Towards the end of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Rey (Daisy Ridley) reached the planet of Ach-To where Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) is hiding from the First Order. She hands him his lightsaber, hoping he will teach her how to work with the Force.
The movie ended on a cliffhanger and we got to see how the training goes only when the first trailer for Star Wars: The Last Jedi dropped during Star Wars Celebration earlier in the year. Rey had managed to hurt Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) - giving him a scar and chopping off his hand. But profession guidance felt like a must for a former scavenger.
Behind the scenes, Ridley had to go through rigorous training which involved learning to fight with her staff and then finally sword fighting training that allowed to swing like a pro.
In a featurette released on Saturday, Ridley is seen practising with her fighting coach Lian Yang. Yang said "I was planning to teach her the whole routine in three days but she surprisingly learned everything in an hour and a half. She's a very quick learner."
Talking about the training sessions, Ridley said, "Physically I never really had to push myself that hard and stamina wise you're like oh my god. It's like a psychological thing of knowing that you can do it more and more and more."
Ridley isn't the only warrior featured in the video. Gwendoline Christie, who plays Brianne of Tarth in Game of Thrones, said that fight training for the clash between Finn (John Boyega) and Captain Phasma (her character in Star Wars) was the hardest physical thing she had done yet.
Echoing her sentiments, Boyega also said that the shoot for the showdown between Finn and Phasma was very tiring.
Kelly Marie Tran, the newbie of the Galaxy Far Far Away too trained for action scenes.
At mark 1.46 in the video, we get to see Adam Driver back on training mats to brush up on his moves for fighting with a crossguard lightsaber. Talking about the rigours, 'but in a good way,' sessions he said, "These stunt guys are very disciplined so you can't half-ass it."
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Everyone would like to fight with a lightsaber. While it looks cool on screen, The Last Jedi BTS video shows it's no child's play.
Directed by Rian Johnson, Star Wars: The Last Jedi is scheduled to release on December 15.
