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gffa · 4 years

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OKAY, IF I’M GONNA DO THIS, I’M GONNA DO IT PROPERLY. WHICH MEANS YEAH IT’S GONNA GET REALLY LONG. A couple of things to say ahead of time: Lucasfilm’s Story Group has always said CANON > WORD OF GOD when it comes to these matters, so when I quote canon examples from supplementary materials that contradict what he says, that’s LF’s official position, but that doesn’t mean that an influential person like Dave’s views couldn’t affect how things will be shaped in the future, like Deborah Chow listening to this may be influenced by it on the Obi-Wan show, despite that Master & Apprentice contradicts him. It’s an incredibly murky area! Mileages are going to vary. Another thing to keep in mind is that Dave Filoni never worked on The Phantom Menace, that was long, long before his time at Lucasfilm (which I think he joined sometime around 2007? and TPM was released in 1999), that he has worked with George more than probably anyone else, but we cannot and should not treat him as infallible or the True Authority on things, because even Dave himself has said things like: “I mean, I know why I did that and what it means, but I don't like to explain too much. I love for the viewers to watch stuff and come up with their own theories -- and they frankly come up with better things that I intended.” --Dave Filoni, Entertainment Tonight 2020 interview Or, in the same episode as the above Qui-Gon interpretation:

So, when I dig into this, I’m not doing this out of a sense of malice or even that I suddenly hate Dave or don’t appreciate all the incredible things he’s brought to SW, but in that I disagree with his take, Dave understands that he doesn’t always get it right, that he enjoys that fans come up with different things than he does and sometimes he likes those even more. There’s room for both of us and, for all that Dave mentions George a lot (and, hey, fair enough, the guy worked with George and I’m just quoting what George Lucas has said) doesn’t mean that this is straight from George, especially because I have never seen George Lucas utter so much as a peep about how the Jedi were responsible for Anakin’s fall. He has explicitly and frequently talked about how Anakin’s fall was his own choice, as well as I’ve never seen him say anything Jedi-critical beyond “they were kind of arrogant about themselves”. I have read and watched every George Lucas interview I could get my hands on and maybe I’m still missing something, but that’s literally the extent of him criticizing the Jedi I have EVER seen. (It’s from the commentary on AOTC where he put in the scene with Jocasta to show they were full of themselves, but I also think it’s fair to point out that Obi-Wan immediately contradicts this by going to Dex for help, showing that it’s not necessarily a Jedi-wide thing.) Before I go further, I want to say: this is not a post meant to tear down Qui-Gon, he is a character I actually really do love, but the focus is on showing why the above interpretation of him is wrong, which means focusing on Qui-Gon’s flaws. He has many wonderful qualities, he is someone who cared deeply and was a good person, I think things would have been better had he lived! But Anakin’s choices did not hinge on him, because Anakin’s choices were Anakin’s, that has always been the consistent theme of how George talks about him, the way he talks about the story is always in terms of “Anakin did this” or “Anakin chose that”, and the Jedi are very consistently shown as caring, they believed very much in love and Dave’s own show (well, I say “his own show”, but honestly TCW was George’s baby primarily and he had a lot of direct, hands-on say in crafting it, through at least the first five seasons) is plenty of evidence of that. I’m not going to quote the full thing because this is already a monster post, I’m just going to focus on the Jedi stuff, because I like the other points a lot, but if you want the full text, it’s here. The relevant part is: “In Phantom Menace, you’re watching these two Jedi in their prime fight this evil villain. Maul couldn’t be more obviously the villain. He’s designed to look evil, and he is evil, and he just expresses that from his face all the way out to the type of lightsaber he fights with. What’s at stake is really how Anakin is going to turn out. Because Qui-Gon is different than the rest of the Jedi and you get that in the movie; and Qui-Gon is fighting because he knows he’s the father that Anakin needs. Because Qui-Gon hasn’t given up on the fact that the Jedi are supposed to actually care and love and that’s not a bad thing. The rest of the Jedi are so detached and they become so political that they’ve really lost their way and Yoda starts to see that in the second film. But Qui-Gon is ahead of them all and that’s why he’s not part of the council. So he’s fighting for Anakin and that’s why it’s the ‘Duel of the Fates’ – it’s the fate of this child. And depending on how this fight goes, Anakin, his life is going to be dramatically different. “So Qui-Gon loses, of course. So the father figure, he knew what it meant to take this kid away from his mother when he had an attachment, and he’s left with Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan trains Anakin at first out of a promise he makes to Qui-Gon, not because he cares about him. When they get Anakin, they find him on Tatooine, he says “Why do I feel like we’ve found another useless lifeform?” He’s comparing Anakin to Jar Jar and he’s saying “this is a waste of our time, why are we doing this, why do you see importance in these creatures like Jar Jar Binks and this ten-year-old boy? This is useless.” “So, he’s a brother to Anakin eventually but he’s not a father figure. That’s a failing for Anakin. He doesn’t have the family that he needs. He loses his mother in the next film. He fails on this promise that he made, “mother, I’m going to come back and save you”. So he’s left completely vulnerable and Star Wars is ultimately about family. So that moment in that movie which a lot of people I think diminish, “oh there’s a cool lightsaber fight”, but it’s everything that the entire three films of the prequels hangs on, is that one particular fight. And Maul serves his purpose and at that point died before George made me bring him back, but he died.“ --Dave Filoni I’m going to take this a piece at a time to show why I really disagree with the content of both the movies and The Clone Wars supporting what Dave says and, instead, contradicts it a lot. The rest of the Jedi are so detached and they become so political that they’ve really lost their way and Yoda starts to see that in the second film. He doesn’t explain what this means, but I’m pretty sure that he’s referring to this conversation: OBI-WAN: “I am concerned for my Padawan. He is not ready to be given this assignment on his own yet.” YODA: “The Council is confident in its decision, Obi-Wan.” MACE WINDU: “The boy has exceptional skills.” OBI-WAN: “But he still has much to learn, Master. His abilities have made him... well.... arrogant.” YODA: “Yes, yes. A flaw more and more common among Jedi. Hmm... too sure of themselves they are. Even the older, more experienced ones.” MACE WINDU: “Remember, Obi-Wan, if the prophecy is true, your apprentice is the only one who can bring the Force back into balance.” OBI-WAN: "If he follows the right path.” None of that has anything to do with being “detached” and, further, I think this is something that’s come up with Dave’s view of Luminara a lot, because he’s described her (re: the Geonosis arc): “We were trying to illustrate the difference between the way Anakin is raising his Padawan, and how much he cares about her, and the way Luminara raises her Padawan. Not that Luminara is indifferent, but that Luminara is detached. It’s not that she doesn’t care, but she’s not attached to her emotionally.” Here, he says that the Jedi care, in the above, he says that the Jedi don’t care, which makes me think there’s a lot of characterization drift as time goes on, especially when fandom bombards everyone with the idea that the Jedi were cold, emotionless, and didn’t care. However, look at Luminara’s face in that arc, when she’s talking with Anakin:

That is not the face of someone who doesn’t care. She even smiles brightly in relief when Barriss is shown to be okay, that this really doesn’t convey “detached” in an unloving or uncaring way. (We’ll get to attachment later, that’s definitely coming.) (I’m also mostly skipping the political thing, because I think that’s just a fundamental disagreement of whether Jedi should or should not lean into politics. My view basically boils down to that I think ALL OF US should be leaning more into politics because we are citizens who live in the world and are responsible for it, and the Jedi are no different. This is evidenced by: - M&A’s storyline has Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan saving the day specifically because they play politics, that’s how they manage to free the slaves, through playing politics and being part of the Republic/having Senate backing. - The Clone Wars has shown that the Jedi believe “lasting change can only come from within” and “it’s every citizen’s duty to hold their leaders accountable” when Ahsoka teaches the cadets on Mandalore, as well as that politics are not inherently bad, given that Padme and Bail are working to make the system better or “create lasting change from within [the system]” - "Trying to serve the greater good does not always make you popular” says Padme Amidala in a very caring speech - Star Wars Propaganda makes the case that the Jedi might have won the war had they leaned more into politics. - Sometimes the Jedi get unfairly accused of playing politics when there’s just no good choice and they still have to choose one or the other.) But Qui-Gon is ahead of them [re: caring and loving] all and that’s why he’s not part of the council. This is flat-out wrong in regards to canon. Mileages are going to vary, of course, on how much one takes a novel into consideration, but Dave Filoni is not a fan with the luxury of deciding what is or isn’t canon, he works on Star Wars where canon is canon. Now, does that mean canon will never contradict itself, especially if Dave gets to write something for Qui-Gon? Of course not, SW isn’t immune to continuity errors and they themselves have never said otherwise, even when fans want to hold them to that standard. However, this is still pretty much a big “that’s not what happened” instance. In Master & Apprentice, the Jedi Council offer a seat to Qui-Gon on the Council, specifically BECAUSE he has different opinions from them and they welcome that. (Excerpt here.) “We hope it will also be our gain,” Mace replied. “Qui-Gon Jinn, we hereby offer you a seat on the Jedi Council.” Had he misheard? No, he hadn’t. Qui-Gon slowly gazed around the circle, taking in the expressions of each Council member in turn. Some of them looked amused, others pleased. A few of them, Yoda included, appeared more rueful than not. But they were serious. “I admit—you’ve surprised me,” Qui-Gon finally said.“I imagine so,” Mace said drily. “A few years ago, we would’ve been astonished to learn we would ever consider this. But in the time since, we’ve all changed. We’ve grown. Which means the possibilities have changed as well.” Qui-Gon took a moment to collect himself. Without any warning, one of the turning points of his life had arrived. Everything he said and did in the next days would be of great consequence. “You’ve argued with my methods often as not, or perhaps you’d say I’ve argued with yours.” “Truth, this is,” Yoda said. Depa Billaba gave Yoda a look Qui-Gon couldn’t interpret. “It’s also true that the Jedi Council needs more perspectives.” Ultimately, Qui-Gon is the who turns them down and gives up a chance to shape the Jedi Council because he doesn’t like the shape they’re taking. That he does become less political, but this is after he’s argued that the Jedi should be working to push the Senate harder, so when he has a chance to help with that, he turns it down. It has nothing to do with caring and loving, it’s about Qui-Gon’s desire to not have to deal with the work himself, when he wants to be more of a hippie Jedi. (I’ve written a lot about Qui-Gon in M&A, why I actually think it’s really spot-on to someone who can be both really kind and really kind of a dick, but it’s not the most flattering portrayal, even if narrative intention likely didn’t mean what came across to me. I think this post and this post are probably the most salient ones, but if you want something of an index of the web that’s being woven with all the various media, this one is good, too.) So he’s fighting for Anakin and that’s why it’s the ‘Duel of the Fates’ – it’s the fate of this child. And depending on how this fight goes, Anakin, his life is going to be dramatically different. I have only ever seen George Lucas talk about Anakin’s fate in one instance and it’s this: “It’s fear of losing somebody he loves, which is the flipside of greed. Greed, in terms of the Emperor, it’s the greed for power, absolute power, over everything. With Anakin, really it’s the power to save the one he loves, but it’s basically going against the Fates and what is natural.“ –George Lucas, Revenge of the Sith commentary I’ve made my case about why I think Anakin’s fate is about that moment in Palpatine’s office, and so I’m not fundamentally opposed that “Duel of the Fates” is about Anakin’s fate, but here’s what George has provably said about the “Duel of the Fates” part of the story: - In the commentary for The Phantom Menace during “Duel of the Fates” and none of Dave’s speculation is even hinted at, there’s more focus on the technical side of things and the most George talks about is that it’s Obi-Wan who parallels Luke in going over the edge during the fight, except that instead of a Sith cutting off a Jedi’s hand, it’s a Jedi cutting a Sith in half, drawing the parallels between them. - He does say of the funeral scene that this is where Obi-Wan commits to training Anakin and how everything is going to go (though, in canon we see that Obi-Wan still struggles with this a bit, but Yoda is there to support him and nudge him into committing even more to Anakin, because the Jedi are a supportive community to each other). This is some solid evidence for that Obi-Wan is already caring about Anakin beyond just Qui-Gon. - Then here’s what he says about the “Duel of the Fates” fights and themes of them in "All Films Are Personal": George Lucas: “I wanted to come up with an apprentice for the Emperor who was striking and tough. We hadn’t seen a Sith Lord before, except for Vader, of course. I wanted to convey the idea that Jedi are all very powerful, but they’re also vulnerable — which is why I wanted to kill Qui-Gon. That is to say, “Hey, these guys aren’t Superman.” These guys are people who are vulnerable, just like every other person. “We needed to establish that, but at the same time, we wanted the ultimate sword fight, because they were all very good. It sort of predisposes the sword fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan later on. There’s real purpose to it. You have to establish the rules and then stick with them. The scene illustrates just how Jedi and Sith fight and use lightsabers.” “So Qui-Gon loses, of course. So the father figure, he knew what it meant to take this kid away from his mother when he had an attachment, and he’s left with Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan trains Anakin at first out of a promise he makes to Qui-Gon, not because he cares about him. We’ll get to the “attachment to his mother” thing in a bit--but, for now, let’s just say, George Lucas’ words on this are not that attachment to her was a good thing. Fair enough that “not because he cares about him” is up to personal interpretation, but canon has also addressed the topic of Obi-Wan’s treatment of Anakin and Obi-Wan stepped up to the plate on this. In addition to how we see Obi-Wan REPEATEDLY being there for Anakin and being concerned and caring about him, they specifically talk about Qui-Gon and overcome this hurdle.

No, Obi-Wan is not Anakin’s father figure, on that we definitely agree. Anakin never really even treats Obi-Wan like a father--he says “you’re the closest thing I have to a father” in Attack of the Clones, as well as he says Obi-Wan practically raised him in The Clone Wars “Crystal Crisis” story reels, but Anakin has never actually acted like Obi-Wan is his father--”then why don’t you listen to me?” Obi-Wan points out in AOTC--as well as Obi-Wan glides past those remarks, which I’ve always taken that he doesn’t want to reject Anakin’s feelings, knowing that Anakin can be sensitive about them, but neither does he want to confirm them. This does not mean Obi-Wan was not supportive, caring, and loving. He says, “I loved you!” to Anakin in Revenge of the Sith, he asks after him and if he’s sleeping well in Attack of the Clones, and even George Lucas himself said that the elevator scene was set up TO SHOW OBI-WAN AND ANAKIN CARE FOR EACH OTHER:

PUTTING THE REST UNDER A READ MORE FOR A BETTER LENGTH REBLOGGABLE VERSION, IF YOU WANT.

This is further evidenced by how the Jedi do see themselves as family, they just don’t need to put it into strict nuclear family dynamics: - “You were my brother, Anakin! I loved you!” [–Obi-Wan Kenobi, Revenge of the Sith] - “We are brothers, Master Dibs.” [–Mace Windu, Jedi of the Republic - Mace Windu] - “Did your parents bicker?” she asked. “The adoptive ones, I mean.” A slow smile broke across Ashla’s face, curling first one side of her mouth and then the other. Whatever she was remembering, Kaeden could tell it was good. "All the time,“ Ashla said, almost as if she were talking to herself. [–Kaeden Larte, Ahsoka Tano, Ahsoka] - Vos, brought to the Temple even younger than most, felt that he had hundreds of brothers and sisters, and it seemed that whenever he went into the dining hall he ran into at least half of them. [Dark Disciple] - “It was not his birthplace, exactly, but the Jedi Temple was where Quinlan Vos had grown up. He’d raced through its corridors, hidden behind its massive pillars, found peace in its meditation hall, ended-and started-fights in rooms intended for striking blows and some that weren’t, and sneaked naps in its library. All Jedi came here, at some point in their lives; for Quinlan, it always felt like coming home when he ran lightly up the stairs and entered the massive building as he did now.” [Dark Disciple] Brothers, sisters, and other more non-traditional kinds of family are not lesser and Obi-Wan and Anakin absolutely were family, just as the Jedi are all family to each other, so, no, there was no “failing” Anakin, except in Anakin’s mind, perhaps. (In that, I can agree. But not on a narratively approved level, canon too thoroughly refutes that for me.) Rebels as well pretty thoroughly shows that non-traditional families are meaningful and just as important--we may joke that Hera is “space mom”, but she’s not actually Ezra or Sabine’s mother, Kanan is not actually their father, and even if they sometimes stray into aspects of those roles (as the Jedi do as well in the movies and TCW), that they don’t need that traditional nuclear family structure. Mentor figures--and Kanan is Ezra’s mentor--are just as meaningful and needful as a “dad”. And I’m kind of :/ at the implication that anyone without a dad/father figure or mom/mother figure is being “failed”. When they get Anakin, they find him on Tatooine, he says “Why do I feel like we’ve found another useless lifeform?” He’s comparing Anakin to Jar Jar and he’s saying “this is a waste of our time, why are we doing this, why do you see importance in these creatures like Jar Jar Binks and this ten-year-old boy? This is useless.” Whether or not Obi-Wan is being genuinely dismissive in this movie (I think you could make a case either way), the idea that Qui-Gon is better than Obi-Wan about this, as shown through Jar Jar isn’t exactly very supported given how Qui-Gon and Jar Jar first exchange words:

QUI-GON: “You almost got us killed. Are you brainless?” JAR JAR: “I spake.” QUI-GON: “The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.” Qui-Gon is just as bad as everyone else to Jar Jar, he’s not somehow elevated above them. It’s also baffling because, Dave, I have watched your show. The Jedi are specifically shown to be kind to people and creatures, not considering them “useless”. Henry Gilroy (who was the co-writer for The Clone Wars and frequently appeared in featurettes on the same level as Dave Filoni) explicitly draws this to The Jedi Way, that “life is everything to the Jedi“, when he said this about the Ryloth episodes:

