ST The relationship between Finn and Rey. SEE FIRST POST WARNING

Oh, absolutely. The FinnRey ship has got it all. Whatever you want, you got it. Best dinner menu around. Open bar 'til 2 am. About to have another scotch and ginger cocktail to wash down this burger and fries.

I totally agree. JJ, KK, and RJ (as well as Pablo Hidalgo) know that Finn and Rey were magic - not too often great chemistry like that happens and can translate so well over the big screen (especially when the basis of their bond is a wonderful friendship, which we know will lead to something more), so why suddenly change that by reducing Finn's screen time or spreading rumors of a LI, which we know is pure BS? Just doesn't make any sense. All it does is add more fuel to the haters' fire to the point they don't even acknowledge his name (and apparently misspell the names they DO mention) and he is lumped into 'so on'. Ugh.

 

Anyway, John was talking about how the next episode will require him to be "more physical", I am really excited about that. He will probably get to fight and I am hoping for an exploration of his stormtrooper background and the bad blood between him and Phasma. Finn and Phasma can do really well as a rivalry. John and Daisy are the only ones who are training already and are returning to the filming process soon so I am really hopeful about the next episode. I am curious to see how they will handle the aftereffects of Finn's coma.

 

Nah it really doesnt, but SW is back to being the biggest film property EVER, so all the media crows are circling trying to get a piece of something, even if it's complete garbage. I will be really happy when some actual news from a source other than Stan in his mom's basement comes down the wire

And cool I'll see y'all at breakfast, imma play poker in the ship casino lol.

 

They need to get Phasma in the mix, I mean Gwen Christie is too good to be just a chrome plated prop. Need to get that confrontation with Finn on camera, because we all know she gon' be pissed lol.

But yeah good to know that this movies gonna be physically taxing, that means lots of action scenes. Probably together

 

I've heard that Phasma actually had LESS of a role in TFA initially, and that they inserted a bit more for her once Gwendoline got cast. They've also confirmed her return I believe, and that she'll have a bigger role.

I could easily see Finn and Poe on some kind of important mission for Leia, and Phasma (who wants payback for Finn humiliating her last time) is leading the hunt for them.

 

The only think stopping me from likeing this, is that corny a#% joke Zero

 

Sue me I'm freaking corny sometimes lol.

 

I see that as a very likely scenario. Also, the whole Phasma thing got caught up in the merchandise hurricane. I don't think they knew how quickly fans would latch onto her.

 

Kind of like GL didn't anticipate Boba Fett becoming as popular as he did (by his own admission). And he admits that, had he known that at the time, that he'd have done things differently.

 

In regards to the sexual undertones of Reylo....the thing is that, the interrogation scene WAS being played for the audience to interpret the sexual nature of the encounter (The mature audience at least, kids may not have picked up on it). It's just that it was meant to be interpreted as an attempted assault...it was the complete opposite of a romantic sparring ala Han/Leia (Which, in hindsight, had some problematic aspects to it as well, it's just that 30 years ago people were more accepting of it).

Kylo saying "I can take what I want" wasn't meant to be a moment to swoon over him...she's strapped to a chair. He also says something about her being "so lonely at night". You don't have to be particularly intuitive to see what kind of imagery they are conjuring up. Kylo is trying to...probe Rey. She's resisting him. She eventually turns the tables and gets the upper hand. He's left embarrassed and...impotent.

It was flipping the "women in shackles" trope. It was a moment of girl power. It was a deconstruction of the typical Hollywood nonsense of the weak helpless woman being used by a powerful man. Same as this scene from The Avengers :


^ Whedon played this closer to comedy, while Abrams made sure for us to understand that Rey was vulnerable and in danger, but it pretty much served the same exact purpose.

For various reasons (Mostly wishful thinking), the Reylo shippers have tried to interpret this as some hint of sexual-chemistry between the characters. It couldn't be anything further away from that. If anything, this scene should have *killed* that ship (And in the minds of the high majority of the audience, it certainly did), but once again..wishful thinking.

And don't get me started on him knocking her out and carrying her away, as the guy she actually likes runs and screams her name.

Coincidentally (Or, actually not. As we've been stating, they put this stuff in for a reason.), who DOES get the Han/Leia-esque squabbling? Finn and Rey! Remember Leia's "let go of me!" and "my hands are dirty"?



