ST Allegiant General Pryde/Richard E. Grant in Episode IX

Ben Solo is a composite of Jacen Solo. It would not surprise me at all if Grant was basically a knock off of Thrawn functionally without actually being him either. Heck, Gallius Rax sort of was as well (though more of a womanizer and obviously not a Chiss). I also don’t think he was as perceptive as Thrawn.

 

I don't really see Hux as being incompetent in TLJ. Sure, he was made fun of early on, but that also plays directly into his character as the pompous general whose ego is too big for his own good. His plan worked just as intended, he had the resistence in a trap and was on course to pick of one of their ships after another without facing much of a risk of losing his own. That's basically what every general loves to achieve, wiping out the enemy with minimal losses of your own. He couldn't possibly know that Kylo Ren would betray Snoke, nor was he responsible for Kylo Ren losing his cool once seeing Luke. He was actually the voice of reason in that battle.

In other words: he did a pretty good job in TLJ, but he's thinking he's a better leader than he actually is, which is made worse by his desire to gloat over the enemy. That makes him worse than he could be, but he is very far from being incompetent.

I don't see how Hux is supposed to feel like a throwaway character either. He was always just a relatively important side-villain, not someone who carries the story. He has a far more developed and clear cut role than most military leaders we have seen in the entire saga. The only ones who might top him in that regard, are Tarkin and Krennic, and those two were the main villains in their respective movies.

 

Oh I see him as incompetent. Call it a plot execution problem if one likes, but he can't figure out how to use all the resources at his disposal. He's better at prancing about the bridge like an indignant peacock than anything else. TLJ did definitely make his character such a joke that um I feel any more normal, reasonably intelligent and wise person would see 101 ways to take the reigns of the FO military.

 

Everybody wants him to be a villain... what if he is playing one of the good guys? Maybe a senator who survived the destruction of Hosnian

 

Whoever he is, he better not be able to glean his opponent's military tactics by looking at their pottery.

 

LOL. This made my day. And gosh please no insidious classical music while he's doing it.

That he keeps Sabine's art was so hilarious.

 

Maybe he's a hero and a villain?

What if Grant is a former Imperial who is now on the side of the Rebels because he sees the danger of Kylo and the First Order? I like the idea of using another segment of the Imperial remnant who isn't on the First Order side to sort of briefly explain how the FO rose in power, etc. Surely Snoke had lots of former Imperials that he thought he couldn't properly control simply killed and that would have caused others to defect/hide/etc.

 

If he is a flashback to Young Snoke, where we a given a thorough 20 minutes explanation of who he is and what his motivations are... with Powerpoint slides... will all be forgiven?

 

Like this?

 

My gut tells me that Grant will be a villain but I also thought Max Von Sydow was going to be a villain. Turned out he wasn't a villain. He was an extra! Hope that's not the same case for Grant.

 

He'll be commander of a ship that gets destroyed by the opening crawl.

 

Captain Canady's brother

 

If you look at past announcements you quickly realize this is very unlikely.

https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-episode-viii-now-filming

In the exact same section of the announcement for VIII were D.J., Holdo and Rose.

So, there’s every reason to believe his role is significant, loaded with significant dialogue and will feature his own small arc.

The Captain Canady style accouncements come later.

 

He meant to be. He only got to where he was by stabbing people in the back.

 

So we can assume he is competent at stabbing people in the back.

 

Yeah he's competent at that but not at commanding an army.

 

He's good at shouting "all fighters!"

 

That has got to be the only moment of cooperation between Kylo and Hux. Kind of liked that.

 

I liked how Kylo looked at him. Admittedly I hope Kylo doesn't kill Hux, doesn't even wanna kill him. I feel like Kylo (in his horrible way) abused Hux to show him who's boss, and he knows Hux will try over and over to backstab him, but he doesn't wanna kill him.

Also I could even ship Kylo and Hux.

Or they are like brothers with a sibling rivalry thing going. Hux is like Loki to Kylo's bad Thor?

 

How did he not achieve what he was supposed to achieve?

His arrogance and ego keep him from being a great leader, but they do not make him an imcompetent one. Neither does him being made fun of. He used Starkiller to destroy the Republic and its fleet, it wasn't his fault that the station went down. Then he created a trap for the remaining resistence that worked out great, there is a reason why Snoke praised him for it. That the resistence would suicide its last ship to attack Snoke's ship is hardly something anyone could have predicted. It wasn't his fault that Snoke got killed, or that Kylo Ren let himself be distracted by Luke, thus allowing the resistence to escape.

What he does lack is consistency. There are times where he cares more about gloating than finishing the job, and then there are times where he could apply the devil may care attitude that fits to his ego and opt for an costly all out assault but instead goes with an efficient plan that would have saved resources, like with the trap in TLJ.

A cunning leader can outsmart him, but there aren't exactly a ton of those around. Not to mention that you need support among the rank and file to get rid of someone like Hux, and his kind of character does tend to create some sort of loyalty, based either on fanaticism or on fear of him. History is full of people like that.

 

The FO failed in TLJ in that they did not destroy the entire Resistance. Hux decided to just wait the Resistance out in the Space Chase and the movie didn't convince me there was no way at all to destroy the Resistance more quickly (Kylo's TIE run showed me they could have been destroyed earlier and this whole Crate battle could have been skipped). Hux is kind of equivalent to Vader's incompetent offices in ESB. Vader's failures are often explained by Vader vs. his incompetent officers. Hux IS the incompetent officer. That's how I see it anyway.

I like the argument that he's not supposed to be competent. But I think that the impression of Hux as more incompetent is coming from two things: 1) Space Chase is full of holes and makes very little sense, 2) Hux is primary comic relief in TLJ.

 

With Snoke gone, I see a vacancy for a dark side ( or maybe just The Force ) exposition-guy. Particularly if they're going to attempt to tie Rey and Kylo's story into Anakin's story. I don't think Kylo can occupy this role. Perhaps it's something connected to the KOR, or perhaps it's the Whills, but of the 3 new cast members, I see Grant as the most likely fit for this.
Of course, now that he's one with the Force, Luke could move into this role, and judging by his last words to Kylo, he'd presumably be able to appear to both Rey and Kylo. Still, I feel that if the intent is for IX to make some kind of definitive statement on the Skywalker story, and the balance of the Force, etc, etc, you'd probably need a character above and outside of the Skywalker clan - perhaps even a character representing the narrator of the story, or something approaching that.

 

R2 is the narrator.

 

I really hope Luke appears to both. I know this would break a previous FG "rule" but Luke may not be one's typical FG and Yoda has already gone beyond what FGs have been able to do before by striking the tree with lightening.

 

Sure, in the context that George originally envisioned the story, I could certainly get behind that.

Maybe 'outsider', rather than narrator, would've been a better description.
What I was really trying to drive at was; if the intent is for IX to tie the ST to the overarching themes of I-VI, and deliver some finality and answers to the questions that the Skywalker / Chosen One story has raised, then I feel that there's a need to introduce a new element to the story.

For example, if this story is ultimately about destiny versus free will, with the mortal players ( and even the immortal ones ) ultimately just pieces on a chess board, then as I see it, the antagonist of the tale ( in this case, fate itself ) needs to be represented and embodied onscreen somehow, whether this character be sinply an agent of said forces, or the actual article themselves.