(Caps cribbed from Pan’s blog, because I cannot make another gif, save me, please.) Henry Gilroy in an Aggressive Negotiations Interview: "Obi-Wan truly is a Jedi in that he’s like, ‘Okay, I’m not going to murder these creatures [in the Ryloth arc of The Clone Wars]. They’re starving to death. They’ve basically been unleashed against these people as a weapon, but it’s not their fault. They’re just doing what they do. They’re just animals who wanna eat.’ "So the idea was–and I think there was an early talk about how, 'Oh, yeah, he’ll go running through them and slicing and dicing them and chop them all up or whatever, and save his guys. And I’m like, 'Yeah, but that’s not really the Jedi way. He’s not just gonna murder these creatures.’ "And I know the threat is [there], to save one life you have to take one, but the idea of him [is]: why can’t Obi-Wan just be more clever? He basically draws them in and then traps them. "It says something about who the Jedi are, they don’t just waste life arbitrarily. And someone could have gone, 'Oh, yeah, but it would have been badass if he’d just ran in there with his lightsaber spinning and stabbed them all in the head!’ And 'Yeah, you’re right, I guess he could be that, but he’s trying to teach his clones a lesson right then, about the sanctity of life.’ "That is the underlying theme of that entire episode. Which is: A tactical droid is using the people as living shields. Life means nothing to the Separatists. The droids. But life is everything to the Jedi. And even though he doesn’t have to say that, it’s all through the episode thematically.“ It’s also Obi-Wan who teaches Anakin about kindness to mindless creatures in the Obi-Wan & Anakin comic:

"These beasts are nearly mindless, Anakin. I can feel it. They are merely following their nature, they should not die simply because they crossed our path. Use the Force to send them on their way.” Now, fair enough if you want to say Obi-Wan was taught by Qui-Gon, but also Qui-Gon is dead by that point and Obi-Wan growing into being more mature is his own accomplishment, not Qui-Gon’s, especially given that we see Qui-Gon himself being pretty dismissive to Jar Jar in TPM. This isn’t unique thing either, Padme is incredibly condescending to Jar Jar in “Bombad Jedi�� and expresses clear annoyance with him to C-3PO when sighing over him. Jar Jar is a character you kind of have to warm up to, pretty much the only one we’ve seen consistently being favorable to him is Yoda (and maybe Anakin, though, Anakin doesn’t really interact with him a ton) and Mace Windu warms up to him considerably in “The Disappeared” and even specifically is shown to be teaching him and helping him, which is a huge theme of the Jedi and how much they care.

So, ultimately, the point I’m winding my way towards is--the other Jedi do show kindness and consideration to Jar Jar Binks, including characters like Mace Windu, so if you’re judging the Jedi based on that, the conclusion of Qui-Gon somehow being more compassionate and loving is really pretty thoroughly disproved by The Phantom Menace and The Clone Wars themselves. So, he’s a brother to Anakin eventually but he’s not a father figure. That’s a failing for Anakin. He doesn’t have the family that he needs. He loses his mother in the next film. He fails on this promise that he made, “mother, I’m going to come back and save you”. So he’s left completely vulnerable and Star Wars is ultimately about family. You could be charitable and say this is just from Anakin’s point of view that it’s a “failing”, but within the context of what Dave’s saying, it’s clearly meant as a more narratively approved take, not just Anakin’s point of view, and I really, really dislike the idea that Anakin--or anyone, really--needs a traditional nuclear family, ie a “mom” and/or a “dad”, or else it’s a “failing” for them. Setting aside that the idea that Qui-Gon would need to be Anakin’s dad to be kind to hi (which is ?????) is contradicted by The Clone Wars as well. Yes, Qui-Gon is warm with Anakin in several scenes, which is what Dave is presumably drawing on to show that Qui-Gon believed the Jedi should be caring and loving, but you know who else is warm to younglings? OTHER JEDI COUNCIL MEMBERS.

Those two scenes have the exact same kind of warmth to them. Ie, THE JEDI ALL BELIEVED IN BEING LOVING AND KIND, NOT JUST QUI-GON. The things evidenced to show Qui-Gon was loving and kind are evidenced just as much in other Council members, in Dave’s own show. As a bonus--have Mace Windu, known Jedi Council member, being super kind and loving towards a young Twi’lek girl he just met in a canon comic:

But I know that this is about the way the Council treated Anakin in The Phantom Menace testing scene, but here’s the thing--when I go back and I watch that scene and the Jedi aren’t ever mean to him, they’re neutral in an official testing situation, where they are trying to determine if he’s able to adapt to the Jedi ways. They never once say he’s bad for holding onto his fear, only that he does--which Anakin digs his heels in and gets angry about, he can’t really even admit that he’s afraid and that’s a huge deal for the Jedi. I’ve made a longer post about it here (and here), but the basic gist is: - That scene has Yoda giving the famous “Fear leads to the dark side” speech which is almost word for word how George Lucas describes how the Force works, showing the Jedi are narratively correct - “Confronting fear is the destiny of a Jedi” may be from the sequels, but it is thoroughly supported by the movies and TCW and Rebels and even supplementary canon material, including that the Jedi literally design their tests around both Masters and Padawans for it (Ilum, the Jedi Temple on Lothal, etc. - Anakin cannot admit to his fears in that TPM scene - We have examples of Jedi younglings do admit to their fears and the point isn’t not to have them, but to face them--the younglings in “The Gathering” are the most blatant example of this, but it’s also pretty much the entire theme of Jedi: Fallen Order, especially when Cal goes to Ilum to face his fears and get another kyber crystal. The point isn’t that Anakin--who has very good reasons to be afraid! nothing in the story or the Jedi have said he didn’t!--is wrong or bad, but that he’s not a great fit for the Jedi life because he is “unwilling to accept [Jedi philosophy] emotionally”. And they’re right about this, because this is how George Lucas describes Anakin in commentary: “The fact that everything must change and that things come and go through his life and that he can’t hold onto things, which is a basic Jedi philosophy that he isn’t willing to accept emotionally and the reason that is because he was raised by his mother rather than the Jedi. If he’d have been taken in his first year and started to study to be a Jedi, he wouldn’t have this particular connection as strong as it is and he’d have been trained to love people but not to become attached to them.” --George Lucas, Attack of the Clones commentary And so this brings us to A T T A C H M E N T, which, yeah, we’ve been having this discussion forever, but I’m going to state it again: Within Star Wars, ATTACHMENT IS NARRATIVELY A BAD THING. It is consistently tied to possessive, obsessive relationships, to greed and an unwillingness to let things go when it’s time (letting go is a huge theme in Star Wars) and equating love with attachment is fundamentally wrong according to George Lucas’ Star Wars worldbuilding: “The Jedi are trained to let go. They’re trained from birth,” he continues, “They’re not supposed to form attachments. They can love people-- in fact, they should love everybody. They should love their enemies; they should love the Sith. But they can’t form attachments. So what all these movies are about is: greed. Greed is a source of pain and suffering for everybody. And the ultimate state of greed is the desire to cheat death.” --George Lucas, The Making of Revenge of the Sith If attachment and love were the same thing, then he would be saying, “They should love their enemies, they should love the Sith. But they can’t love.” The way George makes the distinction shows that, no, attachment and love aren’t the same thing at all, attachment is not caring. Further, there’s another instance of him showing there’s an important distinction between relationships and attachment and the association of attachmets with possession: "Jedi Knights aren’t celibate - the thing that is forbidden is attachments - and possessive relationships.” --George Lucas, BBC News interview So, yes, when Anakin is attached to people, it is directly tied to obsession, possession, and greed, all things of the dark side: “He turns into Darth Vader because he gets attached to things. He can’t let go of his mother; he can’t let go of his girlfriend. He can’t let go of things. It makes you greedy. And when you’re greedy, you are on the path to the dark side, because you fear you’re going to lose things, that you’re not going to have the power you need.” --George Lucas, Time Magazine “But he has become attached to his mother and he will become attached to Padme and these things are, for a Jedi, who needs to have a clear mind and not be influenced by threats to their attachments, a dangerous situation. And it feeds into fear of losing things, which feeds into greed, wanting to keep things, wanting to keep his possessions and things that he should be letting go of. His fear of losing her turns to anger at losing her, which ultimately turns to revenge in wiping out the village. The scene with the Tusken Raiders is the first scene that ultimately takes him on the road to the dark side. I mean he’s been prepping for this, but that’s the one where he’s sort of doing something that is completely inappropriate.“ --George Lucas, Attack of the Clones commentary ATTACHMENT IS BAD IN STAR WARS AS THEY DEFINE IT. Finally, I’m going to circle back to: Because Qui-Gon is different than the rest of the Jedi and you get that in the movie; and Qui-Gon is fighting because he knows he’s the father that Anakin needs. Because Qui-Gon hasn’t given up on the fact that the Jedi are supposed to actually care and love and that’s not a bad thing. Here’s the thing about this: You know who else, by this logic, Qui-Gon should have been a father to? OBI-WAN KENOBI. This isn’t said as “Anakin specifically needs a father” (which I think would be an interesting idea to bandy about and I’m not disagreeing, though, it’s complicated because of what Anakin refuses to accept emotionally), it’s said in a bigger context, that Qui-Gon is better than the other Jedi because he understands the need for fathers (and thus this ties into Return of the Jedi) and he’s ahead of the other Jedi, who apparently think loving and caring about people are bad things, but Qui-Gon does not treat Obi-Wan like his son. Or, if he does, he’s not exactly a stellar dad about it. Within Master & Apprentice, there’s an incredibly consistent theme of how Qui-Gon thinks supportive things about Obi-Wan, but never says them aloud. He thinks he should talk to Obi-Wan about the upcoming decision to be on the Council and then never does. He could have explained why he kept Obi-Wan training the basics but he never does. There are multiple instances showing that Qui-Gon is actually really, really bad at actually handling a young apprentice who needs him to talk to them about important things. Qui-Gon continues this in From a Certain Point of View where he still never talked to Obi-Wan about everything that happened, even after he became a Force Ghost. Damn, damn, damn. Qui-Gon closed his eyes for one moment. It blocked nothing; the wave of shock that went through Obi-Wan was so great it could be felt through the Force. Qui-Gon hadn’t thought Kirames Kaj would mention the Jedi Council invitation. It seemed possible the soon-retiring chancellor of the Republic might not even have taken much note of information about a new Council member. --Master & Apprentice That comment finally pierced Qui-Gon’s damnable calm. There was an edge to his voice as he said, “I suspected you would be too upset to discuss this rationally. Apparently I was correct.” “I thought you said my reaction was understandable,” Obi-Wan shot back. “So why does it disqualify me from hearing the truth?” Qui-Gon put his hands on his broad belt, the way he did when he was beginning to withdraw into himself. “…we should discuss this at another time. Neither of us is his best self at the present.” --Master & Apprentice Obi-Wan walked toward the door, obviously outdone. “At the beginning of my apprenticeship, I couldn’t understand you,” he said. “Unfortunately, that’s just as true here at the end.” Only yesterday they had worked together as never before. How did Qui-Gon manage to get closer to Obi-Wan at the same time he was moving further away? Just before Obi-Wan would leave the room, Qui-Gon said, “Once, you asked me about the basic lightsaber cadences. Why I’d kept you there, instead of training you in more advanced forms of combat.” Obi-Wan turned reluctantly to face him again. “I suppose you thought I wasn’t ready for more. The same way I’m not ready to believe in all this mystical—” “That’s not why.” After a long pause, Obi-Wan calmed to the point where he would listen. “Then why, Qui-Gon?” “Because many Padawans—and full Jedi Knights, for that matter—forget that the most basic technique is the most important technique. The purest. The most likely to protect you in battle, and the foundation of all knowledge that is to come,” Qui-Gon said. “Most apprentices want to rush ahead to styles of fighting that are flashier or more esoteric. Most Masters let them, because we must all find our preferred form eventually. But I wanted you to be grounded in your technique. I wanted you to understand the basic cadences so well that they would become instinct, so that you would be almost untouchable. Above all, I wanted to give you the training you needed to accomplish anything you set your mind to later on.” Obi-Wan remained quiet for so long that Qui-Gon wondered if he were too angry to really hear any of what he’d said. But finally, his Padawan nodded. “Thank you, Qui-Gon. I appreciate that. But—” “But what?” “You could’ve said so,” Obi-Wan replied, and then he left. --Master & Apprentice "I owe you that. After all, I’m the one who failed you.“ "Failed me?” They have never spoken of this, not once in all Qui-Gon’s journeys into the mortal realm to commune with him. This is primarily because Qui-Gon thought his mistakes so wretched, so obvious, that Obi-Wan had wanted to spare him any discussion of it. Yet here, too, he has failed to do his Padawan justice. --From a Certain Point of View, “Master and Apprentice” (Further, in Master & Apprentice, Qui-Gon thinks that the Jedi give Rael Averross--who is HUGELY paralleled to Anakin--too many exceptions, were too soft on him because he came to the Jedi later than most and has trouble thinking of them as his family, and he thinks they should have been stricter with him.) It’s also readily apparent within The Phantom Menace itself:

You can take some charitable views of this scene, that Qui-Gon was pushed into a corner where he had few other options (and this is the view I generally take even!), but this is after the entire movie where he’s never once indicated that Obi-Wan was ready, has instead indicated that he still has much to learn (not just of the Living Force, but in general), as well as made it clear that he’s still teaching Obi-Wan, like on the Trade Federation ship. And I do think Obi-Wan got over this because he understood, because Obi-Wan actually is a very selfless person, he clearly cares (which is furthered by how we see him warm up to Anakin very quickly), but look at their faces. This was not a good moment, and they do somewhat make up, where Qui-Gon says that Obi-Wan has been a good apprentice, that he’s wiser than Qui-Gon and he’ll be a great Jedi--but if we’re counting that as Qui-Gon being this great Jedi, then you can’t say Obi-Wan failed Anakin, given that we show him doing the exact same thing, except better. He tells Anakin, “You are strong and wise and will become a far greater Jedi than I could ever hope to be.”, echoing Qui-Gon’s words, but also he never threw Anakin aside for someone else. This is kind of a major undercurrent throughout The Clone Wars, where Obi-Wan never takes another apprentice, where he continues to teach Anakin, to support him, even to the point of occasionally co-Mastering Ahsoka with him. “This has been quite a journey for our Padawan.” Qui-Gon’s treatment of Obi-Wan in this scene isn’t the worst, he’s kind about it later (though, he never actually specifically apologizes for this), but we can see that this is a moment where Qui-Gon hurts Obi-Wan and knows it. And you know what George Lucas has to say about Qui-Gon? This: “So here we’re having Qui-Gon wanting to skip the early training and jump right to taking him on as his Padawan learner, which is controversial, and ultimately, the source of much of the problems that develop later on.” –George Lucas, The Phantom Menace commentary There’s nothing about Qui-Gon being right or better than the other Jedi, but instead that Qui-Gon’s actions here are a source of much of the problems that develop later on. So, ultimately, I liked some points Dave made in that speech, it’s a beautiful and eloquent one, but I thoroughly disagree with his interpretation of George’s intentions for Qui-Gon and I thoroughly disagree that that’s what the movies, The Clone Wars (DAVE’S OWN SHOW), and the supplementary canon show about Qui-Gon and the other Jedi. I still stand by my appreciation of Dave’s contributions to SW as a whole, I think he does a really good job at making Star Wars, but he doesn’t always get everything right and this is one thing where I think the canon and George’s commentary show otherwise, as much as I love his desire to defend the prequels’ importance in the story. Because, my friend, I have felt that every single day of my SW life.

#anakin skywalker #qui gon jinn #jedi order #george lucas #dave filoni #meta #long post #really long post

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padawanlost · 3 years

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hi!! i adore your blog!!

i’m sorry if this is query is too long to make sense of but i was wondering, since you’re such a well or prequels knowledge and the 2003/5 clone wars has just arrived to d*sney+, what the canon story is for when palpatine was “kidnapped” by grievous immediately before RoTS?

as far as i can tell, there are seemingly several versions?? or am i mistaken? there’s the 2003/5 version and the filoni!clone wars season 7 version (i’ve yet to read luceno’s labyrinth of evil so i don’t know if that has any bearing on my question), as well as the RoTS novelisation — but that introduction is less focussed on the attack on the senate itself and more on how the galaxy reacts to the whole ordeal.

(there have also been several debates on whether or not the 2003/5 clone wars are considered “canon”, which can be factored into discussion, but i personally do consider them to be canon (if not spaced out somewhat oddly, if we’re to believe they coincide with filoni’s canon))

additionally, there’s the question of shaak ti’s “death” on grievous’ invisible hand; whether it actually even happened or not. there’s been debates over her canon death for years now and i’ve never truly gotten a straight answer.

i, and many others apparently, don’t believe that grievous killed her on the invisible hand (THAT death only serves to further goad obi-wan and anakin into wanting to bring the general to justice, which is referenced with the scene in filoni’s tcw where grievous crushes a clone trooper’s skull and obi-wan informs him that “[grievous]’ll regret that”), nor do i believe that she survived order 66, in the pursuit of training a padawan on felucia and then dying by the hands of vader’s secret apprentice starkiller. circling back to the RoTS novelisation, shaak ti is there to keep a watchful eye on anakin and try to keep him from leaving the temple while under lockdown (i’m afraid that’s all i remember of her in the book lol).

at the very end of the 2005 micro-series, anakin and obi-wan are informed by mace windu that the chancellor has been taken hostage before they leave to pursue him – leading directly into RoTS. i personally believe that this aspect of the micro-series is no longer canon, since this is erased with tcw season 7 when anakin, obi-wan and ahsoka are forced to end their reunion prematurely.

one final question (sorry again; i feel like i’ve been asking more than fair, and this has already grown into a tangent) are there other aspects of the 2003/5 clone wars that you believe are no longer canon? what with tcw and d*sney now being unanimously considered to be the True Canon™️, while earlier clone wars material are now only legends.

look forward to hearing your reply!! 💝

Hi! Sorry for taking so long :(

There’s a lot to unpack here so I’ll try to give you a timeline, maybe it’ll be easer to understand what happened

2003 -2008

What was canon? Everything officially released by Lucasfilm, unless stated it wasn’t canon by official sources. Novels, comics, movies, shows, games, etc. Everything was canon, save a few exceptions.

