ST The Knights of Ren in Episode 9

This all sounds very familiar. I´m getting more and more the feeling that the Knights of Ren are a direct parallel of Rebels Inquisitors, and all of these "Hux said this" arguments work similarly to how they used Tarkin´s ANH line to phase the Inquisitors out of the series. If they don´t show up at all in IX, they would be an even more direct parallel: a fantastic opportunity, wasted, and perhaps (hopefully) seized by another media...

 

I think a lot of people downplay the size and scope of Luke's operation. This wasn't Luke in the back yard on weekends. The flashback shows us that it was a substantive operation. It was a significant structure. Elegantly built. Time and care had gone into it and anything within it. It had a dozen or so students in it who were likely learning nothing but Jedi concepts.


At least one of which was 23 years of age. If they weren't Knights yet the only thing that really stopped them was being killed by Dark Side users in the end. Some of whom then deemed themselves Knights (of Ren). Based on what we've seen of the Knights of Ren in flashback it's also logical to believe there were others similarly aged to that of Ben Solo at the temple. The Knights of Ren will be sufficiently dangerous as a group if they're back. Perhaps even dangerous enough to stage a coup d'etat versus Ben Solo directly, forming an alliance with Hux, to force Ben Solo out, allowing Ben Solo to form an uneasy alliance with Rey and others to defeat the FO with the Knights of Ren and Hux and all of the military might of the FO becoming the final villains in IX.

 

This is what I fear, the KoR being yet another threat built up by this trilogy and thrown away because of subversion or something.

 

Except we have no clue if the KoR are actually the other missing students. At this point it is just fan speculation. Sure, it makes sense, but it is still just guessing at this point. In fact, there are no concrete facts regarding them at all. The stuff at wookieepedia is just fandom speculation. The official SW databank doesn't even have an entry for them.

Yeah, I'd love for them to be classmates of his.

But this sudden need for them to be redeemed because Kylo Ren somehow manipulated the to only build a case to stone him is absolutely ridiculous. (see other threads for that trainwreck of a debate.)

 

I fully expect the KoR to be some of Luke's former students but in a way I think it would almost make more sense if they weren't. As I've touched on before making the KoR some of Luke's students means that in addition to Luke failing to stop his nephew from falling to the dark side he also failed to stop HALF HIS STUDENTS from falling as well!

Now maybe they'll explain that something had happened in Luke's past that distracted him from all these people around him falling to the dark side but if they don't go in that direction then Luke is going to look like the most incompetent teacher in Jedi history. Sadly I think it's going to be more the latter than the former. TLJ has set the groundwork for Luke being a very imperfect teacher.

There's also the possibility that half of Luke's students were sleeper agents of Snokes so they were evil the whole time though that still reflects poorly on Luke. He couldn't detect that half his class were dark side users from the get go?

On the other hand technically what we know is that half of Luke's students were killed and Ben left with the other half. I'm thinking it would make more sense if the people that left with Ben were basically taken prisoner after they witnessed him slaughter half of their classmates.

I suppose if they went in that direction then there could be a subplot in Ep. 9 about freeing the students? Not sure I like any of this but it seems like a possibility.

 

I think sleeper agents makes more sense than Ben Solo managing to corrupt half of Luke's school. Another possibility is they are simply Ben's friends who thought he was in danger and fought to protect him thinking their master went mad. And since the KoR are not bound to Snoke (I think I read that somewhere, but it could be conjecture) they may just be loyal to Kylo out of self preservation.

With that in mind, If the FO is either falling apart and splitting into factions while battling the Resistance, I wouldn't mind a third faction that's the grey force users: Kylo, Rey and the KoR serving in some capacity to bring an end to the conflict.

 

Re: Ben's friends siding with him, I really hope it's something other than that. The idea that Ben comes back with a story that Luke tried to kill him and half his friends believe him without any proof and ostensibly without any prior history of Luke clashing with Ben in the past seems nutso to me.

At the risk of contradicting myself it seems more believable that maybe Snoke had gotten to some of the students and Snoke had warned the students that Luke would turn on them one day so when Ben tells them that Luke attacked him some of the students think Snoke's prophecy came true. This however means that Snoke got to Luke's students and Luke didn't pick up on that. That seems bogus to me.

 

I think it's very plausible that Kylo, already under Snoke's influence, poisoned the minds of some of the other students against Luke. The flashback indicates that Luke knew Ben had some dark tendencies (also why Leia and Han wanted him trained, they thought Luke would help), and was aware of that, but not that Snoke had been manipulating him. When he saw the vision of what was to happen, he nearly struck him down, before catching himself, similar to how he nearly killed Vader, then caught himself.

