Rey and Kylo Ren observations

@jakkusun Absolutely. Really nice comparison. He couldn't stop Chewie's blast, he couldn't perform freeze on Rey (hence just regular Force push), he couldn't call the saber and finally couldn't even defend himself. His mind was complete mess.

vaderito wrote:@jakkusun Absolutely. Really nice comparison. He couldn't stop Chewie's blast, he couldn't perform freeze on Rey (hence just regular Force push), he couldn't call the saber and finally couldn't even defend himself. His mind was complete mess.

@vaderito

I think he definitely felt the weight of what he had done despite thinking it would free him. He still felt burdened by the little piece of Light left in him and guilt/sadness for killing Han. And then he saw all of what he was trying to suppress clearly in Rey's reaction and the way she looked at him and called him a monster. I think he might have felt if he could just get hold of Vader's saber that might be the missing piece of the puzzle. Then he'd be free. And when the lightsaber went to Rey, he transferred that hope to if he could bring Rey to him, to get her to come to the Dark side that might do it. That would validate his choices/actions.

Kaleyna wrote:

I think he definitely felt the weight of what he had done despite thinking it would free him. He still felt burdened by the little piece of Light left in him and guilt/sadness for killing Han. And then he saw all of what he was trying to suppress clearly in Rey's reaction and the way she looked at him and called him a monster. I think he might have felt if he could just get hold of Vader's saber that might be the missing piece of the puzzle. Then he'd be free. And when the lightsaber went to Rey, he transferred that hope to if he could bring Rey to him, to get her to come to the Dark side that might do it. That would validate his choices/actions.

@Kaleyna

Agree with eevrything except about getting Rey to come to the dark Side. he said "I cna show you the ways of the Force" not "dark Side". That's a significant slip. Compare that to his exchange with LST:

LST:"First order rose from the Dark Side. You did not."

Kylo:"I'll show you the Dark Side"

and than at the end of the movie:

Kylo: "You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force."

it's a subtle change but significant one. Just like how Vader was Force choking officers who failed him at the beginning of ESB but just walked away after Luke slipped through his fingers. Many didn't even catch on that but it's actually important and the beginning of his redemption arc.

Agree with eevrything except about getting Rey to come to the dark Side. he said "I cna show you the ways of the Force" not "dark Side". That's a significant slip. Compare that to his exchange with LST:

LST:"First order rose from the Dark Side. You did not."

Kylo:"I'll show you the Dark Side"

and than at the end of the movie:

Kylo: "You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force."

it's a subtle change but significant one. Just like how Vader was Force choking officers who failed him at the beginning of ESB but just walked away after Luke slipped through his fingers. Many didn't even catch on that but it's actually important and the beginning of his redemption arc.

[/quote]
@vaderito

Have to admit I don't read as much into his saying The Force here because he sort of had to for the scene to work. His saying the Force makes Rey remember Maz's words and that is how she turns the fight around.

Kaleyna wrote:Agree with eevrything except about getting Rey to come to the dark Side. he said "I cna show you the ways of the Force" not "dark Side". That's a significant slip. Compare that to his exchange with LST:

LST:"First order rose from the Dark Side. You did not."

Kylo:"I'll show you the Dark Side"

and than at the end of the movie:

Kylo: "You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force."

it's a subtle change but significant one. Just like how Vader was Force choking officers who failed him at the beginning of ESB but just walked away after Luke slipped through his fingers. Many didn't even catch on that but it's actually important and the beginning of his redemption arc.

[quote="Kaleyna]
@vaderito

Have to admit I don't read as much into his saying The Force here because he sort of had to for the scene to work. His saying the Force makes Rey remember Maz's words and that is how she turns the fight around.

@Kaleyna

I agree he had to work in the word "the Force" in his proposal to make it work because of what you said about the callback to Maz's words. However, if what he wanted was to bring Rey solely to the dark side, it would have made more sense for him to say, "I can show you the ways/power of the dark side of the Force," and it would have demonstrated he wanted to specifically bring her to the dark side. Based on his wording, my impression was that he wanted it bring her to his side, not specifically to the dark side, but I agree his side would probably include the dark side because that's where he's choosing to be now.

my impression was that he wanted it bring her to his side, not specifically to the dark side, but I agree his side would probably include the dark side because that's where he's choosing to be now.[/quote]
@Kessel89

As long as they are firmly by each other's sides by the end I'll be a happy girl.

