ST The New Definitely Not Improved Even More Horrible Than The Last Two Rumors Thread

MSW regarding Rey and Kylo: "The idea seems to be that their 'emotional tie' and increased power makes it so that Snoke is no longer necessary."

TLJ shows Rey and Kylo make this connection one last time after Snoke is dead. The writers may have been setting this up. Most likely, it is because of "increased power" or something similar. Also possible, I suppose, is that Palpatine is involved.

 

Hm, this is kinda interesting. Probably only works if Sheev did indeed literally create Anakin from nothing using all that Plagueis force-mojo (I always kinda leaned toward the notion he didn't, first became aware of him in EpI - but there's wiggle-room there due to EpIII), but liking that conceptually.

Somehow even with Kylo going down the path he has, he's got this destiny of being the only one to be able to bring down Palpatine for good.

Then again, it both kind of cheapens Rey and plants itself in that whole "it's the bloodline that matters, not deeds" camp which I sorta hate, so blahhh. Buuut it's definitely interesting, could see something like that being a possibility.

 

I guess its all down to the execution of the idea, but I don't know how I really feel about the idea of "Flash Fighting". I swing more towards not liking this idea and there are thousands of ideas for a better story. Is the execution going to be like the Hayden Christensen movie Jumper - except battling with lightsabers the whole way? That movie was okay I guess, but it never really resonated with me that much.

And why do this to the overall story though? Just because it is the end of the "Skywalker Saga", it doesn't mean its the end of the Star Wars universe. Life goes on regardless without a Skywalker as new good Force Users will rise; as will new Dark Side Force Users. So why create this "greatest hits" rubbish? Why not leave the Star Wars universe with the possibility of something else bad beginning to stir, or shows them (the Resistance) rebuilding the galaxy into something new? Show some kind of scene of "continuity" - where it shows a rough sketch in where the future of the Star Wars universe is heading; good or bad (side).

I guess it may be too late now if that's what JJ has created and filmed, but he needs to take into account that the story does not stop at a Skywalker. And to me, a greatest hits reel of "Flash Fighting" speaks the word "finality" - and this is the wrong approach.

 

It's pretty weak storytelling if it was Snoke who was bringing them together in TLJ, but now they're so powerful they can do it themselves. That's just weirdly convenient. Given they did have that one last connection after Snoke was dead, it would actually make perfect sense if Snoke was actually Palpatine. Then you could explain it by saying it was Palpatine inhabiting Snoke who did it, and then after Snoke was killed, Palpatine's spirit lived on, which was why Rey and Kylo connected even after Snoke was dead. It was Palpatine all along.

 

Or Snoke merely created the bridge and once it's created it doesn't need the creator to maintain it. Or Snoke was full of it and just found out it was happening and used it to try to manipulate Kylo.

 

Also, Palpatine could have been reaching out to him as some kind of Force Ghost Thing through Vader's helmet, pretending to be Vader the whole time. Telling him he's found a way Kylo could bring his grandfather back. If you just get this thing... and take it here....and do this thing.....etc. until it turns out Palpatine has just deceived him into reviving him....

 

Yeah, these are explanations, but they feel just as convenient to me.

 

Yeah, the whole thing still works. Snoke opened the door, it didn't necessarily end once he died. Same deal as Ben trying the mind-probe on Rey in TFA, she figured it out in the moment and was able to turn it back on him. She probably couldn't have probed Ben's mind if he hadn't tried it on her first.

 

I would say the first example I provided is more than convenient. It is, and was always, the most logical reading of the phenomena once Snoke reveals that he had bridged their minds. In the real world, when you build a bridge you can just leave it be for the most part and it keeps working.

 

So it seems that Han might be appearing to Kylo in some sort of dream or vision.

https://makingstarwars.net/2019/04/...-comeback-in-star-wars-the-rise-of-skywalker/

 

Every new “leak” makes me sicker than the last, frankly. That Han one most of all.

