Star Wars' traitor trooper has an official backstory

If you're one of the millions of people who have seen Star Wars: The Force Awakens, you'll know that at one point in the film John Boyega's Finn is confronted by a baton-wielding stormtrooper. What you may not know is that the brief appearance of the side character has gone down a, um, storm with the fandom, who have since christened him TR-8R and made him the subject of a rapidly increasing number of memes.

Courtesy of StarWars.com, new information about the popular buckethead has come to light. His name is FN-2199, but to his friends he is known as 'Nines'. The article goes on to say that "as detailed in Greg Rucka’s excellent book Before the Awakening, Nines trained and served on a squad with Finn (then FN-2187) in the First Order. That explains why he seems just a little extra angry upon seeing Finn during the attack on Maz’s Castle".

FN-2199 was voiced by Skywalker Sound sound editor David Acord - who absolutely nailed the "Traitor!" line delivery - and played by Liang Yang who has done stuntwork on films such as Kingsman: The Secret Service and Edge of Tomorrow. Although Nines may not have survived the film, at least he will never be forgotten.

Directed by JJ Abrams and starring Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, Andy Serkis, Oscar Isaac and Gwendoline Christie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens is out in cinemas now.