ST Kylo Ren/Adam Driver Discussion Thread

To be honest i get the sense both sides are just as insecure as the other.

 

Is it really about sides? If it is I’m kind of on the fence. I don’t ship them in TFA and TLJ but Ben Solo’s and Rey’s last scene was really emotional for me.

 

What about comparisons that are accurate, highly inflammatory, and literally made by the guy who created the character?

 

It could have work, but to do what they did with Ben Solo at the end require far more initial groundwork to underpin the redemption story than what was done. They relied on audience goodwill and being familiar with Star Wars tropes like I say in other thread, in order to have audience just accept that Ben Solo was now a good guy separate from the Kylo Ren, who Rey could maybe be attracted to. For many audience member, that would be fine and I am not going to criticise them if they are happy to do this and enjoy the Reylo, but the huge gap in and missing narrative that sell a story like this is missing. I am supposed to accept from the writer “Do not worry about that Kylo Ren, he is gone now and this is Ben Solo, okay?” which is very jolting.

To work, I think that Rey need to know who Ben Solo was before he turn to Kylo Ren, so that her character has motivation to help save him and understand that his behaviour as Kylo is not normal for him, something like this. It isn’t enough that we as audience accept he may have been a good guy, the characters who interact with him in the story must also know and fully understand this, but they don’t.

The Kylo story remind me a little of a wrestling angle, when a heel wrestler suddenly for no reason other than the writers and management want this, become a face wrestler. It usually require the goodwill of wrestling fans to forget that the wrestler has been cheating, doing dirty tricks, trashing the good wrestlers for months or years before, and wrestling fans will accept this often as part of wrestling story culture, but I think it a bit much for writers to expect that Star Wars fans accept the same.

 

Regarding 'thin skinned'.....I no longer 'ship' reylo because I've completely gone off Rey as a character, but I know quite a few reylos who have closed their SM accounts and shut down tumblr blogs (I have neither) because they have got some truly dreadful threats and accusations from those who dislike the ship, the Kylo Ren character, and even Adam Driver. It's why I do not have any SM accounts, apart from Facebook and that is purely for family.
Yes, I know 'some' reylos have been unpleasant on SM - I personally don't know any of them, but none of us are saints - but they have also been victims of trolls. And I don't mean mild threats, I'm talking about threats of violence, rape, and even death threats. A 'reylo' fanfic author - a talented one at that - also erased everything she'd written on AoA for the same reason.
The fact is, some people cannot differentiate between fantasy and reality, and unfortunately SM has given these odious bullies a coward's way of intimidating those who happen to disagree with them. It's saddening, it's worrying and it's infuriating.

 

Nobody should get the abuse or death threat, that is awful. I think what most opponent of Reylo feel is that whilst it should be enjoy by anybody who enjoys that kind of story idea, the idea is strictly niche, fan-fiction element only, because it require too much mental gymnastic to even make it work at all. As soon as it appear in canon, in the saga story of all place, then it devalue the saga to the level of poor quality fan fiction.

 

I think anything in the ST could be considered Poor quality fan-fiction. not just Reylo. but in the end people are gonna attract to something, even if others don't agree.

 

I think the poorest quality 'fan fiction' I've seen on film was the Hulk/Black Widow relationship in the Avengers films. I'm baffled as to why they came up with that one!

 

That dude’s never makin a star war

 

Actually, I think he's a good choice for that.

 

Is it really about want? That part creates an illusion that anyone who does not see Kylo as a villain lacks the agency to make up their minds. I have participated in this thread for a while but simply being told that my POV is not as valid because I'm not seeing others' is just really not taking the discussion anywhere. We all have a chance to participate though and I prefer not to. I am sure the other side also feels the same and tbh, I find all this having to take sides and being boxed and labelled as somenthing quite tiring.
For example, I did see Kylo as a villain but I also did not agree on a few things that made him black and white evil. Nobody is that simple. Well, perhaps Palpatine was but even the jedi were not. For example, while Yoda is my top favourite organic character in the SW universe, I am ok with acknowledging that he made mistakes and there were times when even his 900-years-old wisdom fell short. Do I expect everyone to love Yoda because he was one of the good ones? No.

 

The major problem with Kylo is that his role was changed in a way that was fundamentally at-odds with what had already been established. He’s a badly-written, frankensteined character who’s extremely inconsistant - as one might expect from a character written by several writers who fundamentally disagree about who a character is and his role in the story.

Had Kylo been “a reverse OT Vader” he could have been amazing.” Had he been “a tragic confused anti-hero” he could have been amazing. But he ended up being a confused, awkward, contradictory mash-up of the two and really didn’t work.

Imo Kylo only works for those who have formed a perfected headcanon version of him. But canonically, on the screen, he’s a bad character. He was massacred more egregiously than Finn or Rey. Think “ending of GoT” character massacre.

I don’t say “Kylo was a bad character” with contempt. I feel sorry for Adam, who was pitched a brilliant character and barely got to play him. I would have loved to see that Kylo.

 

I think the problem was with how Kylo was written, and why we are divided about him. Disney wanted it both ways; they wanted a Vader like OT villain and they wanted a dashing Anakin PT type fallen hero that would bond with Rey. It did not mix well to me.

 

Do you think both RJ and JJ tried to write him as both those concepts or that something else happened?

 

I honestly have no idea lol. I do think Disney had a bunch of boxes for the ST they needed checked and wrote the story around it.

 

IMO Kylo being the reverse of anakin made the most sense for a 9 part saga. it is a very George Lucas thing to do. but as much as id like to give credit to JJ and Rian, i very much doubt they had that in mind. i think it was a late realization into episode 9 where they went... oh wait... so this is part of a 9 movie saga? ah crap, now how do we resolve this? episode 9 feels like its trying to tie itself to the saga. the previous 2 seemed like they were trying to be a film series revival.

 

I don't even get what reverse Anakin means. Anakin went from good to bad to good again. So Kylo would go from bad to good to bad again? It makes no sense.