I’m sorry, Kylo Ren getting some heroic redemption is absolutely appalling.

 

It completely depends upon how it's done. If it involves self sacrifice where he takes down Palpatine and the First Order with him I don't see how it is any different than Vader's redemption.

I like the idea of Luke working to redeem Kylo.

 

How is it, in theory, any more appalling than the redemption Vader received at the end of Return of the Jedi? Up to that point, we'd seen him torture Leia (who we'd later find out is his daughter), stand by as a planet was destroyed, kill Obi-Wan, torture Han and put him in carbon freeze even though it could have killed him, maim Luke only moments before revealing he was his father, and threaten to turn Leia to the Dark Side in an effort to goad Luke into fighting him. That's not counting everything he did as Anakin, which included slaughtering an entire tribe of Sand People, helping wipe out the Jedi Order and personally killing the younglings, and Force choking his wife to the point of unconsciousness. And yet the majority of fans seem to be completely in favor of and accept his redemption, and widely regard it as a happy ending; how is Kylo any less redeemable? Isn't Star Wars essentially a story about redemption and forgiveness at its core?

 

'Cause Anakin didn't kill hundreds of people including children, choke women, summarily execute officers over virtually nothing or anything. Redemption was okay for him.

But Ben, that's a bridge too far.

EDIT: ^ PymParticles nailed it.

 

The amount of 'awh poor baby Kylo' in the previous two movies was already pretty ridiculous. Might as well go for the hat trick of repetition! I probably wouldn't have had as much of a problem with it if they hadn't been shoving it down our throats which the OT never did until late in the game. The guy still needs to receive his comeuppance/punishment which he never has yet.

 

You can be redeemed and punished at the same time, y'know?

He's probably not just going to end up prancing around happily among the sugarplums & fairies by the time the dust settles.

 

Just saw a long article from SyFy Wire that not only was so wrong on the religion vs spirituality in TLJ, and said it was okay to hate TLJ but you were wrong if you did, but also trotted out, yet again,”abuse and neglect at the hands of those closest to him” about “Ben Solo” and again, where is any of this in canon except in JJ and Adam’s comments, which aren’t canon?

 

Yeah, I don't foresee Kylo getting a happy ending. Even if he returns to the light, the best life he can possibly hope to achieve is one of isolation, lifelong guilt and remorse, and probably some form of continuing penance or atonement.

I just read the article you mentioned, and while I do agree with you that it's unnecessarily dismissive towards those who don't like the film, because this is all our subjective reactions to art and by definition none of us are right or wrong for our preferences, I don't agree it's "so wrong on the religion vs. spirituality in TLJ." I actually find myself largely agreeing with it, apart from a few factual inaccuracies. The article's reading of Rey as potentially representing a new kind of Jedi that's detached from a strict, hierarchical Order, but are instead concerned with their own personal relationship with the Force, is a reading of the film's commentary on the Jedi that I share, and something I've said many times on here that I hope is developed in TROS.

 

But that was already where Luke was in ROTJ, then suddenly he’s dogmatic follower of the old ways, when no one has ever explained how he would even know about what the PT Jedi did. My argument isn’t so much with the article as it is the ST.

Well, and anyone who spouts that nonsense about “Ben Solo” and “abuse and neglect,” I wouldn’t credit their opinion in any case

 

What's been dogmatic about Luke's approach in the ST though?

Seems he's shunned all of that pretty heavily. Like he thinks the texts are probably important (until Yoda pours cold water on that), but that's different to him buying into all the stuff the Jedi had become by the prequels. The books seemed to go back thousands of years before all that became a problem, they were more the pure original philosophic stuff.

As for how he learned about the PT events, lots of ways that could go. He's been communing with Yoda (even if not for quite a while by the time of TLJ), he's read other source material he's got his hands on, meditation/visions/force shiz, plenty of room for that to be logical. It's been 32/33 years, and from what we know he was probably pretty proactive all that time until about 6 years prior to TFA. 26 years-ish to work with there, lots he could accomplish/unlock in that amount of time.

