The Last Jedi and the Shakespeare Novelizations

Forgive me if this has been brought up before (I’m a slow reader and have just made it through chapter 1!) but I felt like this Leia quote could apply to Ben as well as Han:

“I once told Han that it was tiresome watching him do the right thing only after he’d exhausted every alternative. But sooner or later, he’d get there.”

@Cowgirlsamurai You are so right.
And this movie and novel made a huge deal about Ben being like his father. Wasn’t there a bit about the dice and Ben holding them?
My heart hurts.

Calling those with the junior novel, any chance of sharing a couple of scenes please. I'd like to see how they compare with Jason Fry's novel.

The first scene is when Rey is in the cave looking at the mirrored wall.

The second is when they are fighting for control of the Lightsaber, I'm interested to see if the junior describes what happened to the kyber crystal.

Maybe I'm slow- but does he means Kylo knows Leia is alive by the end of TLJ or that he doesn't know after the bridge strike???

P.S: I laughed out loud because about the name reference from Jason

He suspects she's alive (not sure why he would though) but can't sense where she is anymore I guess?

I can't decide if this is a plot hole, or one of those things that will be (somewhat) answered in IX.

@Night Huntress
@nickandnora
Interesting - after the film I couldn’t decide if Kylo knew, the scene made sense either way - he could think Leia’s dead and emotionally he still wasn’t at his best, but at the same time Kylo was still shocked, angry and humiliated after Rey’s refusal and this bitterness could lead to him just give up everything. I think more people thought he didn’t know? Kylo in the movie looked shocked and broken the moment Leia’s ship blew up, and the novel confirmed it with a very detailed chapter. And now Jason Fry says he thinks Kylo knows? The way he answered, though, suggests it’s his interpretation, maybe there wasn’t anything in the script (apparently the part on Crait isn’t written from Kylo’s point of view?) and he hasnt discussed this issue with Rian Johnson either? I think he accidentally created a small plot hole .

on Crait leia was fine, so it seems to me impossible that Kylo had not perceived it.
It's impossible to say that Kylo was focused first on Luke and then it's all about Rey forgetting about his mother. this is very romantic but at least let us understand that he knows that Leia is not dead ....
in fact, the Leia / Kylo part did not like it in this film, they let it go...

nana7marie wrote:@Night Huntress
@nickandnora
Interesting - after the film I couldn’t decide if Kylo knew, the scene made sense either way - he could think Leia’s dead and emotionally he still wasn’t at his best, but at the same time Kylo was still shocked, angry and humiliated after Rey’s refusal and this bitterness could lead to him just give up everything. I think more people thought he didn’t know? Kylo in the movie looked shocked and broken the moment Leia’s ship blew up, and the novel confirmed it with a very detailed chapter. And now Jason Fry says he thinks Kylo knows? The way he answered, though, suggests it’s his interpretation, maybe there wasn’t anything in the script (apparently the part on Crait isn’t written from Kylo’s point of view?) and he hasnt discussed this issue with Rian Johnson either? I think he accidentally created a small plot hole .

@nana7marie

Yeah, I don't think that he thinks Leia is alive at all. He looked pretty upset after the bridge *and* even the book says he couldn't sense Leia after the bridge explosion. He also never mentions her again. Further, Leia has given up on him. That could mean that she's blocked him, and as such, he can't feel her. Finally, if he was so upset about her dying that he would have frozen the torpedo when he was in a super aggressive state, why would he be so lacsidisacle about letting the transports blow up? He was letting the transports go *before* the break-up with Rey, so his frame of mind was decent for him. IOW, if he is open to love with Rey at that moment, he is not going to want his mother blown to smithereens when he was so upset about her "dying" before. Openness to love with Rey would mean he would be more open to love from his mother. Also, he gets no moment of relief anywhere in the movie that his mother is alive, nor does he get any twinge of shock on Crait that she is there. They would waiting for the big "Leia lives" reveal in Episode IX.

SoloSideCousin wrote:
Yeah, I don't think that he thinks Leia is alive at all. He looked pretty upset after the bridge *and* even the book says he couldn't sense Leia after the bridge explosion. He also never mentions her again. Further, Leia has given up on him. That could mean that she's blocked him, and as such, he can't feel her. Finally, if he was so upset about her dying that he would have frozen the torpedo when he was in a super aggressive state, why would he be so lacsidisacle about letting the transports blow up? He was letting the transports go *before* the break-up with Rey, so his frame of mind was decent for him. IOW, if he is open to love with Rey at that moment, he is not going to want his mother blown to smithereens when he was so upset about her "dying" before. Openness to love with Rey would mean he would be more open to love from his mother. Also, he gets no moment of relief anywhere in the movie that his mother is alive, nor does he get any twinge of shock on Crait that she is there. They would waiting for the big "Leia lives" reveal in Episode IX.

@SoloSideCousin

Yes, I agree- I think the revelation that his mother is indeed alive would've been a big turning point for him in IX...maybe they'll change it now into him feeling her death instead?

