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  1. #31
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    I think I'm one of the few the enjoyed the Rey Palpatine twist.

    It inverts the Skywalker saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine to a Palpatine saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine, which was a nice bit of themetic nuance for me. Granted, I wish they set it up & executed it better but I digress ... It was a good idea.

    Rey Nobody I think would've worked had they continued down the path of rejecting what came before you. If Kylo is revealed to be the one that killed her parents at Luke's temple and drops her off because he feels guilty murdering a child because he doesn't want to be a full-on Vader (and blocks her memory), I think Rey Nobody works. And he would still need to turn to the light to bring back Rey from death IMHO for that arc to work as she dies trying to stop the big bad.
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  2. #32
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mik View Post
    Or they could've done right by Rey, instead of putting the primary focus on Kylo's journey, and then it wouldn't be a problem if she's no one. And it does come off as a bit elitist if only one family gets all the attention in a massive galaxy.
    That’s what the “ideal” Rey a random scenario is - focus on her, use him to show why his family shouldn’t be the center of the story/why his blood doesn’t matter.

    It’s just a reaction that a lot of people don't have and have to be almost brutally shut down from reversing, repeatedly. Abrams had Kylo killing Han for the sake of being more evil... and Rian Johnson’s starting point was still “Rey should want to save his soul and kiss him!” That’s how strong of an impulse to ignore that is.

    Though I would say that Rian Johnson and other Kylo Ren fans would argue it’s not “elitism” on their part, but a belief that they’re in a “family story,” so they should focus on that “family.” And to some extent? They’d be right - everyone knows a Star Wars story can exist without the Skywalkers (Rogue One, KOTOR, etc.), but they’d argue that *if* the family still has a prominent member in the leads for the story, than it’s a Skywalker Saga tale as much as a Star Wars tale, and refocus on the family.

    It's why I ultimately think Rey Random, even at its best, is fighting an immense up-hill battle for a mostly redundant purpose - people know the franchise is larger than the Skywalkers... but people also want to see the Skywalker sub-story and treat it differently.

    Quote Originally Posted by BeastieRunner View Post
    I think I'm one of the few the enjoyed the Rey Palpatine twist.

    It inverts the Skywalker saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine to a Palpatine saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine, which was a nice bit of themetic nuance for me. Granted, I wish they set it up & executed it better but I digress ... It was a good idea.

    Rey Nobody I think would've worked had they continued down the path of rejecting what came before you. If Kylo is revealed to be the one that killed her parents at Luke's temple and drops her off because he feels guilty murdering a child because he doesn't want to be a full-on Vader (and blocks her memory), I think Rey Nobody works. And he would still need to turn to the light to bring back Rey from death IMHO for that arc to work as she dies trying to stop the big bad.
    To me, as long as Kylo/Ben is getting treated as Rey’s co-protagonist and Finn is getting screwed out of that job, it’s just further evidence that the idea, whether Rey Random or Rey Palpatine, is still going to collapse under the desire to focus on the Skywalker. The only thing he can really do to help a Rey who’s not a Skywalker stay in center stage and *not* take Finn’s spot is grow more evil and die. That’s it. Rey can’t be a “transitional protagonist” to slowly pull us away from the Skywalkers by ceding her own focus and that of Finn to a deplorable Skywalker family member - she's too under-equipped to stand toe-to-toe with the family story then. She either should be a stronger part of the family story than Kylo (whether as a blood member or as an adoptee with him basically being totally disinherited and cast out of the family), or she shouldn’t be competing with the family story (so Kylo shouldn’t be Ben Solo, and the character should have to seem redeemable for something other than his family ties.)

    Rey Palpatine’s ultimately just a weaker version of Rey Skywalker, conceptually, especially if there’s a decent middle generation to go ahead and again prove that blood =/= evil, and still end up subordinating her to Kylo’s story.

    The big, annoying issue here is that there actually wasn’t anything in TFA or TLJ foreshadowing a redemption quest that Rey could believably pull off on Kylo - outside of valuing his parentage over her characterization. That’s exactly what TLJ was trying to do, and what TROS tried to sidestep by using Leia instead... though that just opened up another problem arising from how if Han couldn’t save Kylo, then Leia really shouldn’t be able to either.

