New Rise of Skywalker trailer

[Gradine]

Does Rey have any flaws? Poe does. Finn does. Their faults are very obvious conflict and growth points (or in Poe's case his flaw is a strength)

She does have those flashbacks and questions about where she came from, being abandoned.

Aside from improved Force skill, does Rey change in any way? She's strong, confident. Does she ever do the wrong thing? Whether she's a full Mary Sue or not, there's signs that she's not getting the full Arc treatment.

Do we ever tackle that abandonment issue? Does it ever come up or hold Rey back?

It's stuff like this that make me question whether (a) we're even watching the same movies (especially TLJ), or (b) people really do hold female characters to different standards. Rey fails at basically everything she tries to do in TLJ until the very end, almost exclusively because of her abandonment issues and the subsequent need to feel like she has some important role to play in everything. She maybe gets Luke to budge a little but she fails to convince him to actually lift a finger to help (force ghost Yoda gives him the final push he needs there). She fails the ESB-esque "dark cave" trial just like Luke before her (fun fact: there's a reason, by the way, that the big scary thing in the dark cave is a mirror. Subtelty this is not). She tries to pull a ROTJ Luke and turn Kylo Ren, but fails miserably in that too, only succeeding in the "well at least he killed the mysterious cackling overlord" part of that particular plan (though honestly Snoke doesn't strike me as a cackler. Palpatine, now, there was a cackling enthusiast).

Hell, even in TFA the whole reason she gets captured in the first place is because Luke's lightsaber strikes her right in the feels and she runs away from everyone right before The First Order attack.

Yes, sure, she starts at a higher level, so to speak, than whiny Tatooine Luke did. But she's experienced plenty of failure. She's had an arc.

 

[Janx]

It's stuff like this that make me question whether (a) we're even watching the same movies (especially TLJ), or (b) people really do hold female characters to different standards. Rey fails at basically everything she tries to do in TLJ until the very end, almost exclusively because of her abandonment issues and the subsequent need to feel like she has some important role to play in everything. She maybe gets Luke to budge a little but she fails to convince him to actually lift a finger to help (force ghost Yoda gives him the final push he needs there). She fails the ESB-esque "dark cave" trial just like Luke before her (fun fact: there's a reason, by the way, that the big scary thing in the dark cave is a mirror. Subtelty this is not). She tries to pull a ROTJ Luke and turn Kylo Ren, but fails miserably in that too, only succeeding in the "well at least he killed the mysterious cackling overlord" part of that particular plan (though honestly Snoke doesn't strike me as a cackler. Palpatine, now, there was a cackling enthusiast).

Hell, even in TFA the whole reason she gets captured in the first place is because Luke's lightsaber strikes her right in the feels and she runs away from everyone right before The First Order attack.

Yes, sure, she starts at a higher level, so to speak, than whiny Tatooine Luke did. But she's experienced plenty of failure. She's had an arc.

This is exactly what I needed. Thanks! Really.

 

[Umbran]

I always love it when someone calls Rey a Mary Sue. It shows me that individual isn’t a thinking person and their views on things can’t be trusted.

Noting that the whole Rey == Mary Sue thing is weak sauce is fine.

Insulting people over it is not fine. Folks need to stop doing that. I hope that's clear.

 

[Umbran]

Do we ever tackle that abandonment issue? Does it ever come up or hold Rey back?

Goodness, she's tackling it through the entire first movie. Every time she asserts that she has to go back to Jakku, she's confronting that issue, for cryin' out loud! Solo offers her a job. She says no - right there, holding her back from what she really wants.

It takes force visions from a lightsaber, Maz Kanata, and being kidnapped and nearly having her mind violated by Darth Whineypants* to get her to realize that for herself and others, she needs to move forwards, not stand in place - and she tries to take those steps forward in seeking out Luke.

And later, when Darth Whineypants tells her her parents were nobody... again, that issue is influencing her. She overcomes it in that moment, to remain her own person, rather than try to replace parents with another dominating relationship.

I sometimes wonder how folks ask questions like that, when they are major plot points of the movies.


*By the way, I actually like Kylo Ren as a character - he's an exploration of an all-too-human form of evil. And Adam Driver does a good job putting him on the screen. I just think as a person he deserves derision

 

[billd91]

Goodness, she's tackling it through the entire first movie. Every time she asserts that she has to go back to Jakku, she's confronting that issue, for cryin' out loud! Solo offers her a job. She says no - right there, holding her back from what she really wants.

