focus on smaller, more interpersonal developments between the characters. Obviously we don’t have too many details on plot and things just yet, but just going off what we know, the parallels seem a bit close.

Isaac notes as much, as he goes on to say, “Poe, he gets to be more a part of the story, and all of the characters in the film, they get tested, intensely. It’s a lot of conflict in it, which is great.” Mhm. Conflict. Someone’s going to lose a hand, huh? Or a foot. Wouldn’t that be weird?

All that being said: hype levels are pretty high for Episode VIII, even this far out from release. We’ve still got a little more than a year and a half to go, so hold on tight and try not to trip over all the wild, rampant speculation, folks.

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