    To me, the only way Rey can stand as tall as Luke and Anakin without being their blood descendent, and that Finn can stay male lead, is if Kylo is basically made abhorrent to everyone as he checks out. Otherwise, there’s just always a straight line I see devaluing Rey as the main character and demoting Finn from the male lead for Kylo.

    I wish that weren’t so. But too many creators I otherwise trust to have solid opinion in LFL (Johnson, Hidalgo, Kennedy, Soule) clearly can’t counteract their bias towards Kylo because of who his parents are.
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  3. #33
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    I agree it's an uphill battle for Rey nobody. IMO if tLJ showed more of her inner personality than Kylo's, and tried less to redeem him after he killed Han, then it would've worked out better

  4. #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by BeastieRunner View Post
    I think I'm one of the few the enjoyed the Rey Palpatine twist.

    It inverts the Skywalker saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine to a Palpatine saving a Skywalker from a Palpatine, which was a nice bit of themetic nuance for me. Granted, I wish they set it up & executed it better but I digress ... It was a good idea.

    Rey Nobody I think would've worked had they continued down the path of rejecting what came before you. If Kylo is revealed to be the one that killed her parents at Luke's temple and drops her off because he feels guilty murdering a child because he doesn't want to be a full-on Vader (and blocks her memory), I think Rey Nobody works. And he would still need to turn to the light to bring back Rey from death IMHO for that arc to work as she dies trying to stop the big bad.
    I mean, I'm sure I would have enjoyed it, if it had been set up at all in the previous movies, which would have made better execution of the twist possible, in the last movie. You're right, it's not a bad idea -- it just clearly was not something they'd planned from the start.

    Though, redeemable Kylo still wouldn't be my preferred choice, for Rey having no biological connection to any established characters. I'd still prefer just let him be completely evil, and defeating him just being the closing chapter of the whole original saga, while also opening up the franchise to doing something completely new with your new characters. With him dead and just the first Big Bad they defeated, you have carte blanche for how you want to flesh out the stories of Rey, Finn, and Poe, after that. It's still the same universe, so not like you can't have an echo of the old stuff here and there as you want, but the aim really should be to try to do something new, rather than continue endlessly looking back to how cool the stuff created 40 years ago was.
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  5. #35
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    Quote Originally Posted by Adam Allen View Post
    I mean, I'm sure I would have enjoyed it, if it had been set up at all in the previous movies, which would have made better execution of the twist possible, in the last movie. You're right, it's not a bad idea -- it just clearly was not something they'd planned from the start.

    Though, redeemable Kylo still wouldn't be my preferred choice, for Rey having no biological connection to any established characters. I'd still prefer just let him be completely evil, and defeating him just being the closing chapter of the whole original saga, while also opening up the franchise to doing something completely new with your new characters. With him dead and just the first Big Bad they defeated, you have carte blanche for how you want to flesh out the stories of Rey, Finn, and Poe, after that. It's still the same universe, so not like you can't have an echo of the old stuff here and there as you want, but the aim really should be to try to do something new, rather than continue endlessly looking back to how cool the stuff created 40 years ago was.
    I feel a good approach is like comic books - if you want to call back to old stuff, then do so with skill and scale, not cynical meta-commentary, and if you want to do something fresh, do something fresh.

    Itks part of the reason I feel that after TFA (and given Disney/LFL’s desire for a guaranteed hit by playing it safe), and how TFA set-up a call back to the old stuff... you have to make sure that Rey is front and center of the answer you have to the most important part of the older films - the family.

    You can’t have Kylo be the centerpiece of the one element of the OT that made it rise from “pulpy throwback” to space opera.

    So either embrace making Rey a statement breaking away from the blood element of the family story and kill Kylo as an evil dude, or embrace the fact you want an OT retread and make Rey a Skywalker.

    Don’t half-ass it. LFL had discussion about the idea of making Rey “The Skywalker” in a metaphorical sense right before hiring Johnson... then showed they weren’t that serious about it by approving a script that immediately started treating Kylo as “The Skywalker” in a real sense, and Pablo Hidalgo even bluntly stated that after TLJ came out to fans who found that unacceptable.
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  6. #36
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    Rey Doe wouldn't have spawned the ocean of memes that stupid ass Rey Skywalker scene did though and really, the memes and jokes are pretty much the best thing about the sequels.

