9 things the new Japanese Star Wars trailer reveals

There's been a great disturbance in the Force. As if millions of Twitter voices suddenly cried out in terror... because they hadn't expected Disney Japan to drop a new The Force Awakens trailer on them.

Swooping from the shadows like an enraged Sith lord, the latest sneak peek at J J Abrams' Star Wars effort runs along a similar arch to the recent Western trailer: there's an unknown female voice offering someone sage wisdom, the same horse remarks of Kylo Ren and a fair amount of general menace.

There are some significant differences though, with the Japanese marketing team dipping into previously unseen sequences.

If you're full to the brim of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and want some surprises left in store, best not proceed with the following...

Let the speculation commence.

Rey's new friend

The real star of the new trailer is BB-8, everyone's favourite new ball droid. 

Early on in the trailer we appear to hear Rey having an introductory conversation with the small droid:

BB-8: Beeps

Rey: Where do you come from?

BB-8: More beeps

Rey: I know all about waiting...

BB-8: Questioning beep?

Rey: For my family.

Right there we get a big fat confirmation that Rey parallels a young Luke, stuck on a dead-end desert world without any real knowledge of her wider heritage. We'll get on to where BB-8 might be from in a bit...

That's no moon...

A glorious shot - a squad of TIE Fighters stream across the sky in front of a setting Jakku sun. 

Unless... what if that isn't a moon? What if one of those large orbs is the large Death Star-like craft we saw in the new poster? 

That can't be good news for Jakku - the First Order is looking for something on this dusty world.

Not following health and saftey

Here we have Kylo Ren's super-awesome cross-hilt lightsaber in full glow mode... inside a ship? A First Order ship?

Is Ren a bit of a lose canon? Is he prone to kicking off, succumbing to hate? It would appear in keeping with his menacing character - perhaps he's a bit too much of a handful for even the First Order.

Rey and Finn meet... in the Millennium Falcon?

Now, we've already seen a bunch of footage of Rey and Finn running about the sand of Jakku, dodging explosions and Stormtroopers (who still can't shoot straight).

But this sequence clearly shows them exchanging first names within the Millennium Falcon.

Whatever draws these two heroes together, they don't get much time to become acquainted before the First Order arrives, and Han Solo swoops in to save the day.

Another threat

Leia Organa Solo is back in command, with a series of familiar tactical screens seen here apparently depicting that large new Death Star ship.

J J Abrams might well be mirroring the original Star Wars: A New Hope to the extent that a conclusive show down will see the Resistance battle the First Order and their nasty space station. 

BB-8's arrival

We're stretching on this one, but stick with us.

Here we have BB-8 trundling around Jakku in some pretty violent circumstances. Either BB-8 escapes the First Order along with Finn, crashing on Jakku in a ball of flame (though Finn appears to wander about after downing his TIE Fighter in daylight) - OR, BB-8 has been sent to Jakku with is own mission.

We like the idea that this little droid is sent to Jakku to seek out Rey, that he's holding on to an important message much like R2-D2 - that someone (Luke Skywalker) is keen to reach out to Rey before it's too late.

Rey's Staff

We keep seeing a lot of Rey's staff. An awful lot of it.

While we're yet to see exactly how it works, we're betting big on this pointy death stick having some meaner skills than just being used to poke bad guys in the face.

Let the Wookie win

Chewbacca is back, "grawling" as ever. 

Midway through the trailer we see Chewie use a remote detonator to blow up the bridge of a First Order ship. 

This implies firstly that Chewie or Resistance members will have boarded the ship (the new Death Star?) and that things are going to go tits up for the bad guys once their main window is blown up.

Maybe this is why Kylo Ren starts swinging his lightsaber around indoors.

A close shave

The real money shot of the new trailer.

Rey has a run in with Kylo Ren - with the Knight of Ren having the upper hand. 

We highly doubt that Rey is going to meet her end in this film, so there'll be some heroic action here, or Ren has some motive in keeping Rey alive. Maybe we'll see the film conclude with Rey being taken prisoner, with her rescue forming a large part of Episode VIII.