What I’m about to say may sound absolutely stupid to you all, but this comes from what I heard since the film was still in post-production, so I could be in the wrong for writing this post, but we’ll see what happens.
According to test screening reports, mainly orchestrated by YouTube user Overlord DVD, there was originally a scene during the climax where Palpatine’s force lightning blew up the Millennium Falcon, taking the lives of Lando, Chewie, C-3PO and R2, and was described in short as “the saddest moment in the film”.
As of now, there exists no substantial or conclusive evidence of whether or not this scene exists, but I am sure that some of you have contemplated how the Falcon should be dealt with in the film. The other day, I saw an old post on this thread describing the deaths of Lando and Chewie in the Falcon’s destruction, summed up as such:
The legends are dead.
No doubt destroying the Falcon in such a manner would have been a huge risk for J.J. Abrams or Lucasfilm to undertake, and I’ll be honest, I actually thought they were going to go through with it when I saw the film in 4DX 3D. I guess my assumptions were proven wrong.
Nevertheless, the very idea really puts new meaning to the phrase, “Let the past die. Kill it if you have to.”