ST Adam Driver (Kylo Ren) in the ST

I agree, I have also thought something similar would happen when it comes to Kylo. It is an interesting analogy. I have not really watched a full episode of Game of Thrones since the second season, but I have friends who have 'spoiled' the story for me, so while I only really know 'evil' Jaime, my friends (and other viewers) now see him in a very different light. I always plan to start watching again, but I have still not done so. Perhaps I will now take the time to watch how Jaime progresses in the story.

While the ST is shorter than Game of Thrones, I think something similar is still possible in the ST, especially if there is a time lapse. I think based on everything we have seen and what Rian Johnson has hinted at, the odds are good that Kylo's world view is going to be shattered and he will get a 'new perspective' from his interactions with Rey. I think she will too, although in a different way.

As for Kylo's past, I think there is always a price to pay (for him and Jaime), so I believe a Kylo redemption would have bittersweet elements to it. He can redeem himself, but he will never be as he would have been had he not done the awful things he did. He will always bear the scar of his past actions.

 

Yet we barely knew Bran when he was pushed out of a window by Jamie. Whereas Han was a hero in 3 high grossing SW films, one of the most popular characters of all time when his own son impaled him. So it's a bit different.

 

Didn't Jamie also attempt to rape his sister?

 

If you go by the show, he did rape his sister. If you go by the books, it's vastly different.

GOT is a show meant for adults. SW is for kids and adults. So that's where our thinking and analysis needs to be.

 

i don't think it matters that we barely knew bran. when i first watched got and the first thing i saw jamie do was push a child out a window attempting to kill him just to hide the incest relationship, i thought jamie was a total psycho and my mind didn't change about this until he met brienne and more was revealed about his character. due to the bran scene and my assessment of his
character which nothing had seemed to contradict, i imagined he killed the mad king for power.

 

I don’t think that matters at all. He was an innocent, precocious and very likeable little boy who is then deliberately thrown out of a high window. Redemption for the person (Jaime) who did that is absolutely comparable to redemption for Kylo Ren.

 

Ok, that's fair. But we've had around 50 episodes to develop Jamie's character and we have gotten further and further away from that moment when he crippled Bran. Here, Han's murder is going to be ever present and a constant shadow on this film. So while I do think Kylo is headed towards redemption, I don't buy that he's going to be doing a 180 an hour into TLJ. I see it more as the end of TLJ he has to face some harsh truths and he finally starts to change going into IX.

Another difference is that Jamie can believably have a normal life after all is said and done. The GOT world is just different. I just don't see that for Kylo/Ben in the GFFA.

 

In all fairness though I think the two story arcs are circling back around and they will almost certainly meet again in Season 8. In the books, we can only speculate where Jaime will end up especially if he takes the bait laid for him by Lady Stoneheart.

Agreed. I think if we have been given any kind of foreshadowing here, it is that Kylo becomes increasingly conflicted not less, and it looks like he not only meets his sister again in TLJ but his mother as well...

The moral compass for GOT is completely different from SW of course and 'justice' can often be swift and brutal. It will be interesting to see how SW handles any possible redemption for Kylo, especially if family are directly involved in that redemption as I'd expect. Despite this however, he'd still have to pay for his crimes one way or the other... nothing can return to how it was.

 

I don't see GOT's central moral compass as being different from that in Star Wars. It's just a more brutal world that portrays more complex moral and ethical dilemmas. But at it's heart, the most heroic people (such as Dany and Jon) stand for fairness, equality, justice, hope, etc.

 

Twist! The person that appears in Kylo Ren's outfit and mask in Rey's Forceback isn't Ben Solo. It's somebody else. Later that person is killed and Ben takes over wearing the Kylo Ren outfit.

 

Is it Bran or Jamie? Otherwise I'm super-confused about why Game of Thrones folk are in here.

 

it's Bran who's warged into Jaime who's killed by Ben who then takes over the Knights of Ren as Kylo.

 

I can see Kylo starting to get lighter in TLJ but then going darker, but with a path to redemption in Ep 9 being firmly established.

 

I have no idea who those people are!