    The one ending i could have liked would have been if for our lord and savior Reysus Christ to acknowledge the sacrifice of her brave parents and claimed back the Palpatine name to make it something worth of trust and respect.

    But noooo, let's just have her claim the name of two people she barely knew, cause it rimes i guess.

    -Rey who?

    -Rey Palpatine...that's right, run you hag!!

  7. #37
    Amazing Member Adam Allen's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by godisawesome View Post
    I feel a good approach is like comic books - if you want to call back to old stuff, then do so with skill and scale, not cynical meta-commentary, and if you want to do something fresh, do something fresh.

    Itks part of the reason I feel that after TFA (and given Disney/LFL’s desire for a guaranteed hit by playing it safe), and how TFA set-up a call back to the old stuff... you have to make sure that Rey is front and center of the answer you have to the most important part of the older films - the family.

    You can’t have Kylo be the centerpiece of the one element of the OT that made it rise from “pulpy throwback” to space opera.

    So either embrace making Rey a statement breaking away from the blood element of the family story and kill Kylo as an evil dude, or embrace the fact you want an OT retread and make Rey a Skywalker.

    Don’t half-ass it. LFL had discussion about the idea of making Rey “The Skywalker” in a metaphorical sense right before hiring Johnson... then showed they weren’t that serious about it by approving a script that immediately started treating Kylo as “The Skywalker” in a real sense, and Pablo Hidalgo even bluntly stated that after TLJ came out to fans who found that unacceptable.
    Yeah, like I've said, having the story fully embrace the idea that family is not just a matter of blood would really have been the direction I would have appreciated most. Because, for one, I really feel like it's true to life -- while sure, we can and often do have close bonds with blood relatives, it's also true that lots of people find greater (spiritual) kinship with people they are not genetically connected to, than with their blood relatives. And I think it's misguided, the general societal suggestion that you need to embrace blood family, regardless of how toxic or abusive they might be ... then, to consider chosen family as somehow less-than, even if those connections might have literally saved your life.

    Really, the more I think on it, the more I like it. In the original trilogy, you have Luke almost die because he still believes in his birth father -- despite not having ever known him and despite Vader having been an evil murderous bastard for decades -- and somehow, love for the son he never knew cuts through all the evil and dark side of the force stuff, and Vader becomes Anakin again for his last moments, saving his son and killing the Emperor. It's a very cool cinematic moment, obviously ... but you know, how true to life is it? I think that Han trying to reach out to his evil son once again, and being senselessly slaughtered for it -- that's kind of more true to what it's like to have abusive family. And I think, you could still have finished out Kylo's story with Luke and Leia never completely giving up hope for him, with them having tried to leave some space in their hearts for him to somehow be redeemed, to the bitter end -- just have him fail them, and have his being loved from day one not being enough to automatically make him a great person. While you could simultaneously have Rey as this stranger whose formative years and lack of a biological family could have made her this bitter and cynical person who only looks out for herself, but who instead fulfills the hopes the Skywalkers had for their failed blood relative; who is as brave and loving and heroic as he should have been ... thus, making her worthy of the name.

    And I mean, I was fine with how much TFA echoed A New Hope, because again, I thought the prequel trilogy kind of sucked, and kind of updating and reimagining the first movie in the saga felt like getting things back on track. I would not have advocated just full-on doing a retread of the first trilogy, though. Instead, like I've said -- just use the bookend of this last trilogy to be a jumping-off point for new stories and characters, making it clear that movies going forward are going to be their own thing, and not just endlessly reliving the nostalgia for the older stuff. Saying this without disrespect for the old stuff -- just that, it's a good thing to eventually try something new!

    One last thing tho -- you originally have Obi Wan describing the Force to Luke as this kind of mystical energy thing that permeates the universe, versus the thing where it's later explained as midichlorians, I guess to try and make it more scientific. Well, this is a universe with magical space wizards. The Force isn't science, and I think trying to explain it with science was just dumb. So, not saying we'd have to straight say the prequel trilogy is not canon, but letting Kylo just be an irretrievably evil guy and Rey become the spiritual successor of the heroes is an opportunity to go back to emphasizing the more spiritual/mystical side of things. I liked that version better anyways, and ... you know, while science is definitely what we want things based on (in the real world) in general, I think the world needs to have space for spiritual stuff, as well.