What happened? Palpatine was kidnapped by Grievous before the beginning of ROTS. Shaak Ti was one of the many Jedi sent to rescue the Chancellor. She wasn’t able to rescue Palpatine or kill Grievous but she survived the Ordeal and was alive during the events of ROTS. these events are called the Battle of Coruscant and they were portrayed in Clone Wars (2003) and Labyrinth of Evil by James Luceno.

During the production of ROTS (2005) they had to different death scenes for her. In one she would die by Grievous hands during the Battle of Coruscant. The other would have her be killed by Anakin/Vader during the attack on the Temple. Both ideas were scrapped and neither were considered canon.

So, technically, Shaak Ti survived the events of the Revenge of the Sith (2005). In 2008 The Clone Wars were released. As informed by Lucasfilm everything previously released that clash with what was being portrayed with TCW was no longer canon. But because TCW never clashed with Clone Wars (2003) or the movies on this particular subject, it doesn’t influence Shaak Ti’s fate. Also in 2008 the game Star Wars: The Force Unleashed was released where Shaak Ti officially dies after a fight with Star killer.

2012 - ...

That was her canonical death until 2012 when Disney bought Star Wars and made everything, with the exception of the movies and TCW, non-canon.

‘Fun’ fact: TCW (2008) did show a vision of Shaak Ti being killed by Anakin/Vader during Order 66 (based on the ROTS deleted scene) but because it was a vision and not an actual death scene, I don’t think it counts (in terms of Original canon).

However, those episodes were released after the Disney purchase so at the time everything previously published that could contradict this was no longer canon. i’m not 100% sure but i think Shaak Ti dies, in Disney’s canon, during Order 66 because of the events mentioned above. They used that vision to ‘explain’ her death.

PS:

The Battle of Coruscant remains canon to this day. The shows/novels don’t contradict the movies because this is what happened:

Anakin and Obi-wan were away from Coruscant, reunited with Ahsoka.

Grievous and Dooku arrive on Coruscant, kidnap the Chancellor and the Jedi Council goes to the rescue.

Before Anakin and Ahsoka can properly reconnect, he and Obi-wan are told about the Chancellor and return to Coruscant to help.

Clone Wars (2003) we see what happens in Coruscant;

Revenge of the Sith (2005) we see what happened immediately after anakin and Obi-wan arrive on the planet.

The Clone Wars (2020) we see them leaving to Coruscant and what happens to Ahsoka.

#ask #anon #sw meta #meta: fandom #txt #shaak ti #tcw meta #meta: shaak ti

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bedlamsbard · 4 years

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(in response to this post)

This turned out really, really long, so, uh, apologies? The short version is that the number one rule is that your legacy characters don’t undercut your main cast.

I think Rogue One and Solo pulled it off -- Solo is a weirder case because it’s a prequel story about a main character, but Rogue One’s use of Tarkin, Vader, Mon Mothma, Bail Organa, etc. worked for me because from the beginning they were there to support the original characters in the film and never wavered from that. Rogue One also benefited from knowing exactly what it was going to do and never wavering from that for an instant.

In terms of the shows, TCW is also not a straightforward case because it was using film characters as its mains and pulling from all over, but in terms of OT characters that appeared in the show, I am pretty happy with how TCW pulled off Chewbacca in Wookiee Hunt (3.22) -- puts him there, uses him well to support the main character of that particular arc (Ahsoka) and the other supporting characters (the other youngling Jedi), but it doesn’t turn into the Chewie episode. Same with Ackbar in the Mon Cala arc in S4: support, not overwhelming, doesn’t waver from the central theme of the arc. Tarkin’s the other big one, and I’m pretty satisfied with the way he was used in TCW -- he’s always there in reference to the main characters of the arcs he appears in, and not in reference to himself, if that makes sense -- he’s there because having him there specifically makes more sense than it doesn’t.

(Honestly, I think the little philosophical lessons really helped with TCW being able to keep its focus: they have to drive straight towards that and not hesitate about it. Every time they dropped those (I’m talking about you, Siege of Mandalore), they ran into a problem where they sort of wandered around a bit.)

Maul...I like Maul a lot. I don’t have that much of a problem with the decision to bring him back into the timeline in TCW (at least you always knew that when George Lucas was doing something he was doing it because he enjoyed it, instead of the current case of “are you doing it for a purpose? for cheap lulz? for the aesthetic? are you setting up a sequel? are you trying to course-correct another piece of canon?”). I do think Maul got overweighted in S7, and this is partially because they didn’t really have the space to build him up from where he ended in S5. The Darth Maul - Son of Dathomir comic helps a little, but S7 is such a rapid switch from where he is in S5 (and you do have to assume that most viewers hadn’t read the comic) that he then pulls in too much narrative weight, and that’s because S7 was trying to do something really, really different from what the previous six seasons of TCW were trying to do.

Rebels sometimes pulls it off, sometimes does not. Since we’re on the topic of Maul already, I am actually fine with Maul in Rebels. I don’t actually think he was used to his full benefit because they pulled back at the last minute, but Maul in Twilight of the Apprentice? Fine with that. Same with Holocrons of Fate and Visions and Voices. (I’ve got a few other problems with Visions and Voices.) Maul is always there in relation to the main characters of the show, not in relation to himself and not in relation to a non-Rebels character. Did it have to be Maul (back in TotA, obvs, not the latter two)? No, but it makes sense and it works really well thematically with all of the characters present in that episode. Holocrons and Visions and Voices, same.

Twin Suns, on the other hand, another Maul episode, was a disaster -- beautifully made episode, everyone is in character, it should never have been made. (I’m currently grumpy about this one specifically because I recently saw an “Ezra shouldn’t have been in Twin Suns” take.) Yes, Maul and Obi-Wan are both interacting with Ezra, but Ezra in this ep is basically himself the McGuffin. Neither the actual, thematic, or emotional conflict in the episode revolves around Ezra even if he’s the instigator of that final showdown. If you can start and end an episode without the show’s main cast (and Rebels differs from TCW in that it did, very specifically, have a main character as well as a main cast), you’ve made a mistake. Not to mention that Twin Suns takes a bunch of narrative and thematic weight that was set in TotA and earlier in S3 (such as the Maul/Kanan and Maul/Ezra parallels), and then completely ignores it in favor of a confrontation that is not going to be emotionally significant for viewers who are there for the show’s main cast.

Darth Vader mostly works in Rebels -- in S2 in isolation, not as part of the greater Rebels plot arc which is a weird hot mess of deescalating villains season by season (a whole ‘nother thing). In Siege of Lothal he’s set up in relation to the main cast and that’s who most of his interaction is with. Same with TotA, though I sometimes think more weight is put on the Vader/Ahsoka duel than should be there in terms of who the main cast are. Sometimes I think it’s fine as is. His other brief appearances are fine, since he’s mostly there just to loom and use up the fabric animation budget.

Tarkin really works in Rebels -- this is honestly Rebels’ biggest legacy character success, my gods, his introduction in Call to Action is terrifying. Did it have to be Tarkin? No, they could have made an OC and had the same role, but Tarkin here, in this context? It ups the tension level a thousand percent, we see him ordering around the Imperials in the show (and the execution scene still gives me chills), and the end of Call to Action, when he’s talking to Kanan on the gunship and orders the destruction of the communications tower? This is easily one of the most terrifying thing Rebels has ever done and to be honest, I’m not sure they ever topped it in terms of sheer presence. Evacuating the star destroyer in Fire Across the Galaxy? Perfect parallel to ANH.

From S2-S4, Rebels really wavers back and forth on their use of legacy characters and this is true of the show as a whole from that point onwards -- when there’s a legacy character, they tend to be overweighted in terms of the episode and in terms of how much narrative space is given to them rather than to the main cast. Not all the time (I have issues with the S4 Mandalore arc, but I think Bo-Katan was played fairly well because most of the narrative weight was still on Sabine), but a lot of the time. The Future of the Force is really bad on this in terms of Ahsoka -- most of the episode is still focused on Kanan and Ezra, but then they’re taken off the board so she can have her dramatic fight scene. Shroud of Darkness -- I go back and forth. (I have other issues with Shroud.) Leia in A Princess on Lothal -- mostly okay, but some weird moments, like using her to rally the Ghost crew into action?

Wedge in The Antilles Extraction -- fine He’s played in relation to Sabine, his presence in the ep is thematically consistent with everything else they’re doing. Saw Gerrera in both S3 and S4 I really go back and forth on. I think I’m mostly okay with him in terms of how he’s played in those four episodes, but I also think there are a lot of questions raised in terms of, like, his relationship to the Alliance. (This goes for his appearance in Jedi Fallen Order as well -- I’m fine with it, it’s not mindblowing, it was nice to see.) Mon Mothma I go back and forth on and part of this is because I’m not entirely sure what they were doing with the Rebel Alliance -- this same thing is true for Saw Gerrera. Especially in the back half of S3 (though it appears earlier as well), Rebels is intersecting more and more with the Rebel Alliance in the lead-up to Rogue One and ANH, but I don’t think they were really entirely sure what they wanted to do with that thematically, which is how we get these wildly varying views of the Alliance even from within it, especially in S4. Which is part of the reason why S4 thematically is A DISASTER. (y’all I should not have come out of S4 hating the Rebel Alliance and I still can’t tell if they did that on purpose or not?)

I’m not mentioning every legacy character in Rebels here (Cham, Hondo, Madine, C-3PO and R2-D2, Bail Organa), but mostly the ones where they pay major roles. Rex I think Rebels mostly managed to pull off having as treating him like supporting cast and not overweighting him as character. -- The clone trio at the beginning of S2 has them in relation to Kanan, Ezra, Kallus and the stormtroopers, etc., not just in relation to themselves.

(I have no idea how to talk about Thrawn in this context because Thrawn isn’t exactly a legacy character from the current canon, but on the other hand he’s a major EU legacy character, so he’s also just a weird god damn case in general that doesn’t really have a parallel in current canon?)

What else we got -- Star Wars Resistance; doesn’t use that many legacy characters but uses the ones it has pretty sparingly. Poe is always there in relation to Kaz, Leia has a very brief appearance, Phasma and Hux are mostly there because it makes sense for them to be there, same with Kylo Ren. Resistance has its issues (both thematically and with pacing) but this is not one of them).

Jedi Fallen Order -- Saw was fine; Vader wasn’t overweighted once he showed up. Battlefront II had its legacy characters almost entirely in context of Iden and Del; they weren’t there just to be there. (And not being a gamer I’m not one hundred percent certain how those two felt in actual playing, vs. my watching them on YT.)

(I am not terribly familiar with the current canon books and comics because I stopped reading them a while ago.)

Non-canon example from Legends: Han Solo’s appearance in the Wraith Squadron novels.

The short version of this is: if you’re going to use legacy characters, you want them to be there in relation to your main cast. It has to work thematically; they can’t undercut your mains. Their stories, no matter how important to the saga as a whole, should not overwhelm the main cast of your actual show/film/game/whatever. And they definitely should not undercut your mains. (I think Mando did this fine with Bo-Katan, tbh.)

#bedlam watches star wars #bedlam watches tcw #bedlam watches rebels #kimothee-chalamet #bedlam replies

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knightotoc · 4 years

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I can't really rank the SW movies, but I can sort of put them in categories. I wrote a bit about each one because I've never seen a list in an order like mine, though if you're asking me to be rational that is something I know I cannot do.

(This is really long)

1. The ones I love the most:

Attack of the Clones

🍐 favorite characters, favorite planets

🍐 my soul is anchored to early naughts high-key cheesy emo, à la Raimi Spider-Mans

🍐 most Jedi per square inch

🍐 it's pretty and it kicks ass

🍐 the romance is the A-plot for ONCE

🍐 AND it's a "dark middle chapter" that pulls no fucking punches, the whole Tatooine sequence is just hnnnnggrhhh BRUTAL

🍐 the only "dark middle chapter" in which the person explaining the Jedi way (Anakin) doesn't believe in it and the person listening (Padme) doesn't want to join but just cares about him

🍐 morally ambiguous organized religion/monasticism/chivalry are interesting and personally important subjects to me, a Catholic feminist who majored in Medieval Studies

🍐 the hinge between two time periods I love, "Obi Wan trains Anakin" and "the Clone Wars"

🍐 sets up both Clone Wars shows and both KotORs

Return of the Jedi

🐻 SO much fun, SO much imagination

🐻 like RotS, both the silliest and the most tragic in its trilogy (and imo it pulls it off)

🐻 the ending -- Luke tossing his lightsaber, Palpatine killing him, Anakin saving him -- I just -- gahhhh that's what it's all about, dude😭😭😭 It makes me love the Jedi SO MUCH!

🐻 Luke's plan to rescue Han is as bonkers as Dooku's plan to begin the war and I'm obsessed

🐻 Leia's hair down and Luke in black👌

The Last Jedi

🍸 absolute masterpiece of tragedy and hope

🍸 it's so SMART and has this wisdom that brings me so much comfort facing personal failures and societal horrors

🍸 "That's how we win -- not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love" -- Rose the Queen of Themes

🍸 the cave scene in which Luke summarizes the prequels and Rey summarizes the original trilogy is so validating

🍸 "Where's Han?" [cut to Kylo]

🍸 all the transitions but that one ^^^^ especially

🍸 best visions in the movies (Rey's mirrors and Luke's twin suns)

🍸 Yoda is the best ghost and wisest teacher as he deserves😭

🍸 Leia Vader parallels are my biggest weakness

Revenge of the Sith

🔥 I can't handle this one

🔥 it's straight up Camelot and Lancelot is my favorite invention in all of fiction, and here he is as an evil space wizard

🔥 I literally can't listen to this soundtrack and drive because I get too sad

🔥 they hate each other SO MUCH ahhgggg, NO other characters come close to this level of emotion

🔥 the Matthew Stover novelization is even more beautiful

🔥 this meta-level tragedy, the dramatic irony of a guy who has been evil since 1977, a name similar to the Greek goddess of inevitability, the swirling destiny of his "prophecy" and his doom, but still I'm like "DON'T DO IT ANI" as if he ever had a chance

🔥 they play the fucking ANH medals theme at the end of the credits and it blows my mind. Absolutely brilliant

🔥 can you believe that only RotS and TLJ have shirtless scenes in them

2. The ones I also really love:

The Phantom Menace

😈 best soundtrack. All the prequels have the most thoughtful and interesting music in my opinion, but I could go on forever about TPM's.

😈 my favorite musical piece in all of SW is the Baby Anakin theme. It's so terribly sad; it sounds to me like rivers and waterfalls. They use it several times in AotC, too. The end of the melody transitions into the Imperial March😭

😈 Duel of the Fates is the actual star of the movie, of course; the words are a Sanskrit translation of a medieval Welsh poem. Ask me about how the lyrics apply to the fates of Qui-Gon, Maul, and Obi-Wan because I've FIGURED IT OUT

😈 also the cleverest piece in SW is Augie's Municipal Band, the parade theme, which is the Emperor's theme from RotJ in major key and sped up

😈 speaking of Palpatine, this is his best movie and I've basically sold my soul to him so👏👏👏we stan

😈 I've probably thought and written the most about this movie and the time periods around it, the training of Maul and Anakin. If you can believe it😅

Empire Strikes Back

☁️ it's the best one

☁️ the "dark middle chapter" that sets the standard for AotC and TLJ

☁️ "Luminous beings are we"😭

☁️ Bespin Leia is the best look in the movies

☁️ "The evil lord Darth Vader, OBSESSED with finding young Skywalker"😂 Ani has a reason to live again, oh no

A New Hope

🤖 the only one you need

🤖 an actual piece of magic on Earth

🤖 Old Obi-Wan is heartache personified

🤖 bow down to Tarkin

🤖 best droid movie

Solo

🎲 the other kissy movie

🎲 SO much fun; John Powell puts so much energy and excitement in his music

🎲 how does this random movie have the best character designs after AotC

🎲 GIRL DROID!!!

🎲 really different point of view on the central theme of family

🎲 that cameo tho

🎲 where's my sequel

Rogue One

🌠 the most visually beautiful SW movie; it fits into the tradition of beautiful 70s sci-fi movies like 2001 and Star Trek TMP, which focus on the hugeness and wonder of outer space

🌠 can Cassian and Rose please overthrow the government

🌠 I have a real theater poster of this one in my room :D (I also have one of TLJ)

🌠 does so right by Vader

🌠 makes the Rebellion more complicated, just like the prequels did to the Jedi Order

3. The ones I don't like:

The Force Awakens

The Rise of Skywalker

I want to like them, especially TFA, but I find it difficult. I feel like they lack confidence as stories, and they don't take things like death and faith very seriously. Many planets explode, but they are grieved even less than Alderaan is in ANH. And if you just pray hard enough, God will help you out. It bothers me that THAT was the culmination of Rey's spiritual journey, versus the more relatable and dramatic endings for the male Jedi protagonists Luke, Anakin, and Ezra.