It seems really obvious to me that they are setting them up to be 'Grey' -both of them have a combination of light/dark elements but it doesn't mean they are 'evil'.Having a temper doesn't mean you're a bad person, just volatile - and in Kylo's case,possibly mentally ill. I wonder if Rey herself will realise that she has accept both sides of her nature and thus find a balance. If she does then maybe she'll help Kylo do the same. And once they do that they will never become truly 'dark'.
The Sith and the Jedi both were extreme views, I think the Grey path is more suitable for people like Kylo and also Rey, because it essentially teaches someone to accept their flaws and rise against them. For all their talk of compassion,I always found the Jedi too judgemental -and the fact that they rejected the Grey proves this.

motherofpearl1 wrote:It seems really obvious to me that they are setting them up to be 'Grey' -both of them have a combination of light/dark elements but it doesn't mean they are 'evil'.Having a temper doesn't mean you're a bad person, just volatile - and in Kylo's case,possibly mentally ill. I wonder if Rey herself will realise that she has accept both sides of her nature and thus find a balance. If she does then maybe she'll help Kylo do the same. And once they do that they will never become truly 'dark'.
The Sith and the Jedi both were extreme views, I think the Grey path is more suitable for people like Kylo and also Rey, because it essentially teaches someone to accept their flaws and rise against them. For all their talk of compassion,I always found the Jedi too judgemental -and the fact that they rejected the Grey proves this.

@motherofpearl1

I think that Grey may be introduced into the canon though that quote from novelization but Pablo is quite skeptical. So I'm thinking that "Grey" Jedi become more like Yin/Yang Jedi. You know they are Grey but nobody calls them that in new canon. Likewise Force Bond. You know it's there but nobody calls it that.

Yes, that's very likely - I am absolutely certain Darth Revan and Bastila Shan were the inspiration for Kylo and Rey,more in appearance than in their story arc -hopefully not the story arc as theirs ended in tragedy.
They seem to be taking small bits, so to speak, from the EU as inspiration without actually adapting the EU as canon, hence a child named Ben and Han and Leia's son turning 'dark'.

motherofpearl1 wrote:Yes, that's very likely - I am absolutely certain Darth Revan and Bastila Shan were the inspiration for Kylo and Rey,more in appearance than in their story arc -hopefully not the story arc as theirs ended in tragedy.
They seem to be taking small bits, so to speak, from the EU as inspiration without actually adapting the EU as canon, hence a child named Ben   and Han and Leia's son turning 'dark'.

@motherofpearl1

I think so too. Too bad that has so many people convinced that Rey and Kylo's story will be literally Jacen and Jaina.

I feel like there are so many parallels to Revan and Bastila Shan, but hasn't Pablo hinted that he didn't know if the writers were even that aware of KOTOR? Still, seems like far, far too much of a coincidence.

ZioRen wrote:

motherofpearl1 wrote:Yes, that's very likely - I am absolutely certain Darth Revan and Bastila Shan were the inspiration for Kylo and Rey,more in appearance than in their story arc -hopefully not the story arc as theirs ended in tragedy.
They seem to be taking small bits, so to speak, from the EU as inspiration without actually adapting the EU as canon, hence a child named Ben   and Han and Leia's son turning 'dark'.

@motherofpearl1

I think so too. Too bad that has so many people convinced that Rey and Kylo's story will be literally Jacen and Jaina.

I feel like there are so many parallels to Revan and Bastila Shan, but hasn't Pablo hinted that he didn't know if the writers were even that aware of KOTOR? Still, seems like far, far too much of a coincidence.

@ZioRen

The writers, a.k.a. JJ and Kasdan, may not have been aware of Revan and Bastila, but the team of people who were brainstorming and making concept art etc. definitely included people who were aware of KOTOR - for example, Dave Filoni.

Same goes for stuff like Jacen and Jaina. I think Pablo said the same about the writers not knowing about the EU? Well, that doesn't mean the group of people involved in the planning of the trilogy didn't know about it. Even from a practical standpoint, there had to be people who knew the old EU well, if only because it would be silly if they unknowingly repeated the same stories.

Pablo himself knows the EU very well, so it's amusing how he sometimes plays dumb as if he had never heard of Grey Jedi, for example.

Pablo saying he doesn't know about the gray Jedi makes me wonder if he just means that in terms of the current canon. If it's going to be important for the characters later, wouldn't it have been foreshadowed or at least mentioned in TFA? So far it's been set up very solidly as light vs dark side, with the villain feeling caught in-between but it comes across to me that he'll have to pick one side or the other. (Note that I don't know anything about the EU and am taking "gray" at face value as meaning neutral.)