    So yah, too late for it now, but Rey the adopted Skywalker and her scrappy friends ... I would totally have been down for the sequel trilogy ending up with that. But, what are you gonna do, I suppose...
    Last edited by Adam Allen; 05-20-2021 at 08:57 AM.
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  8. #38
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    I thought the Midichlorians only indicated Force sensitivity levels

  9. #39
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mik View Post
    I thought the Midichlorians only indicated Force sensitivity levels
    It’s a bit ambiguous, because Lucas never got a full chance to explain what he saw in them. They could either be the organelles that create the connection people have to the Force, or merely markers indicating they can.

    I keep kind of hoping we find out that all the science projects trying to replicate Force sensitivity have failed, and only “succeeeded” do to random chance - like if Palpatine went through a few dozen attempts to clone himself a body before one had the Force sensitivity he needed and he just can’t count on finding another one, or if Omega turns out to have the Force, but the Kaminoans don’t know why.
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  10. #40
    Amazing Member Adam Allen's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mik View Post
    I thought the Midichlorians only indicated Force sensitivity levels
    I don't know, just saying that for me, it felt about as needed as trying to bring some kind of scientific explanation for how the One Ring works or why some people can resist its influence better than others. (I mean, iirc they did have it that different races had differing base levels of resistance but ... that's less a made-up science thing, and more reflecting the inherent bias of racism influencing fantasy as a genre. But, I digress...)

    I just think it was enough to say there is this energy throughout everything, and some people have the ability to interact with it to do cool things. You know, to make a comics comparison, as I guess is appropriate to the forum -- it's like trying to use science to explain Superman's abilities, or the Hulk's -- or any superhero really, because the point is, you really can't. They basically have magic abilities that completely defy science, so trying to come up with ways to explain exactly how Clark can fly or where all the extra mass comes from when Bruce transforms ... I mean, have fun with it I guess, it can be a fun thought experiment, but I think trying to make it (the sciency explanation) a key component to the characters is a bad idea. You just accept they can do this stuff as part of the buy-in for the story, then we go from there. The Force should be the same. It doesn't need made-up science trying to make it seem less like magic. It is basically space magic. And that's okay.
    Last edited by Adam Allen; 05-20-2021 at 08:16 AM.
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  11. #41
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    Quote Originally Posted by godisawesome View Post
    That’s what the “ideal” Rey a random scenario is - focus on her, use him to show why his family shouldn’t be the center of the story/why his blood doesn’t matter.

    It’s just a reaction that a lot of people don't have and have to be almost brutally shut down from reversing, repeatedly. Abrams had Kylo killing Han for the sake of being more evil... and Rian Johnson’s starting point was still “Rey should want to save his soul and kiss him!” That’s how strong of an impulse to ignore that is.

    Though I would say that Rian Johnson and other Kylo Ren fans would argue it’s not “elitism” on their part, but a belief that they’re in a “family story,” so they should focus on that “family.” And to some extent? They’d be right - everyone knows a Star Wars story can exist without the Skywalkers (Rogue One, KOTOR, etc.), but they’d argue that *if* the family still has a prominent member in the leads for the story, than it’s a Skywalker Saga tale as much as a Star Wars tale, and refocus on the family.

    It's why I ultimately think Rey Random, even at its best, is fighting an immense up-hill battle for a mostly redundant purpose - people know the franchise is larger than the Skywalkers... but people also want to see the Skywalker sub-story and treat it differently.


    To me, as long as Kylo/Ben is getting treated as Rey’s co-protagonist and Finn is getting screwed out of that job, it’s just further evidence that the idea, whether Rey Random or Rey Palpatine, is still going to collapse under the desire to focus on the Skywalker. The only thing he can really do to help a Rey who’s not a Skywalker stay in center stage and *not* take Finn’s spot is grow more evil and die. That’s it. Rey can’t be a “transitional protagonist” to slowly pull us away from the Skywalkers by ceding her own focus and that of Finn to a deplorable Skywalker family member - she's too under-equipped to stand toe-to-toe with the family story then. She either should be a stronger part of the family story than Kylo (whether as a blood member or as an adoptee with him basically being totally disinherited and cast out of the family), or she shouldn’t be competing with the family story (so Kylo shouldn’t be Ben Solo, and the character should have to seem redeemable for something other than his family ties.)