The "stop holding my hand" moment was also meant to subvert a trope. So Finn assumes that she needs to be lead, when she clearly doesn't. Girl power! (And I don't say this in a negative way, in case that's not clear) The difference is that, in this circumstance, the subversion plays out in a light-hearted, positive manner, as opposed to the interrogation, when you thought that Kylo was about to essentially mind-rape Rey.

Rey still doesn't need to be lead...but when Finn asked her if she was okay, she immediately realizes that he genuinely was trying to help her, and may even be a little in need of a hand himself. The book/script shows that Rey is really taken back by him asking her if she was okay...nobody had ever done that before. So she extends HER hand to him. Wonderful subversion, and brought our characters closer together as opposed to pushing them apart.

Our ship has been so good at analyzing TFA and secondary materials. We don't really need to delve into the fan-fiction stuff. But I will say : I expect that hand-holding thing to come into play again at some point in the sequels. Maybe Rey really will need Finn to guide her at some point. Or maybe she'll need to lead him again, as a nice callback to this moment. Either way, I think we'll get some sort of reference to this, it just felt like such a powerful moment between them.

You'll notice that at 1:18, Rey's little flute motif is used. It's a straight up love theme, sounds like one, and it's used as such in the film.





^ JW knows.

Rey definitely got the most iconic motif in this film, but I expect that when all is said and done, we are gonna look back on "Finn's Confession" as being an *extremely* valuable piece of music in the trilogy.

Best thing about this ship is that we don't have to jump through hoops.

We are verified through the movie, script, and book!

Other ships are out here digging through Greek mythology and crap trying to find some sort of clue to justify their nonsense. And here we are, discussing things in the actual movie. Dialog, common cinematic tropes, camera angles, music, etc. It's wonderful....

*Gives digital Finnrey hug*

(That means that it lasts pretty much forever, or until Han interrupts us)

Yep! The breadcrumbs are there for a reason!

 

^

 

They're gonna hook up.

 

The roles spurring on the casting rumors couldn't have been significant. In terms of screen time, Luke will get as much time as Han did, Rey, Finn, Kylo, Poe, Hux, Leia will approximate the same, plus they'll need to be more Snoke, Cpt. Phasma, and introduce Benicio Del Toro's character. There couldn't have been much meat on the bones of the characters they were casting, which is why the roles were so difficult to cast, and ultimately not cast in favor of a rewrite/revision. It would seem all actors were interested until the characters and contracts had to be fleshed out. The drawback of accepting "bit player" roles in large films is that more often than not, much of those characters end up in the editing room floor. For a working actor, especially a young one, that would make a role, even in SW, a waste of their time.

Look at Gwendoline Christie. No disrespect to her or her performance but anyone could've played that role, but at the outset the thinking was...oh, Gwendoline Christie!

 

I kind of got the feeling the part was less significant when all of the bigger names started dropping out. And, as you mentioned, we really don't have room for any new major players. The ST cast as it stands is already more crowded than the OT cast ever was.

 

Yeah, I highly doubt that many up and coming actors would be that excited about a role where they're literally "hi" and "bye" after only a scene or two. Also, you're right, besides the three main stars, there's Luke, Poe, Leia, and all the support characters, plus whoever Benicio's character turns out to be (my money's on a pirate of some sort), and Phasma needs to be expanded also. It's just a lot to juggle and there's so much that was left open ended in TFA that they really need to focus on the story threads that exist, not add alot of new ones.

 

Yeah, with those characters alone, there is so much to deliver in terms of story and character development. There's already so much with Rey, Kylo Ren, and Finn. So to finish telling Luke and Leia's stories, plus the other new characters, that's so much to juggle at once. There's no way this new part could have as much development. So, unfortunately, they had to cut back. And you're right, that explains why things were changed and actresses did not accept the role, thinking they would have as much of a part as say, Hux or Poe, only to realize they may be reduced to a Maz sized role or even smaller.

And I feel bad for GC. She got Boba Fett'ed with that last scene with Han/Chewie/Finn. Wonder what RJ will cook up to make Phasma more believable as a bad ass. I've thought about this since watching TFA and reading BTA, but something is getting at me about this Finn/Phasma thing...maybe Phasma has more of a relationship with Finn from afar or behind the scenes than we thought, which explains why she just lowered the shields without putting up too much of a fight and warned him that he would regret doing that. Maybe she was the key person responsible for taking Finn in to the FO (and this is my imagination running overtime, but...maybe he would have been killed if the FO knew he was force-sensitive, so she advocated for him to stay. Or, maybe she knew Finn's parents and *sadly* killed them or witnessed them dying, and took him away before he died as well, which I know kind of mirrors Rey's back story but with the whole mirroring thing happening between Rey and Finn, it may not be too far-fetched). I don't know. Maybe I'm totally off and she has no history with Finn other than being his superior and in VIII, she'll want her revenge. But you never know...

