What do you think about Snoke’s ship?

Wow, the dark side really likes their big ships, huh? I love the design for it (though I’m not sure what it reminds me of?), but I am starting to doubt the practicality of building these things. I feel like if you can fit three Executors in the same space, your ship might be too big. As much as I liked it, though, watching it get destroyed was admittedly pretty awesome.

~ Jacen

Why would bomb-armed ships keep tight formation?

Bombers are generally pretty slow ships, so they have to fly in close formation so that their fields of fire overlap to protect the whole group. This also allows their fighter escorts to cover them effectively. If you’re asking because of the obvious risk that if one blows up, it could take the others with it, it would be worth remembering that small ships flying in a tight formation often aren’t as close together as it seems, and they generally have a bit of time to pull away from a damaged ship before it explodes.

~ Jacen

minor spoilers Per the visual dictionary for the last jedi there was another General on Crait; would he then be the last in charge of (hypothetically leia is likely removed from the story given carrie’s death) or is there a chance they remove him from the line of authority too?

Are you asking whether he would be in charge of the Resistance in the event of Leia’s death or departure from the Resistance? If so, he may or may not end up in charge. There are other members of Resistance High Command who have not been confirmed dead (though given the events of the evacuation of D’Qar, it seems likely that they are), some of whom outrank General Ematt, so if one of them is still alive then he would not be in charge of the Resistance. Otherwise, he would assume command. I’m not sure I understand the last part of your question, but if you are asking whether there’s a chance that he will die too, it certainly seems possible. Though, he is a very minor character so far, so they may not bother to show what happens to him.

Hope that helps!

~ Jacen

another minor spoiler at the end of Luke’s storyline he sees the twin suns again. I believe I read in the visual dictionary that the planet did have twin suns. What is the likelihood of that given it was ocean-covered? Even at a distance twin suns would affect I would imagine?

Going off of real life, it’s not likely. Planets in binary systems often have pretty elliptical orbits, meaning they can move in and out of the habitable zone, alternately freezing and thawing throughout the year. For life to even exist, the suns should either be so close to each other that the planet experiences a gravitational pull as if there were only one star, or they should have roughly equal masses. For the planet to be covered in water like Ahch-To, it would have to have a fairly large orbital radius, and if we assume that its climate stays pretty much the same, its orbit would also have to be quite circular. But who knows, it could be possible!

~ Jacen

how likely is it that Finn would ever be interested in finding out who his family was or where they ended up? Will they ever tell us childhood, perhaps in supplemental material? They told us the backstory of the former version of stormtroopers in general so I was just curious.

***some very minor spoilers ahead for TLJ***

I’m afraid I couldn’t tell you for sure. Personally I think they will, at some point, go into Finn’s backstory, or at least I hope they do. It’d be near-impossible for them to avoid this issue, but I could see them shoving it away into the extended universe. I don’t think they can really avoid giving Finn a lot of screen time in Episode IX, having thoroughly addressed Luke, Rey, and Kylo, so hopefully we get some information then!

~ Jacen

Is there anything physics related that bothers you about the movies?

I’m pretty willing to suspend disbelief and accept the in-universe laws, but something that’s always bothered me is how starships move in outer space as if they were moving through an atmosphere. Obviously I wouldn’t want them to get rid of it, but they fly like they have air to push against and, in some cases, a force of gravity acting on them. If you’ve ever seen a shuttle maneuvering with its little air jet things, it looks nothing like the swoops and turns an x-wing can do. And I’ve talked about this before, as something that doesn’t bother me so much as make me curious, but I also notice the inconsistencies in how use of the Force relates to the laws of physics. For example, a Force-user may brace themselves so their feet don’t slip while pushing against something heavy, or fall to their knees holding something above their head (meaning that an object being manipulated through the Force can exert a force on the person manipulating it), but at the same time a person can pull a Star Destroyer out of orbit without experiencing a proportional physical strain (or getting pulled off the ground themselves). So yeah, that’s just something funny I’ve noticed.

~ Jacen

Hi Jacen! Trying to figure out when Poe joined the new republic versus defected. I know from a search that he joined the republic 30 years after the battle of Yavin. Was there only a short period between NR and resistance? Was there any particular reason (schooling, training) that he waited until his thirties if that was the case? Thank you!

He joined the Resistance (which is sorta not defecting, really, since the Resistance is a splinter group of the New Republic military) in 34 ABY after an incident that led him to disagree with the New Republic’s policies of inaction against First Order threats. I can’t find any record of when he joined the New Republic Starfleet, but if he did join in 30 ABY (age 28) then I couldn’t tell you why he waited so long, since he’d been flying since he was 6.

~ Jacen

What sort of recruitment tactics does the resistance use?

The Resistance gets its recruits from the New Republic military, planetary defense forces, and from the Galactic Civil War veterans who were left unemployed when the New Republic started to demilitarize. It is stated that they don’t use recruitment posters, and since it is not really a military in its own right I find it unlikely that they actually put resources into other forms of recruitment and/or propaganda. More than anything, it seems like new recruits just stumble into them or join up of their own will.

~ Jacen

How do some of the more famous rebels visit home so easily? Wouldn’t it be easy to pick them off if you knew where they were going?

I suppose it would depend on the rebel. Leia, for example, was a prominent member of the Imperial Senate and wouldn’t have simply been murdered, and Mon Mothma didn’t have to flee until she publicly spoke out against the Empire, despite having helped organize the beginnings of the Rebellion long before that. As well, it’s near impossible to track a ship through hyperspace, and any rebel hoping to visit their homeworld (as long as the spaceports were not being actively monitored by the Empire) could easily avoid being followed by making a few jumps in different directions. Not only did the Empire lack the resources to establish a presence on all the famous rebels’ homeworlds, plenty weren’t exactly friendly to the Empire, and a number of the more powerful systems were essentially allowed to govern themselves. Corellia, the birthplace of many famous Alliance pilots, including Wedge Antilles, was in a situation like this.

Hope that helps! If there’s someone specific you’re wondering about, feel free to send another ask.

~ Jacen

Are IT-esque departments a thing ?

The in-universe equivalent of an IT guy would be a tech specialist. I don’t think I’ve ever seen mention of a whole department of them, like the people who get called to fix a computer in an office building, for example, but it’s safe to say that the galaxy couldn’t possibly function without something like that in place. A lot of simple computer maintenance is carried out by droids in most places, so any IT-style department would probably be staffed mainly by droids.

~ Jacen