ST Kelly Marie Tran (Rose Tico) in Episode IX

@vncredleader I don't think the Resistance hangs deserters. Who knows what they do with them? But the sentiment in this thread was that Finn got off easy because the Resistance only tazed him for deserting (even though we never even learn if he enlisted or if the Resistance has a formal method of enlistment) rather than killed him. I was stating that I think it would be wrong for them to kill deserters and also that I think it's wrong for them to taze deserters. I prefer the ESB approach of letting people go if they want to go. Also I don't think it's fair for them to stop Finn when their plan doesn't involve using pods, the ship is in distress, and quite frankly he never signed up for their cause and has already helped them more than they could justly ask for. Finn is someone who spent his life in service to one military organization not voluntarily. I don't think it's cool that he should have to be immediately compelled to serve another one or be judged a coward or whatever. That's just a mindset that is honestly anathema to me on a fundamental level.

@Ender_and_Bean I think the thing with Rose for me is that she does have flaws and to me she does do things that are at least morally questionable, so if she is going to be given free pass to over and over lecture Finn and bring up the fact that she sees him as a coward/deserter (never mind that it took a ton of courage for him leave the First Order), he should be given a chance to call her out for the problematic things she does and beliefs that she has. To me, it's a matter of fair is far or what's good for the gander is good for the goose.

 

I think Rose knew Finn used to be a stormtrooper since she admires (or pretends to) him for leaving the First Order. So, I had the impression that she knew who he was and tazed him anyway. Then spent much of the rest of the film calling him a coward and accusing him of always looking for ways to escape. I also just in general wasn't a fan of how the Resistance was portrayed in TLJ. They seemed way too militaristic like the First Order for my tastes. Even Leia had turned into someone who slapped subordinates.

 

Yes. This is also true of DJ. Both characters were there to serve Finn's story and offer him different points of view. Rose was the self sacrificing idealist, pushing Finn towards empathy and heroism. DJ was the self-serving cynic, pushing Finn towards apathy and self interest.

 

Agreed.

 

@Pro Scoundrel The problem for me is that I don't see any empathy from Rose toward Finn, and if she's meant to be teaching Finn about empathy, she should be practicing what she preaches instead of tazing him and making jokes about his traumas especially since she probably wouldn't like it if Finn used her past traumas as material for his jokes. I don't really see much empathy from Rose in TLJ. Mostly I see lectures and tazing from her. The narrative treats Rose as if she is teaching Finn these great, profound lessons, but to me, what the movie actually shows Rose doing doesn't really support that narrative. I get that she's the mouthpiece for the director but that mainly makes me roll my eyes.

@Ender_and_Bean Oh, I get that Rose continually mocking Finn as a deserter/coward was supposed to be a funny little running joke but the problem for me is that it turns what I consider the most heroic and brave thing Finn ever did into some sort of running joke, which suggests to me that Rose and Rian don't actually have that much respect for Finn, and that's a problem for me because I do respect Finn as a character, him having earned my respect in TFA just by being a trooper who dared to question and break free of his training. (Of course in TLJ the theme seems to be to question nothing and just submit to the ultimately ineffectual plan of your superiors like a good solider/citizen, so maybe that is why Finn needs to be "fixed" in TLJ since his capacity for critical thought is unacceptable in a good solider/citizen). It also just comes across to me as Rose being given a free pass to poke fun at Finn's past trauma of being kidnapped and turned into a child soldier when I know she probably wouldn't like it if Finn made fun of one of her past traumas like losing her sister. Maybe Rose could display some actual empathy and respect for Finn if she's supposed to be his friend or anything more than that? I don't think that should be too much to ask if I'm supposed to sympathize with Rose as a character nonetheless want to see her romantically paired with Finn.

The Rose/Finn dynamic didn't remind me of the Leia/Han one because the banter in the Leia/Han relationship was mutual, going both ways, while in the Rose/Finn dynamic the banter feels very one-sided with Rose being given carte blanche to "joke" about Finn while Finn isn't given a chance to make jokes at Rose's expense. Why not? Is what's good for the gander not good for the goose? I also don't really buy the "it's just a joke" excuse to explain away Rose mocking Finn for his past trauma and the bravest thing he ever did since plenty of emotionally abusive people use the "I was just joking" excuse to cover up bullying behavior. So, for a Han/Leia dynamic, I would've wanted the banter to be mutual and also not focused on making a mockery of Finn's past traumas and greatest act of courage.

Overall, I liked the Leia and Poe dynamic. Even the rest of the scene with the slap could probably have worked for me, but the slap just took me right out of the scene. It was just one of those moments that felt very wrong to me. I would agree Leia's costuming in TLJ is superior to what it was in TFA. TFA Leia garb was very bleak and uninspired in my opinion, which made it easily the worst Leia wardrobe in Star Wars in my ranking of that.

@Bor Mullet Honestly, Connix was probably my favorite female character in TLJ. She didn't taze or slap anyone on her own side (that I recall), her friendship with Poe came across as mutually respectful to me, she didn't embark on a quest to save the soul of a mass-murdering Dark Sider, and her decisions always made at least some sense to me throughout the film. That may be a low bar to clear but at least she cleared it.

@vncredleader I think for me it's a matter of unless Rose knew that Finn had signed up then she shouldn't have tazed him. I get that she thought he was a deserter but she was wrong to think that, and, therefore to me, wrong to taze him. I also don't like the portrayal of the Resistance as a group of people who taze members for not being onboard with what turns out to be a complete failure of a plan that gets the Resistance decimated (and would have killed the Resistance entirely if deus machina Rey and Luke hadn't shown up in the nick of time to save the day if we consider a little group of survivors on the Falcon saving the day but the narrative demands that we do, so we'll run with that interpretation, I suppose). The message to me seems to be that to be a good soldier/citizen I should turn off my brain and never ask questions even in the face of poorly communicated plans that turn out to be as poorly conceived as they were communicated. That happens to be a message I don't agree with as someone who likes to use my brain to think critically.

As to Finn, I don't think that he has an obligation to go from one militaristic organization that brainwashed him since childhood to the next one that demands he fall in lockstep without questioning. Sure, the Resistance purports to represent all that is good and noble in the galaxy, but I can imagine that Finn was raised with First Order propaganda and so might be skeptical about such claims. Anyone can claim to represent all that is good and noble in the galaxy but that can just mean they have a strong spin department, so of course given his past experiences and trauma, Finn is going to be slow to trust the Resistance. I think he should be allowed time to reflect before being expected to devote his life to serving the Resistance.

I also don't agree with comparisons to Han. Finn is dealing with the trauma of being raised against his will to be a First Order trooper since childhood and his motive is to save a person he cares about, Rey (so he is trying to save what he loves as genius Rose puts it). This motive makes a lot more sense to me than for instance Rey's to save Kylo's soul yet the narrative sympathizes with Rey's decision to save Kylo much more than it does Finn's desire to save Rey, which to me suggests that Rian held Kylo in higher esteem than either Rey (who apparently isn't worth saving) or Finn (who had the nerve to have a friend he cared about, the horror). Han by contrast is someone who comes across to me as selfish and jaded but ends up saving his friends at the end of ANH. Oddly enough when Han cares about saving his friends, he doesn't get called a coward or selfish. So, to me, Finn is being called a selfish coward for doing what we saw from Han at the end of ANH because at the end of ANH I think Han only cared about saving his friends, not fighting the Empire. And I'm okay with that from both Han and Finn since friendships are important in life. Sometimes more important than blind allegiance to militaristic organizations that demand one falls into lockstep without questioning.

 

@cerealbox, sure, she admires (like a girl with a crush) Finn for deserting the First Order, but the problem for me is that she lacks the ability to make the logical or emotional leap from understanding that Finn as someone who just got out of being a brainwashed stormtrooper might not want to immediately fall into lockstep with her militaristic organization. So, she proceeds to taze and deride him throughout the rest of the movie. That's the problem for me. That people are somehow only deserving of respect and empathy if they want to fall in lockstep with a militaristic organization. If they don't, it's okay to taze them, mock their past traumas, and deliver condescending lectures to them. Yeah, if I knew a person like Rose, I wouldn't call her a friend. More a colossal annoyance I'd steer clear of whenever possible. The rest of the time I'd be sure to stand up for myself whenever she felt the need to condescend to me.

Finn lies to her because she's a stranger standing in the way of his effort to save Rey. Finn doesn't have an obligation to stay with the Resistance (especially since the Resistance turns out to have a terrible plan that is a total failure, so a smart person would have fled the situation in my opinion) and the main reason the Resistance members will die is because of poor leadership from people like Holdo rather than Finn fleeing. The problem in the Resistance and really the galaxy isn't people like Finn not falling into lockstep. It's people like Holdo who are ineffective leaders requiring blind obedience to a militaristic organization.

I think the problem for me is that we don't see Finn's side represented at all and also that for me Rose's ideology is kind of a toxic one. So, the script requires me, like Finn, to fall in lockstep with an ideology that frankly doesn't resonate with me.

@Ender_and_Bean, I think a core problem for me is that the thing Rose mocks Finn for is the exact same offense the First Order hates Finn for so in many ways she views Finn in the same way as the First Order: someone who is expected to blindly fall into lockstep with a militaristic organization and should be punished if he doesn't. The Resistance's punishments are milder than the First Order's but a lot of the ideology is the same. There's an irony here, and I think Rose is missing it. As is Rian probably.

I agree that Finn's personality isn't like Han's in the sense that he isn't a smart aleck but then a relationship where he's being made the butt of jokes all the time to me doesn't strike me as a good or healthy one for Finn to be in especially since in real life if I knew a couple where one party constantly made fun of the other party that never felt comfortable making the same types of jokes in return, I'd not view that relationship in a positive light. I also think it's worth noticing that Leia treats Luke differently than she does Han in part because Han shows himself her equal in engaging that banter. Leia's characterization is fine to me because she comes across as someone who will give as good as she gets whereas Rose tends to seem to me like someone who can dish out jokes but I suspect can't take them. I don't have a problem with the first type of people (where I live, many of us are kind of raised like that and have to try to tone it down when we go elsewhere) but the second type of person will really lose my respect quite quickly. So if I get that vibe from a character, I'm less disposed to like that character.

I didn't really enjoy seeing Finn get tazed by BB-8 in TFA (I thought that was kind of tone-deaf given current political events) so to me seeing Rose repeat that was like doubling down on past mistakes. I will say that I think Rose is a better character than BB-8, though. Rose at least has a backstory that explains her motivations and behavior as well as some original aspects to her character that I like while BB-8 is like the dollar store knockoff of R2-D2.

@Bor Mullet When they are on the First Order ship, Finn wisely points out that he knows where the escape pods are, which is relevant information, and Rose takes that time to offer a snide, unconstructive dig about how of course he would know that. Implication obviously being he is a coward who always knows how to escape. This despite all the time they've spent together through that point in the film which should have made her realize he isn't a coward at all. I wish Finn had told her something along the lines of: "Yes, Rose, you see sometimes it's useful to know how to escape militaristic organizations that demand unquestioning obedience like the First Order or the Resistance." It's what I would have said in his shoes.

 

@Bor Mullet I guess I don't see what's so friendly about Rose poking fun at her friend's past traumas. If my friend thought they could poke fun about, say, my mom's alcoholism, they'd no longer be my friend in about five seconds flat. That would be the time it takes me to tell them they aren't my friend any more for failing to know what crosses a line with me.

 

That is a fair point. I think you are right that Rose does grow as a character by the end. I will be interested in seeing where her journey goes next as a character, so overall that is probably a compliment to her character that Rian created.

 

I agree that it's handled clumsily, which is how I consider most of the "humorous moments" in TLJ. I think it just comes down to not liking Rian's jokes that much, and his handling of "issues" being a bit too on the nose, and overt.

 

@Pro Scoundrel Yeah, I would agree with that. Rian and I don't seem to share much of a sense of humor, and his handling of issues does feel too overt as you put it for me. I will say in fairness that at least Rian does try to tackle some important issues. The handling of them for me is just fumbled. I can see the effort even if I find the execution lacking in many cases such as with Rose. With Rose especially there is some promising thought put into her background and how that connects with her motivations.

@Bor Mullet, I guess there are just certain things that are to me off limits. I wouldn't say to someone who had escaped an abusive relationship, "Always running away, aren't you?" as a joke. So everyone probably just draws the line somewhere different. What Rose said came across to me a little bit like that. I don't think Rose necessarily intended it maliciously but in the context of everything Finn had been through, it just seemed out of line to me. Perhaps the issue I have is more with Rian in a sense than with Rose.