 

In the novel or supplemental material, don't they point out that Finn is top of his class in everything, so she kind of takes him under her wing in a sense, looks after him? You kinda wonder if that aspect will be explored at all, because the impression the film left you with is they hated each other.

 

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This is an excellent post. So nice to see people analyzing FinnRey in this thread as opposed to just discussing Kylo Ren/Rey, which is what I seem to find whenever I venture in here. Maybe I just have bad timing.

Anyway, you raise very good points, even though I don't agree with all of them. I think even the staunchest of anti-Finn/Reyers need to acknowledge that there is a special connection between Finn and Rey. As to the nature of that connection, that remains to be seen and we can agree or not on that.

My question to you Nanosoft: what do you say about the moments that some view as Rey's friend-zoning of Finn? I know that has been discussed here, but I'm interested in hearing your take in particular since you've given this a lot of thought and have delivered a good analysis here.

 

Yeah, in BTA, they point out Finn's in the top 1% in everything and the only stormtrooper Phasma doesn't present any criticisms to after completing their training. In a way, this also makes the other stormtroopers resent Finn and make him even more of an outsider. Maybe RJ wanted those details left out of TFA? You'd think they would have included some quick dialogue to get across the import of Phasma's disappointment later on. I assume JJ and RJ agreed to let it go for now. Maybe those details will be saved for VIII when we learn more about Finn.

 

It adds an interesting dynamic between them, but yeah maybe they'll expand on it in ep8. Idk, I just want to see them do something interesting with her. She was in most people's minds the most dissapointing part of TFA, just because she was marketed so heavily and she stood around for a few scenes. Gotta fix that.

 

In my opinion, Finn should have won against TR-8R. Not easily, but is able to defeat him. Then, Phasma steps in. They fight. Phasma shows off her skills, proving she's a bad ass. Finn loses. Han and Chewie step in to save him. Phasma escapes. Later, on SKB, instead of Phasma lowering the shields, it's some random stormtrooper who does it and then gets put in the trash compactor. That way, Phasma is still a bad ass even though she isn't able to kill Finn or bring him back for reconditioning, and wants her revenge, just like Finn will most likely want his from Kylo Ren for hurting him and Rey.

 

The ONLY reason I would think those exact scenarios didn't play out, is that when they hired GC they already had all the sequences planned out, and seeing as how their schedule was pretty tight maybe they couldn't work in those adjustments. Because yeah, it only seems logical that Phasma fights Finn on Takodana. I was actually pretty shocked she wasn't even in that battle tbh.

 

she was too busy polishing her armor instead of going into battle

 

I agree with this. I have long assumed that the reason it wasn't Phasma is because Phasma being a character they differentiated with a cool actor and cool armor and lots of toys seemed like a more-or-less last minute decision. That would have been an opportunity to actually show her being a badass, because I don't recall a single scene of her being a badass in the movie… other than her moment with Finn at the beginning. She was sufficiently scary for a hot minute there, even though she wasn't doing anything physical. Even in the trailer I thought it was strange that we were getting a random super fight with a random stormtrooper.

I get why they did it though. Having Finn fight not with a superior officer, but with a peer that viewed him as a traitor, served a different purpose character-wise. Finn discussed stormtroopers like they were victims, kidnapped to be child soldiers. I like that that scene made it clear other stormtroopers don't share his views on the subject. As a huge Finn fan, I'm not even bothered that he lost. I don't want the light saber to lose all it's mystique, and TFA was full of amateurs running around acting like they have authority with the lightsaber. That was the first time Finn had ever laid eyes on a lightsaber, as far as I can tell. There's no journey if he's immediately an expert against an enemy trained with his weapon that repels the saber perfectly.

 

Me, too. If there was an opportune moment to have Phasma shine, that was it. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case due to the casting like you mentioned. And maybe it was once again, another one of RJ's modifications and he wanted to save Phasma being a BAMF for VIII.

Since John hinted that VIII is more dark, maybe we'll see a more evil Phasma. Maybe what we saw of Phasma in TFA was just a walk in the park with the Care Bears compared to the way she really is and what we'll see in VIII. Maybe she is one of the reasons why Finn after his awakening (besides Kylo Ren and seeing Slip die right before his eyes) wanted to get the hell out of there.