 

I mean, he has nothing to go off of but the teachings of Yoda and Obi-Wan. I doubt they just stopped appearing to him; in all likelihood, they told him how it was done, gave him guidance, and I'm sure he searched out any lead he could find as to what the old Jedi Order was like. This isn't something we need to be told or shown in film, it's pretty easy to extrapolate. Yes, he had a moment of Jedi purity when he threw aside his lightsaber, but he's still essentially a product of the old institution who more or less believes in that institution. I completely get where you're coming from, but even in the old EU, he mostly just resurrected the old Jedi as they were, with the caveat that he let everyone get married. It's not hard to see him doing more or less the same thing here, and it seems to be what even Lucas had in mind for him.

As for Ben, I don't believe for a moment he was abused (unless you count the moment of weakness where Luke was tempted to kill him as abuse, which I don't), but I think neglect might be a reasonable assumption from the films. Clearly something was pushing him closer and closer towards the Dark Side, and unless TROS reveals there was something else going on, I think him feeling neglected by his family while simultaneously being treated with recognition and appreciation by someone like Snoke is a reasonable conclusion as to why. This doesn't necessarily mean he was neglected Oliver Twist style, left to starve and fend for himself, or that Han and Leia were bad parents/Luke was a bad mentor, but that the kind of love he was receiving from his family wasn't what he needed, or what they were trying to give him wasn't being felt. And no, that doesn't excuse his actions in the slightest; they're his responsibility, and whether he attempts to redeem himself or not, he needs to own them as his own doing and no one else's. But regardless, no one does what he did for nothing, and so reasonably there has to be a cause; him feeling neglected is the Occam's Razor simplest answer, and it's reinforced in film by dialogue like Leia saying, "I never should have sent him away," or Kylo telling Rey, "You feel like he's the father you never had. He would have disappointed you."

I'm totally willing to own up to being wrong if TROS reveals some other cause for his turn, but as of now and going off of the two films available to us, that seems to me the obvious reading.

 

Yeah. I'm smelling more just "he always felt neglected even though in reality he wasn't" type of thing. Leia with her political duties/necessities, Han as a fighter then a racer/businessman, whatever, they loved him and did indeed spend as much time with him as they humanly could, but it wasn't enough for a guy like Ben. He's just that type of guy, warped perceptions, it wouldn't ever be enough.

Throw in some potential Palpatine stoking of those feelings over the years (from birth, if that hint in the books pans out) and the family legacy of indulging the darkside and flirting with it respectively, you've got a powderkeg.

 

The TLJ novelization went with the idea that Ben was already messed up before Leia sent him away to Luke, as I linked to in my previous post. Here it is again THOUGH it may not matter as the movies take priority over the novelizations and I haven't been too impressed with how they've been keeping stuff consistent (like why did Luke have to discover this for himself):

https://books.google.com/books?id=fd80DwAAQBAJ

 

I know my Xena analogies may fall on deaf ears, but it's a great reference point for Kylo's potential "redemption."

Xena was an outright mass murdering villain before she became a hero. But she wasn't "forgiven" for her sins as soon as she turned good. In fact, she was constantly confronted with her past for the rest of her life. No matter how many people she saved, there were always people who hated her for her past crimes. And she was okay with that. In fact, she never fully forgave herself either -- that's what made her heroic.

In other words, redemption is a path, not an event. Kylo being "redeemed" in TROS doesn't mean his sins have now been erased and he's free to live a happy life. It just means he's seen the error of his ways and will try to do good deeds from now on. I prefer to see the Skywalker saga end with a positive message about it never being too late to do the right thing rather than a simple "kill the bad guy" ending.

 

Vader's helmet involved in Ben Solo's return to the light?

Maybe its a bait, and this Luke is 'Luke'.



This 'Alzmann' is artist Christian Alzmann.