ST Kylo Ren/Adam Driver Discussion Thread

Darth PJ · May 4, 2025 at 10:37 PM

DarkGingerJedi said: ↑

JJ's "opposite day" school of character building is basically: Vader starts out confident and ends conflicted, so Kylo starts out conflicted but will end up confident. BOOM!

This shows how JJ completely misunderstood Vader, as a character, on every level. And we all know this because Vader didn't actually start out confident. JJ would know this too, if he had watched the PT, where we see Anakin as a conflicted hot mess of emotions about turning to the dark side. But he doesn't care about the character the second before he shows up in ANH. He just cares about Uber Vader in ANH. and remembers him being conflicted about emotions in ROTJ. And that lack of care for the character outside of the suit, clearly shows by the lack of Anakin existing in any form in TFA or the ST.

And the same largely goes for Kylo. His backstory about how he got to this point is largely immaterial and unimportant to JJ, which is why none exists. Just as Vader's backstory is to JJ in ANH. He doesn't really care about Anakin, doesn't really care about the seduction part. Doesn't even care about any of the teases into his character journey that happen in ANH, or why he might actually befit a later redemption or want to save his son.

This is why the character of Kylo fundamentally doesn't work. Because he's not really a character. It's not an creative exercise in seeing what Anakin's grandson might be like 30 years after the events of ROTJ, and how he might genuinely have a totally different dark side journey than his grandpa. Its a screenplay thought experiment about what is taking place in ANH and nothing more.

And in to be honest, this is how he creates all of this characters. It's not just Rey who is mystery boxed, they all are. None of them really have full-fleshed out backstories about how their characters got to TFA. None of them feel attached to the end of ROTJ, and none of them feel like they exist 30 years later. Not Han. Not Leia. Certainly not Luke (who had the foolishness to try and offer JJ an explanation on why Luke might be on that island, at least for the actor's own emotional investment in playing the part 'correctly"). Nope. Not Poe. Not Finn (his 'backstory' takes in the present so its not really a backstory, just an intriguing character set up).

If JJ were really interested in doing a story about the opposite of Vader, it would be someone (perhaps mentored by Anakin and certainly Luke, who didn't turn to evil, but instead stayed good, rose up, saved the galaxy, and was an amazing Jedi (like Obi-wan or something).
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You articulated it better than I…

Lightstrike · May 5, 2025 at 3:17 AM

Concerning Reylo, I think that's something that just happened by default.
If you look at the romantic pairings for Disney's filmography, you'll notice that there has never been a black prince.
The only animated Disney movie with a black princess, The Princess of the Frog (2009), has a south Asian prince (Prince Naveen).

In addition, for the live action films where the princess was race swapped (Cinderella (1997), The Little Mermaid (2023), Snow White (2025)), the prince either remained white or was race swapped to Asian.

It seems that there may be an internal policy that prohibits black men as romantic leads in Disney films for whatever reason.
Therefore, FinnRey was never a possibility and by default Lucasfilm went with Reylo.

godisawesome · May 5, 2025 at 6:27 AM

Lightstrike said: ↑

Concerning Reylo, I think that's something that just happened by default.
If you look at the romantic pairings for Disney's filmography, you'll notice that there has never been a black prince.
The only animated Disney movie with a black princess, The Princess of the Frog (2009), has a south Asian prince (Prince Naveen).

In addition, for the live action films where the princess was race swapped (Cinderella (1997), The Little Mermaid (2023), Snow White (2025)), the prince either remained white or was race swapped to Asian.

It seems that there may be an internal policy that prohibits black men as romantic leads in Disney films for whatever reason.
Therefore, FinnRey was never a possibility and by default Lucasfilm went with Reylo.
Click to expand...

I feel certain that systemic racism against Finn played a major part, as you said, but...

I think its probably still more a default of "do whatever gets Ben Solo 'over' with fans" specifically behind the films' version Reylo, especially considering that "Finn can't be a Disney Prince" has no bearing on the "To exploit, waste and pimp out our female supposed main character in service of a fascist mass murderer who assaulted her, or not to do that?" question.

Trevorrow's attempt to establish Poe as her romantic interest in his Duel of the Fates script follows more in line with "it just can't be Finn."

Instead, we got Reylo in TROS, and even before that in TLJ - in a rushed, hurried, inorganic and toxic manner because it was likely more about trying to put focus on Kylo than actually trying to write a functional romance.

anakinfansince1983 · May 5, 2025 at 7:25 AM

Lightstrike said: ↑

Concerning Reylo, I think that's something that just happened by default.
If you look at the romantic pairings for Disney's filmography, you'll notice that there has never been a black prince.
The only animated Disney movie with a black princess, The Princess of the Frog (2009), has a south Asian prince (Prince Naveen).

In addition, for the live action films where the princess was race swapped (Cinderella (1997), The Little Mermaid (2023), Snow White (2025)), the prince either remained white or was race swapped to Asian.

It seems that there may be an internal policy that prohibits black men as romantic leads in Disney films for whatever reason.
Therefore, FinnRey was never a possibility and by default Lucasfilm went with Reylo.
Click to expand...

“Whatever reason” is a funny way to spell “racism” or “coddling racists.” Not saying you’re wrong though.

DarkGingerJedi · May 5, 2025 at 7:38 AM

I don't think this is something that happens by "default". That's what systemic racism basically boils down to.

That's actually why I was impressed with the ending of TFA. I was like "wow, White girl kisses black guy in a Disney movie. They usually don't do this kind of thing. Good. About time".

But I don't think they knew what they had until after the movie came out. I don't think they really ever quite saw the chemistry with JB and how he interacted with Rey and Poe before hand the movie really came out, or at least not as much. And that's when their reaction came. That's when someone, through intention or extreme bias, put the Rey/Finn thing to rest and they went back to their 'normal' rules for this kind of thing and ordered/pushed for Rey and Kylo instead.

I Are The Internets · May 5, 2025 at 7:47 AM

Disney is the definition of "passive progressive"

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ST Kylo Ren/Adam Driver Discussion Thread

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