I have rewatched TFA a few times and I like parts of it, like the scavenging setting in the beginning and how handsome everyone is. Some of Maz's lines justify the borrowed plot in an interesting way. And I've thought of some headcanons to make TRoS more okay, because they did so wrong by Palpatine but not necessarily by "the Sith" as a Borg-like force of evil that, I guess, consumed him. So despite JJ's best efforts, I'm trying to make this work.

#star wars #star wars movies #attack of the clones #the last jedi #revenge of the sith #i wrote this back in December but it's still true #leaning more toward ESB rn

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hyperesthesias · 5 years

Text

Boba Fett x Valera

Permafrost

Rating: G

Word Count: 6.4k

Notes: i have a character in one of my novels who is married to a man like boba. so i came up with this. au. 25+aby.

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Boba Fett never noticed silence until it was broken. Most of his adult life had been lived in silence. A quietude in his vicinity that transpired even in his mind. His thoughts transparent on the surface, he considered himself an honest man: plain and forthright, without hidden intent. He was known for his directness with his clients, he was no different with himself. Not in any sense of which he was aware. For while Boba Fett was known for his astuteness of a battlefield, insight into the survivalist instincts of a thousand different creatures, there was little of which he was aware within himself. For a long portion of his life, he hadn’t wanted to be; he’d been content with surface thoughts: skimmed water atop cracked ice. It was easier that way, he knew. Much colder, too. But chill was prone to giving clarity – a certain insight not afforded by the comfort of warmth and clouded, melted waters. And now, with the ache in his bones he’d told to no one, with the wrenching in his guts he’d taken without a mire of his features, he was sure he’d drown in those waters should the ice begin to melt.

“Dinner’s almost ready, my dear,” a sweet voice climbed up the hatch to the cockpit. “Shall I serve you here?” Valera asked and sat beside him in the co-pilot’s seat, hands neatly settled in her lap. She looked on him attentively with that pink smile embedded like a quartz on her lips. That quartz had never faded, never withered in the time of their marriage – it may have cracked, chipped, maybe, but it never vanished.

He didn’t know how she did it. He didn’t know how it stayed fastened there, despite everything. And though she may have told him why she still smiled, why there was still a softness in her, and though he understood it as if he were reading words on a sheet of flimsi, he couldn’t comprehend it on some deeper level he felt was inaccessible to him. Surely, it must have been locked beneath that sheet of ice. That, too, was logical. “Yes, I’ll have it here,” he finally answered her, but he did not look at her. He couldn’t. He hadn’t been able to for nearly a week. Because when he looked at her he could feel a warmth of dawn in him – she emanated starlight, bright and blinding, and a shiver would whip through his soul: stern and biting. Her warmth, her gaze, her touch – all reminders of his failures, all reminders of the inevitable, reminders of what he could have done, what he should have done.

No, he hadn’t looked at her in a long while – in an effort to cling to what frost he could in the midst of her daylight, and because Valera always had the disconcerting ability to see him through the visor. His eyes were fixated on the star charts, the controls and lights, the tunnel of stars blurred through hyperspace, but still he knew she could see him despite the black, despite his efforts of obfuscation. She knew him. Better than anyone. Besides his father – since his father.

“Very well,” she nodded once and relinquished her gentle gaze. He could see her from the display in his visor the way she settled into the seat. She curled up and away from him, her knees cradled to her chest as her head languished in her palm, elbow perched on the armrest. She pulled from the pocket in her apron a book and turned instinctively to the page she’d left off on, thumbing through it with deft, calloused fingers.

His hands gripped the yoke a little tighter as he felt his own callouses rub against the inside of his gloves. His joints ached as his fingers curled around the controls, his clenched jaw sent a sharp pang through the back of his skull and straight through to his eye. The pain was getting worse. Pain he hadn’t admitted to her yet. Pain he didn’t want to admit to anyone. But especially her. He made her a promise the day he married her: to always protect her. And despite what he might’ve told himself, what surface truths he wanted to whisper to himself in the midst of silence, Boba Fett was afraid. He was afraid of breaking his word, of disgracing his honour – he was afraid of failing her.

Calloused hands spoke where words remained quiet or inept. Scars have voices of their own. Pelted flesh contain more stories than flimsi or datapads could ever hold. He knew her scars, intimately. Just as she knew his. He knew how she’d received each of them – the stripes on her back, the chafing on her ankles, on her wrists, the smaller inflections of her skin along her jaw nearly to her ear from shards of glass her slaver had thrown at her. He had no regrets breaking the contract that scum had put out to retrieve her – he had no regrets killing him, either. Fett didn’t take kindly to slavers. Neither had his father.

He’d never let a quarry go. He’d never returned to them and told them they were free – free from him, free from their servitude. Valera had been the first and only one. But when she threw her arms around him and wept into his shoulder praising gratitude to him in Basic and in a language he’d never heard, even the twin stars of Tatooine above them had sparked warmth in him, around him. ‘I’m indebted to you,’ she’d said. ‘You owe nothing to anyone. Ever again.’ He’d meant it. But when she persisted in wanting to repay him with at least a meal, he agreed – only in favour of a home cooked meal over rations or cantina food.

It was the last time he’d see her, he was sure. For that, he’d been glad. He couldn’t afford attachments. They weren’t made for men like him. The only bonds that couldn’t be severed were the grit understanding between he and his clients. Or so he’d told himself, but even then he’d broken that bond for her. ‘It wasn’t for her’, he remembered he’d rationalised, ‘It was based on principle. It was because the client lied to me. He didn’t fess up. If he’d told me she was a slave, I would’ve walked away.’ It was the truth: he wouldn’t have given her a second thought, it wouldn’t have been his business. But the client had made it his business when he tried to pull one over on him. ‘No one lies to me and gets away with it.’ That’s all it had been: principle, the ice whispered in cracks and groaning audible only to him, even then.

He’d never given much thought to the concept of fate, either. A foolish superstition, it was just another escapist reality for those unwilling or unable to make their own path. Predetermined luck. Worse than the concept of the Force and Jedi fanaticism. He’d at least seen the work of the Force with his own eyes when he’d been at Vader’s side. But the idea of ‘fate’ was something far more ludicrous – a crutch for the weak.

Until he thought he might’ve caught a glimpse of that, too. Underneath those damned twin stars of Tatooine, again. He’d grown to hate the desert, the heat, after lying in the sand for hours – broken in body, in mind. Delirious with the stench of death and the inescapable pain of acid corroding at him as carrion. His armour, destroyed. Patches of his flesh, gone. He could barely see in the washed out light of day, but what he did see he couldn’t believe. Not at the time. A woman hovering over him, comforting him in words distorted by what might’ve been death throes.

He doesn’t remember anything that happened in the week after he escaped the Sarlacc. His first memory after escaping the stomach of the beast is Valera sitting at his bedside. She was dabbing what parts of his face that were not bandaged with a cold cloth. It stung even his undamaged skin – and everything hurt. His leg was on fire, he couldn’t feel the other, his hips burned and seared, his arms and torso twisted with gnawing, his face in so much pain it’d passed the point of numbness. She soothed him with quiet, kind whispers – with gentle breaths as she lay him back down. She kept him calm as she told him of the loss of his leg, the work she and her droid had done to heal him in the absence of a medical facility for hundreds of miles. It’d taken him some while to remember who she was, to remember where he was. Yet she greeted him with nothing but patience. A patience that persisted even in his unrighteous anger – his contempt of himself that he’d been at the mercy of someone else, with the realisation that he was not as strong as he’d once been. Fury that, despite the strength that gradually returned to him, there would always be a part of him that was left in the Pit of Carkoon. It was mourning disguised as anger that he was different now. And he was powerless to change it completely.

He was never powerless.

‘We’re even,’ he’d said at last, coldness biting at his breath. He could remember exactly where he was when he’d said it: sitting at the edge of the bed, winded from lifting the shirt over his head. ‘A life for a life,’ he wanted to bite at her for no other reason than that she’d seen him – both naked of body and soul. But she’d simply smiled at him with that unequalled warmth inside the darkness of her eyes and shook her head. ‘You owe me nothing. And you never will.’

He felt like a boy again when she looked at him like that – as though she were with him on some other plane; when she spoke to him like that – so softly, as though she would envelope him in a feather. And for a long time as he stayed with her whilst he recuperated, he couldn’t place why. He didn’t feel small, for she was certainly no threat to him – despite the power and distance she could throw a harpoon; he didn’t feel shuffled and avoided as he had been as a boy around the Kaminoans, around Dooku – she invited him to her table, included him as a guest, not a burden. Whatever it was, it’d been a rarity in his life. A garment that was fitted for his boyhood self, rather than the armoured man he’d become. Yet still, much like the way he clung to the Slave I for the sake of his father, he did not want to let her go. It was sentimentality at its weakest, but he had nowhere else to go. It took him the months he stayed with her to realise what it was he felt when she looked at him, spoke to him:

He felt loved.

He hadn’t been loved since he was a boy, when his father embraced him.

And she’d loved him since. She never stopped. Her love did not cease when she was stolen from him by vengeful slavers. Her love did not dwindle amidst the lasting pain of the death of their daughter caught in the crossfire of her mother’s theft, of her father’s failure -- a pain left pressed upon them, between them, around them as a crushing vacuum. Her love did not falter or fade against the starkness of the frozen pool that’d made its home in him long before he’d met her. Instead, she’d made camp there, finding a home for herself in the frost, finding balance in the chill. Where others had met his guard with hostility and impatience – fragmenting the ice into thousands of pieces, only to have it expand and seal shut the cracks, that the malleability, the fluidity beneath, may never be revealed – Valera had found an answer to her love by fishing patiently in the frozen lake beneath. A world with depth and life, though persistently cold as it may have been. She cared enough to look. She cared enough to see. Regardless of how disconcerting it was for him, it was a rare ability he did not take lightly.

It was why he couldn’t look at her now. Sometimes the warmth of her burned him like the stars of Tatooine. He was not afraid of pain – he’d learnt how to deal with the immolating grief in his leg that longed for the one with which he’d been born. He was motionless, expressionless as he’d stitched himself, as she’d stitched him. Much pain had he endured without a complaint, and much more was ahead of him – and still he did not flinch. So why, then, was he afraid?

In the silence, in the quiet – in the stillness of his mind as he sat there remembering her, remembering how much she’d loved him, a whisper emerged from the melting drink beneath the armour within him:

Because I don’t know how to love her back.

It was the ugly truth he’d never wanted to face, since the day he married her. He didn’t know how to love. He knew how his father loved him, and he loved their daughter with what love Jango had shown him. But his father never showed him how to love a mate, a companion. For all the information Jango had left him of surviving in a wayward galaxy, there was still much his father never taught him.

He tried. Fierfek, he tried. Every day he tried. And when his thoughts began to settle, and soft, light slumber crept up behind him, he knew he could have done better job. Being married was the hardest job he ever took. And sometimes he wondered if it would’ve been better, easier to have never married her at all. Easier, yes. Better…

He couldn’t find an answer. Lonelier. Harsher. Something told him he would’ve been a lot more weathered of soul, a lot more calloused, colder than he already was. It might’ve made him better at his job. Not much else. But what else was there for him?

It nearly took him aback as pieces began to fall in their rightful places of selfishness and gaping distances: ‘for him’. But what about for her? Was she really any better off with him? Or had she been better placed on her farm on Tatooine? Would it have been better for her to stay there, unsullied by the blood on his hands?

He took a glance at her from his visor’s display again, watching her read. She turned a page tenderly and nestled her face into the crook of her shoulder. How could he have touched something so soft and not have shattered it to pieces? How could she not have recoiled from him?

He resisted the urge to sigh audibly and instead gripped the controls a bit more taut as a dull ache grew into his back from his jaw.

“Are you alright?” she called to him. She set aside her book and turned her head to see him. His shoulders gazed the edge of his helmet, his arms stiff, his chest stilled. He was in pain. Though what pained him she could only guess.

Valera had a preternatural ability to know if something bothered him. She rarely asked him about it. He was grateful. “Fine,” he said behind gritted teeth. The spasm was growing across his kidneys. “Just uncomfortable.”

“Can I get you water?” she asked.

Sometimes he wondered if she still believed herself a servant. And another great, dark fear -- finned and toothed -- swam beneath the surface of his mind: had he treated her as such? There’d been times he’d have to remind her she was his wife, not his slave. But had she believed him? More to the point, he thought, have I proven it to her? “Water would be good.” As she made for the galley he added: “Thank you.” The uncomfortable thought lingered – had he freed her only to capture her unwittingly? Did she see him as a slaver and not a husband?

Did he even qualify as a husband?

Inevitability of a narrowing ending -- an inescapable tunnel that squeezed tighter and tighter as days pressed onward into limiting days -- had a way of procuring clarity in a way not even a coldness of the soul could conjure. Regrets started to form at his mouth, sudden cavities that sprung overnight and all of them hurt at once. Or maybe it was the kriffing spasm in his jaw.

“Here you are.” Valera returned with a flask of cold water in one hand, the hip of her skirt bustled in the other. She sat down again beside him in the co-pilot’s seat and pulled the book from her apron; and though she turned to the correct page, she couldn’t read a word upon it. Her mind fixated on other things entirely. Cavernous things that echoed in her heart growing louder and louder as gusts of thought whipped through her.

She let a quiet breath and snuggled into the worn leather seat: a gift he’d given her. To sit beside him in his ship was equivalent to sitting beside his soul. It was a form of intimacy for him, and she knew it. She was grateful for it. But lately, they’d only sat in weighted silence. The only time he beckoned her was when he told her strap in, or that they’d landed somewhere. Even when they’d had their spats, the silence had never been so heavy and spined. A great fear had begun to well in her: that perhaps he had no more use for her. That soon, he would consider her a stranger. That the intimacy of sitting beside him, and the intimacy of merely being with him, would be lost.

Valera stifled the scratching pain that’d begun to gather at the back of her throat at the mere thought. She set her book in her lap and rested her head against the back of the seat with a quiet sigh. It was drowned out by the hissing sound of Boba’s helmet as he removed it and its environment controls equalised. She could see his reflection in the permaglass: scarred and steeled. She knew him no other way. He was a pillar – unmoving and built of tempered strength, unbreakable. But sometimes he forgot he was just that: a constructed thing. He was not invincible, he was ‘human’ – as she came to learn, non-human that she was, the term was synonymous with ‘fallible’. But fallible was never synonymous with feeble, in any language. And she never thought him weak.

She noted he did not return her gaze in the reflection. She also knew it was on purpose. She did not begrudge him, but it made her sad. A sinking of her heart deeper into the centre of her stomach than it had been already suddenly made her wish she had never prepared dinner. She was no longer hungry. Her stomach full with wishes instead of nutrients.

Her eyes fell from his image as he drank the water – a small wince at the corner of his eye as he lifted the flask and tilted his head back. He’d been doing that more frequently, believing her mostly ignorant -- though not entirely; he gave her the credit of her observational nature, hyper-aware as it may have been at times. She knew something had happened, especially after their last visit to Kamino, but she didn’t know what exactly. He wouldn’t tell her. She didn’t ask. She knew he would tell her eventually, he just needed time. But it wasn’t the time he needed that bothered her. It was the empty space between them that swelled with uncertainty -- with her own insecurity. Did he not trust her? Did he think her weak? She may not have been a Mandalorian, she may not have been a warrior, but she knew what it was to defend. She knew others thought plainly of her because she did not wear beskar, that she did not like to handle blasters -- though a harpoon was equally dangerous in her hand. She had hoped he never thought as others did, and he said he did not. But in her difference to him, had he grown indifferent to her?

One question, above all others, bothered her the most. And she felt if she did not ask it, she would resonate out of existence and fissure into stardust.

“Bo’aba?” she called.

He turned his head towards her somewhat, but still did not look at her. Even after all the years they’d been bonded, the way she said his name – with that graceful accent of a land he’d never known – thralled the centre of his chest. He swallowed the last of the water. “Yes?”

Valera suddenly lost all her courage when he turned towards her. She could feel it vaporise from her bones and she pushed herself into the corner of the seat. It would be better to wait, she thought. It’s just me.

“Are you alright?” he asked and took the chance to glimpse her. But this time when his eyes fell on her, he felt no warmth from her. The air around her was sullen and dark – a cold and quiet night. A faint furrow built in his brow and he set the flask aside. “What is it?”

She thought about lying. But she loved him too much to deceive him, even if the truth would hurt the both of them. She took a deep breath, feeling the weight of her heart in her gut even heavier than before, and sat up to face him. But this time it was her eyes that would not search for his. “Bo’aba, will you be honest with me?”

Normally, he might’ve taken offence – the implication that he was dishonest a mar to his reputation. But his mouth went dry at the notion of all he had not told her, and he knew he would be a hypocrite if he felt any umbrage. “Yes,” he agreed, in a careful, singular answer.

His voice was quiet, softened. It reassured her somewhat, even if it would be the last time she heard the softness in his voice. With another breath, her eyes wandered upwards and found his. Despite the glitter that gathered at the edges of hers, there was something eeling in his own – a worry she had not seen in a long while. It made her feel foolish as the words gathered at her mouth in a gentle breath: “Do you still love me?”

Boba straightened, his eyes turned stern. Valera immediately regretted asking, and her gaze fell to the floor. He’d never lashed out at her in anger. He’d never mistreated her. But memories of past anger died hard. They rattled in her like pieces of loose gravel, harsh and bruising. Her wrists hurt as passive ghosts grabbed them.

