ST Rey & Kylo Ren in Episode IX

Was that sweet side when he told Rey she's nothing, but not to him? What about when she was crying and begging him to stop torturing her and stealing her private, intimate thoughts? Did her crying then bring out his sweet side?

I'm not trying to be snarky, I just don't think Kylo Ren has ever had a sweet side actually depicted in a movie. I get that it exists to fans, but it's not in the movies.

 

I don't see any way in which it's implied Rey and Ben are going to get married by the end of IX. There's not enough runway left to even attempt something like that and they'd know that the messaging on that would be bad for a lot of people.

The idea will likely be that he earns her respect more and justifies the hope she had in him and others had in him by setting out on his own path to help make the galaxy a better place and that perhaps years later, if those two cross paths, and Rey isn't with someone else, he'll have a better chance and after all he's done... and how great Rey is... that's still a happy ending for him and it would leave a some sizzle and interest in the EU when rumors pop up of those two crossing paths again, which is exactly what those materials will need for a number of years as they continue to build toward new characters and new situations.

They then buy themselves time with a will they or won't they involving them with some occasional team-ups and more drama in the EU and then maybe 5 years from now it's implied that he's been helping long enough and shown that his darkness is in his past and things get more serious between them after that and maybe that sets up episode X. Don't forget that even if they did hook up 10 years into the future in the EU and Episode X was set 10 years later in their timeline... Ben Solo would be 40 and she'd be 30. More people would buy that then anyway if she did decide she wanted to have a family later on her own terms after she'd been teaching and going on more adventures.

 

Nope! When she was in the hut after exiting the dark cave. The man touching her hand was Ben, not Kylo. What was left of Ben. The Solo heart. That's what I mean by small glimspes that give hope. They don't last, but they are put there for a reason.

 

Well I think the reason that particular scene is there is because the writer of the movie was under the mistaken impression that "everyone" could relate to Kylo Ren. Kylo Ren had one line of dialogue in that scene, and I took it as 100% manipulative and possessive and creepy. I take Rey in that scene as suffering from Stockholme Syndrome.

 

I think it was to create a complicated relationship between two enemies. That's why Kylo is kneeling and feeling defeated at the end of TLJ despite winning. He realized in that moment that losing Rey was not worth gaining the throne. As Rian said, it's like the moment of regret Anakin has as the Vader mask comes down to cover his face in ROTS. Kylo lost his Padme by choosing to rule the galaxy instead of putting her feelings and "them" first.

 

The decision to show him being quiet, and listening to her, and not interrupt her, and being softer and more considerate of her feelings there coincided with the glove coming off by design. The shot later when he asks her to join him and he's being emotionally abusive and selfish again pans down and shows the Kylo Ren glove still on. Rey's feelings for the man are for only the Ben Solo that's within. She refers to him as such and is intrigued by the Ben Solo within the monster of Kylo Ren that she hopes Ben Solo will cast out.

 

I’m guessing you’re going by annecdotal evidence?

I expected a far more robust redemption arc for Kylo in TLJ no matter what. And such was - according, at least, to how these things go in kids’ films - necessary if they were going “enemies to lovers.” (Frankly, if they were using that trope they wouldn’y have had Kylo murder Han onscreen. That event was depicted as a BFD and a Very Bad Act.)

I’ve seen Rey/Kylo compared to “enemies-to-lovers” stories where the “enemy” is merely very unpleasant. I’ve see the relationship compared to very long, drawn-out arcs in TV show that have that sort of narrative space to devote to turning an evil character good. They’re simply not comparable, and for good reason.

 

Romance? Well that's probably inspired by Strange Magic. Also JJ said it would be different. I suspect if they already have Kylo's endgame story written, his future with Rey is written too. Remember it was originally supposed to be a Solo kid seduced by a female darkside user. Now that they've made Kylo the Solo kid, the romance has changed to Rey's light seducing him unintentionally.

 

I very very strongly doubt that the bad guy in Strange Magic was depicted as Kylo has been depicted.

Showing a character ordering mass murder and commiting patricide onscreen may not seem like an insurmountable obstacle to romance to some, but it’s not something a kids’ movie shows a future love interest doing.

 

We'll have to wait and see, but it's much deeper than what he did in TFA, though no one expects him to get away with it without some sort of consequences. I expect him mangled somehow by the end of IX.

 

I'd never heard that bit before that at one point it was supposed to be a female darkside user who seduced the child of Solo to the darkside. Do you have a link to that? If that's true then that absolutely adds to everything we're discussing. That almost sounds too perfect a hint to be true though and I'll be frustrated that I've been talking about these things for as long as I have without anyone else ever mentioning that or me ever hearing of that before. Unless you're referring to the old Solo twins story with Lumiya in which case things have been changed pretty substantially from that beyond just that.