    Rey Palpatine’s ultimately just a weaker version of Rey Skywalker, conceptually, especially if there’s a decent middle generation to go ahead and again prove that blood =/= evil, and still end up subordinating her to Kylo’s story.

    The big, annoying issue here is that there actually wasn’t anything in TFA or TLJ foreshadowing a redemption quest that Rey could believably pull off on Kylo - outside of valuing his parentage over her characterization. That’s exactly what TLJ was trying to do, and what TROS tried to sidestep by using Leia instead... though that just opened up another problem arising from how if Han couldn’t save Kylo, then Leia really shouldn’t be able to either.

    To me, the only way Rey can stand as tall as Luke and Anakin without being their blood descendent, and that Finn can stay male lead, is if Kylo is basically made abhorrent to everyone as he checks out. Otherwise, there’s just always a straight line I see devaluing Rey as the main character and demoting Finn from the male lead for Kylo.

    I wish that weren’t so. But too many creators I otherwise trust to have solid opinion in LFL (Johnson, Hidalgo, Kennedy, Soule) clearly can’t counteract their bias towards Kylo because of who his parents are.
    Quote Originally Posted by Adam Allen View Post
    I mean, I'm sure I would have enjoyed it, if it had been set up at all in the previous movies, which would have made better execution of the twist possible, in the last movie. You're right, it's not a bad idea -- it just clearly was not something they'd planned from the start.

    Though, redeemable Kylo still wouldn't be my preferred choice, for Rey having no biological connection to any established characters. I'd still prefer just let him be completely evil, and defeating him just being the closing chapter of the whole original saga, while also opening up the franchise to doing something completely new with your new characters. With him dead and just the first Big Bad they defeated, you have carte blanche for how you want to flesh out the stories of Rey, Finn, and Poe, after that. It's still the same universe, so not like you can't have an echo of the old stuff here and there as you want, but the aim really should be to try to do something new, rather than continue endlessly looking back to how cool the stuff created 40 years ago was.
    Well the thread is about addressing Rey Nobody, not Finn's role.

    I don't see how this would impact Finn? You could easily change his story, too.

    Addressing one hypothetical doesn't mean you can't address another.

    An easy fix for Finn, even in the realm of the existing movie, would be to let him convert and recruit a bunch of Stormtroopers in that final battle. It is a bit cheesey and deus ex machina but I think it would give him a nice moment.

    On Kylo, if you want him nonredeemable then you need to see him go full Paul Muab'Dib & Leto II from Dune and grow so big while trying spread a religious fanaticism that even he can't control it. IMHO having Hux around as a foil is stupid and Supreme Commander Kylo needs to be that ... supreme. That was one of my biggest problems with the DotF script. Hux shouldn't be the lead in any sense of the word and definitely shouldn't have been given an honorable death.
    Last edited by BeastieRunner; 05-20-2021 at 09:52 AM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by godisawesome View Post
    It’s a bit ambiguous, because Lucas never got a full chance to explain what he saw in them. They could either be the organelles that create the connection people have to the Force, or merely markers indicating they can.

    I keep kind of hoping we find out that all the science projects trying to replicate Force sensitivity have failed, and only “succeeeded” do to random chance - like if Palpatine went through a few dozen attempts to clone himself a body before one had the Force sensitivity he needed and he just can’t count on finding another one, or if Omega turns out to have the Force, but the Kaminoans don’t know why.
    I heard they were influenced in design by mitochondria, although I could be wrong. I think Moff Gideon was doing a similar project, but we have yet to see what that results in

    Quote Originally Posted by Adam Allen View Post
    I don't know, just saying that for me, it felt about as needed as trying to bring some kind of scientific explanation for how the One Ring works or why some people can resist its influence better than others. (I mean, iirc they did have it that different races had differing base levels of resistance but ... that's less a made-up science thing, and more reflecting the inherent bias of racism influencing fantasy as a genre. But, I digress...)

