Star Wars: The Force Awakens: JJ Abrams on why major scene featuring Maz Kanata and Leia was cut
'That was a scene actually filmed, but we took out...'
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Your support makes all the difference.The chances are, if you’re a major Star Wars fanatic, you trawled The Force Awakens trailers a hundred times, analysing every shot, hoping to uncover any hidden secrets JJ Abrams may have left in there.
**Mild spoiler ahead**
One of the most talked about scenes was one in which a small yellow hand - which we now know belongs to Lupita Nyong’o's CGI character Maz Kanata - hands over Luke’s lightsaber to General Leia (Carrie Fisher).
Eagle-eyed viewers were quick to note that the scene never takes place in the film, having been presumably left on the cutting room floor.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly after The Force Awakens’ release, Abrams revealed just why we never got to see the Jedi weapon being handed over in the film.
"That was a scene actually filmed, but we took out. At one point, Maz used to continue along with the characters back to the Resistance base, but we realised that she really had nothing to do there of value, except to be sitting around. ... Lupita did film scenes on set for that sequence, but it felt unnecessary. So we ended up leaving those things out."
It would have been interesting to see some more Maz but at least we now know she is still alive which was a question on many people’s minds.
There were also a number of other characters cut from The Force Awakens, including Constable Zuvio. The Jakku alien has his own action figure, yet didn’t appear anywhere in the film. That would never have happened if George was in charge.
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