#but i’m salty about aaaall of the sequel trilogy characters to be honest

[solohux]

@anonynous submitted: Poe:- As he should've been

 I am still so fucking salty that Poe got left behind as the awkward third wheel that no one seemed to know what to do with. His character was horribly underutilized and if anything, went through character regression, not character development! TFA!Poe and TLJ/TROS!Poe are practically different characters! It just doesn't seem.... natural for the compassionate, confident (NOT arrogant!) pilot we met in TFA to suddenly be totally ok with sacrificing dozens of his fellow pilots for ego in TLJ and to have been an ex-drug dealer in his youth as revealed in TROS! 

  By no means am I saying that Poe should be flawless. But his flaws and failings should’ve made… sense. He can be compassionate! Just have it get the better of him! Like say:- Poe takes every death of a pilot under his command hard. He feels guilty, as if he’s failing his pilots personally by not preventing their deaths. That would even tie into his extended backstory as revealed in that comic series he had! So Poe over-extends himself, he refuses to put his pilots in danger when it’s not “necessary” so he’s constantly volunteering to go on dangerous solo missions… 

  Just like the one where we were introduced to him in TFA! 

  Holy shit! Having Poe develop a Savior Complex could even have made TLJ work better! You could even keep the bungled attack in the opening! So Poe leads the attack on the First Order, he places himself in a truly ridiculous amount of danger to give the evacuation enough time to get away… but it still goes horribly wrong! Despite Poe’s best efforts his pilots die like flies, he’s one of the only survivors. 

  Leia can still be disappointed in Poe, only she’s upset with him because she knows he puts himself in too much danger! She can still want him to put himself in a less “In the air with his troops” mindset! But now she’s genuinely concerned that Poe will never get the chance to transition to a “Lead from the command deck” role like she wants him to, because with the way he’s been acting he’s going to get himself killed sooner rather than later! 

  Then Leia is incapitated shortly thereafter… (Or we can just substitute her for Holdo, whichever way works)

  Now we have a distraught Poe, who is pretty much convinced that he’s a failure (Because not only did so many of his pilots die, his mentor is disappointed with him!) and then Holdo sweeps in and doesn’t want much to do with him! 

  Only now Holdo has a different motive for giving Poe a wide berth. She’s one of Leia’s personal friends and is an accomplished military leader in her own right. She takes one look at Poe and immediately knows what type of person he is. So instead of barring Poe from being amongst the leadership and planning The Resistance’s next move because she doesn’t like his attitude… she tells him to stay out of things and get some rest because she can see that he’s in no emotional shape to be of any help to her! 

  Poe naturally is even more freaked out and left frantic! He's lost confidence in himself, but he just has to help! There must be something that he can do....

  So there we go, Poe can still be a “menace” to Holdo during her short term of leadership (Or he can simply go on the ill-fated mission with Finn as the first draft of TLJ’s script had planned to do!) but now TLJ!Poe is more consistent with TFA!Poe because we have changed his motives for acting the way he does throughout the film. Making Poe (And the various character he interacts with!) seem more sympathetic even if his attempts to help just keep making things worse. 

  That can cumulate in Poe learning a valuable lesson “That he can’t save everyone and shouldn’t light himself on fire just to keep others warm” and thus actually develop as a character. 

  Oh my god, now I’m even more pissed off at Rian Johnson for not taking that route. It just seems… so obvious! It would’ve been a refreshing change of direction ( ;) A “subversion” if you will) for Poe’s character archetype (Seriously, just how common is it for male leaders to be so emotionally invested in those under their command that they become distressingly self-sacrificial?) and more importantly, not stereotypical! 

  Ugh! And now that TLJ has been fixed, TROS would go so much more smoothly! You can have a more nuanced Poe, growing weary and perhaps a bit jaded by the seemingly endless war. He’s transitioned into a more traditional leadership role like Leia wanted him too. All of this causes some tension between him and Finn and Rey. 

  Poe can regain more of his original optimism by having him go with Finn and Rey ( :) And Chewie! And the Droids!) on the big mission, where he can have opportunities to patch up his bond with Rey and Finn and thus now that he’s feeling more like himself again Poe can inspire more people to join in the final push against The First Order (There we go! The perfect way to bring the Spice Runners into the film without giving some bullshit excuse about how Poe was a member of their gang as a teenager!) and then during the big final battle Poe can showcase all that he’s learned over the course of the trilogy by comparing and contrasting what he does there to what he did during TFA’s opening scene! 

  Lol, now I’ve made myself even more mad! It’s just so clear that the Sequel Trilogy genuinely could’ve worked -Even without a lot of big changes!- had the characters simply been more consistently written. 

  I just re-railed Poe’s character simply by making some small changes to his motives! Things can still progress closely to how they did in the various films’, but now Poe is a stronger character that does more stuff, has opportunities to naturally bond with Finn and Rey (And other characters too!) and again, isn’t stereotypical in any means! 

  I just kept Poe’s backstory (A rebel born of rebels! With a closer than usual relationship to the heroes of the Original Trilogy. Oh yes, I just realized that a potential childhood friendship with Ben could easily be worked in, which would help out with Kylo’s character as well…) in mind the whole time and had him react to various things happening as he logically should react! 

  -Sigh- If only Poe’s backstory had been upheld from the start… 

  But ultimately I am pleased with myself for coming up with all of this, so thanks for listening Lottie! Hope you didn’t mind me dumping this into your submission box. :) Hope you have a great day.