ST Finn's Poor Character Development

MODified: Garbage Removal

 

OHH boy....

 

Who is Rucka?

Rey has has a long, varied, and very hard life prior to the movie. She can fly because she was trained to, and has flown before in-atmosphere. While she's never flown the Millenium Falcoln before it's basically as "generic light cargo vessel" as you can get. She's multilingual because she's lived in a multicultural society, and she's skilled in melee combat because otherwise she would have been mugged and left for dead long before the movie started.

Meanwhile, Finn has been living in a homogenous, strictly regimented society. He only speaks Galactic Basic because everyone around him speaks Galactic Basic. He can't fly because he was shunted into the Stormtrooper career track instead of flight crew. For the same reason he's very good at shooting things and hitting things. And despite growing up in Soace DPRK, he breaks his mental conditioning through sheer moral fortitude and strength and will, and becomes a hero.

 

It's unclear to me why he was on camera so much. You can see him in the marketing looking badass and wielding a lightsaber. Why? The movie is careful to show that Rey is completely better than Finn. He plays a role in the sabotage/destruction of Starkiller base, but so what? That didn't get the Bothans any screen time.

His attitude toward war/killing is also strange. OK, his buddy dies, and that's traumatic. He decides he doesn't want to do this after all. Fine. War is hell, that's entirely reasonable. Then the next thing we know, he shoots at Ren, shoots the tail guns in the TIE Awesomer, shoots the turret guns in the Falcon, and tries to lightsaber Ren's face off. Why is he now perfectly fine with leaving a trail of bodies, when before he just wanted out out out? In those incidents where he was attacking bad guys, he was trying to save his own life, but he was being shot at on Jakku as well! If he's completely OK with killing you to save his own life, why doesn't he go on with his stormtrooping, since trying to stay alive is all he would have been doing there too? The Jakku-ites are the ones who killed his buddy, why doesn't he just return fire at them instead of First Order guys?

 

Finn is really the weaklest link of the new characters imo. However, that weak link is still a lot stronger than the weak links in the prequels, so I mean... Even though Finn isn't very skilled, other than being a good shot, he's really only there for the audience to connect to. That's pretty much his whole real purpose in the movie. And truthfully, I didn't hate it. My only problem is I can't really see where they plan on taking him in the future movies.

 

Poor character development...in the first film of a TRILOGY.

Clicks "Ignore"

Onto the next thread...

 

Lighten up little fella..... Its just a discussion.

 

Troll lock

 

Finn is awesome. All of the new leads have aspects of Luke in them: Rey of course most closely compares to him, but Poe has the X-Wing pilot part. What Finn has is the humor (Luke IS funny) and the commitment to friends. Finn is a hero not because he has special powers, but because he knows right from wrong. He is a character who is based in morality. He is also the most unique character in TFA and the first of his kind in the SW Saga: he is the audience stand-in. We can't identify with Luke, Leia, Rey, Anakin, etc. We also can't really identify with guys like Han or Lando because none of us are that cool. But Finn? He's the closest thing to the everyman, the average joe that we have had. Luke will always be my favorite SW character but I can't put myself in his shoes. Finn I can, even with his tragic background because of his everyman personality. He's the Barry Allen or Peter Parker of the GFFA.

 

I see the echochamber remains alive and well here. Almost all the posts personal attacks.

 

The weirdest thing about his character is:
He turned traitor because his fellow stormtrooper was killed...
He then kills 20+ people including other stormtroopers during his escape in the TIE...
Guess he only had one friend in the fleet, and thought everyone else he knew should die...

 

I didn't realize character development meant only how much of a badass you are

PalpShouldLive - it had a lot more to do with the fact that he didn't want to be asked to kill innocent people I thought this was pretty clearly laid out in detail

 

I'm not sure you understand how character development works. I'll be reductive and summarize it briefly. He goes from running to "come and get it." He has the best arc in this movie.

 

I felt his whole body language during the fallen Stormtrooper/blood scene was the first point he showed an inner conflict in what he was doing. And the crew on the Star Destroyer were just doing their jobs. They were brainwashed even, so they're even less at fault. And he kills them, then CELEBRATES with Poe...

Really weird to kill your coworkers then celebrate...but whatever. It just struck me as hypocritical when I saw it. That one troopers life was more valuable than 20+.

But yeah, the OP is out there. He did have one of the better arcs, even though he was kind of just a tag-along and was rescued by Rey 4+ times.

 

Did Rucka actually give the name Finn a different origin? I haven't got to Before the Awakening yet.

Anyways, Finn has the strongest character arc of anybody in the movie by far. At first he isn't necessarily motivated to do good, he simply wants to run away from doing wrong. He is tempted to walk away from the resistance entirely, but then chooses to return and fight to save his friends. It's a lot more than we get with Poe and Rey.

 

Al sharpton?

 

Finn's not a hypocrite for fighting against the First Order. He's doing what he's been trained to do. Except now he's not aiming at huddled villagers.

 

As much as I don't want to tell the Mods how to manage their forum, I find some some of the tone of the OP somewhat suspect. "Slashed across the back by Kylo because a some white girl".

I was recently banned from these boards for having forthright views about the PT. I admitted at the time that some of my views were reactionary and slightly off topic but c'mon...I genuinely don't see how comments like this can be accepted. Or am I missing something?

 

Clear and concise.

It's like...do you even movie?

 

I am usually not a fan of suicide but if you ever feel the need just go for it

 

Not all those Stormtroopers/crewman have killed people...some of those villagers have. Who is Finn to judge who lives and who dies?