Teo oswald wrote:on Crait leia was fine, so it seems to me impossible that Kylo had not perceived it.
It's impossible to say that Kylo was focused first on Luke and then it's all about Rey forgetting about his mother. this is very romantic but at least let us understand that he knows that Leia is not dead ....
in fact, the Leia / Kylo part did not like it in this film, they let it go...

@Teo oswald

I think Jason hasn't had any "directions from above" on this score and just kinda responded given that his name was being chanted endlessly lol.

I agree with you re Kylo and Leia sort of ignored (save the bridge scene) in VIII. I think they were waiting for IX to do that.

I would think that him honestly thinking she was dead would warrant a much, much bigger reaction than what we got in the movie. This is why I lean more toward him knowing she lived. After all of his trauma over Han dying, would he really be so nonchalant over Leia's death and not have it affect him later in the movie? I get that one was by his hand and the other wasn't his shot, but still. If he thought she was gone, that would be an unforgivable glossing over of his feelings toward his mother.

yeah, we are concerned about whether he knew his mother was alive the moment when he ordered the guns on Crait, whereas the whole point of that entire act/scene was that he was too far gone to care about anything. Same with the "blow that piece of junk..." and "I'll destroy her and you and all of it". His pain was driving the bus.

Dar-ren19 wrote:yeah, we are concerned about whether he knew his mother was alive the moment when he ordered the guns on Crait, whereas the whole point of that entire act/scene was that he was too far gone to care about anything. Same with the "blow that piece of junk..." and "I'll destroy her and you and all of it". His pain was driving the bus.

@Dar-ren19

Yep. We don't know if he'd have been able to go through with anything were he to have come face to face with Rey or Leia. I'm guessing the answer is a solid no (and we sort of got proof of that with his pouty face at Rey through their bond). He was just in burn it all tantrum mode. With the Falcon, I don't think he was even thinking about Rey being in there. It was probably the fact that it was a reminder of his father that made him rage out at it without thinking of anything else. Basically, I find this scenario more understandable than Kylo being relatively "eh" when he thinks his mother just died to the point of not even bringing her up at all or grieving.

Many months ago, a few of us (I remember discussing it with @snufkin, specifically), speculated that Snoke might have been pulling a long con with the Skywalker family, with manipulating the events around Ben, etc.

According to the novelization, if this wasn't Fry's headcanon, there's some evidence for this theory:





There was also that cryptic tweet from Pablo way, way back in the early post-TFA days, where he'd said that rebuilding the Jedi wasn't Luke's plan but someone else's plan for him. Now, that could still have been Yoda, I guess, but I don't think we can rule out it being Snoke, either.

@ISeeAnIsland



It was Kasdan's Writers Guide of America podcast with John August in 2016 when he mentioned how Kathleen Turner's femme fatale in Body Heat, had already plotted everything out and identified William Hurt's character as the patsy. She already had a plan in place and had planned her approach and having him take the fall before he was even aware of her existence.

And he doesn’t know it, but someone has spotted him as a talent that will be usable. So he thinks he’s meeting a woman, but she’s actually pre-scoped him. And she knows that these very things that are his weaknesses and his greatest desires can be put to her use. And we don’t find out that she know all about it before for quite a while in the story.

Wasn't there some Twitter comment about how restoring the Jedi Order wasn't really Luke's original idea?

snufkin wrote:@ISeeAnIsland



It was Kasdan's Writers Guide of America podcast with John August in 2016 when he mentioned how Kathleen Turner's femme fatale in Body Heat, had already plotted everything out and identified William Hurt's character as the patsy. She already had a plan in place and had planned her approach and having him take the fall before he was even aware of her existence.

And he doesn’t know it, but someone has spotted him as a talent that will be usable. So he thinks he’s meeting a woman, but she’s actually pre-scoped him. And she knows that these very things that are his weaknesses and his greatest desires can be put to her use. And we don’t find out that she know all about it before for quite a while in the story.

Wasn't there some Twitter comment about how restoring the Jedi Order wasn't really Luke's original idea?

@snufkin

Yes, Pablo tweeted way back when that restoring the Jedi Order was someone else's plan for Luke--not Luke's own plan.

@ISeeAnIsland And here we were joking about his new Jedi Order being a sketchy charter school and it totally was. Leia probably loaned him money to start one up as a way of 'getting a handle' on Ben's darkness. God, no wonder Han was low-key unhappy about the whole thing, handing over his kid to his weird hippie brother-in-law and money he'd never get back.

snufkin wrote:@ISeeAnIsland And here we were joking about his new Jedi Order being a sketchy charter school and it totally was. Leia probably loaned him money to start one up as a way of 'getting a handle' on Ben's darkness. God, no wonder Han was low-key unhappy about the whole thing, handing over his kid to his weird hippie brother-in-law and money he'd never get back.