But his austerity spoke only to his own fears. That they’d all been confirmed with one, honest query from his wife. “Why do you ask this?”

She started to shake her head, hoping they’d both dismiss it and move onto an awkward dinner – nothing more, nothing less.

But he didn’t let it go. “Why?”

She sighed and closed her eyes, biting down on her lips. “I just wonder…if perhaps you tire of me. If you feel…stuck with me.”

His furrow deepened and he read her carefully, as his wife, not a client – with an intimacy, with a knowing, with a held breath.

She glanced at him with a sheepish shrug and a resigned simper. “’A contract’s a contract’.”

The breath was expelled and he leaned back, a pained awareness of his mistakes twinging into his sides. He’d pushed her too far away. “You’re not a contract, Valera.” He moved closer to her and rested his arms on his knees as one hand passed through his hair.

She remembered when it was solid black, a colour that purely matched his eyes. Now there was salt peppering his hair and lines beginning to form at the edges of his hardened features. It made her smile, and a pang shot through her cradled heart. They were growing older together, she just hoped they wouldn’t grow apart. She ran a hand through his short, curled locks and her smile grew. “Are you sure? Because, if I recall correctly, the way you asked me to marry you was – how did you put it? ‘Would you like to enter a mutually beneficial, lifelong contract?…Of marriage?’”

A muted grin appeared on his face and he eased his eye up to her. “I said ‘Marry me’, you said ‘What?’, and I…clarified.” He didn’t admit to the nervousness that he remembered had overtaken him in the moment he’d fumbled out such a ridiculous sounding sentence.

Her smiled widened, brightened the entire ship – daylight dawned in the hull and he felt a patch of ice within him dissolve with it. She was the brightest thing on board, despite the stars that passed them by in a brilliant blur. “It was the sweetest thing I’d ever heard,” she laughed. He watched her smile dissolve and the dusk was upon her once again, a waft of cold night air passing his face as she breathed. “But it was still a contract. You’re not known for breaking your word, despite anything.” Her hand caressed the smooth side of his face, her thumb tracing his brow. “You’d stay with me no matter what, unless you were forced to part from me. You’re a man of honour, I know you.”

She did know him. Unsettling as it may have been at times, it was irrefutable. “I stay with you because I love you.” He pried it out of his mouth quickly in a jolting motion – a ragged tooth at the back of his mouth that bruised and scraped his throat for all the times he would not let it free. “I love you,” he repeated in a breath. It was a breath that’d been locked in the depth of his lungs, it ached when it pushed out of him. “I don’t –” He stopped and swallowed, the feeling of vulnerability crawled beneath his skin. He was as naked as he had been when she treated his wounds. “I don’t want to let you down,” he finally said.

“You won’t, you’ve never –”

He stopped her. “I’m sick, Valera.”

Her sight stayed on him and she gave him a tilt of her head. “I know, my dear. I’ve known for a while.”

“But you don’t know how bad.” He fought the urge to turn away from her completely. But her hand was still lingering on his face and there was a part of him – a dying part of him – that didn’t want to feel her fall from him. The loved little boy he thought he’d forgotten until she’d woken him all those years ago. “I haven’t got long.” It’s all he said and his head bowed, his gaze averted.

She didn’t move her hand, but it stilled against his skin. He felt a flush raft through her – the heat of adrenaline, of fear. The ache settled itself in the back of her throat again and she batted her eyes to keep herself from crying – he hated it when she cried. Because there was nothing he could do to help, he said. Because it hurt him to see her hurting, he said. She’d always cried anyway, and he’d always been reduced to a mess of confusion. But this time she didn’t cry, and this time he wasn’t confused.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.

He shook his head once. “I kept telling myself I would.” Something else lingered on his tongue – bloody residue from the pulled tooth at the back of his throat. It was heavy and salted and filled with rusted iron: “It hurt too much.”

Her gaze softened and a single tear fell onto her flushed cheeks. “You hide yourself in armour, yet your heart hurts most of all,” she whispered. Her hand fell from his face and rested on his chest. “But you needn’t hide from me.”

He knew she was right. That hurt, too.

“How long?”

“A few years. Doctor wasn’t certain.”

She swallowed and looked away briefly. A deep breath thinned her neck and pursed her lips. “The Sarlacc?” She knew without asking.

He nodded. “Don’t have enough spare parts for how much damage there is.”

“You’ll find a way. We will...find a way.” Her hand ran through his hair again. All she wanted to do was touch him – to keep him close in tangibility. To know he was there, he was real, he was solid. She didn’t want him to leave.

“I don’t plan to go down without a fight.” He forced a simper.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less.” Her smile began to return – a ray of light that broke through heavy clouds as a pillar of embers. Heavenly.

There were times he thought she had too much faith in him. While he recovered, she encouraged him that he would reclaim his strength, that he would persevere with the tenacity he’d always had. He recovered – not without blood and sweat and swearing – and settled with her for a while. The knowing that his strength was there, regardless of whether he farmed with her or hunted quarry had been enough for him then. When she asked him for a child, she allayed his hesitations with the faith that he would carry on the love of his father impeccably. They tried for so long to have their daughter, the cellular damage a hindrance for his own progeny; he resented himself despite her faith. But when she was born, he tried. With everything in him, he tried to live up to Valera’s faith, to his father’s legacy, to prune his own fears. He loved his daughter, as strange and as broken as it may have been at times. And now he could only hope she knew that. It was too late for anything else.

And now Valera invested her faith in him again. Though this time, he was unsure he could provide her with a return – with evidence of her well placed fealty and confidence. There was a part of him that believed she would be left empty handed, both figuratively and not.

But he couldn’t afford to fail her. Not again. Not this time.

His mouth twitched, and the discomfort of vulnerability returned beneath his skin with quick and tiny padded feet.

Valera was about to stand and return to the galley, but stayed in her seat as she watched thoughts unfold within him. “What is it?”

He peered upward at her and was baited by the steel within him to shrug off the resonating truth. The truth that hummed inside his head in tandem with his growing migraine.

She didn’t have to ask him again, the way her sights settled on him -- unmoving and assured, she asked him wordlessly to trust her. To speak to her. To not make the same mistakes, not when he didn’t -- when they didn’t...have as much time as she had hoped, as they had wanted.

He sighed and looked away, mindlessly observing the controls that told him nothing he didn’t already know. He flicked a switch and then another and shook his head once. “You’ve always deserved better.” He didn’t say anything else.

Neither did she.

Between them there was a lingering burden of truth. A gravity that had always existed outside of realised words. Until he’d said them. They were tangible now, truth with a corporeal form that sat between them. It was as heavy as slate, and compressed with the ashes and sediment of years’ time.

Fett had the primal instinct to run. He never minded silence. But the one settled between them -- the one that he, himself, had mined and appraised -- was oppressive. He stood from his seat, flicked another switch and turned for the ladder. “We’ll be out of hyperspace in a standard hour.” Ba’slan shev’la suddenly came to mind: the Mandalorian art of strategic disappearance. And for the first time in his life, he wondered how much of his life he’d spent running. Even if he hadn’t meant to.

Valera heard his footsteps recede down the ladder and vanish into the galley. The sounds of utensils were the only thing that pierced the air, and for a moment she believed things would return to the spined silence that’d persisted before truths had been lanced between them. That belief was short lived. Boba was stubborn, the most stubborn man she’d ever met -- he was hard-headed and ferocious about besting every expectation put upon him, including those he put upon himself; and there was a longsuffering patience in his obstinacy that would fuel it through the night with oil. But she had her own meek immovability. One that could not, and would not be ignored. One that sat adjacent to the wick, calm and bated in steadfastness when the time called for it. Time was something they did not have much of, now. She didn’t want to waste the time they did have in a frothing cauldron of reticence.

She climbed down the ladder and found him serving himself dinner from a pot and into a bowl. He didn’t speak, he didn’t look at her, even as she came beside him. She waited for him to finish so she could serve herself, but smiled when he handed her the bowl with a piece of flatbread atop it. She could hear him, even without a word. She was loved, she was cared for, provided for -- he was trying.

“I’m happy here,” she finally answered him. “I always have been.”

He served himself and sat across from her, knelt on the floor next to the warmth of the cooker. He always let her sit closer to it, he never needed much warmth. But blue starlight couldn’t be without heat for long. He didn’t want her to drown in the chill, but she still did not leave it behind. She did not leave him behind. “You’re more adaptable than most,” he said and tore a piece of bread.

“Is that why you love me?” she grinned.

“Part of why, yes.”

She hadn’t expected him to answer her jest with honesty. There was a quiet in her, hesitant about what he left unsaid. But she could not leave it unanswered within her. “And the other part?”

He stopped, and wondered if he shouldn’t have said anything open-ended. But this was honesty. There was little he valued above honesty and honour. He set his piece down onto the bowl. This time, Boba looked up and directly into Valera’s eyes. In them, he saw what he had many years ago: a depth, a vast endlessness even the edges of the galaxy could not provide. Something he didn’t understand, something he knew he was missing, something he wanted to learn and keep close. He saw everything he’d wanted since he was a child -- that his father longed for before him. He saw a home. He saw safety. He saw family. “You’ve never hurt me. And I know you never would.”

He trusted her. With his life. With parts of himself that even he had little acquaintance. She knew this, intimately, and never had she used it against him. She was the first and only since his father who had never betrayed him, who never even thought of it. She wanted nothing from him, and yet he’d found everything in her.

Valera reached across the small space between them and rested her hand atop his. It was warm, though gloved, and she cherished it as a sign that he was alive. His fingers lay languid, still, and they were pliable as she massaged her thumb against them. She felt them curl around her own, but the rarity of their yielding malleability continued as he held her hand in silence.

After a moment, she nudged forward and leaned her head towards him. There was a pleased inflection in his mind as he watched her. It was a Mandalorian custom of a masked kiss, but one she had adopted with great enthusiasm. ‘Any excuse to kiss you, my dear,’ she’d said the first time he’d done it.

So many memories. So many years to which he wondered if he’d done the best he could. So many things he would’ve done differently. But he couldn’t change any of them now. What was done was done. There was no going back.

But he wasn’t dead yet. He still had a chance to change the future.

Boba leaned forward and nudged his head against hers. He could feel the warmth that’d gathered on one side of her skin as he rested there. A breath escaped him as he swept his scarred face across her softness. His damaged nerves couldn’t feel it, but he didn’t need to. He knew her softness would prevail -- as would her mercy for him, and her honesty. This was the faith he put in her. And never had he been left wanting.

His nose caressed the top of her brow as he dragged his unmarred skin along the surface of her face, his hand clasped around hers with a gentle tenacity. He absorbed her warmth, pocketed it with deft secrecy in a portion of himself that was emerging beneath a glacier. He felt her purr beneath him, he felt her nose and cheek nestle against his jaw -- and suddenly he found there was no longer a throbbing in his neck. It’d vanished, just as she’d appeared. A medicinal remedy that required no other payment than a kiss. He lingered there, a little longer than he might’ve before, relishing the relief. Until at last, he rested his lips on her skin. As he breathed in, he smelt the embers of a daylight he’d never seen, of a hearth he’d never had.

Home.

For a moment everything stilled, and time stopped. For a moment all that existed in the galaxy was the warmth and the melt shared between them. For a moment, he was safe.

#boba fett #star wars #star wars fanfic #mandalorian #fanfic #*#this is the longest fic i've posted to this hellsite #but i really really enjoyed writing it. i wrote the first 5k in one sitting last night #touched it up tonight.#IF you want listening material while you read #gone gone gone by phillip phillips is from valeras pov #and when im gone by 3 doors down is from b's pov #this is a great fic if you want a look into his psyche #any way. enjoy!

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smokeybrandreviews · 4 years

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The Tragedy of Rey Palpatine

I really, really, like Rey Skywalker, in concept. I think she could have been an amazing character and the perfect torch-bearer for the mythos going forward. After The Force Awakens, i was all in with this new trio of characters. Say what you will about Abrams, dude knows how to build a character. He knows how to write a story and Rey’s began wonderfully. She had all of the potential to be held in the same esteem as Mara Jade, Leia Organa, and Ahsoka Tano. Hell, Disney even introduced Chelli Aphra in the Vader comics, another brilliant, female character of Asian descent. Each of these characters were fleshed out, nuanced, and felt real. There is a humanity to them and, i imagine that’s where Abrams wanted to take Rey. Then The Last Jedi happened and ruined almost everything. I think it did a great service for Kylo Ren, overall, but everything else got a big fat Rian Johnson/Kathleen Kennedy sh*t all over it.

Abrams set up a ton of intriguing plots to explore going forward. The hints that Finn may be Force sensitive, the mystery of how Mas got a hold of Anakin’s lightsaber after Vader cut Luke’s hand off in Empire, who the f*ck was Snoke; All threads that could have been elaborated upon to embellish the new characters and give an opportunity to pass the torch on with the new characters. More than anything, the enigma of Rey Skywalker could have driven this trilogy of films in a direction for the ages. The seeds were there for greatness. Why did she hear Obi Wan in that flashback? Why was she spared by the Knights of Ren? Why did Ren know exactly what girl that trooper reported about? The only answer we got was that Rey was the spawn of a Palpatine clone and it was stupid.That reveal was the dumbest sh*t in Rise of Skywalker and there was a lot of dumb sh*t in that movie. Rise spent way too much time apologizing for what Last Jedi did to the mythos and had literally no time to fix the characters going forward. That’s how bad Kathleen Kennedy let Rian Johnson f*ck up.

I like the Last Jedi as a space opera. Hell, i even like it as a Star Wars side story in the vein of Solo or Rogue One. If those events happened in between VII and VIII, cool. But to be a mainline entry? Are you kidding? It just gets so much wrong about the overall lore while simultaneously sabotaging all of the character development and good will fostered by it’s predecessor. The level of f*ckery in The Last Jedi is ind of amazing. At it’s core, The Last Jedi s a fanfic, filled with OC characters, trying to “subvert” expectation to be more than it can or has any right to be. Rian Johnson wanted to make his movie, mythos be damned. Trilogy be damned. Kathleen Kennedy was okay with all of that as long as Johnson pushed her agenda and virtue signaled for all the “Girl Bosses” out there, which he did. The end result was a usual cool, collected, Resistance Ace, Poe Dameron, literally committing treason. We got a regression in the character of Finn, a former Stormtrooper turned rebel scum, a traitor to the First Order who literally got into a lightsaber duel with Vader’s grandson to protect his maybe-love interest, try to runaway like a f*cking coward, only to be tasered into a drooling mess by Rian Johnson’s Jar Jar binx. And the sh*t they did to Luke? That mess is criminal and an entire essay for another time. The Last Jedi f*cked everything up, forcing Abrams to course correct for two and half hours. This sh*t killed any momentum the Disney films had, it killed any semblance of a cohesive narrative going forward, and, worst of all, it murdered any semblance of Rey being more than a poorly written Mary-sue.

These new trilogies had every opportunity to be great. If they had someone with a reverence, a respect, for the source material helming Lucasfilm, they would have been. Look what Filoni has done with The Clone Wars and Rebels. Look what Favreau is doing with Mando. This might be a little glib but, considering Disney is bringing him in for a Star Wars trilogy on their own, look what Feige has done with the MCU? Hell, all things Marvel at this point. When you focus on dope stories and compelling characters, the narrative takes care of itself. When you focus on agenda and pushing divisive material, you can’t help but destroy what you hope to build. Kennedy is letting her ego cut her off at the knees when, if she just reined that sh*t in a bit, she could have been standing tall and walking into the future with her OCs intact. Instead, she has people in her own organization apologizing for her f*ck ups as the value of the legacy property you were gifted, tanks at a hilariously exponential rate. So how do we fix Rey and, effectively fix this entire trilogy?

First off, she needs to be a Skywalker. That is an absolute necessity. I would make her Luke’s kid. That would explain away her proficiency with the Force, the fact she pilots like a champ, and has that hole Force Dyad bullsh*t with Ren, like her dad and aunt kind of have. Rey would be an organic growth of the Skywalker legacy while simultaneously bringing a refreshing conclusion to it with Episode IX. I would build the familial relationship between Kylo and Rey, one representing either side of the Force, both fighting to discover something about themselves within, over the course of this trilogy. I would have made Rey Luke’s kid; A proper Skywalker. I would have made her mother Mara Jade, opening up a whole situation that could have been embellished into at least two spin-off tales with a ton of ramifications going forward. I mean, imagine a story where Luke had to fight off the Knights of Ren AND his nephew before Ben donned the mask, as his pregnant wife ran off into space to avoid the overall destruction of the New Jedi Order. That sh*t writes itself.

You get a side story of Mara Jade and a young Rey on the run, being chased by the Knights over the years, until she leaves Rey on Jakku, ultimately meeting her fate in a last stand battle, like her nephew, at the hands of several Knights on some nameless planet. Or Tatooine, i dunno. That’s an entire film. That’s a brand new, female lead you can explore. It’s organic. It homages the lore. It’s respectful of the overall mythos. It’s literally better than anything Disney has done with the mainline titles so far. Hell, you can even explore how Luke met Mara. Maybe she was one of the reformed Knights. Maybe she was one of the surviving Force Sensitives after Order 66. Maybe she used to be an Inquisitor but turned on Paps once Vader saw the light. Personally, i would skew more toward her being a former Inquisitor, seeking out Luke for revenge but, upon finding him, falls in love after several clashes. That gives Mara depth and allows for her to grow over a novel or two. Maybe a stand alone film. Luke would self-exile after losing to Ren but not because of the L, more because he thinks his wife and unborn kid are long dead. He’s heartbroken and knows he isn’t strong enough to fell his own nephew so Luke runs away. He goes into exile, like Yoda and Obi Wan before him, all the way to Ahch-to, searching for some killer app to finish Snoke before he can really get started. Imagine how much emotional resonance the ending of Episode VII could of held, going this route. Luke staring at Rey with such apprehension and regret. He immediately knows this is his daughter. That she's live. That she's here to ask him to do what he can't.