 

I'll have to dig around. I saw it a few months ago. I love stories that never happened-type stuff and found it when looking for concept art. It seems the Jedi Killer and Solo were also not the same, then became the same. He had a twin sister too, which is what Rey was likely at first before becoming the female lead like Lucas had wanted. So many changes happened! Finn looked like Han at one point too. I think it was too much like the EU, so they changed it.

 

And originally, the story had *more than one* Skywalker grandchild. And same concept of “parentless girl goes on journey to find a depressed and exiled Luke Skywalker whose temple had been destroyed.”

If we’re going to use the original concepts as evidence, then, well, it points squarely at Rey Related.

If one sees it as evidence.

 

Oh, see I did know that then. That’s the old Solo twins story that was in the EU. Too much has been changed for me to put much into that unfortunately. I thought there were quotes related to the Ardnt treatments that involved that which changed or something.

 

Yep! Twins! Then Rey became her own person, Solo became the villain and instead of him seducing Rey like in the concept art, she ended up drawing him to her without meaning to in the final story. More subtle and less adult story. We also had Rey at one point on Jakku where her father is killed and she finds Luke's map on a scrapped R2 and wants to avenge them or something like that.

 

I did know that they had an art contest where one painting would be considered official Lucasfilm art during TFA & that they chose Reylo art and made it official in what is now one of the clearest hints that they had imagined this for a long time now.

 

The hands reaching out. Exactly what we saw in the movie. Reylos are amazing at getting things right and they nailed TLJ perfectly. Going into IX, I bet most of their speculation will be what we end up seeing too.

 

The “multiple Skywalker grandchildren” was in the story/treament materials George left LFL. If LFL changed that then they fundamentally changed the entire concept of the ST. And I don’t get the impression that happened.

 

Strange Magic wasn't a very good movie to begin with. If I remember correctly the villain was more of a comedic character. Definitely not like Kylo.

 

I doubt it'll be Rey anymore. They've gone too far with discussing the romantic tension and questionable meaning of the hut scene for it to be just a joke and they are related. Honestly the way Mark seemed upset about them scrapping everything, though it was not completely true, I'm wondering if Luke's part was what got scrapped. If that's the case, I'll be pretty sad.

 

I do get the impression that’s exactly what’s happened. Lucas has said as much.

http://ew.com/article/2015/11/20/george-lucas-star-wars-force-awakens-breakup/

Reylo was likely put on the table early and the only lineage tie in that made sense after that for Rey to combine back to the PT and ensure an old bloodlin continues on alongside the Solo and Skywalker one that will live on in Ben is the one that combined some aspects of Rey Random and a grandparental reveal to mirror Ben’s while keeping them unrelated to allow for romance later in the future & that’s Rey Kenobi.

 

I wouldn’t pin my hat on faith that a TPTB means what you think they mean, and the comments you refer to must be balanced against comments TPTB have made which are pretty toxic to Reylo.

Rey, how the Rey/Kylo relationship will go, I’m judging by how the specific trope at issue unfolds in analagous stories. Structurally, it doesn’t fit.

Of course, neither will Rey angrilly chop off Kylo’s head. But it’s not a binary choice between romance or enternal emnity.

ETA: @Ender_and_Bean

Not using Lucas’s treatments or stories does not mean discarding core concepts. And TPTB have stated repeatedly that they worked off of what Lucas left them. Considering the major story elements LFL *did* take from George’s treatments, I don’t believe the core ideas were changed, and Rey’s parentage is fundamental.

 

Reylo might have been JJ's idea and that's why the twins were scrapped. In this 2013 quote he says this about a romance in TFA: "No doubt, even if I already know I want to approach this project in a different way … We’re only in the initial stages [of making the film] and it’s difficult to talk about it other than to say it’s very exciting." Now JJ says he can end IX how he wanted to, so it makes me wonder what he wanted for Rey and Kylo.

 

Considering that the backstory was written first, Rey was who she was and JJ worked with that.

I feel that an extremely vague statement made 2 years prior to TFA’s release doesn’t counterbalance the fact that JJ called the interrogation scene “the torture scene” in the TFA blu-ray commentary.

=\

 

It was torture. Rey was an enemy. Kylo wanted the map. He had orders. Rey returned the favor by tormenting his mind. It's not a big deal. Poe was treated worse to show Kylo had a soft spot for Rey and she was the start of him going down the path of light. Enemies to friends to lovers is not a picnic in the park. It's funny how Rey and Poe just brushed it off in the comic though. "Torture buddies!" Haha!