‘Star Wars: Episode VII’ Teaser Trailer to Debut in Select Theaters This Friday

Good news for anybody who loves Star Wars but hates family and/or turkey. Starting Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, an 88-second teaser trailer for Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens will air before films at "select theaters."

The story was broken by Regal Cinemas, who announced on their website Monday morning that the teaser would run before every showing of every movie...at just nine locations in Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, Irvine, Knoxville, New York, San Diego, Seattle, and Warrington. However, not long afterward the announcement was replaced with this, making the whole thing seem suddenly mysterious.

Of course, making things seem mysterious is J.J. Abrams's bread and butter. So retracting the announcement was probably his idea.

In any case, a few hours later, a far less specific announcement came from the official Bad Robot Twitter feed.

So is the teaser going to air exclusively at just those nine theaters Regal mentioned earlier in the day, or will be be a little wider than that? That's unclear.

What is clear is that you'd have to be an idiot to pay $15 just to see a trailer. (No offense, idiots.) If you already wanted to go see Interstellar or Penguins of Madagascar anyway, then sure, go. But don't go just to see 88 seconds of Star Wars you can see online next week. FOR FREE.