The big difference between Jacen and Kylo is Jacen was not the last Skywalker - his sister and cousin both carried the Skywalker genes.

In the movies Kylo is the last of the line - which is why he needs to survive.

As for Pablo...he strikes me as a man who likes to wind people up so to speak- and he can't give anything away!

One thing I'm sure we all noticed- Rey wore white,Kylo wore black, but apart from the colours their costumes were mirror images of the other. Until at the end Rey wore grey.

I don't know if anyone made that remark before... but has anyone noticed how the back of Kylo's cowl looks like a fallen angel's wing here?

Re: what we talked about before, whether they were aware of the EU and whether there's someone to point out what's been done before - well, turns out Pablo basically is that guy.

A snippet from an interview:

Now we’re at this new point in our history where we’re going to have a very production-focused future with [Lucasfilm president] Kathleen Kennedy leading the way. And if we’re going to build onto this franchise, it’s important to know what’s happened in the past, to know what’s been established, to know what George’s intentions were and stuff like that. So I just got more and more roped into this process to the point where I’m now part of Kiri Hart’s story group. Among things that I do is I offer that kind of level of deep knowledge. I’m able to give my two cents when I see something that isn’t tracking, maybe pointing out that, well, you know, that spaceship doesn’t have that capacity or these two planets are closer than the script is suggesting that they are. That kind of deep universe history.

In terms of history, you’re not just talking about the films and the TV shows, but also novels, comics, games?

Yeah, any sort of storytelling that’s been done in the Star Wars space. We kind of break that out to different degrees of what we call canon, you know—whether or not we’re beholden to it in new storytelling going forward. It’s like if someone will come into a situation and say, “Have we ever done a story like this?” And I could be able to say, “Yeah, we did that, but it was, like, in a 1978 comic book, so, you know, take that as you will.”

The rest of the interview here: http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/05/pablo-hidalgo-lucasfilm-star-wars

Irina de France wrote:I don't know if anyone made that remark before... but has anyone noticed how the back of Kylo's cowl looks like a fallen angel's wing here?

@Irina de France

Just noticed that-well spotted.

I just randomly realised that the Darth Vader helmet scene is where Kylo is at his most undressed in TFA - he has his mask on but it's the only scene in the movie where he ditched his outer man-dress. I guess it was another way for them to convey the confessional intimacy of the scene without revealing his face. Makes me wonder if he'll peel off more layers down the track

Well, no way has Adam been working out for nothing!

My initial interest was because I could see that Kylo Ren had compassion for Rey, that he developed some fascination with her, and once she drew the lightsaber to her, he was in awe of her. This of course is in the context that Kylo Ren is on the dark side, so the compassion is something that wells up with the light that he is trying to snuff out.

But Rey represents the light, and he is drawn to her. I realized that this awe of her can bring him back when everything else has failed. It can make him want to change--see the value in what he didn't see the value in before. Her presence provides illumination. In the scenes between them, she is in the light. In the interrogation scene, he is looking up at her, and I realized that if there was anything representative of his kneeling before the light in devotion, this is it. Because he already has devotion to his misguided cause (he believes what he is doing is right). Snoke may have won in turning Kylo Ren against his family and against any compassion from them that might pull him back; but Kylo Ren wasn't "designed" to have any defense against the form the light takes in his connection to Rey. I saw the potential for a story in which he finds he can't bring himself to kill her, and that allows an opening for Ben Solo to defeat Kylo Ren, and overturn everything he previously believed in.

There are so many moments that intrigued me. He knows that she wants to kill him but it doesn't cause him to want to kill her. He tries to understand her (understanding comes from the light). He finds in her someone he can relate to, someone lonely, isolated, abandoned (which is how he has felt, no matter if he is delusional in his beliefs about his relationship to his family). Although he is dark and selfish (cruel), he tries to be "considerate" in abducting and questioning her. He tries to humanize himself and terrorize her less. He speaks of her point of view, knowing it will relieve her to know that he doesn't know where her friends are, telling her that she "needs a teacher." Very carefully did he angle himself to face her in that moment btw, so as not to push her off the ledge. Oh, and he just waits while she finds the Force. Even after she has defeated him, almost killed him, he doesn't seem to hate her (his expression is not angry--he almost seemed to be checking that she hadn't fallen in when the ground split). One can look at all of these things with cynicism because of what he has overtly done. But when he confesses in private that he feels the pull to the light, these are the sorts of things that are betraying the light in him. It's taking a backseat to the darkness, but it is still viable. I can see that this used to be a good person, perhaps even a gentle person. I can even see both Leia and Han in the performance of the character.

