Star Wars: The Last Jedi spoilers explained
How does Star Wars: The Last Jedi end?
The Resistance survivors, including General Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher), escape the Crait base on the Millennium Falcon. Rey arrives to help, but Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) confronts Kylo Ren on the salt flats using a Force projection from Ahch-To; Kylo attacks the projection in vain, unable to harm Luke. Luke then stuns Kylo long enough for the Resistance to flee, but he collapses on Ahch-To, becoming one with the Force. The film ends with a slave boy on Canto Bight telling the story of Luke Skywalker and using the Force to grab a broom, symbolizing hope.
What is the main twist in Star Wars: The Last Jedi?
Rey (Daisy Ridley) learns from Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) that her parents were nobody: drunkards who sold her for drinking money and are dead in a pauper’s grave. She is not related to any legacy character. Additionally, Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis) is killed mid-film by Kylo Ren, who then declares himself the new Supreme Leader.
What happens in Star Wars: The Last Jedi?
The film opens with the Resistance evacuating their base. Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) leads a bombing run against the First Order dreadnought, sacrificing many bombers under Vice Admiral Holdo (Laura Dern) who is not yet introduced. Poe disobeys Leia’s orders and loses most of the fleet. The Resistance jumps to hyperspace, but the First Order tracks them through lightspeed using new technology. General Leia is injured when Kylo Ren personally fires on the Resistance bridge; she is sucked into space but uses the Force to save herself. Poe and the crew are stunned, and Holdo takes command.
Meanwhile, Rey has arrived on Ahch-To to find Luke Skywalker. She offers him the lightsaber, but he tosses it away. Luke refuses to train her, revealing he has cut himself off from the Force. Rey persists, and after finding the Jedi texts and speaking to R2-D2, Luke reluctantly agrees to give her three lessons about the Force, but he is cynical and fearful. He explains that the Jedi’s arrogance allowed Palpatine to rise and that he saw a vision of darkness in Ben Solo, which led him to briefly consider killing his nephew—the moment that turned Ben to Kylo Ren. Rey believes she can turn Kylo back to the light.
On the Resistance fleet, Finn (John Boyega) and Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) are tasked with a secret mission to disable the First Order’s tracker. They travel to Canto Bight to find a master codebreaker, but are imprisoned. They meet a hacker named DJ (Benicio del Toro). They escape on space horses, stealing a ship.
Rey has growing Force connections with Kylo Ren, where they see each other across space. Kylo tells her she is nobody, but also offers to help her take down Snoke and rule together. Rey goes to him, believing she can turn him. She is captured and brought to Snoke’s throne room. Snoke reveals he created the Force bond between them to lure her. He taunts her and orders Kylo to kill her. Instead, Kylo uses the lightsaber to kill Snoke, slicing him in half. He and Rey together fight Snoke’s elite Praetorian Guards. After the battle, Kylo asks Rey to join him, but she refuses, wanting to save the Resistance, not destroy it. He tells her her parents are nobody, and the two use the Force to pull at Luke’s lightsaber, which splits in two.
DJ betrays Finn and Rose to the First Order. Holdo stays behind to sacrifice herself by ramming the Supremacy with a light-speed jump, wiping out the First Order fleet and saving the fleeing Resistance ships. Finn and Rose escape and return. The Resistance is forced to evacuate to an abandoned base on Crait.
On Ahch-To, Luke is visited by the ghost of Yoda, who destroys the Jedi library tree and tells Luke that the Force does not belong to the Jedi. Luke is inspired and decides to act.
On Crait, the First Order attacks the base. Poe leads a ground assault in ski speeders. Holdo’s sacrifice gives them time. Kylo orders all turrets to fire on the base gate. At the last moment, Luke Skywalker appears. Kylo goes to duel him. Luke is old but seems to effortlessly dodge Kylo's blows. Kylo finally runs his lightsaber through Luke, but Luke is unharmed. He is a Force projection from Ahch-To. Luke tells Kylo he will not be the last Jedi; he will always be with him. He then disappears. Leia realizes it was a projection and tells Rey. On Ahch-To, Luke sees the twin suns, then collapses and becomes one with the Force.
The Resistance survivors, including Leia, Poe, Rey, Finn, Rose, and BB-8, escape on the Millennium Falcon. They are the spark of hope. The final shot shows a slave boy on Canto Bight using the Force to pull a broom toward him, looking up at the stars.
Quick, non-spoiler context
Rey develops her newly discovered abilities with the guidance of Luke Skywalker, who is unsettled by the strength of her powers. Meanwhile, the Resistance prepares to do battle with the First Order.
Sources and methodology
Title, release, genre, artwork, and rating metadata come from The Movie Database (TMDB). The spoiler explanation is AI-assisted, checked by automated consistency and completeness rules, and may contain errors. See our AI transparency note and report a correction.