    I just think it was enough to say there is this energy throughout everything, and some people have the ability to interact with it to do cool things. You know, to make a comics comparison, as I guess is appropriate to the forum -- it's like trying to use science to explain Superman's abilities, or the Hulk's -- or any superhero really, because the point is, you really can't. They basically have magic abilities that completely defy science, so trying to come up with ways to explain exactly how Clark can fly or where all the extra mass comes from when Bruce transforms ... I mean, have fun with it I guess, it can be a fun thought experiment, but I think trying to make it (the sciency explanation) a key component to the characters is a bad idea. You just accept they can do this stuff as part of the buy-in for the story, then we go from there. The Force should be the same. It doesn't need made-up science trying to make it seem less like magic. It is basically space magic. And that's okay.
    I don't think any explanation is necessary either, as long as the powers follow internal logic. The Force always seemed to be influenced by magic or spiritualism, so I didn't really see the point of making them be caused by midichlorians. But if midichlorians aren't necessarily the cause, I don't think it's as much of a problem

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    Quote Originally Posted by BeastieRunner View Post
    Well the thread is about addressing Rey Nobody, not Finn's role.

    I don't see how this would impact Finn? You could easily change his story, too.

    Addressing one hypothetical doesn't mean you can't address another.

    An easy fix for Finn, even in the realm of the existing movie, would be to let him convert and recruit a bunch of Stormtroopers in that final battle. It is a bit cheesey and deus ex machina but I think it would give him a nice moment.

    On Kylo, if you want him nonredeemable then you need to see him go full Paul Muab'Dib & Leto II from Dune and grow so big while trying spread a religious fanaticism that even he can't control it. IMHO having Hux around as a foil is stupid and Supreme Commander Kylo needs to be that ... supreme. That was one of my biggest problems with the DotF script. Hux shouldn't be the lead in any sense of the word and definitely shouldn't have been given an honorable death.
    The reason I see Finn as impacted by this is because, to my POV, there’s a direct line in LFL’s subconscious between “Rey is a nobody” to both “Well, then we need to focus on Kylo, because he’s a Skywalker” and thus “...Finn needs to set aside, because we can’t have the family story be third in ranking, and Rey needs to focus on the family story.”

    Yes, I think it’s stupid, too... but you’re also talking to someone who thinks that anytime an LFL member tried to argue that Rey could be the main character and not be a Skywalker, they were lying to us or themselves, because they weren’t fighting their bias towards Kylo that was screwing over Rey and Finn.

    You are right they *shouldn’t* impact each other. But what I’m saying is that they do anyway. Y’know how sometimes a creator or executive for a production company will insist on sabotaging a character because they’re afraid they’ll steal attention from others? That’s usually horse-****... but not always, and a guy like Rian Johnson feeling a compulsion to waste Finn and pimp out Rey to Kylo is a perfect example of that.

    The thing for me about trying to make Kylo iredeemable is that having him kill Han really should have been sufficient to fuel any desire to portray him as irredeemable going forward: you’ve inverted Vader’s redemption on a character you’ve already made a mass murderer, had violate the main heroine, and follow it up by projecting his own failing on an escaped slave soldier so he can sadistically toy with him in their fight.

    Fundamentally, if you still think he’s still redeemable *at that point*... then I don’t think you’re ever going to really believe he’s irredeemable, likely because you’re still thinking of who his parents are. And really, if he’s just to be evil, than it’s best to just lean into him being a pathetic person outside of his destructive and evil capabilities. He can’t really work as a POV character - he’s a Palpatine equivalent, not a Paul Muab’dib or Leto II, who are POV character and protagonists.

    To be blunt... he can’t even really be a protagonist, because again, people feel the need to elevate him above the other characters because of his connections.

    My problem with the DOTF script was that it was clear its Rey Random was still largely floating around in someone else’s story, because how does Kylo get defeated?... Leia calls him, and he stops winning the fight so he can die redeemed instead. If you did that, than Rey would basically have had a storyline that went: “She accepts the Force in TFA, isn’t in the climax of TLJ at all, and doesn’t decide the climax of the entire story.” Seriously. That’s not going to match up to Luke or Anakin, partially because neither has the shot show of TLJ denigrating and neutering their character arcs mid-story, but also because, yes, the family story elevates their personal arcs and Kylo is getting that in the ST.

    To me, there can’t be any mercy or real ambition with Kylo in the ST of someone’s serious about Rey Random/Palpatine/Not-A-Skywalker... because that mercy and ambition always ends up feeding back into the family story that people want more.
    Like action, adventure, rogues, and outlaws? Like anti-heroes, femme fatales, mysteries and thrillers?

