The Star Wars sequels made a lot of mistakes, but fans did appreciate the flashbacks in The Rise of Skywalker that revealed Princess Leia had briefly trained to become a Jedi. Ultimately, Leia would choose to focus on her political duties and raising her son, Ben Solo, but a glimpse of a training session with Luke Skywalker was one of the movie's better moments.
Leia's lightsaber came into play during the final battle, but some newly revealed concept art shows that director J.J. Abrams considered giving the Princess and General a purple blade rather than a blue one.
It's typically considered that individuals who used a purple lightsaber generally shared an affinity with both the Light and Dark sides of the Force. They demonstrate attributes such as instability, high energy, and the relentless determination to accomplish any feat that they are subjected to.
That sure sounds like Leia for the most part, right?
Carrie Fisher's death limited The Rise of Skywalker's ability to tell the story with Leia it originally planned to, but re-used footage and deleted scenes went some way in giving the character and actor a fitting send-off in the Skywalker Saga's final chapter. We'd like to see Leia's story continue in other ways, though, as spending time with the young Leia in Obi-Wan Kenobi was a delight.
For now, it appears Lucasfilm has no plans to revisit legacy characters with different actors (at least not during periods we've spent time in before) so we're not going to bank on that happening.
Check out this newly revealed Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker concept art, courtesy of artist Adam Brockbank, in the Instagram posts below: