ST Rey Skywalker/Daisy Ridley Discussion Thread

Rey in TFA = Quickly became a character I really liked and was intrigued by.

Rey in TLJ and ROS = Uuuuuhhhhhh, not so much.

 

Rey was a blank canvas early on and that’s often Star Wars fans favorite time for new characters. In part because some can project their own backstories and futures onto them but, for me, as Rey’s dark side interest grew following her mind probe of Kylo Ren/Ben and she continued to let the dark side in more and more and learn the truth of her dark family history she took off as a character of true intrigue. I loved her conflict by the end as one part of her was only interested in Ben Solo and doing what she get was right for the Jedi and the Skywalkers and the other only interested in ending Kylo Ren, and later, her grandfather for ending her parents lives. With still a third part of her worried she might succumb to it all.

 

Rey started out as a role model, and ended up as a pro-abuse psa. It's such a shame, because DR is really talented.

 

I think a lot of people saw Rey in TFA the way someone might look at a beautifully wrapped present under the Xmas tree. They could imagine whatever they wanted in there because they had no idea what it was. She was a big mystery & people just assigned whatever they wanted to her. Expectations and all.

 

A worthy foil for the best character in this trilogy.

 

a character challenged by choices, who confronted her past. The last Jedi choose her friends and mentors as family and not her birthright.

 

I really liked Rey in TFA. TLJ Rey is... not a character I enjoy much, but to be fair: I don't like anyone in TLJ. I went back to enjoying Rey in TROS, even with things I had issues with, as it's easy for headcanon to fix issues I had. I've already read fic that explored issues I had and answered them well.

 

I think it would have done the character some good if they'd allowed her to spend more time with Luke, and with her actual friends. That's when her character truly shined.

 

Her acting was really good in TROS. TROS had me kind of relieved after her TLJ characterisation tbh.

 

You’re pretty much where I was at. I was incredibly intrigued by her backstory and trajectory in TFA. I was astoundingly disappointed by the answers and arc (or lack thereof) in TLJ. And I was more than satisfied with her direction and conclusion in Episode 9.

 

What’s nice about movies with sequels is being able to watch an actor like Daisy grow in their field (and with their character). Since I am ambivalent about her taking the Skywalker name, Daisy Ridley’s earnest helps sell it. That being said, I think she does her best work with Adam; they feed off each other and hopefully that is a skill she can extract and apply to other screen partners going forward.

 

In the jedi prince books, we have the grandson of Palpatine (Ken) and also Palpatine's son (Triclops). The thing is, Ken's mother was a 'jedi princess'.

That's FG Leia at the end of TROS. There's also JJ's comment about the house of Skywalker and the house of Palpatine.
That's royal language. The Palpatine House was one of Naboo's royal houses...as were the Naberries. Anakin became a part of it, part of a House, when he married Padme.

Leia was a Naberrie (Naboo) and also an Organa (Alderaan). In TROS, Palpatine says after the duel 'the princess of Alderaan has disrupted my plans', and he's clearly talking about Leia...but Snoke was clearly talking about Luke in TLJ ('darkness rises and light to meet it...Skywalker, I assumed. Wrongly'), and yet he wasn't wrong. Not now.

Rey's possible royalty is never addressed, just her jedi path and her jedi path name, Skywalker. But Luke Skywalker, jedi master, had been royalty too.

There are several possibilities for Rey's mother -Leia herself, a Naberrie, some alderaanian princess. Originally,Leia knew who Rey was in TFA. (Rey's mother in TROS looks more like Beru or Breha or Sabé to me) But the question's there, I think, as was Luke&Leia's mother until it was answered in the prequels.

 

Rey being a foil for Kylo is part of the problem. He should be a foil for HER, because she is allegedly the protagonist. Or was, I guess we can stop pretending the ST is about Rey.

 

I loved how she fought to suppress her dark side self and he fought to suppress his light side self and both knew that about the other from being inside the other’s minds and from when their bodies became one in the hut before Luke broke up some much needed force stress release.

Thankfully they got to experience that connection with both on the light side of the force once more before the end.

 

The sequel trilogy was about Rey, she was the one at the end to complete the heroes journey. Just because another characters arc ended in the same place doesn’t discount Rey’s journey from nobody to the last jedi. The protagonist had a heroes journey (Rey) and the anatagonist had a redemption arc. Two completely different arcs that will always be intertwined.

 

Maybe it never was exclusively about Rey? Despite the generally held opinion that this trilogy had no plan or direction, I suspect that it was always planned as the two-hander we got.

 

I loved how Rey abandoned any pretense of self-respect and kissed her Nazi abuser.
/S
Rey was supposed to be a role model. Her arc is about fixing and kissing the evil fascist who tortured and violated her and yada yada yada.
Not a very interesting arc if one thinks a woman's character development shouldn't revolve around her abuser. Rather, I find it repulsive and regressive.

 

Kylo Ren died on the Death Star ruins. Han Solo’s son, Ben, who was a lot like his dad and who gave his life so that she may live is who she kissed.

 

The trilogy was always about Rey as the main hero. She is the one who defeats the villain in the end and she's the only character where all three titles of the trilogy relate to her.

Other characters are important, but Rey is the Luke Skywalker of this trilogy. Now, how her character was handled or done is open to interpretation. Do people think it was done well? That's a discussion. But it was her story.

 

I wanted Rey’s journey towards being a Jedi to be really arduous and punishing. Kind of like The Bride’s treatment at the hands of Pai Mei in Kill Bill Vol 2.

I was hoping that we would see her really down in the dirt with Luke barracking her relentlessly, and her questioning herself whether she could actually go on. I think that would have made for some great Star Wars.

The next best thing then was that she was put through the ringer by her adversary. In classic villain style he tried to manipulate her, fight her and break her will, but she overcame him. For me, she became a Jedi on DS2 when she didn’t leave him to die, she instead healed him. It was compassion that defeated cruelty, and thus ended Kylo Ren forever.