J.J. Abrams' longtime editor Maryann Brandon has opened up about some of The Rise of Skywalker 's biggest production challenges in the wake of The Last Jedi , citing Luke Skywalker's death as a "problem."

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In an interview with AwardsDaily , Brandon, who has collaborated with Abrams on more than 20 projects, including The Force Awakens and The Rise of Skywalker, addressed a few issues the production team faced in wrapping up the long-spanning saga, as she admitted that it was difficult to return to the franchise after Luke's tragic trajectory and the real-life loss of Carrie Fisher "All I can say about that is that The Last Jedi, I really enjoyed, but I will say it did present a lot of challenges in terms of where Episode IX had to go to finish the saga. In other words, unfortunately Carrie died, but she didn't obviously die in Episode VIII . She's a character that had to be figured out, and that was a huge challenge," she explained, as she commended Abrams and screenwriter Chris Terrio on their "amazing job" on the film."Luke died, which was a problem," she continued. "So we had those two opposing problems, so I think what you're seeing trend is that the setup was difficult to deal with. I think Rian Johnson is an amazing filmmaker, and I just think that when you're doing a trilogy, you can't just abandon a story. So whatever he chose to put in that film, those things that are dangling have to be dealt with. And you have to deal with them honestly."Abrams previously spoke about how he reacted to the big twists in Rian Johnson's The Last Jedi , revealing that Dark Luke Skywalker was the "biggest surprise" for him, though he praised Johnson's film for defying expectations, as he claimed that Episode VIII didn't derail his vision for Episode IX."[Luke's darkness] was the thing that I thought: 'Oh, that was unexpected.' And that's the thing The Last Jedi undeniably succeeds at, which is constant subversion of expectation. The number of things that happened in that movie that aren't the thing you think is going to happen is pretty fun," Abrams said, adding that none of the creative decisions "obviated a sense of inevitability" where he thought the story could go.Mark Hamill has portrayed Luke Skywalker since Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope in 1977, and will return for one final time in The Rise of Skywalker , presumably as a Force Ghost For more on Episode IX, find out which Clone Wars character might be making a surprise appearance in the saga-capper , discover how the Star Wars prequels influenced the forthcoming film , and read about the new Force powers likely to divide fans

Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter