Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker has a lot to answer for, from doing its best to torpedo the entire Skywalker saga to tainting the legacy of the franchise by spawning multiple memes inspired by its cringiest moments. One of its more underrated crimes, however, is how J.J. Abrams’ Episode IX did its utmost to ruin that iconic Star Wars trope that reduces millions to giddy children whenever they see it: the opening crawl.
Infamously, Rise of Skywalker‘s crawl kicks off with the terrible opening line “The dead speak!” which is on a par with “Somehow, Palpatine returned” for TROS‘s worst moments. For many years there, it seemed Lucasfilm might be permanently retiring the opening crawl out of sheer embarrassment as we hadn’t seen the franchise fixture used in any subsequent Star Wars project since 2019. Thankfully, though, Disney Plus’ latest series from the galaxy far, far away has just rescued the crawl by restoring it to its former glory.
Yes, Ahsoka‘s pilot episode begins with the nostalgic use of an opening crawl, the very first time a Star Wars series has utilized the storytelling device which allows the audience to be brought up to speed and still start the narrative in media res. Even The Mandalorian has never contained a crawl, not even in its own first episode. It’s curious that Ahsoka received this honor, then, when it’s more about continuing the legacy of Star Wars on TV rather than the movies, unlike say Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Perhaps it’s just as simple as Lucasfilm knowing that fans missed the opening crawl and desperately needed another one to wash away the lingering bad taste of Rise of Skywalker‘s. Whatever happens next in the saga’s uncertain cinematic future, thankfully we can say the last Star Wars crawl definitely doesn’t begin with “The dead speak!”