If the final fate of Director Krennic in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was just a little too on-the-nose — and bereft of violence — for your taste, take some level of comfort from the fact that an earlier version of the movie had a very different idea of what would happen to the man responsible for the construction of the Death Star.
Gary Whitta, who worked on the original story with director Gareth Edwards, told Entertainment Weekly that Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) was originally intended to have somehow survived the Death Star’s shot at the Imperial base on Scarif — something he admits was “a bit of a reach” — only to have to face the music as a result.
“He survived the blast and they pulled him up and brought him to the Star Destroyer to report to Vader. … He’s all beat up, his cape’s all torn up and stuff, and he thinks he has survived,” Whitta explained.
Turns out, nothing could be further from the truth, as he discovers that he suddenly can’t breathe anymore. “Vader kills him for his failure,” the writer said.
The scene was never filmed, and Krennic was left to die at the (metaphorical) hands of his most terrible creation. After all, Vader was too busy chasing after the Death Star plans to care about where Krennic was in the finished version of the movie. Either way, let’s just be satisfied in knowing that Krennic didn’t live on to trouble the Rebel Alliance another day.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story will be released digitally on Friday, ahead of an April 4 Blu-ray release.