 

I'm not sure how compare Jaime Lannister to Kylo. In Game of Thrones books, the mostly of the characters are "gray" (even Tyrion, who in GoT series version is pratically a hero). But in Star Wars, the evil and good are more separated (and the villains don't have a happy ending, even Vader who redeemed himself).

 

i actually agree the GOT characters are more gray. lighter characters tend to get killed in the um brutal world, like most of house stark lol. but even most (all?) of the lighter characters seem darker than the PT jedi before the war because they kill for other reasons than just "defense."

 

Yeah, you can't really compare the two. For all the attempts to introduce more "grey" characters into Star Wars, it still comes down to a basic and consistent world-view - selfish people are bad and selfless people are good. There's room for nuance in there, but that dichotomy is at the core of it. Attempts to be "in the middle," like Bendu, are ultimately portrayed as shirking your moral responsibilities, and even Rogue One comes back around to that idea by the end. Game of Thrones doesn't have a moral worldview beyond "people really are terrible, aren't they?"

I can see us getting a few hints in TLJ that Kylo still hasn't entirely snuffed out the light in himself - maybe he'll spare Leia from death, as he can't face murdering another parent - but I wouldn't be surprised to see him suffer another relapse at the end, just to preserve the ambiguity about which side he'll ultimately end up on at the end of IX. Maybe he'll even kill Snoke to protect Leia, making us think for a moment that he's redeemed as Vader was, but the lure of taking the throne of the First Order for himself will be too strong.

 

That could explain why they’re so freely portraying him as kickedpuppy!Kylo. I think it will be accurate to a degree but wont tell nearly the whole story.

 

i think star wars might be a little more morally complex than it seems. compassion and redemption are major themes in star wars, as is loving and understanding your enemy (to have compassion for all, not only people who have a long track record of good deeds and have never strayed). these views actually contradict a morally black and white viewpoint in a sense.

as for kylo i agree that he's a character who can fall either way, and kind of unpredictable because of that. some think the overall trend will be getting darker, others think he will eventually be redeemed. i can see either path, or even some weird antihero path in-between somehow.

another thing i was thinking about is how often he has to prove himself to snoke. he killed luke's other students and "destroyed everything" which proved he chose the dark side. he leads the FO in slaughtering people (dark side). he murdered his own father, reaffirming again the choice of the dark side over the light. i imagine snoke will remain unconvinced because he can sense the light in kylo.

so i think kylo has more trials ahead where he will have to choose dark or light, and i do agree that choosing light one time =/= "redemption" necessarily, which is a return to the light and washing away of the darkness. he may be forever trapped in the middle, i really don't know. this is why he's portrayed as tormented, because he lives in this state of being torn apart inside. even though he's chosen the dark side over and over, the light remains. and it will be really interesting to see if this is by design (snoke's design).

 

Oh, Star Wars is certainly more morally complex than it's often given credit for. It has a strong value system, but it still shows that being a good person is hard, and requires a lot of maturity and discipline - it's much easier to be bad.

With compassion, I'd say that idea is an ancient one, found in the religious ideas that influenced Lucas - it's not something post-modern or subversive. If anything that absolute compassion is the kind of value our society has been moving away from, and one of the strengths of Star Wars is that it reminds us of that. Everything about Star Wars is wonderfully old-fashioned. But learning to be that compassionate is difficult - it's much easier to hate, or to want revenge.

So yeah, I'd say that Rey forgiving Kylo for what he did to Han and finding compassion for him will have to be a part of her journey, because every Jedi has to learn that. Kathleen Kennedy said years ago that VIII and IX are going to explore compassion as part of the Jedi value system.

 

I wonder if Kylo will get a haircut in TLJ or Ep. 9. If so it's going to be weird seeing the master of the Ren sitting down for a trim. Will he make chitchat with the barber? Will he be good at it, and how well does he tip?

 

I absolutely see a haircut coming down the line...

 

The ultimate punishment.................for his stans

 

I have a feeling he’ll go completely bald in IX.

 

Why would Kylo get a haircut and/or go bald in the ST? I don't get it.