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First behind-the-scenes picture from 'Episode VII' surfaces

Posted Thursday, November 14, 2013 at 4:42 PM Central

by John Couture

Let's face it, we now live in a social media world and while, sure, George Lucas filmed the prequel trilogy during the nascent stages of the Internet, it was only a sad version of today's online and connected world.

So, it's not surprising that despite director J.J. Abrams' desire to keep the mystery of his projects as quiet as possible for as long as possible, details and pictures from Star Wars: Episode VII will hit the social media networks and the Internet as a whole. As 2013 comes to a close and the release of Episode VII is merely two years away, we have become quite ravenous for anything resembling news on the forthcoming Star Wars film.

Sure, there was a bit of news about J.J. and Lawrence Kasdan taking over the screenwriting duties. And yes, we did get the official release date of December 18, 2015, but we want more. And it seems that J.J. has gotten the message.

But first, believe it or not, there were people back in the early 1980s that hated the Star Wars films. Let me introduce you to film critic John Simon, who not only panned Return of the Jedi and the rest of the Star Wars movies, but said that "they're making children dumber than they need to be."

In fact, according to John, parents should take their kids to see Tender Mercies so they can learn a bit about life. Thankfully, film critics extraordinaire of our generation Siskel and Ebert play Luke and Han to Simon's Darth Vader and Roger Ebert even proves wise beyond his years when he claims that Star Wars movies are films that Disney "should be making."

Well Roger, 30 years later, Disney is making Star Wars films and below we get the first picture of proof.

So, there you go. In news that surprises absolutely no one, R2-D2 will indeed be in Star Wars: Episode VII, but interestingly his copper-plated sidekick C-3PO is noticeably missing in the picture. Is Threepio holding out for more money? Have they recast his role? Only time will tell.

Is there more than meets the eye in this picture? And why isn't Kathleen Kennedy facing the camera? Let the sleuthing begin!