WATCH ECCC: Delilah S. Dawson kept the biggest Porg secret

And it wasn’t just a Porg secret (though we'll get to that later). As she told SYFY WIRE's Jackie Jennings, author Delilah S. Dawson needed to flesh out Captain Phasma and how she became a galactic phenomenon.

"With a character like Phasma that we know so little about [we want to know] the kind of crucible that she was forged in; how she became the person she did at the time," Dawson said. "We technically didn't know who let down the shields on Starkiller base, so the book was supposed to answer that question."

The book was a vehicle for Dawson to explain how Phasma was forged — not in the Resistance, not a heroine, but not a coward. She also got past the hallowed doors of the Lucasfilm officies to read the script for The Last Jedi. Later, she also had Gwendolyn Christie's onscreen interpretation of the character in mind as she continued with the book.

(By the way, the coffee shop at Lucasfilm headquarters is called Java the Hutt. The things you hear from people who have actually been there and lived to tell about it.)

It helped to have access to then-top-secret deleted Phasma scenes that Dawson evidently thought were more important than whoever threw them on the cutting room floor. If you want to know what those scenes were, get the DVD or Blu-ray.

Dawson's entire life right now is the upcoming books Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge Black Spire and Star Wars: Skywalker Saga. And what is that burning Porg secret? You're just going to have to watch to find out!

This article was contributed to by Elizabeth Rayne.