    I wrote a book with them. Outlaw’s Shadow: A Sherwood Noir. Robin Hood’s evil counterpart, Guy of Gisbourne, is the main character. Feel free to give it a look: https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asi...E2PKBNJFH76GQP

  14. #44
    Silver Sentinel BeastieRunner's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by godisawesome View Post

    The thing for me about trying to make Kylo iredeemable is that having him kill Han really should have been sufficient to fuel any desire to portray him as irredeemable going forward: you’ve inverted Vader’s redemption on a character you’ve already made a mass murderer, had violate the main heroine, and follow it up by projecting his own failing on an escaped slave soldier so he can sadistically toy with him in their fight.
    In order for Ray Nobody to work, you would need to throw out the last quarter of TFA as well as all of TLJ and RoS. Same goes for Kylo. Let Starkiller Base survive but be broken to mirror Kylo surviving but being broken. Then you can easily slam the theme of brokenness as why he can never be redeemed and he's hellbent on restoring Starkiller Base, which in the end, costs him his life. He doesn't even have to lose the base in the third movie, it could be the second and the third is all about him trying to become all-powerful which leads to Rey balancing the Force finally.

    There were TONS of people that thought Rey was Luke's, Han's/Leia's, Obi-Wan's or Palpatine's kid as early as TFA and even after TLJ, so I don't think you need to change much narrative structure till RoS for those to work.

    Fundamentally, if you still think he’s still redeemable *at that point*... then I don’t think you’re ever going to really believe he’s irredeemable, likely because you’re still thinking of who his parents are. And really, if he’s just to be evil, than it’s best to just lean into him being a pathetic person outside of his destructive and evil capabilities. He can’t really work as a POV character - he’s a Palpatine equivalent, not a Paul Muab’dib or Leto II, who are POV character and protagonists.

    To be blunt... he can’t even really be a protagonist, because again, people feel the need to elevate him above the other characters because of his connections.
    I think you misunderstand my Dune reference. While protagonists, especially with modern eyes, Leto II and Paul where not heroes like we see in Star Wars. They might have been heroes of thier story, but were not heroic. One lead a jihad to purge the galaxy and both ruled with iron fists and killed their detractors. I think Kylo would be serve the most benefit from that singular MO. Let him and the Knights of Ren be religious zealots.

    Star Wars always spins the story around 3 main leads, so making Kylo the natural foil makes sense here.

    Again, Finn could fill his own thread for story changes but I still don't think it affects the nuts and bolts of Rey or Kylo.
    My problem with the DOTF script was that it was clear its Rey Random was still largely floating around in someone else’s story, because how does Kylo get defeated?... Leia calls him, and he stops winning the fight so he can die redeemed instead. If you did that, than Rey would basically have had a storyline that went: “She accepts the Force in TFA, isn’t in the climax of TLJ at all, and doesn’t decide the climax of the entire story.” Seriously. That’s not going to match up to Luke or Anakin, partially because neither has the shot show of TLJ denigrating and neutering their character arcs mid-story, but also because, yes, the family story elevates their personal arcs and Kylo is getting that in the ST.

    To me, there can’t be any mercy or real ambition with Kylo in the ST of someone’s serious about Rey Random/Palpatine/Not-A-Skywalker... because that mercy and ambition always ends up feeding back into the family story that people want more.
    We also have to factor in that you can't use Leia in the way they did because none of that dialog existed, so that is a major factor in delivery of the proposed arc that seems to have been the plan since TFA (Ben redeemed). RoS would have been WAAAY different had Carrie still been alive. I think that is the #1 reason why the story didn't work well for most people. She was gone and there was no way to fix the story in time. I think her real life death affected the overall arc WAY more than they let on.

    I can totally get on the Kylo should never have been redeemed wagon. Which, IMHO, works perfectly with a Ray Nobody story and even better with a Rey Palpatine story.

    I still think that in RoS, when Rey says "Rey Skywalker" it is a title, not a name, as in Skywalker is going to be the new Force users she trains.

    I will most likely be wrong.
    Last edited by BeastieRunner; 05-20-2021 at 02:52 PM.
    "Always listen to the crazy scientist with a weird van or armful of blueprints and diagrams." -- Vibranium

  15. #45
    Ultimate Member Tendrin's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BeastieRunner View Post

    I will most likely be wrong.
    Honestly, that was what I assumed was going to happen as soon as I heard the title of the third movie and I rolled my eyes so god damn hard.

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