@snufkin

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it comes out that Snoke invested money in Luke's school at this point.

It also aligns with my pet theory about some of Luke's students being plants from Snoke (the ones with KoR ties).

@ISeeAnIsland OMG. I think you're right. And Kylo probably trusts them implicitly - all the better to have them betray him. Can I use this? I have to use this for my fic...Please let me use this....

PalmettoBlue wrote:@ISeeAnIsland OMG. I think you're right. And Kylo probably trusts them implicitly - all the better to have them betray him. Can I use this? I have to use this for my fic...Please let me use this....

@PalmettoBlue

Go ahead and use it!

@PalmettoBlue

please! And let me read it!

ISeeAnIsland wrote:

snufkin wrote:@ISeeAnIsland And here we were joking about his new Jedi Order being a sketchy charter school and it totally was. Leia probably loaned him money to start one up as a way of 'getting a handle' on Ben's darkness. God, no wonder Han was low-key unhappy about the whole thing, handing over his kid to his weird hippie brother-in-law and money he'd never get back.

@snufkin

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it comes out that Snoke invested money in Luke's school at this point.

It also aligns with my pet theory about some of Luke's students being plants from Snoke (the ones with KoR ties).

@ISeeAnIsland

I seriously hope your pet theory comes true, because that would effectively hammer in just how much Snoke influenced Ben and the entire Skywalker family.

rawpowah wrote:

ISeeAnIsland wrote:

snufkin wrote:@ISeeAnIsland And here we were joking about his new Jedi Order being a sketchy charter school and it totally was. Leia probably loaned him money to start one up as a way of 'getting a handle' on Ben's darkness. God, no wonder Han was low-key unhappy about the whole thing, handing over his kid to his weird hippie brother-in-law and money he'd never get back.

@snufkin

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it comes out that Snoke invested money in Luke's school at this point.

It also aligns with my pet theory about some of Luke's students being plants from Snoke (the ones with KoR ties).

@ISeeAnIsland

I seriously hope your pet theory comes true, because that would effectively hammer in just how much Snoke influenced Ben and the entire Skywalker family.

@rawpowah

I see him as a tycoon

Okay so I just finished the audiobook novelization which was AMAZING and there were two parts of the book that really stood out to me towards the end. The scene that I am sure was cut from the movie where Rey is standing over an unconscious Kylo after the saber breaks and the ship is shredded from that Holdo Action.... and at the very end where she very clearly severs the tie with Kylo. The force bond... whatever.

So in the first scene where Rey has a little self-reflection after leaving the Supremecy and leaving Kylo on the ship.

"Rey had learned that the Force was not her instrument - that, in fact, it was the other way around. Just as Kylo was its instrument, despite his determination to bend it to his will. He would learn that one day, she sensed - the Force wasn't finished with him. ANd that meant that Kylo's life was not hers to take, whatever future she thought she saw ahead of him. Rey would wait, however difficult that would be to do as the First Order warship descended on Crait. She would wait, and the future would unfold as the Force willed."

So here it seems she's reached a higher level of understanding about the force, that she no longer needs to rely on the connection with Kylo to understand or use the force. She is now... one with the force. Something that seemed to happen during the throne room battle. She also seems to have a decent idea of it's future plans for Kylo and has resigned herself to be patient and wait.

This passage gave me the impression that she will wait for him to be ready to accept his role. Right now he's not ready but he will be at some point and she will be waiting for him. This also gave me the impression that waiting for him would be difficult for her... is that because of her feelings for him... or will it just be hard due to the fact that during that waiting period things might get worse before they get better...

In conjunction with that, we have that last scene.

"He stared at Rey. She stared back at him, her gaze level and unafraid. There was no hatred in her eyes, as there once had been. But there was no compassion, either. A moment later Rey severed the connection, leaving Kylo alone in the gloom with his father's dice resting in the palm of his upraised hand."

I have to admit that when I read that last part... a part of me screamed NNOOO

but the more I have reflected on it, the more I view Reys action of cutting off the connection with Kylo as a sort of Tough love, punishment, consequences situation rather than she's just done with him. She has already said she will wait and see what happens. I think this is her way of not only staying out of Fates way but also an act of true love. Rather than enabling him, she realizes he needs to have consequences for his really poor choice. He needs to be cut off from everything and everyone. That very symbolic move coupled with the vanishing of his fathers dice in his hands... and we already know that Hux is already planning a mutiny of some sort. Kylo has NO one... He may have all this power now... but he has NO one who really respects him, trust him, understands him... or cares about him... save for Rey who has now cut him off. I Do Beleive this act of tough love will be necessary to spark the change he needs to make.

If Reys vision of the future was right and the force is not done with Kylo... there is still hope for him and I think when he is ready she can reopen the connection, she will be waiting for it.

THOUGHTS????

@Lamiller1390, I have merged the thread you have opened with the TLJ novelization thread, since it belongs in the same topic and to make following the various threads on this forum easier for everyone.