You'd spend the a good chunk of Episode VIII building that relationship. Showing Luke being cold and stand-offish because he knows Rey is his kid and he regrets his choice to run. He knows that Mara survived for years without him, probably dogged by First Order assassins. That the woman he loved, died alone after abandoning her child to strangers on a backwater planet somewhere in the galaxy. He knows this adult woman standing before him, is his and Mara’s living legacy and he doesn’t want her anywhere near the conflict to come. She’s demanding to be trained. He’s dismissive and curt, until the Dyad with Ren kicks in. Just being on the Force rich planet of Ahch-to increases Rey’s sensitivity, allowing Snoke to tether her to her cousin. When she goes straight to the dark, that’s Ren’s influence. When she cracks the rock and wigs Luke out, that’s Ren’s influence. In order to combat that growing corruption, Luke decides to train Rey to combat the dark. We actually show look acting like a master, teaching Rey sh*t instead of just, you know, “go cut that rock”. We show her learning from Luke, growing in confidence with her abilities. This entire sequence can take the place of literally all of the Canto Bight nonsense. No one liked any of that and it kills the momentum of the entire narrative going forward. Replace it with Rey actually being trained and you not only give her an opportunity for much needed character development, but you give Luke so much more of an arc and a means to have him bow out with substantial grace. If you decide to go the “Luke Dies at the end” route. Personally, i would have nixed Leia in VIII considering things and moved forward with Luke as the survivor but that's another story. I'd have to rework all of VIII and I don't feel like doing that right now. Leia’s death would devastate Ren, flooding him with a boost in the Dark Side, enough to slay Snoke and raise him to Supreme Leader without the need of Rey’s help. This would lead into a version of Colin Trevorrow’s version of Episode IX, which i think is a superior narrative overall but we’ll get there when we get there. Maybe.

The climax of the Last Jedi could be exactly the same but now it has so much more depth. It has so much more resonance for the trilogy going forward. Luke’s sacrifice would mean something as we watched him slowly come to terms with his daughter being the hope going forward, effectively replacing him in the narrative. Most fans would be okay with this as, even though he never tells Rey he’s her father outright, the audience kind of knows. It’s hinted at. The reveal can come in IX somehow or in his last regards to Leia. He apologizes for Kylo but reassures her that, even if he passes, her niece will carry on the fight. Luke tells Leia of Rey's parontagem she says “I know” like her husband, and promises to continue Rey's training to best of her abilities. Kylo gets his shadows chase. Luke’s last words have so much more impact. We have an emotional investment in Rey because the torch had been properly passed. I, personally, would rework the majority of the plot while i’m at it. I’d fix Poe, continue exploring Finn and his connection to the force, and find a way to make Rose Tico relevant without being trite. I mean, you can have the Canto Bight stuff but draw it back considerably. It doesn’t need to be an entire third of the whole f*cking movie.

I like the character of Amilyn Holdo, too, but her arc was stifled by nonsense politics and shallow development. All of that mediocrity kind of made her an easy target to hate, a lot like Rose. In my story, she’d still take the helm from Leia in Last Jedi but would have had an appearance in Force Awakens. She didn’t need to have a ton of facetime, maybe a shout out at the round table toward the end of VII or getting off the ship at Mas’ bar with Leia. Hell, a f*cking holo transmission would be enough of a mention, Holdo just needed a presence in that movie to be legitimized for the next. Rose was fine as is, she just needs more agency and not that bullsh*t, half-assed, love triangle that was literally dropped like a hot track on Soundcloud in the middle of a chase movie. That sh*t was stupid and it doomed Rose before she had a chance to even get started.

Episode IX would start like Rise, Kylo slaughtering his way toward the wayfinder, but revealing that planet was Mustafar instead of whatever planet he was on originally. Ren has been planetside for weeks, searching for the wayfinder dealy and the planets dark side alignment is taking it's toll on him. The mcguffin is deep in the wreckage of Vader's demolished castle, the deep subdivision and what not. Kylo makes his way to it, fighting dark side shades of his grandfather in Anakin form, goading him about his weakness, feeding into Ren's inadequacies about being weaker than his pap-pap. Kylo finds the mcguffin and takes off toward the Outer reaches in an effort to unlock more power. After the climax to VIII, Rey returns to Ahck-to to find Luke gone and the growing pull to the dark within her as the Dyad is wide open and Ren's spiral is pulling Rey along toward the drain, too. She feels him getting closer to full Sith, all of that pain and rage, multiplied considerably by his anger toward his grandfather's shades. Kylo basically flies to the outer reaches to find a Lost sage of the Darkside. It's not a Jedi or a Sith, but a being that thrives in the Dark, like whatever Maul is, but gigantic and monstrous. He learns from that creature, all the while leaving Hux to command the Last Order in his stead, second by General Pryde. The two of these cats have a battle for power, Pryde suspecting Hux of being a traitor, Hux trying to stave of attempts for his seat at the head, all the while pounding the Rebels as they continue to fight. The Knights of Ren are off, clashing with Finn, Poe, Chewie, and Rose as they search for another means to find a way to Rey, as she has the map and R2 with her on Ahck-to where she is training for the final battle. The majority of the film continues to follow the basic plot of IX, mcguffin chasing and what not, with Finn, finally adept enough in the force, to adequately take Rey’s place in those narrative spots.

We have the whole montage of training on both worlds; Force ghost Luke showing Rey more advanced techniques and Ren taking on a full-on, Vader shade, like Luke, in the Outer Regions or whatever. Eventually, the remaining main characters decide to split up as the pressure of the Last Order continues to deplete their resources. Finn fixes Anakin’s lightsaber and begins to train with it under the tutelage of Mas, who is all in with the Rebels now, as they go after the other mcgiffin on Endor. He still meets the other former stormtroopers or whatever and they still help in the final battle but, instead of Rey and Kylo, it Finn and a few Knights of Ren. Maybe two, I dunno. Anyway, he beats them with Anakin's saber, gets the mcgissin and returns to the Rebel base, stormtrooper backup in hand. Poe and Lando try to drum up support for a final strike on the Last Order’s base and you get that whole shtick with Keri Russell's character. I'd take her helmet off, too. Why the f*ck would you hide Keri's face? Shes adorable! Finn and Lando try their best, but it seems like a no-go so Lando stays to work his magic as he and Chewie return to the Rebel planet. Rose can return to the Rebel planet and take charge of strategy or whatever as Leia secludes herself within the base. I dunno. Rose is kind of hard to place because she has no discernible talents but I imagine anything is better than what they did to her originally. Anyway, Rey is able to develop enough self-control to force the Dyad closed, cutting Ren's influence off from her but, at the same time, her influence off from Ren, completely. That's gonna have big ramifications later.

Around the end of the second act, Ren sees a force projection from his mother pleading with him to turn back to the light but he waves her off. Like her brother, Leia uses the last of her strength in this effort and she dies, pushing Ren over the edge, forcing him into full Sith. Since Rey closed the Dyad, Ren has no semblance of Light to keep the Dark at bay and he just absorbs SO much of it. It multiplies his strength in the Force and Ren is able to slay the Dark Sage, take it's power, and return to his fleet. Sh*t, the sage might be an actual Sith, Like, the people Sith and Ren kills him, effectively exterminated the race. Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot. Anyway, Ren arrives to find Hux is the traitor so he allows Pryde to kill him. Pryde takes command and they raise their newly constructed, massive, fleet along with a brand new flag ship. Mobile, lightspeed ready, and far more deadly than any planet cannon, Ren is ready to begin his march of devastation. Our heroes arrive on the First Order hideaway and the battle ensues. Finn boards the flagship, clashing with the remaining Knights of Ren, his hit squad of former Stormtroopers at his side, as Rose uses her tech skills to drop the shields or whatever they were doing with horses on that spaceship at he end of IX. Rey arrives on the planet, Ren sensing her returns to the surface, to face off with each other. Ren is brimming with the dark, Rey knows he;s too far gone to save and she resolved to do what is necessary to end his tyranny. She ignites Lukes green lightsber, which upsets Ren and then Leia's yellow saber, which sends Ren into a legit rage. Yeah, Rey dual-wields now because it's cool. Poe does his whole lone ranger whatever as he's the last of the vanguard and sh*t. All is lost.

The reinforcements show up in the nick of time and sh*t happens. Big ass sky battle with spaceships and explosions and sh*t, while Finn, Rose, and that black chick accomplish their task on the flagship. Shields dow, sh*t stats blowing up, fun times. Rey gets wrecked by Kylo, who is all the way Dark, no redemption, yellow rage eyes and everything. She’s getting dumped on until she forces the dyad open, allowing Ren to see the Force ghosts of Jedi Masters of old, as they all appear behind Rey, including Leia, Luke, and Mara Jade. They speak that bullsh*t, lay hands on Rei's lightsabers giving her a jump in power, and Rey defeats Ren in a harrowing duel. It has to end in a lightsaber clash. How can it not? Finn wrecks the remaining Knights and the flagship falls as the Rebel fleet overcomes the last of the Last Order. Ren is defeated, dying slowly, lamenting his choices. In his last moments, as the Force ghosts fade, the last few left are his mother, uncle, and grandpa. The last thing Ben sees as he dies is the face of the man he’s chased for so long. Poetic. Tragic. Requisite celebration on a jungle planet ensues while Rey is off, giving Ben a proper Jedi bonfire. Finn approaches, objecting to the respect shown, but she tells him that, in the end, Ren was still a Skywalker. If Vader can be forgiven, so could Ben. The two watch as the flames rise into the night sky. We get a scene of a shadow tracing the insides of Uncle Owen’s joint on Tatooine, generators firing on, mechanics coming to life. Rey is seen, all by her lonesome, igniting her new, personal, lightsabers; Gold, I guess? Is that what color they were supposed to be? A young kid arrives, inquiring about why the old Lars place is lit up for the first time in decades. He asks her name. She hesitates, looking over her shoulder to see the force ghosts of Anakin, Leia, Luke, Mara, and Ben; Her entire family. She gives a knowing smile and answers, “Rey. Rey Skywalker.”

This is just a rough outline of how i would have written this trilogy. I might embellish a little bit, maybe write it up as a proper fan fiction, but i don’t know. There’s a lot to unpack and i don’t really want to spend the time actually fleshing out this narrative but, i believe this is far superior to anything Disney has done. It fixes Rey, sets up Ren as a actual antagonistic force, kills anything resembling a Reylo romance, returns agency to Finn and Poe, fixes Rose, makes Mas a factor, and wraps everything up nicely. You get answers to the questions from before, the Knights of Ren have a presence throughout the entirety of the trilogy, and even divisive characters like Holdo get a shot at relevance outside of agenda. More than anything Rey being a Skywalker feels earned. It feels organic. It feels right. This is the bookend the Skywalker story deserved, not the rushed, politic laden, ego trip we got.

#Star Wars #The Rise of Skywalker #The Last Jedi #The Force Awakens #Rey Palpatine #Rey Skywalker

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smokeybrand · 4 years

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The Tragedy of Rey Palpatine

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ladykf-writes · 5 years

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Fanfic Writer Appreciation (and a little self love)

Sooooo, as talked about I wanted to do a little promo. I may not always be my favorite writer, but I try to be one of my cheerleaders. And well, if you’re here you obviously have some interest in what I’m up to.

SO! Here’s a list of my currently-published WIPs and some info about them, in the order that I’ve updated them, most recent to oldest.

Feel free to ask questions about any of them!

Dog Whistle (Ao3 || FFN) - started off as a prompt from @snackarey when I reblogged some Soulmate AUs. This one was a prompt for soulmates (Zack/Kunsel) who felt what each other felt - like pain. Needless to say, this went into a canon divergent AU where Kunsel felt some of what Zack was going through when Hojo got a hold of him after Nibelheim. And saved him, setting off an ever-increasing list of revolutionary consequences. It’s nearly 58K, and though I’m a little stuck I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes.

Dewprism: Journey to the [Relic] (Ao3 || FFN) - this actually has a lot more written than I’ve posted, I just got a little frustrated because well... the fandom is teeny tiny and there’s no real feedback. But! It’s an interesting piece. It’s a semi-novelization where I’m taking the old PS1 Classic from Squaresoft, Threads of Fate/Dewprism and merging the two storylines. Basically... you can’t play the game anymore unless you got it from the PSN for your PSP or... PS2, I think? Or emulate it, of course, you can do that. And I wanted to bring the experience to more people, because it’s got such a great story.

It’s Not a Game (Ao3 || FFN) - this is my Avengers/FF7 crossover, and funny story, it was actually born out of a comment back on my old Genesis RP blog about how Genesis would totally be Tony Stark’s favorite character if he played Crisis Core. It’s turned into a full blown fixit I have a type and I actually have like, 90% of the next chapter done, it just doesn’t feel quite right so I haven’t posted it. And am, of course, stuck. There’s a case of choice paralysis here; the premise is that, in the MCU, FF7 is a series like it is in our world, and Tony is a fan. So he goes to make a simulation to do a self-insert... only he somehow transports himself (and Bruce) to a dimension where it’s real. A “Stark-insert” someone called it; and it does use a lot of “Self-Insert” tropes, actually. There’s just so many ways it could go that I’m stuck on choosing exactly how to progress here.

Party of Five (Ao3 || FFN) - the MMO AU! This was actually originally a prompt @up-sideand-down got, that I got permission to take off with. It’s a modern AU AGSZC where they meet online playing this MMO I made up that’s based off of FF7 and modeled after a mashup of like, me studying WoW and my experiences playing SWTOR. I’ve actually got some ideas of where it’s going, I just got too caught up in technicalities and need to reroute it back to the relationships going on.

Welcome to FF7 (series link, Ao3) - this is me hashing out basically what I think went down pre-games. Most of it is headcanon, I cannot stress that enough. It’s based off of the little we know, of course, but there’s just so much we don’t that it’s mostly headcanon. Tons of OCs. It’s a whole series, and they overlap - different sections that follow different departments, mostly. The base story is Welcome to ShinRa (Ao3 || FFN) and that follows the man who will become President Shinra from back when they first discover mako energy. I’ve also got Welcome to the Science Department (Ao3 || FFN) which starts off with college students Gast and Grimoire and how they get drawn into the beginnings of what becomes ShinRa Electric.

And last but not least, honorable mention to Times of Change (Ao3) - this was actually a piece inspired by @deadcatwithaflamethrower‘s Re-Entry series. I desperately need to reread that before I can hope to continue this, but... one day. One day.... I don’t suggest reading it right now, my headcanons have changed and it needs an overhaul. But you’ll see eventually.

And now... the WIPs you haven’t seen. (Under a cut)

By fandom, just to keep things straight, but in no particular order otherwise.

Compilation of FF7

The Snowball Effect (Ao3 || FFN) ... sequel? continuation? - as one of the gift exchange presents I’ve just done this past month, it is definitely standalone as is, but if I ever figure out where I want to take it, I’ll continue that one. It was just far too much fun.

The Price of Freedom - the sequel to To Be Human, which... I’m looking forward to, but I really burnt myself out on TBH so it’s going to be longer than anticipated before I approach this one. TBH definitely stands on its own, but there were some loose ends left to tie up, so we’ll see how that goes. And when it goes, when I’m ready to approach that again. TBH needs some editing, too... lots of work there.

The Unnamed Pokemon/FF7 crossover that I’ve talked about for... a couple years now (yikes) but now actually have a plot for. It’s very interesting to me, putting Pokemon on Gaia, and seeing how that changes everything. Because like, they’d have presumably used Mew’s DNA since there’s no Jenova (I can’t see them using Deoxys, which would be the closer parallel) and since there’s no Chaos, Grimoire is still alive. Which means no extra Drama between Lucrecia and Vincent - and really, there shouldn’t be the stress between Vincent and Hojo over her being sick because Mew would theoretically be much more compatible with humans than Jenova was.

What I’m saying is Seph has three parents and at least one set of grandparents and a much more stable Sephiroth (and Genesis and Angeal, thanks to Lucrecia teaming up with Gillian) leads to some very interesting changes. Like deciding they don’t want to fight the Wutai war anymore. >_>

Hold My Flower - a timetravel fic featuring our one and only flowergirl, who has had enough of people messing up her planet and refuses to just... let it die. She is, unquestionably, a force of nature. No fragile flower to be found here, this is the gal you see in the OG who threatened a mob boss and meant it. Heaven help anyone who gets in her way. She’s going to save the world. Possibly in a Turk Suit, don’t look at me.

The Long Game - Reeve goes back in time, and holy crap this one is a monster I am truly intimidated by so it’s gonna take a while for me to get going on that. XD But basically, similar premise to the above - the world isn’t healing and someone has to do something, so Reeve is nominated due to his position in ShinRa and potential to... he’d say “influence” but let’s call a spade a spade - manipulate people and events to a more favorable outcome.

A third BIT fic is one that I started writing with my friend @askshivanulegacy back in... damn, somewhere between 2011-2013, before we switched to writing SWTOR fic together. It’s one where Zack is sent back in time, and the differences in him post-Hojo change things even before he can start deliberately changing anything. But I got permission to take and remake that, so I intend to, one day. It was Good Stuff. And you can never have too much timetravel.

