‘Star Wars IX’ Shocker: Leia Confirmed To Return Despite Carrie Fisher’s Death — Fans Go Crazy

Despite Carrie Fisher’s death in 2016, her General Leia Organa will be a part of the the third ‘Star Wars’ trilogy. We’ve got details on how she’ll appear in Episode IX.

Star Wars: Episode IX is about to begin filming in London on August 1, and one of the great mysteries has been whether or not the late Carrie Fisher would appear as General Leia Organa. The actress died at the age of 60 in Dec. of 2016, but had already filmed her scenes for the eighth movie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Her character was going to be a big part of the second trilogy of the sci-fi saga and now director J.J. Abrams has revealed that he’s found a way to include her in the final movie of the series.

“We desperately loved Carrie Fisher,” says Abrams. “Finding a truly satisfying conclusion to the Skywalker saga without her eluded us. We were never going to recast, or use a CG character. With the support and blessing from her daughter, Billie, we have found a way to honor Carrie’s legacy and role as Leia in Episode IX by using unseen footage we shot together in Episode VII.” The highly anticipated final chapter to the Skywalker series is due for a Dec. 2019 release. Abrams also announced that veteran Star Wars actors will be back, as Mark Hamill will reprise his role as Luke Skywalker and Billie Dee Williams will be back as Lando Calrissian.

Of course this news was met with nothing but joy from Star Wars fans across the world. It seemed unthinkable that Carrie could be included in the final chapter of the Skywalker trilogy when she died. The actress and author was flying back to LA from a European book tour when she suffered a massive heart attack and  stopped breathing about 15 minutes before landing at LAX on Dec. 23, 2016. Passengers then paramedics administered CPR on the star, who was rushed to the hospital upon landing. She passed away four days later. She had already shot her scenes for Episode 8 and thankfully Abrams was able to garner enough material to include her in Episode IX.

“Star Wars Episode IX will feature Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia, Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, and Billy Dee Williams as Lando Calrissian! I pray that the Force is with the whole cast and crew,” one fan wrote on Twitter. Some fans were skeptical of how this might turn out with another writing “Please JJ get this right.” But one fan summed it up pefectly, tweeting “Carrie Fisher will return as Leia.” So many feels right now!”