Lines he says remind me of romantic moments in previous Star Wars films and I hope it's not all for naught. In ESB Han says to Leia, "We need. What about you need?" In AOTC, Anakin says to Padme, "Don't be afraid." The latter seems impossible to miss in connecting with, "Don't be afraid. I feel it too." This in addition to the bridal carry, the look of complete awe on his face when she calls the lightsaber... it's so difficult to see this in purely platonic terms. I know though that a lot of people do. And Star Wars has been "incestuous" before pre-familial reveals... lol.

Another thing I latched onto was in the 'forceback' where the theme is "come back." Rey is crying for her family to come back. Kylo Ren is lost in the darkness in the vision: come back. This is what Padme asked of Anakin at the end of ROTS. And it all makes me think this person (Ben Solo) is not lost beyond all hope. There's still a chance he can come back. Rey can light the way when it is too dark to see. And maybe her love for her family who she had been waiting for on Jakku all this time (devotion), can make him see what he is destroying--his family, himself, and all the things that truly matter.

Anyway it still could turn out that I am seeing things not there... but I see them and they might be mocked more in other online places.

I do expect it to get darker before the dawn though. He may try to kill her in TLJ, only to come back around in Episode 9 for instance. And I really don't know what will happen in this story.

@Acritiqua You will get zero judgements here on this board for this excellent post. Welcome to our board!

Everything you detailed I saw and noticed on my first viewing, and it intrigued me to no end. Here you have this supposedly bad*** masked villain in black robes. I mean, in the beginning of the interrogation, even when he's masked he sounds less than threatening through the voice modulator. "You still want to kill me?" He sounds like someone who lost his puppy - not the unwavering bad guy who does terrible things without remorse.

In regards to those who think he will die unredeemed at Rey's hand, I'm just so glad they aren't writing this story.

@Acritiqua Wonderful post, and I agree 100% with you. I'm a long time SW fan but I was media blind for TFA, and the dynamic between Rey and Kylo hit me like a ton of bricks. It's intriguing, it's complex and I can't wait to see more of it.

Welcome to the forums!

Piper Maru wrote:@Acritiqua Wonderful post, and I agree 100% with you. I'm a long time SW fan but I was media blind for TFA, and the dynamic between Rey and Kylo hit me like a ton of bricks. It's intriguing, it's complex and I can't wait to see more of it.

Welcome to the forums!

@Piper Maru

Yes, I'm under the impression that if you walked into TFA wondering who is who's son/daughter, Reylo will fly over your head and you'd be likely to walk out of TFA thinking Rey is Luke's offspring. If you're like me, and you walked into it completely blind with no expectations, you're more likely to get hit over the head with Reylo like a hammer.

I was pretty certain of what I saw on my first viewing. It wasn't until I logged into the Internet and saw the majority of the GA thought she was Luke's. Just...Huh? It caused me to backtrack and wonder if there was something I missed that others were seeing as I didn't see that at all. Once I began following the story team, I realized it was the other way around.

IoJovi wrote:

Piper Maru wrote:@Acritiqua Wonderful post, and I agree 100% with you. I'm a long time SW fan but I was media blind for TFA, and the dynamic between Rey and Kylo hit me like a ton of bricks. It's intriguing, it's complex and I can't wait to see more of it.

Welcome to the forums!

@Piper Maru

Yes, I'm under the impression that if you walked into TFA wondering who is who's son/daughter, Reylo will fly over your head and you'd be likely to walk out of TFA thinking Rey is Luke's offspring.  If you're like me, and you walked into it completely blind with no expectations, you're more likely to get hit over the head with Reylo like a hammer.  

I was pretty certain of what I saw on my first viewing.  It wasn't until I logged into the Internet and saw the majority of the GA thought she was Luke's.  Just...Huh?   It caused me to backtrack and wonder if there was something I missed that others were seeing as I didn't see that at all.  Once I began following the story team, I realized it was the other way around.  

@IoJovi

I know a lot of people -- friends, co-workers, relatives -- who watched TFA without any previous experience with Star Wars or at least were casual fans. No fandom culture or theories, just watching the movies and enjoying them. All of them saw 'something strange' between Rey and Kylo. And all of them think Rey being Luke's daughter is horrible, that it would be 'too easy' for her, and it wouldn't add any conflict to her character.