Everyone's Second Favorite Stormtrooper Has A Name

Listen, I'm not trying to steal any of Finn's shine here. Although he would be classified as more of a former stormtrooper than an actual stormtrooper, the fact still remains that Finn is everyone's first favorite stormtrooper. However, there is another. The Star Wars fandom has a habit of geeking out over the smallest of things and, in the Force Awakens, one of those things was the baton-wielding stormtrooper that tried to beat the ever-lovin' poop out of Finn for being a traitor and betraying the First Order during the attack on Maz's Castle. That stormtrooper had a rough life, okay. He's basically an anti-hero, you guys, and you know how the world loves an antihero — enough to give him a fan name of TR-8R (get it? Traitor!). However, the baton-wielding stormtrooper from The Force Awakens has a name, and, thankfully, it isn't actually TR-8R.

As it turns out, the official Star Wars site is reporting that the guy's name is FN-2199 — or Nines, as he's called by his friends — and he has a tragic history with Finn that will make that moment in the film all the more poignant to you. The book Before the Awakening reveals, "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. You can see FN-2199 in the image below by Phil Noto from Before the Awakening — he’s the trooper seated in the background with red hair. Who’d have thought?"

Yes, who would have thought that the unnamed hero of The Force Awakens (besides named heroes like Rey and Han and all the rest) actually had a nickname? Friends? A life? A life that included training Finn before he decided to peace out of this whole First Order business? Who knew that that bark of "traitor" was really the anguished cry of a mentor and friend, rather than an overzealous snarl from an angry fellow soldier? Yes, your favorite meme-worthy stormtrooper just probably became your favorite minor character in the film, all thanks to this sweet backstory that sheds further light into Finn's former life as a stormtrooper before he bolted and was named by Poe. And now we even know that the stormtrooper looked like under the mask, so, basically, this meme is going to catch fire with pretty much everyone across the fandom if it hasn't already.

Is anyone else dying for a prequel series of Finn's time as a stormtrooper that leads up to his decision to take off, just so we can see his mentor relationship with Nines develop and then break down? Anyone? Just me? Well, I'm going to make myself cry thinking about it anyway, and you can't stop me.

Image: Walt Disney Motion Pictures/Lucasfilm; Giphy