We have been keeping our ears low to the ground for what’s going on over at Pinewood Studios with Star Wars: Episode VIII. Things are in full swing for the most part, it seems. Cameras are going to begin rolling in less than a month’s time and sets are being constructed now. A lot of the various bits we have been hearing require more investigation and details. There is one set we already knew would likely be in the film due to some location filming a few months back. However, the fact they’ve recreated the location at Pinewood itself is interesting:

The Skellig Michael sets have been built and in some cases recreated at Pinewood. The location of the set at Pinewood is the same place they filmed the Jakku village scenes for The Force Awakens. Filming at Skellig Michael was just too complicated for environmental reasons. Migrating birds have more power than any corporation over that isle.

A few questions pop up from this. Does this mean the location will have greater screen time in the sequel to The Force Awakens? Or is it simply that they need to do some stuff again and it requires the location to exist in some form? A lot of exterior footage has already been shot for the island Luke Skywalker lives on. Between the filming of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Episode VIII, including plate and helicopter shots, it is unlikely the audience will ever know they are not seeing the actual location on screen in the Pinewood shots. There are rumors they wanted to do some night shooting on the location as well. (Before anyone thinks this is a horrible thing, the Jakku scenes were shot in Abu Dhabi and Pinewood at times and most couldn’t tell the difference or which take was used from which location.)

Hopefully we’ll have some more interesting information on the Falcon once we have cross-checked the info!