AHSOKA Premieres to Standing Ovation

Last night 500 fans, press, and influencers trekked to London’s Waterloo to attend Disney & Lucasfilm’s ‘UK Fan Screening’ of Star Wars: Ahsoka at London’s BFI IMAX, and were screened the first two episodes two days before its worldwide release.

The fans in attendance were treated to a number of photo ops, including a number of character and series posters in the cinemas foyer, as well as a Samsung printable photo booth and a 360° slow-mo lightsaber video set on the series-original planet ‘Seatos’.

The two episodes screened to thunderous applause from all guests in attendance and lightsabers rose for the tribute to Ray Stevenson, the actor of Baylan Skoll, who unfortunately passed after the series’ completion. After the screening, many of the lightsaber wielders in attendance amassed outside the cinema for a collective photo before departing their separate ways for the evening, raving about the show on their journeys home.

Having spoken to a few dozens fans at least night’s event, all gave glowing reviews of the first two episodes and hadn’t a bad word to say about it, an opinion shared by myself, a huge fan of the franchise (read my review here). Even fans who admitted to being more critical of Star Wars in recent years believed this show to be on the path to redeeming the saga. As these are some of the franchise’s most dedicated fans, I have no doubt that the collective fanbase will adore these premiere episodes.

Getting to watch the first two episodes of Ahsoka on the big-screen was an absolute delight, as I haven’t seen lightsabers in the cinema since 2019. Watching it on the colosseum-like BFI IMAX screen allowed fans to watch the premiere episodes on one of the biggest screens in the UK – the last feature I watched here was Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer.

After having conversations with the invited guests at the screening, I came to learn many of the invited fans were true fans that Disney put great effort in searching for. Those I spoke to came from Star Wars-related fan societies, whether cosplay groups (as evident by the number of Jedi in attendance), replica-makers, or gamers, everybody there was a fan of the franchise and relished the opportunity to attend such a special event. Often, other studios promote their “fan events” that have little-to-no fans in attendance and instead invite reality TV stars and models, to the behest of real fans who see through the misleading marketing, so this was an incredibly refreshing and heartwarming sight to see from Disney, as it shows they care for and respect their fanbases.

Star Wars: Ahsoka will debut its first two episodes tomorrow at 2am BST, followed by individual episodes releasing Wednesdays at the same time. Check out our review of the first two episodes here.

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