Dragon Ball Z

So, this is an oooooold fandom of mine - the first fanfics I ever wrote (under a different name, no I’m not telling XD it was ten years ago) were for DBZ, and definitely the first ones I ever read, back in the days of dial up. And I read a couple interesting takes on Chichi/Vegeta fic... and I was talking with @vorpalgirl about it and said I’d love to try my hand at something with that one day. I think they have the potential to be a really great pair (don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the canon pairings but those two have a lot of potential) so... yeah someday I might dip my toes back into Z. It’s on the wishlist, as well as reviving and cleaning up an old unfinished work of mine. Someday~

Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Seven Years Lost - this one I’ve been debating a long time, and even did a little on! It’s basically how I rationalize what happens when Link pulls the Master Sword out and - well, spoilers but it’s a really old game so - when he comes out as a teenager and is immediately able to handle a nearly-adult body. It involves a dreamscape scenario where he communicates with his past incarnations and learns from them, and from sharing dreams with Zelda due to their bond.

Sailor Moon (manga/Crystal based)

Second Chances - I read a lot of SM fanfic back in the day, and my favorite ones were... more real? Like, there were more consequences to these 14 year old kids out there fighting for their lives and sometimes losing them. I’d like to tell a story through Minako/Venus’ eyes primarily, covering what that’s like, and then I also just really want a happy ending for the senshi/shittenou? So... yay canon divergence, lol. You guys know the deal by now. XD

Star Wars: Legends Era

United We Stand - SWTOR fanfic, baby! Basically, I’m just dying to see the eight classes cross over each other, and I will bend canon to do it. For anyone that’s played the original class story lines, there is some cross over but believe me when I say there were huge opportunities that were let drop by nature of the game. Just with the two Jedi stories alone... but that’s #spoilers for a not-as-old game so I’ll leave that be and only elaborate if asked.

(And do feel free to ask about any of these! I’d love to hash them out more.)

#writer ramble #rambles #ff7 #avengers #ff7/avengers #threads of fate #dewprism #star wars #pokemon #pokemon/ff7 #dbz #sailor moon #swtor

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renegade-skywalker · 6 years

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Out of the Abyss, Chapter 15

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6 / Chapter 7 / Chapter 8 / Chapter 9 / Chapter 10 / Chapter 11 / Chapter 12 / Chapter 13 / Chapter 14 / Chapter 15: Housekeeping

After years in exile, ex-Jedi General, Eden Valen (now going by Vale) continues to clean up after Revan and Malak’s mess of a war, only to find herself forever cursed with their unfinished business. As an ill-fated lead brings her to Tatooine, Eden finds that Revan’s mysterious plans go beyond the Republic, beyond the Outer Rim, and into the utter unknown. (A novelization of The Sith Lords and beyond)

Chapter Summary: As a secret Jedi agenda catches up with those who remain, the situation on Nespis VIII reaches new heights.

3951 BBY, Nespis VIII, Jedi Academy Mical

Mical had been here for three days. Day one, he scouted the ruins. Day two, he was apprehended. Day three, he was apprehended - again. And now, he was sitting in a room, bound again and more intensely than before, alongside the stranger and his previous captor. The white-haired woman remained silent, her eyes seething. The man at her side, however, was calm, curious if anything. A twinkle in his eye told Mical he was just as surprised by their capture, or re-capture if that meant anything, and appeared to be far more interested in where this was going than in finding a way out of it.

There was something oddly familiar about the man called and not called Wyland Rhell. And Mical wanted to find out what.

Mical knew the man was lying from the moment he arrived, jostled uncouthly as he was ushered to the seat across from him in the remains of the Jedi archive. It wasn’t unusual, in this line of work. Mical regularly lied his way into places he may not have otherwise been allowed, but he had his easy smile and pleasant demeanor to thank for that as well. His disposition was always genuine, despite the lies, but it was a necessary measure when it came to recovering what he could of the fast-disappearing Jedi. The man beside him, however, Mical wasn’t sure of. At least not when it came to his ultimate goal.

His cover story - an operative working to collect artifacts for the Golden Company - made sense. Interested only in credits and their wealthy connections, the shadowy syndicate of antique dealers often infiltrated places such as these if there was something of interest. With the Jedi all but gone, Jedi artifacts were easier to find and also easier to sell - who doesn’t want a part of a recently fallen ancient religious order?

The stranger’s story checked out until it didn’t, that is, and now Mical was itching for an answer.

It was clear that the Golden Company was holding them hostage now, not bothering with the false formalities the Echani had employed earlier or the man that sat beside them both now. But if Wyland Rhell was working for them, why was he here, bound by Mical’s side?

“Alright, now you three stay put, ye hear?” one of the mercs muttered as he fastened the Echani’s restraints, smirking as he spoke.

It was easy to tell he was Mandalorian, if not by his accent but by his profession and the means by which he bound them. Classic, Mical thought, trained to the last .

The knots he used, the weapons he brandished, even the armor he wore - none of it was Mandalorian, but it screamed Mandalorian just the same. A huddled mass of other faceless men and women waited beyond the door, ready to scour the area once they were secure, as the maskless merc made his way to each of them once more, testing their restraints and giving each of them a wink. When the man wasn’t looking, Mical rolled his eyes.

He didn’t flinch, nor did he scowl. Mical kept his face completely expressionless, pleasant if anything, which only seemed to infuriate the mercenary even more. He yanked harder than the others when he tested how tightly Mical’s wrists were bound, scowling as he moved away.

“We’ll break you yet, ye hear?”

Ye hear, he said it again. Part of Mical’s inner linguist began decoding the phrase, trying to see if he could place it with a specific clan, but the Echani spoke before he could reach any conclusions.

“You can’t do this,” Irena spat, eyes flashing, “You don’t have jurisdiction here. We can-”

“We don’t need jurisdiction,” the merc replied, shoving his rifle into the space between her shoulder blades as he passed, making for the head of the room - all the better to watch them, Mical presumed. “Credits trump everything, cuz. Get used to it.”

The Echani’s eyes were like fire, only the violet-blue of her irises almost blended in the whites of her eyes, making her look like something else entirely in the dim lighting.

“Didn’t the rest of your team already make off with most of the temple by now?” Mical heard himself say, hardly realizing he was speaking as he was thinking, adrenaline coursing his veins as his mind worked tenfold to read the situation and stay calm beside it, now eager to get an answer out of the Echani after hours of his own interrogation, “What else is there?”

“We haven’t found the-” she started, her breath in a rush, but Irena bit her tongue. Her eyes narrowed as her posture changed completely, her anger dissolving into a cool, steely calm as she turned to face the front of the room, holding herself as dignified as she could while still restrained. “It doesn’t matter, they’ll be coming soon.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Mical muttered, knowing there were only four, maybe five, other Echani in the wings. As for the Golden Company, he knew they were many, but for the man who was and wasn’t Wyland Rhell? Mical couldn’t be sure.

“They all secure?” a voice interrupted, a static piercing the momentary quiet. The merc plucked a comm from his belt and held it to his lips.

“Affirmative,” he said, keeping an eye on his captives as he spoke, “Send in Del-Nara when you’re ready.”

“Understood.”

“And you may want to keep an eye out for where these Echani have been storing their... bounty ,” he said, smiling eerily at Irena now, “They may have a cache of goods worth looking into.”

So the Echani were looking for something specific, and the Golden Company were as well. It would stand to reason they were both in search of the same thing, given that Irena alluded to a specific object of import and the merc referred to the current Echani inventory as more of a bonus than amain objective. Whatever it was, neither group had honed in on it yet, and apparently Wyland Rhell had the same idea - he watched the two curiously, eyeing each as they spoke, just as Mical was.

But Mical, too, was watching. He eyed the imposter from across the room, waiting for him to notice. He could tell Wyland felt his gaze on him, purposefully avoiding eye contact until the moment was right. And when their eyes met, Mical’s blood ran cold.

I know.

Wyland Rhell’s face remained emotionless, betraying nothing of the words Mical swore he heard in his head before turning to face the front of the room again. A woman entered, burly and brusque as she nodded at the already-present mercenary and proceeded to gag each of them in turn, swathing their mouths with a rough fabric that made Mical shudder. Irena only glared over the edge of the cloth on her face, the thing hastily tacked to her person and clearly getting in her eyes. But the stranger Wyland Rhell watched Mical as his mouth was bound, not breaking eye contact.

I know you know, Mical heard in his mind, as if the man before him were speaking, though he knew he was not. And I’m going to make you tell me.

3951 BBY, Nespis VIII, Dock Hostel Mission

“You’re a lot… taller than I remember,” Zayne said, trying to make conversation as Mission led him to the crew’s current room. He watched as she ascended the stairs, already dissolving into his usual charmingly awkward self.

“Well, that’s what happens when you grow up,” Mission joked, stroking one of her head tails, both of which had grown longer with age. “I’m not ten anymore.”

“Right, right, so I’m told,” Zayne chuckled gruffly. Mission looked at him sidelong and noticed that he still hadn’t managed to grow facial hair, or if he did he knew how to hide it well. It made him look younger than she knew he was, more like the version of him she’d remembered from Taris. He was much younger then, of course, but to a kid even teenagers seem like adults. It was odd, but even though she knew Zayne had matured, he still looked like the boyish, idealized version of him she’d had in her mind since she was a kid.

“So, let’s get a few things straight before we meet the others,” Mission said, changing gears. She couldn’t afford to be soft now, especially now that there was so much to keep track of and the news kept changing every damn day, “Who referred you to me, exactly?”

“Well, that’s the thing,” Zayne started, slowing his pace. Mission slowed to match, knowing they were about to launch into the land of backstory.

“Oh, here we go,” she muttered under her breath. Zayne either didn’t hear her or decided to continue without comment.

“You were supposed to make a pickup in the Outer Rim Territories, right?”

Mission stopped in full now, pausing on the step ahead of Zayne, gazing down at him unsurely from her new vantage point.

“How do you know about that?” she asked, her question coming out in a breath.

“You see, I was supposed to make the drop off.”

“You’re heading the recovery operation? With Bastila?”

“The one and only,” Zayne confirmed, managing only to roll his eyes in the slightest. Mission laughed heartily despite herself, “But also… not exactly.”

Zayne watched her reaction carefully, but Mission was too confused and too self-aware to give him the satisfaction. He’d been waiting for this, knowing it might put a kink in things, or at least encite questions. She let her laugh die naturally on her face, letting it settle over her features as she waited for Zayne to speak, knowing she may not be so amused the more she learned.

“Please, do go on,” she implored, half-sarcastic, half-tired with all of this already. When she took this job, like any other she’d run lately, she was just in it for the credits and for the quick in-and-out, something to do so she and Big Z could feel useful without feeling bad about the law and all. Carth had at least been good about that. She liked knowing she was following Nevarra’s last orders, that she was getting something done, but she also didn’t like thinking about what that meant exactly, especially when it came to all the Jedi stuff. She knew it’d become important eventually, but she didn’t expect it to be now and she honestly didn’t want it to be ever. She wanted Nevarra to return in one piece, for the Jedi to be restored or whatever, and for everything to go back to normal… or at least plain stay they way they already were. With Zayne here, now, Mission was instantly brought back to Taris, when everything about life was a right mess - Zayne included. And it seemed not much had changed since then.

“My old master contacted me, asked me for my help,” Zayne said sheepishly, as if it meant anything to Mission, though she could tell it was probably something odd for him. “Being a non-Jedi myself and all, I wasn’t exactly prepared to get roped back into this mess.”

Zayne’s shoulders slumped as he went on, his resolve dissolving before her eyes as if he had something to answer for.

“But given what’s happened and-” Zayne looked away, swallowing hard, “I kind of have a bit of experience with it, actually.”

“With what, exactly?” Mission asked, careful to keep the guarded skepticism from her voice.

“Force-related stuff, objects not meant to be handled lightly.”

Mission and Zaalbar had only been trusted with their cargo because Bastila didn’t know of anyone else, save for the few Jedi she knew of. With the others in hiding, making any contact was sure to warrant the attention of whoever wanted to see the Jedi die out. Mission rarely ever had to deal with the cargo herself, only with the transport, and she wanted to keep it that way. She wanted to tell Zayne, but part of her knew it was no good. She was already in this mess and she’d have to see it through if she wanted to see herself out of it - if that was even an option, now. After trusting in Nevarra? After knowing Revan? Not likely.

Mission wondered if she really was too trusting for her own good. For a moment, she thought of Griff and how he’d laugh at her, reassuring… but there was nothing reassuring about that image.

“And how exactly did this friend of yours get pulled into the mess? He’s Republic, right?”

Now Zayne really looked guilty. His eyes darted around the cramped stairwell, anywhere than straight at Mission, before he nodded soberly.

“We met during the Mandalorian Wars. Mical was with the medic corps, a good guy. Our backgrounds were… similar. ” Zayne looked as if he might elaborate but quickly thought against it before continuing, “He’s always been a bit of a history buff, a nerd if you will. He’d found a few things during the war, either come across by soldiers he was tending to or found on scouting missions. Whenever Mical would find something, he’d comm me and I’d swing by, taking whatever it was and dropping it off with my old master, Lucien Draay. Before I was even a Jedi, he’d been collecting Force-related artifacts, particularly things that were… darker in nature. Things that weren’t safe if left out for just anyone to find. And lemme tell you, they found a lot of interesting stuff during the war.”

Mission’s skin grew cold, thinking of the package that General Valen now carried with her, of the stories that Orex told of where it had come from and where he had seen others like it.

“Mical had a funny feeling that it was more than just a coincidence, so he kept at it. He stayed in contact with Draay, working without me. I went and… did my own thing for a while. I hadn’t heard from any of them in so long and then… I get a call, from Master Draay. A relayed message, a warning, from before the conclave at Katarr - he may have even sent the damn thing while it was all happening-”

Zayne ran a nervous hand through his hair, almost shuddering at the thought of the massacre.

“Draay knew it was the end for the Jedi, but he knew their cache of dangerous objects needed to remain hidden, and that whatever else was left out in the galaxy needed to be found. He wasn’t sure who else hadn’t made it to conclave, save for me, for… obvious reasons, I guess. But he knew someone would need to contact this Bastila of yours, and continue his work, someone to keep up the drop-offs.”

“She sure ain’t my Bastila, but-” Mission laughed now, the pieces falling into place, “Well, I guess she is.”

For all her exasperating behavior, Mission figured she couldn’t have been more different than the stiff Jedi-in-hiding, but Bastila had also been a friend, a confidante, and after knowing someone like Revan those were hard to come by.

“Gir’s a character,” Zayne laughed, “We’d never have gotten along at the Academy, I’ll tell you that. But I’m not sure she knows who I am just yet…”

Mission cocked her head, curious, though she had a feeling she already knew the answer.

“Thing is, I’ve been following Draay’s orders, but I haven’t exactly… outed myself, you see? I have a feeling she knows I’m not Draay but that I can somehow be trusted. I’m not sure, exactly, but… does any of this make sense?”

Zayne sighed, suddenly out of breath, as his posture slumped against the railing beside them. Not much had changed, Mission was sure of that. Zayne was still the same old troublemaker, always explaining himself out of or into something.

“Well, sort of,” Mission said, crossing her arms over chest, “I get it though. Things are weird.”

Zayne looked relieved, though none too energetic about it, looking as if he might soon collapse into the nearest piece of furniture out of pure exhaustion once given the chance. Mission had a feeling more of the story would come out later, but there were still a few details she wanted to hammer out first.

“So this friend of yours, Mical?”

Zayne nodded and laughed, his voice hollow.

“Yeah, about that,” he began, adjusting his posture so he stood up straight again, “Turns out he’s working for another friend of mine. A veteran, you might’ve heard of him.”

Mission waited a beat, even though she knew what was coming next.

“Lemme guess, Admiral Carth Onasi,” she drawled once Zayne failed to respond. His eyes widened, suddenly alert now, but Mission waved him off.

“I’m no Jedi, but I see where this is going, just- just tell me about this friend of yours and why he needs our help so badly.”

“I said Mical’d been looking for stuff, right? He’d been working in intelligence since the war, got news of a rogue Jedi or something. So he came here. And he - well… my friend found something. So he called, and I came. Only… I was a bit too late.”

“I see,” Mission said, sighing again as she took to the stairs, climbing towards the room where the others were waiting, “Best get to it then.”

She could feel Zayne bubble with questions as he caught up beside her, taking two steps to her every one just to keep up now. Mission shook her head, knowing she’d have to call Bastila, knowing she’d have to sort this mess out, and knowing there’d probably be a firefight by the end of the day to show for it.

“We’ve got a long day ahead of us.”

3951 BBY, Coruscant Carth

Carth hated Coruscant. Always had.

It wasn’t much different from many other places he’d been, Telos least of all. At least before the war.

He used to think it was because of that - the memories, the familiarity. But other planets, similar in their makeup and overall volume, had hardly irked him as much as this one had. No, it wasn’t that. Perhaps it was the new memories he had here and the mere fact that he associated the damn place and the now empty apartment he seemed to haunt rather than live in. Yeah, that was most likely it.

Carth thumbed through his personal datapad as the lift kept bringing him up and up and even further up, absently rereading reports as if new words might appear between the ones he’d already memorized - anything to keep his mind off the anxiety mounting in his chest. If the Republic didn’t have problems worth solving about every nanosecond, Carth was sure he would have already driven himself insane with worry and second-guessing, though his preoccupation with work probably wasn’t much healthier.

