WARNING: The article below contains spoilers for director Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi, in theatres now.

With the glaring similarities between The Force Awakens and A New Hope, people were unsurprisingly afraid that Star Wars: The Last Jedi would simply be reusing elements of The Empire Strikes Back. While The Last Jedi has an entirely new focus and an almost entirely different cast, fans weren't entirely wrong to expect the familiar.

Cloaked beneath new characters, weapons and creatures are the familiar journeys and in some sense, familiar settings, we saw thirty years ago in Empire Strikes Back, back when the drama was still fresh and shocking. Just take a look at the five biggest similarities between the two films, ranging from borderline coincidental to the undoubtedly stolen.

5. DJ AND LANDO

Let's take a look at one of the new characters introduced in The Last Jedi: DJ, the slicer. He's introduced to us as the slightly eccentric and completely shady character, one that Finn and Rose are justifiably hesitant to work with. While he seemingly proves that he's a decent guy by giving Rose her locket back after using it to hack a door, we find out that he's betrayed them and the Resistance to the First Order.

If that sounds vaguely familiar, it's because Empire Strikes Back did that with the smooth-talking Lando Calrissian back in Cloud City on Bespin. Lando offered Han, Leia and Luke friendship and hospitality only to hand them over to Darth Vader and the Empire. We can't say for sure if DJ is this new trilogy's Lando, so we're just going to have to wait and see. Unlike Lando, DJ may just end up being a complete jerk and not just a guy trying to keep his city alive.

4. THE URBAN ENVIRONMENTS

There are also similarities in the locations in which our heroes meet their respective traitors. In Empire Strikes Back, we're shown Cloud City on the planet Bespin and in The Last Jedi, we're introduced to Canto Bight, a planet full of the galaxy's wealthiest, war-profiteering death merchants. Aesthetically, they're miles apart but as story beats, they feel familiar at times and that might have been intentional.

Brief peace on an urban planet, enjoying luxury in some fashion while trying to find a way to defeat the evil Empire or First Order, there they meet a shady character who eventually betrays them. It would seem like more of a coincidence if the whole subplot involving Finn and Rose didn't ultimately lead to nothing, but because that's exactly what it all resulted in, Canto Blight seemed like an attempt at creating this generation's Cloud City. Whether or not it worked is a topic for another time.

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3. JEDI TRAINING ON A BACKWOODS PLANET

Clearly, the swampy planet of Dagobah and the serene, often sunny planet of Ahch-To look and feel different. That's pretty much where the differences end. Everything that unfolds on those planets are pretty much the same. For one thing, each one is home to a Jedi master on a self-imposed exile, hiding from the dark side. These Jedi masters encounter a Force-sensitive chosen one in search of a teacher and are initially hesitant to teach. After some time, the masters concede and teach their respective students.

Then there are the more mystical things about these planets. On Dagobah, there was a cave where the dark side energy of the planet seemed to be at its strongest. It gave Luke illusions of Darth Vader and the evil beneath that mask. Rey finds a similar place on Ahch-To when she jumps through a hole surrounded by an eerie, tendril-like, black substance. In that cavern, like Luke on Dagobah, Rey is thrown into an illusion with nothing but what she took with her. That cannot be coincidental.

2. THE STATE OF THE RESISTANCE

Let's talk about what the Rebel Alliance and the Resistance endured in their respective films. In the beginning of Empire Strikes Back, the Rebel Alliance was forced to flee from its base on Hoth when the Empire discovered their location. Not dissimilar from what the Resistance was forced to do when the First Order discovered their presence on D'Qar in The Last Jedi.

While fleeing, the Resistance fleet is almost completely decimated, which older audience members were used to since the same thing happened to the Rebel Alliance fleet thirty years ago when they escaped Hoth. They almost ended the same way too: by the end of The Last Jedi, the Resistance is left with nothing but a few good soldiers, a Jedi and a lot of hope. By the end of Empire Strikes Back, the Rebel Alliance was left with nothing but a few ships, a Jedi and...well, you get it. Just like old times, eh Leia?

1. FAMILIAL VILLAINS

We know that Kylo Ren is trying, in many ways, to imitate his grandfather, Darth Vader. With the way The Last Jedi unfolds his story, you'd think that he wasn't necessarily doing it by choice. Sure, the black suit and voice-changer was probably Ren's choice, but let's look at everything that isn't: Ren and Vader are both supposedly incredible Force-users whose barks are worse than their bites. They both joined the dark side but clearly don't want to be there and, just as Vader faced Luke and ultimately failed to kill him, Kylo Ren faces Rey and fails to kill her.

In Empire Strikes Back, Vader fights Luke and then asks him to join the dark side so they could destroy the Emperor and rule the galaxy. The offer Kylo Ren makes for Rey in The Last Jedi is incredibly similar: join the dark side, topple the current regime and rule the galaxy...all the essentials of that offer are there. Ren and Vader even use family as a way to sweeten the deal. Vader used his fatherhood while Ren reminded Rey that her parents were nobodies, that they thought she was nothing and that he didn't. Like Vader, like grandson.

J.J. Abrams said of The Force Awakens that the similarities between that film and A New Hope were intentional and that it was meant to help ease fans into a new Star Wars with new characters and worlds. Perhaps Rian Johnson thought it best to continue in that attempt. Despite these similarities, The Last Jedi does feel like more of a departure than its predecessor.

In theaters now, director Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi stars Daisy Ridley as Rey, John Boyega as Finn, Oscar Isaac as Poe Dameron, Adam Driver as Kylo Ren, Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, Carrie Fisher as Leia Organa, Andy Serkis as Supreme Leader Snoke, Domhnall Gleeson as General Hux, Kelly Marie Tran as Rose Tico and Laura Dern as Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo.