ST Kylo Ren/Adam Driver Discussion Thread

That "Han" (agian, remember, that was not Han Ben was talking to on the DS, just himself) would have to give an apology at all indicates Han did something wrong. As far as we know he did not. If anyone needs to apologize it's Ben, not Han.

Would you argue the same for Vader in ROTJ? Why does Kylo Ren deserve his so-called "issues" (which as far as we know from canon information existed soley in his head) being acknowledged but Vader did'nt?

 

And I disagree with you too.

I think there is a real broad spectrum in how a parent's actions can impact on a child; regardless if they come from a privleged position or not.

And I feel Ben's cant be dismissed with a customary handwave like JJ did. There were steps in his downfall and these issues played a part.

At least we got the full story with Anakin.

 

they were appealing to the 30 year old still living rent free in your parents basement but still hate them crowd.

 

The crimes Ben committed as Kylo in the time since his fall, relative to the minor and essentially non-existent nature of his issues, robb him of any right to feel he needs to have, let alone deserve, an apology or someone going "oh, poor Ben. I'm sorry your feelings got hurt by the imaginary issues you drempt up - we did our best as parents but that does'nt matter becuse you, a man in their thirties, don't think we tried hard enough."

Agian, Vader was not given such charity by the narrative upon his redemption, nor Ventress in Dark Disciple (nor any Darksider-turned-good in the old EU whom I can think of), so what makes Kylo so special? Why does he deserve to be coddled when they did'nt?

Sixteen years after the fact and applied in hindsight. When ROTJ came out we little to no information on Vader's fall - the ST is far more generous to Kylo then the OT was to Vader.

 

I agree that if you isolated and purely looked at Anakin's/Vader's story from an OT perspective, there is nothing in there for an audience to sympathise or emphathise with him. Even after Vader has done the only good and right thing that he has done throughout the entire trilogy in saving Luke from death, when he tells Luke to tell his sister that he (Luke) was right about him, the words ring hollow for the audience because one good deed does not make up for a trilogy's worth of evil. And at no point was Vader's story painted a good and potentially redeemable one; particularly from Luke's two mentors who had hinted of having considerable interaction with his father. At no point did Anakin or Yoda paint any sort of a rosy picture of Anakin - to the contrary, it was quite the opposite.

But the opening words of the crawl should have given one an insight that there was more to this story as the words "Episode 4" indicates there is more to be told. Had Lucas kept it at the OT, then I agree with you that there is nothing redeemable about Vader.

But then came the PT and Vader was given a sympathetic and empathetic back story that would ultimately add considerable weight to the ending of ROTJ and make his character arc one that could be the subject of redemption. The PT showed he had a vulnerability where losing those close to him had a considerable effect on him and that he would be prepared to make bad choices to prevent it from happening again. And this vulnerability was exploited with a promise and a lie of being able to achieve what he wanted if he joined the other side.

And for me, the sympathetic and empathetic back story of Anakin works and when I view his character arc over six films, I buy into his redemption and wanting it for him by the end of Jedi. Like a lot of older people, I can't "un-see" the OT because it came many years prior. So there are a moments where I can look at the OT and the OT + PT from isolated perspectives. But on the whole, I now look at the overall storyline in chronological order and I now view Anakin's/Vader's arc from Episode 1 and not Episode 4.

And for me, although I can buy into Anakin's redemption story, I can see the steps in how he fell and I can sympathise and empathise with him because the choice he made was not necessarily out of an evil thought or desire, I certainly don't agree with (nor condone) his choices and actions once he went by the name of Darth Vader. I view him as evil and psychotic and not as a good person during that time period. And the choices he makes and the actions he carries out, that is all on Anakin 100%. But I still buy into his redemption story and character arc conclusion at the end of Jedi.

And if I can buy into Anakin's, I can certainly buy into Ben's. Because despite being different circumstances, the journeys are essentially the same. Because Ben, like his grandfather, had a point of vulnerability that Palpatine could exploit and mindset that would buy into Palpatine's lies and promises and BS.

And like with Vader, I don't agree with Ben's choices and actions as he goes by the name of Kylo Ren. He is pure evil and owns 100% of his choices and actions. But also like Vader, there are steps that contributed to his fall and I can buy into his redemption story that has been condensed into three films rather than six.

And part of those steps and reasons involves the issues between Ben and his family. We got the "Luke issue" part that was well fleshed out by RJ. The "Han and Leia issue" part has of yet not been fleshed out. I'm hoping the novelization will correct that.

 

But even after the PT came out and gave Anakin that sympathy nobody (or at least nobody I've ever seen) is arguing that he was deserved an apology or an acknowladgement of his issues.

But here's the thing, and this is what it keeps coming back to - we don't actually know if there are any Han and Leia issues (or rather, any real issues that deserve to be acknowladged and apologized for), and from everything we've been lead to belive there are not; they were loving, caring parents who did their best and Ben's issues seem to be entirely in his head, based around envy and misplaced, unearned feelings of neglect. To expect Han, let alone a simulacrum of Han, to apologize for something that Ben dreamt up does'nt make Ben sympathetic, it just makes him a self-absorbed narcissist.

And agian, even if they had done something wrong unless what they did was of an immense magnitude the crimes and actions Ben commited as Kylo Ren (which, I'll remind you, include killing Han Solo*) rob him of any right to deserve anything from them.

(*which, agian, means if he got this apology in TROS it would just be Ben apologizing to himself becuse he was only imagining talking to Han in that scene, which automaticly deprives the moment of any meaning it could have held)

 

Tbh, Anakin deserved an apology from the whole jedi Council, including Obi-Wan.

Anakin was a good boy who was thrown under the bus by them because they feared his power. They regarded major input from him with dismay and dismissal. They did hold him back. I'm sure they had the best of intentions but were arrogant and ignorant about how to handle someone like him. The JC were so settled and confident in their place of the galaxy, they became legends.

The parallel with Ben is there too. Ben was too powerful for anyone to understand how to handle him. Luke admits to the same failures. Anakin was a small boy who was taken from his mother he loved most than anything in life at that point and sought belonging. The starry-eyed little one gave up his life of familiarity to belong to a group he idolised only to be constantly rejected by them. That was Palpatine's opening.

Anakin wanted to prove himself, which he did time and again and to what end? He was rejected to be a master, he was used as a political tool and a poster boy and when he pleaded to be present at the arrest of the chancellor he was told to go to his room and stay there... as if he did something wrong by coming forward and telling the JC that Palpatine was a sith. And what did we get from the JC? They attempted to kill Palpatine.

This always bugged me about the PT. And I often felt uncomfortable about the dialgoues between Anakin and Obi-Wan. As a master, he was constantly putting his student down. "Don' do this." "Don't do that." "How many times have I told you!" Yes, Obi-Wan did love Anakin. But was he able to be the parent Anakin needed? No. When Obi-Wan cut off Anakin's limbs what does he say? "I'm sorry but I'm doing this because I love you?"

I can't help but see the resemblence here in Ben's story too. Lot's of parental figures with good intentions but their fears and rejections are there just the same: against a boy who has too much power and is likely to be more scared than the grownups and is definitely more vulnerable than people who dismiss his story allow him to be. That was Palpatine's opening.

I quite like Luke's reflection in TLJ. I feel it was him voicing his wisdom about the past that allowed him to move on, understand that by sitting at home he achieves nothing what he is meant to do and move on. It gave his character a great arch and an 'end' he deserved.
"Lesson two. Now that they're extinct, the Jedi are romanticised, deified. But if you strip away the myth and look at their deeds, the legacy of the Jedi is failure. Hypocrisy, hubris. At the height of their powers, they allowed Darth Sidious to rise, create the Empire, and wipe them out. It was a Jedi Master who was responsible for the training and creation of Darth Vader."

As we say in training, the master fails more times than the beginner tries. Luke failed many times and was more able to reflect on it and acnowledge it than the JC ever did in the PT. But the operative word for him isn't just failed, it's also being able to learn from it and become someone better than he was before.

If people are able to accept Vader's redemption story based on the OT, that didn't work for me 40 years ago and still doesn't work for me now. If people are able to accept Vader's redemption story in the context of OT and PT together, that's fine. That makes sense because it's there, on display and I'm pretty sure most people sympathise with Anakin at that point.

It's against this backdrop that I am able to sympathise with Ben's story too. If I accept the similarities of their stories, then I can also accept that Ben didn't get the guidance he needed. As much as I love the Original3, there is nothing in the ST that tells me that they were good parents or bad parents, just that whateverthey tried, failed.
I don't think Kylo was a good persona, or someone who needs to be excused for his decisions and deeds. But then nor was Vader. We get pretty much the same amount of back story for both of them in their respective trilogies (OT and ST).

Some folks accept that Vader can be redeemed based on the retcon that is essentially the PT but refuse that anything similar that happens with the ST is inexcusable. I don't really see how that works in a logical way but that's just me. Seeing things differently is what makes the world go round.

p.s. In my previous post I didn't pretend that everyone who works in children's education or similar should have the same conclusions. @Generational Fan and I simply drew on our experiences, which influence our thinking. @anakinfansince1983 , please don't make sweeping generalisations about what I say. I speak for myself and not for any group, nor do I represent anyone else.

 

I have been enjoying the detailed, thoughtful posts. I have some of my own thoughts to add:

This is a very understandable and apt comparison for Kylo Ren. In my personal life I try to limit my exposure to people who behave like this, but there really are self-centered, entitled brats out there. One of the major issues i think we have all danced around is that this story does a horrible job illustrating how to treat them.

It is pretty much a fact of life that these kinds of people will crop up here and there, and someone will have to deal with them. They will be given chances for kindness and decency that they do not deserve. They will use up their chances until they either end up alone or surrounded only by other people like them. Preferably, they learn their lesson at some point and become a kind and decent person themselves. This is the struggle that Ben Solo goes through (but of course exaggerated for dramatic effect because STAR WARS).

While there is something to be said for forgiveness, Kylo's story ultimately validates a line of thinking that I strongly disagree with:
Doing bad things doesn't make you a bad person if you are actually a good person deep down.

This is a horrible mentality because it enables entitled brats to continue behaving horribly and gives no motivation to change. Even if Ben was in fact a good, kind and decent person deep down, and he did in fact do good after getting stabbed and all that, the trilogy still wants us to conclude that none of the bad things he did made him a bad person because he was actually a good person the whole time. His good deeds are supposed to be evidence of his inner goodness. This is how Rey treats him in the end. I take issue with this conclusion because I believe people should be judged on their actions and their intent. "Good" and "Bad" are things that we do, not things that we are. I don't even want or need to conclude that Ben was a bad person, or a good person. He deliberately did a lot of bad things for selfish reasons, even if he was feeling a pull to the Light. That's just a lot of bad.

I don't think Kylo really needs to be sympathetic to be a good character, and I don't think a good downfall necessarily needs to be sympathetic. A character can be good as long as they can elicit a meaningful reaction; loathing, disgust, or shame each can work as well as sympathy to make a character compelling. It would be fine to keep Kylo characterized as a self-centered, entitled brat as long as the narrative is in line with that. If anyone earnestly sympathizes with entitled brats, or perhaps gives that kind of person a pass because of their physical attractiveness, well, that's on them I guess. To be fair, I do find myself wanting to be able to sympathize with those kinds of people, but being unable to do so on account of them not giving me anything to work with. And so it is with Kylo for me.

Fair statement here. Its worth adding that acknowledgement is not necessarily apology. I would say that it doesn't even need to be Han to make the acknowledgement. In whatever way it might have been acknowledged, it would have served to deepen the viewer's disgust, or sympathy. Either way, it would have added better depth to the story they chose to tell.

Who exactly is expecting the apology? If it is us, as viewers, then that has no bearing on Ben's character. If Ben is the one expecting it, then I completely agree with you on the self-absorbed narcissism. But the whole point that we are trying to make is that the narrative would have more emotional depth if it were to acknowledge Ben's issues in some way. If you are sympathetic to him, then it might make you feel that more deeply. If you are disgusted by him, then it might make you feel that more deeply. No matter how you feel, I think that this acknowledgement would have bettered the story they wanted to tell.

Regarding Ben and apologies, no one is arguing for Ben to apologize (rightfully) to Han, because essentially he did. It's just that Han wasn't actually alive anymore to be present for the apology...

And regarding Anakin, his issues were addressed clearly in the prequels, so no one needed to ask for it. @chrisfree 's point about Anakin deserving an apology from the Council has merit. Obi Wan perhaps apologied with his "I have failed you..." line, but even then there was some righteousness in his tone.

 

apology accepted Captain Needa

 

Ben’s issues are acknowledged all over the narrative. Way more than, for example, the actually understandable issues of our heroes, especially Finn. The absolute last thing this trilogy needed was more pity for Kylo’s warped views on his privileged and loved upbringing. Frankly the narrative needed way less of it because what it had was intolerable.

 

@anakinfansince1983
I understand your reasoning but I think you misunderstand the goal. We want justification for bad feelings, not for bad behavior. If the story can provide that, it would give us a more complex villian. If it sufficiently justifies their mindset, maybe we are more sympathetic. (I understand why you are doing this...) If it does not, then maybe we condemn the character more. (I still don't understand why you are doing this...)

And your examples for Anakin aren't completely accurate. He didn't kill all of them [The Council]. He was of course complicit with Order 66, but the closest he got was being an accessory to Mace's murder, and the Mustafar Duel. On the Death Star, Obi Wan became one with the Force in that moment of his own accord so Vader didn't actually kill him there either, as much as he intended to.

Obi Wan had already apologized in a way to Anakin far before Anakin tried to kill him on the Death Star.
Han had already apologized in a way to Kylo right before Kylo tried and succeeded to kill him at Starkiller Base.
The main difference is that we know how Anakin felt throughout his life about Obi Wan and the Jedi Council in much more detail than about Kylo and his parents throughout his life. We are left wanting in Kylo's case because his actions don't completely make sense if his parents were as caring and loving as they were. To bridge this gap, there could have been more dialogue between Kylo and Han, or Leia. Or even Palpatine. I don't know. Something.

@AhsokaSolo
Pity for Kylo might not be the end result of a further examination. Contextualize Ben's issues with reality. Perhaps it would give greater sympathy to Han, Leia and Luke. I agree that the heroes (definitely Finn) needed this kind of exploration even more, but I don't see why they couldn't sufficiently write this kind of emotional content for all the main characters. If they really wanted it to be the Ben Solo Show then they should have done something different to make it worth it.

 

I agree that Kylo needed a better story. All of the characters did. But I would not frame it the way you did. They chose to put an escaped slave and an orphaned scavenger in the story as the heroes. In that context, it’s actually seriously invalid to me to try and tell a story feeling sorry for Kylo’s background in any way. That undermines the story of the heroes because his background is objectively cushy and wonderful compared to theirs. Kylo’s story should never come at the expense of the heroes. That’s already one of the biggest problems with this trilogy.

 

There are a lot of ways to explain Kylo’s turn without resorting to the cliche of a terrible childhood [that he didn’t freaking have]. That’s what made him interesting in TFA. It’s was the idea that he turned despite having every opportunity to be a hero. That was in contrast to our actual heroes. RJ flushed that narrative potential down the toilet into something both cliche and genuinely offensive when compared to how RJ treated Finn, the character with the actually dehumanizing background.

 

Agreed.

I think that is a leap that should be left to the audience to make, if they really feel that way about it. I don't agree with the "how dare they" sentiment at all but I am not the Thought Police. People are allowed to interpret (and misinterpret) stories. I will always advocate for a deeper story to give people that opportunity. What they do with it is their responsibility.

 

​

 

Even if he did, he automatically stopped deserving said apology once he decided to willingly becuse a monster and help massacure the Jedi and aide the Sith in overthrowing the Republic and establishing a tyrannical facist regime in its place.

Like with Kylo/Ben, if apologies ever were owed the time had long since pasted to give them.

The Council did'nt fear his power - Anakin thought they did but we know for a fact they did'nt - they were wary of him becuse of his arrogance and untempered nature.

Agian, like with Kylo Anakin's issues were all of his own making.

The Council took input from Anakin all the time just fine, it's just that on the occasions were they did'nt accept it Anakin chose to get angry and take it personal.

Becuse he was twenty-two years old, lacked both the experience and the temperment* to be a master and was being forced onto the council by an outside force the Jedi did'nt trust for entirely political reasons.

Anakin would have become a master in due time, but he did'nt want to wait becuse he felt it was deserved to him - and that was all on him.

*the fact that he chose to react to being told he was'nt going to be made a master (something he just assumed would be done and was never promised) by throwing a fit and yelling about how unfair it w

By the Republic, not the Jedi Order.

Mace did'nt trust him and viewed him as potentially compramised due to his realtionship with Palpatine - his suspisions were well-founded too, considering what ended up happening.

Obi-Wan was'nt Anakin's parent, he was his teacher - he was under no obligation to coddle him and indeed doing so would be counterproductive. Not to mention he only had to be so critical becuse Anakin was so willfull and stubborn a student.

No. When Obi-Wan cut off Anakin's limbs what does he say? "I'm sorry but I'm doing this because I love you?"

I'd hardly call this wisdom since it was said at a time when Luke was engulfed in depression, cynicism and self-loathing - I doubt he would argee with that perception of events by the end of the film.

The problem is that we don't actually have any reason to think his issues are actually valid and every reason to think that their all in his head - what's the point of ackowladging someones issues if their non-existent and don't justify their crimes?

On top of this there's the fact that his redempition scene already lacks waight becuse it's made to be all about him to begin with, when the opposite should be true (see Vader), so this would only make it worse.

RJ did'nt flush anything from TLJ down the toilet - he just fleshed out what happened with Ben's background; he never does anything to justify what he did (all the "justification" is from Ben's perspective of events, which are clearly shown to be wrong) and not only retians him as a villian but actually ups his villiany by eleveting him to the position of main villian by the end.

He added some depth and a bit of sympathy to the charecter (which he was sorely lacking in TFA, and which was more or less nessesery to make him a compelling main villian) but that's all he did - as opposed to Finn, who's charecter development advances in leaps and bounds - Kylo spends the entire movie spinning his wheels and then, when he finally advances he advances in full reverse, further down the rabbit hole of evil, despite having ample opportunity to turn back to the Light and no reason to remain on the dark path, which is fully on embracing TFA's narrative and actually makes Kylo a worse person then he already was.

 

I don't agree that Kylo's background is at all fleshed out in TLJ. We got three versions of one incident that exists in a vacuum in the story without any context whatsoever. I also don't personally feel that this incident makes Kylo at all more sympathetic. It's the opposite with me. If the narrative totally ignores that Kylo reacted to a sympathetic moment by mass murdering innocents, I'm left royally irritated by the blatant manipulation that is devaluing the lives of everyone but Kylo. But really, my point isn't about whether TLJ is effective at giving Kylo sympathy. My point is that in this narrative context, that was the absolute wrong path to take. Kylo didn't need sympathy. He needed agency and a motive. TLJ declines to give him both, and it makes him a weak character.

But in trying to sympathize with this monster while the narrative degrades and derides Finn, the character with the actually sympathetic background that chose good over evil anyway (obviously I disagree with your take on Finn's story in TLJ), the narrative was both offensive and it undermined the themes TFA set up. TFA gave us heroes despite every opportunity to be villains, and a villain despite every opportunity to be a hero. TLJ relentlessly called one of those heroes a coward while offering zero empathy to what he experienced his whole life. Meanwhile, it asked the audience to pity the privileged whiny ahole that mass murdered Luke's students, who everyone ignores ever existed.

This meme is a snapshot of what I see every time Kylo is on screen