'Star Wars' Director J.J. Abrams Tries to Talk About Rey's Parents, Steps in Bantha Poodoo

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” director J.J. Abrams loves making movies full of mysteries. He even made a TEDTalk about the “mystery box” and why the original “Star Wars” movies’ mysteries work so well way back in 2007.

But as Abrams learned last night (or more likely re-learned, since this is the guy who made “Lost”), trying to drop little breadcrumbs about those mysteries will only lead to madness. During an interview at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival, he told an audience member that new “Star Wars” protagonist Rey’s unknown parents “are not in Episode VII.”

A tweeted video of Abrams’ quote attracted hundreds of retweets and a flurry of blog posts by news-deprived weekend editors (cough):

https://twitter.com/theemilychi/status/721117055945150468

That would definitively rule out my Chewbacca-and-C3PO fan theory!

But wait a sec, Internet: Abrams walked back the comments to Entertainment Weekly faster than you can say “Obi-Wan’s granddaughter.”

“What I meant was that she doesn’t discover them in Episode VII,” he said. “Not that they may not already be in her world.”

Cover-up? Simple mistake? Cynically calculated fake mistake to drive sales of “Force Awakens” Blu-rays?

Until Disney releases Episode VIII in 2017, that may remain just another mystery.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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