J.J. Abrams has been discussing Star Wars: The Force Awakens in an exclusive interview with Collider, touching on that new lighsaber amongst other topics…



“I will say that what’s been funny is, since the lightsaber’s come out, I cannot tell you how many contradictory emails I have received from people who have both defended it with unbelievably detailed graphics,” says Abrams.



“I’ve gotten things that are nuts, and I’ve gotten people who’ve shown how it’ll kill you and how it doesn’t make any sense. It’s been the funniest thing to see the arguments that have developed over this thing.”



“It was a number of conversations,” continues the director, when asked how the design came to be. “It was a sketch that became a whole thing and, you know, this was not done without a lot of conversation and it’s fun to see people have the conversation that we had, but in reverse.”



Meanwhile, Abrams is extremely excited by the film’s overall look, with its blend of CGI and practical effects…



“There are obviously an enormous amount of CG effects in the film, and I can’t wait for you to see the combination,” he says. “But it was very important that we build as many sets as we could and that the film have a tangible, sort of authentic quality.”



“That you believed that these things were actually happening in a real space with real sunlight, if it was an exterior scene, or if we could build a big portion of a scene and not have anything be blue screen, do it where we could… it was a very important piece of work.”



Directed by Abrams and co-starring Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver and John Boyega, Star Wars: The Force Awakens will open in the UK and US on 18 December 2015.