I think that if Kylo had been feeding some of the other students a line about Luke, they might have seen Luke's actions as those of someone corrupted, and sided with Ben out of desperation. Also, consider that in the canon, such as Bloodline, Leia had decided not to tell Ben about his lineage, and effectively included Luke on that lie. Ben seems to have found out about this massive lie from the news broadcasts, rather than his family, which already would have made Luke look somewhat untrustworthy. Vader's son, who lied to his nephew and students, then tries to cut the innocent Ben down...Not a good look.

 

TBH, I just want the Knights of Ren to live on past this saga since Star Wars is in such desperate need of new dark side factions. If at the end of this trilogy, Kylo could manage to transform his Knights into some kind of vaguely anti heroic "Jedi" Order to balance out Rey's more traditionally heroic order, I would be a very happy camper.

 

Who was Maz fighting? Could it have been the KoR?

 

The novelization indicated that it was just a bunch of common thugs, but they were vague about it and I forget the specifics.

 

Thanks, not got the novel yet.

 

i hope they are still alive and that kylo calls them from different parts of the galaxy to be his guards.

 

We have still to see how the Force flashback moment with the KoR relates to the context of things. The other moments have been explained, Luke and the temple and Rey being left Jakku but not the KoR and the clan.

 

Magnificent post. He put so much time and effort into establishing his Temple, and from what we can see it was a very impressive structure. He was well on his way creating a new generation of Jedi. He did achieve something after ROTJ - it was just taken from him. That was his big moment. Once the Temple was burnt down, his enthusiasm was gone. And you can’t blame him.

 

The big question is will the KoR jon Kylo in a battle against the FO or will they fight Kylo? Fighting Kylo would be a retread of fighting Snoke’s guards. I’d be surprised if they did that. The KoR and Kylo fighting the FO would be more interesting.

 

The problem with the Knights of Ren is the same as you get with the Praetorian Guard - a large group needs to fight another large group or the choreography is problematic. Even Maul vs Obi-Wan and Qui-Gonn suffered a little. The only real way to do that, seeing as it is possible / plausible that they are Luke's old students and therefore somewhat Force-y, is to have Rey train a bunch of new Jedi and I don't see that happening, even with a time jump. This is personal battle, on a number of different levels, between Rey and Kylo, which would be diluted by having hoardes of Force sensitives running around with lightsabres.

They are the Boba Fett of the ST. Lots of people like them, but don't know why, because we know next to nothing about them. They looked cool standing around in the rain though.

 

The thing that I find the most unsettling about the Knights of Ren is that you can’t tell if they’re making funny faces at you behind their masks. They could all be giving us raspberries for all we know. Not cool.

 

The TLJ novelization states that Snoke and Kylo are the only Force users who existed in the First Order, so it doesn't seem like the Knights are Force users (which might explain why they're not using lightsabers in the TFA Force vision).

 

They could also be separate from the first order.

 

Yeah, I don't think they're a part of the FO. Adam Driver said that they're a "satellite group".

“was a group that existed before him, that he was a part of. Their place within everything is maybe more of a satellite group than I would say … This is really tricky.”

http://www.slashfilm.com/star-wars-episode-8-theories/3/

 

I don't think Luke built any temple, he simply occupied some church or past Jedi temple.

I think Ben was more a student of history and probably plucked ideas from there. His lightsaber was a design inspired from those found on Malachor so its likely the names and designs are coming from the Galactic Empire to some more ancient .

Luke didnt take any students until well after ROTJ . And it was only some point after Ben was born that he eventually did.

"For many years there was balance. I took no Padawans, and no darkness rose. But then I saw Ben, my nephew - with that mighty Skywalker blood. In my hubris I thought I could train him, I could pass on my strengths. I might not be the last Jedi."

 

According to the visual dictionary Luke gathered other force sensitive people for his Jedi Order before deciding to train Ben. "Luke began his travels, largely disappearing from galactic view. During this lengthy journey, Skywalker gathered disciples who would go on to become his first true students".

 

I suppose Luke and his students didn't build the temple themselves, but used this place, whatever it is...anyway....i think i might be asbolutely wrong and this is canto bight instead but...is this the temple set? which wouldn't make sense since it's only background stuff so i guess it's some place from canto bight? the sta that gles? makes more sense...but still....i feel stupid not knowing although it might be obvious haha


Now for those Knights of Ren, i don't think they're part of the FO at all. So they might be force users after all...or not....hope JJ will include them in ep9 or else it's a waste of interesting mysterious characters!!! Only problem is that since they had praetorian guards with melee weapons in the last jedi, they have to sort out how to include the knights without them feeling like a deja vu....

 

I think they are the characters that this trilogy now desperately needs, after the plodding, boring TLJ. They could have been in that movie, in some way and it would have helped continuity. If time was a reason, there are many bits that could have been removed to make room and TLJ would not have suffered, but would have been improved (yes, I don't like TLJ, one little bit).

So if they are in IX, The Knights of Ren, can be depicted as total badasses, just like Phasma should have been and like Fett was. But I want them to have better deaths than Phas and Fett!

Their presence could add so much menace!