It takes force visions from a lightsaber, Maz Kanata, and being kidnapped and nearly having her mind violated by Darth Whineypants* to get her to realize that for herself and others, she needs to move forwards, not stand in place - and she tries to take those steps forward in seeking out Luke.

And later, when Darth Whineypants tells her her parents were nobody... again, that issue is influencing her. She overcomes it in that moment, to remain her own person, rather than try to replace parents with another dominating relationship.

I sometimes wonder how folks ask questions like that, when they are major plot points of the movies.

If I were uncharitable, I'd say that that people skipping over them is because those issues aren't "manly" obstacles to overcome - they're touchy-feelly, womanly issues and thus not as significant or recognizable by the men (invariably men) criticizing Rey as a character.


...I guess I'm uncharitable...

 

[Zardnaar]

To say, "losing a fight to Vader indicates you suck at personal combat," is kind of like saying, "you lost to Usain Bolt in a race, so you are a turtle."

It's also a problem with Kylo. Rewatched TFA and Kylo and Rey both had a great intro duction. However Kylo loses at the end if the movie and gets called Darth Whiney or Emo.

Sure he got wounded but remember Vader soaking a blaster bolt?

Throw in Kylo going back and forth, and he is not even established as a great character.

To make him different to Vader he should have used the for e to dodge Chewies bolt, defeated Rey (she survives) but maybe she wounds him. They follow up Snokes line about training him. Vader's a tank, make Kylo more like a Leopard or Tiger. Something like the T-800 vs T-1000.

Have Kylo kill Han in front of Leia or Leia plus Rey. At some point also have the 3 OT characters reunite before you kill one off.

Finn actually regresses as a character as well.

If the writers don't care about the characters why should we? The main problem apparently was very little collaboration in the writing of the two movies hence Finn essentially having the same character development arc twice.

 

[Janx]

If I were uncharitable, I'd say that that people skipping over them is because those issues aren't "manly" obstacles to overcome - they're touchy-feelly, womanly issues and thus not as significant or recognizable by the men (invariably men) criticizing Rey as a character.


...I guess I'm uncharitable...

that and/or I only saw the movie twice and just saw Rey do what she had to do and forgot about pretty much everything. Once mentioned, it's "oh yeah" Which is why, for me, Gardine's post was very helpful.

 

[billd91]

that and/or I only saw the movie twice and just saw Rey do what she had to do and forgot about pretty much everything. Once mentioned, it's "oh yeah" Which is why, for me, Gardine's post was very helpful.

Honestly forgetting is one thing - constantly discounting is another. I can be charitable about the former to a certain degree (though the question of why it's forgettable, I think, has certain applicability to problems in patriarchal society in general).

 

[Umbran]

It's also a problem with Kylo. Rewatched TFA and Kylo and Rey both had a great intro duction. However Kylo loses at the end if the movie and gets called Darth Whiney or Emo.

Sure he got wounded but remember Vader soaking a blaster bolt?

You are comparing a bud to a flower. Kylo Ren is still young. At the time of A New Hope, Vader had full Jedi training, and a couple of decades hunting down Jedi and doing other dirty work. Vader, when we first see him, is far more experienced than Kylo, when we first see him.

And even then, Kylo takes Chewie's caster bolt (earlier demonstrated to be much more powerful than a typical blaster), and then actually fights both Finn and Rey. Rey doesn't actually beat him - the ground opens up and separates them before she can finish him off, so there's some question as to whether he had a reserve he could have pulled out if she had gotten to try.

I call him whiney because he literally has temper tantrums. And, as I said, his psychology is an entirely recognizable and legitimate source of evil. I'm glad they made him different.

Throw in Kylo going back and forth, and he is not even established as a great character.

I think that depends on what you mean by "great character". To me, he's an awesome character.

 

[BookBarbarian]

You are comparing a bud to a flower. Kylo Ren is still young. At the time of A New Hope, Vader had full Jedi training, and a couple of decades hunting down Jedi and doing other dirty work. Vader, when we first see him, is far more experienced than Kylo, when we first see him.

And even then, Kylo takes Chewie's caster bolt (earlier demonstrated to be much more powerful than a typical blaster), and then actually fights both Finn and Rey. Rey doesn't actually beat him - the ground opens up and separates them before she can finish him off, so there's some question as to whether he had a reserve he could have pulled out if she had gotten to try.

I call him whiney because he literally has temper tantrums. And, as I said, his psychology is an entirely recognizable and legitimate source of evil. I'm glad they made him different.



I think that depends on what you mean by "great character". To me, he's an awesome character.

He's a very believable type of evil.

I also like him as a character, and love to make fun of Emo Kylo Ren.