He was already at the end of his message log when the lift stopped, perching gracefully at the level he had keyed into the console what now felt like ages ago. Rain greeted him and his unsuspecting face. Blinking his damp welcome away, Carth pocketed his datapad and blended into the crowd as best he could. Hood drawn, as anyone with a desire to remain anonymous might, Carth was glad the rain masked any appearance of “trying too hard”. Carth was a soldier, he wasn’t trained to blend in and he had been told often enough that he didn’t know when to make himself quiet, small, and unnoticed – though he knew what they really meant was that he was incapable of keeping his opinions to himself. Well, that much was true, and any grumblings about the weather would at least go unnoticed for now and dismissed as “small talk”, thank the Maker.

As discussed, Carth made eye contact with no one, shuffled along with traffic, and ducked under the awning of a storefront, nodded at the cashier, and disappeared behind its many aisles. Once at the back of the store, he slipped through the service door and into a room full of other doors, each duller and more indiscriminate than the last. One of these doors was a closet, and within that closet was another, smaller, closet, and within that closet was another door, and beyond that door there was a lift. And waiting at the lift was Bastila Shan.

“We can’t keep meeting like this,” she sighed as he approached.

Carth paused, briefly considering making a joke but thinking the better of it.

“You’re telling me, sister,” he muttered, a smirk teasing his mouth though he chewed his lip to hide it.

Bastila watched him for a moment, her eyes rolling once the turn-of-phrase dawned on her. The lift doors opened and Bastila ushered him inside.

“So, what news?” she asked, staring straight ahead as she stood beside Carth.

Carth fidgeted with his datapad again, choosing to start from the beginning, to buy himself time.

“With another one of our ships missing, the closest Republic vessel we had was the Harbinger. We can’t afford to reroute it, not unless we want to garner suspicion. They’re set to arrive at Telos in a few days, five tops.”

“Five days?” Bastila reaffirmed sternly.

“It’s the closest Republic ship we have in the Outer Rim. We’ve already come up with a cover, and it isn’t even a ship for diplomatic transport, but it should all check out. It has so far.”

Carth had practically rehearsed this line all day, as if he needed to convince not only Bastila but himself as well.

“And with whom, exactly? The Republic?” Bastila snapped.

If Carth wasn’t already on edge, her shortness with him would have done it, and it took a lot for him to reign his own temperament in at the thought even now.

“Yes, with the Republic,” he replied, gritting his teeth as he tried to keep his cool, “As we discussed, we don’t know who may be watching us, but someone certainly is. We need to take every precaution we can. I’m practically lying to my own men. To myself, even.”

If he had any other choice, Carth would have been the one to extract the Exile from Tatooine. Hell, the mess there may not have even happened if he had. With news of her records’ release, he could have been there before the woman knew anything was amiss - or anyone else on that backwater planet, for that matter. But it wasn’t worth regretting now. Carth had faith in Mission and Zaalbar. He had no reason not to trust them. He knew they would not only understand his instructions but his position, as well. There was only so much he could tell them, and there was only so much they could work with. The pair had done well so far. The General was given new clothes, a backstory, and Republic clearance, and according to Mission her boarding had gone off without a hitch, its commanding officers none the wiser. Now, as long as the Harbinger made it to Telos without issue…

“I know , I know,” Bastila sighed after a few tense moments, the pair of them still waiting in complete darkness as the lift brought them down, down, down after Carth had already travelled what felt like the length of Coruscant to get up to their pre-arranged meeting place . “This mess has made liars out of all of us. Even I don’t technically exist.”

“I know,” Carth said, “We don’t know what Jedi are left, but for all we know whatever wiped them out at that conclave is also responsible for our missing ships. That’s two now, and several others delayed. They say the equipment’s faulty, and there’s talk of a black hole edging into the Outer Rim.”

Carth watched Bastila mull this information over silently, though he had a feeling what ran through her mind. Was there really a black hole in the far reaches of Republic space? Or was there something darker out there? Waiting?

Bastila sighed, wrapping her arms around herself.

“It’s just, just-“

“Everything?” Carth finished. It was inarticulate, but enough for the Jedi beside him to understand, apparently. She nodded, exasperated.

“There’s so much going on, so much I didn’t realize at first.”

“None of us realized. We got too comfortable,” Carth said, thinking of his empty apartment, his empty bed, and how full everything had felt before Nevarra left and became Revan again, or at least left to follow in the footsteps of her former self.

The lift doors opened, revealing another maze of halls and doors, a tangled web of old, abandoned offices Carth still hadn’t asked Bastila how she managed to hide. He was almost familiar with the route now, following the young Jedi to her personal workplace.

“Too comfortable,” Bastila said after a while, considering the words as she said them, slowly. “Too comfortable, indeed.”

An unsure look crossed her face as she opened the door, letting Carth inside before using the Force to close it at his back. Carth swung around, mildly surprised, and watched as the doors swiftly met in the center of the frame, sealing shut. Bastila wasn’t one to use her powers for frivolous things, closing perfectly functional doors being one of them.

When Carth turned back around, the office was lit but the walls were dark, hiding the academy beyond from view of the transparent glass that surrounded them. Bastila was already seated at the console on the far side of the room.

“So, what’s this other news you needed to tell me?” she said in a rushed almost-whisper, clearly as anxious as he was.

“Well, it’s not good,” Carth started, already apprehensive, still unbelieving.

“I gathered as much,” Bastila snapped.

Carth inhaled slowly and exhaled, commanding his body to release all the tension it held. His shoulders slumped slightly, but his body did not seem to want to take orders.

“They found her ship,” he said, his voice catching, chest tight. “ Our ship.”

Bastila blanched and turned towards him, her face going white.

“The Ebon Hawk?”

Carth nodded, collapsing into a couch on the opposite side of the room. Saying the words seemed to release everything. He dropped his datapad on the table in front of him, his hands rushing to nurse his temples.

“Where?” Bastila pressed, waiting patiently now. Her voice was softer, but she remained stern, trying to be strong for the both of them. Carth glanced up at her, thinking he could almost laugh. She was trying. She really was. Little did she know it only made him feel worse . He was a grown man for kriffing sake. And it’s not like he hadn’t lost someone before.

“In the Outer Rim. Peragus System.”

“Peragus?” Bastila asked, voice flat.

Carth nodded, “Not far from Telos.”

“Do you think she was on her way back? That she had found something? That maybe someone-?”

Bastila couldn’t bear to finish her thought, a concerned hand reaching for her mouth, as if to massage the words out of her but none came.

Carth shook his head.

“She wasn’t on board.”

“Not on-?“ Bastila started, stopping herself, already too wrought with questions to continue.

“They found an old woman in the med bay and a malfunctioning T3 unit in the cockpit.”

“T3,” Bastila repeated, hollow, almost wistful. “But this woman, was she Revan’s Master? The one Nevarra had gone looking for?”

Carth noticed how she distinguished the two – Revan and Nevarra – perhaps still guilty for what she and the Jedi had done. Or uncertain as to what repercussions their actions had, even now.

“Who knows, nothing came up on her. She seems to be in bad shape,” Carth answered, watching the young woman as he spoke.

Bastila did not make eye contact. Instead her gaze turned inward, her eyes fixating on a thought as she stood and began to pace the room.

“I forget how old Kae was when she was still at the Academy. I was still so young, but she could not have been that old,” she mused.

“You forget how unforgiving people can be when it comes to women and their age,” Carth reminded her, thinking of all the senior female officers still on the receiving end of undeserved flak and underestimation.

Bastila nodded, agreeing, but didn’t look at him.

“Where is the ship now?”

“I told the Harbinger crew to salvage it, to take in anyone on board,” Carth answered evenly despite the empty feeling in his chest.

“And they aren’t set to arrive at Telos for another five days at the most, I think I know the rest,” Bastila finished in a huff. She stopped pacing and fell back into the chair poised by her personal console, a hand still cradling her chin.

“She must have been returning, otherwise why would the Ebon Hawk be way out there?” she said after a minute’s pause and a moment’s thinking, “The last coordinates sent by T3 were from Tatooine, that’s a completely different sector.”

“Maybe that was the last time Nevarra was on the ship,” Carth offered, “Maybe she found her Master, maybe she-“

His ideas ended there, dissolving into a slew of endless what ifs he didn’t want to speak truth to .

“Perhaps,” Bastila sighed, “Where was the ship exactly?”

“That’s the other thing,” Carth said, leaning forward and watching Bastila for a moment before continuing. She locked eyes with him this time, unsure of what was about to escape his mouth, “It was found in a dead lock with a ghost ship. A Sith ship. From the Star Forge.”

“Sith,” Bastila echoed, her eyes going wide, “Sith.”

Carth could only nod. Neither of them spoke, but he had a feeling that the thoughts rushing through Bastila’s mind were not unlike the ones he’d already turned over in his head a thousand times. What if Nevarra had fallen back into Revan again? What if her old students found her after fleeing Republic Space?

“There’s no point in worrying,” Bastila said suddenly, the words tumbling out of her mouth in a rush, “We’re already doing all that we can, we’re being careful. There’s nothing we can do but wait.”

As annoyed as he wanted to be with her change of tone, Carth knew this was Bastila’s way of comforting herself, of comforting him. In her own way, at least.

They sat in silence, soaking it in, feeling the weight of it. Carth almost felt calmer, and he wondered if Bastila were somehow harnessing her Battle Meditation to ease their worry. It wouldn’t do to think irrationally, not now, not when they needed to be careful, not when they still knew nothing of the threat that loomed on the horizon if there even was one, not while they still didn’t know why Nevarra left or what happened to her.

“Bastila, I-“

“Carth, there’s something else.”

He blinked.

“Something… else?”

Bastila nodded, waiting for his reaction, though it never really came. Carth felt a bit numb already, not ready for more bad news.

“I only just heard of this an hour ago,” Bastila lead with, turning around now, giving Carth little confidence in what was to follow, “I think we might have a situation.”

“A situation?” Carth repeated. “You mean, other than what’s already going on?”

Bastila hastily tucked a temperamental lock of hair behind her ear several times as her console booted up, images forming on the screen as Carth stood up and watched on over her shoulder. A report manifested, complete with images and notes, detailing a Jedi academy on Nespis VIII.

“As you know, I had been keeping tabs on all the old academies, temples, and other Jedi headquarters since Katarr. Part of the Housekeeping Initiative-” she said, glancing at him momentarily before looking away, referring to Revan’s last orders, as if all of this already wasn’t a result of Nevarra’s final correspondence with the both of them, “There are other Jedi stationed all over the galaxy as you know, keeping watch, in hiding.”

“There’s an academy there?” Carth pointed to the screen, thinking it was no coincidence the Exile had just been there, and Mission and Zaalbar were still awaiting orders not too far away.

Bastila nodded.

“And it now appears to be under Echani jurisdiction. Their credentials check out.”

“Credentials?”

Bastila opened another file, a document of authorization appearing before them.

“It’s not so much a sanction, but they were granted rights by the station,” Bastila said, her voice stiff with dissatisfaction, “Without any formal Jedi to say otherwise, and with us all in hiding, they have the right to turn over the building to anyone with a claim to it.”

“And who would that be?”

Bastila shrugged, defeated.

“Does the Force tell you anything?”

Bastila rolled her eyes.

“That’s not how the Force works, Carth.”

“I know, I know, I was just - I don’t know - hoping it might be,” he admitted, turning away as he felt his face reddening. “I’ll have my people look into it. We should be able to recover any records at least, find out where this claim comes from.”

“I contacted what other Jedi I could, but there’s no knowing what others might be in hiding, ones we don’t know about,” Bastila continued, composing herself again, “And to be honest, I don’t blame them. With all that’s happened, anyone left may not know that others still remain, and looking for them could lead to trouble.”

“And I’m assuming the situation wouldn’t be much better if we did the same,” Carth mused, beginning to pace the area behind Bastila’s chair.

“Well, that’s precisely the thing…” Bastila began.

“That thing being?” he said, trying to coax an answer out of her.

“I’ve heard from one,” Bastila answered finally.

“What do you mean?”

“Mission contacted me,” she said, “Her message was coded-“

“Smart girl,” Carth muttered under his breath, still listening.

“She said a Jedi contacted her . A Jedi that knew you .”

“Me? Since when have I-?”

Carth almost caught himself saying Since when did have I had Jedi friends?- but saw the impatient look on Bastila’s face and thought the better of it.

“I take it you know this Zayne Carrick?”

Zayne Carrick.

The hair on Carth’s neck stood on end.

“Yes,” he said, the memories rushing back – a plucky stow away, just a boy, begging that Carth bring him to Admiral Saul Karath, who only wanted him for the murder of his fellow Jedi students. Carth had believed Zayne, there was something about the kid that made Carth think he wasn’t a murderer, no, couldn’t be. Then again, he had had similar thoughts about Karath as well as the man Carrick requested they contact, a man named Squint, a man Carth would later come to know as Darth Malak.

“Carth?”

Bastila’s voice brought him out of the past. He shook his head and steadied himself, focusing on her slate grey eyes as they watched him intently.

“I knew him, yes,” he affirmed, “What did he want? Was he in some sort of trouble?”

“He was looking for someone of yours, actually. A Republic Scout named Mical.”

Carth nodded, then shook his head.

“Part of Rell’s team, the girl we sent to pick up the Exile.”

Bastila’s eyes went wide for a moment, shaking her head along with Carth, not liking the sound of any of this the more each of them spoke. She swallowed slowly, watching for his reaction.

“Apparently this Zayne had been working with a colleague of mine, the very one whose artifacts Mission and Zaalbar have been transporting. One we lost at Katarr, I now realize. I’d hoped-”

Bastila paused, bringing a hand to her mouth to stifle whatever involuntary sound threatened to erupt at the thought of the incident. She shook her head again, willing the feeling away and looking Carth square in the eye again, keen on continuing.

“Odd, isn’t it?” Carth said after a moment, his voice betraying his suspicion, almost on purpose.

“That wasn’t all,” Bastila continued, darkly, ignoring Carth’s near-sarcasm but mirroring his thoughts in her expression, eyebrows raised as if to say of course this would happen, despite the uncertainty clearly blooming in both of their chests. “Aside from this Zayne’s connection to one of yours as well as one of mine, the last he’d heard of your Republic Scout, he was at this precise academy.”

“The… academy currently overrun by Echani?”

“The very one,” Bastila answered, “Now, what I can’t figure out is why the Echani of all people would be interested in the Jedi.”

“From what I remember the Echani don’t have a high regard for Jedi,” Carth said darkly, “Didn’t Revan ki-“

He stopped himself. Didn’t Revan kill one of their decorated generals? She had, and he knew it. But it still felt strange – remembering who she had been, what she had done, and wondering why.

Bastila watched him, aware of his inner dilemma, and Carth was sure she was thinking the same of her missing friend and mentor.

“His name was Yusanis,” she began, her eyes darting about as she mentally fit pieces of an unseen puzzle together, “Master Atris was to send our regards after the incident. I believe she was well-received, but again that was some time ago.”

“Atris is the woman who tracked the Exile, right?” Carth said, goosebumps spreading over his skin as the coincidences piled up.

“Indeed, and she was a renowned Jedi Historian.”

“And… dead, as I recall,” Carth tried to find a better word for it, but instead resorted to softening his voice as if it might sound more respectful despite his vocabulary failing him. Bastila glanced at him sidelong but didn’t press further on the issue, continuing only with the matter at hand.

“This is true, but,” Bastila paused, “The coincidences are certainly strange.”

“I don’t like this,” Carth said, “If you ask me there are too many of these damn coincidences.”

Bastila thought for a moment, her eyes faraway, before an uncharacteristic laugh erupted from her throat. Carth balked.

“Bastila, I don’t see-“

“I’m sorry,” she apologized, lowering herself into her chair again, “But perhaps you were right, for once.”

“Right? About what?”

“About the Force,” she continued, her laugh dissolving as she took a few measured breaths, “There are no such things as coincidences, there is only the Force."

#kotor 2 #star wars #carth onasi #bastila shan #mission vao #zayne carrick #fan fiction #my writing

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getoffthesoapbox · 7 years

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[SW:TLJ] First Impressions: Kylo’s Trajectory

After much trial and tribulation, we have at last arrived of the moment of destiny: a descent into the depths of what is arguably the most complex character created not only for the Star Wars saga itself, but for the silver screen as a whole in recent memory. Kylo Ren is a bottomless pit of onion layers--the more I peel away, the more I find. I don’t know if I, or any one single person, or even the creators themselves, can truly ever uncover or unpack everything contained within this character. But I certainly want to try my best, and I hope that I can bring some new thoughts to the table, though I admit the prospect is intimidating because this character has been discussed ad nauseum by minds far greater than mine. Still, I can’t move forward in this series without addressing him, so apologies in advance if this covers territory others have previously tread.

This is the eighth post in my Star Wars The Last Jedi First Impressions series. The list of the topics this series covers, including links to the previous posts, is included below:

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - A Flawed Triumph

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - The Thematic Heart

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Finn & Rose

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Luke & Rey

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Luke & Kylo

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Luke & Leia

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Rey’s Trajectory

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Kylo’s Trajectory ← we are here

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Rey & Kylo

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - The Romantic Heart

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Misleading Love Polygons

[SW:TLJ] First Impressions - Schrödinger's Futures

This behemoth guards his hidden treasure trove jealously. He’s no easy pickings.

Kylo Ren is my favorite character in the Star Wars saga, replacing my beloved Luke in the span of a single film (The Force Awakens). The Last Jedi only expanded on what I already saw as the most interesting and complex character ever crafted for the Star Wars saga and turns him into something that is truly a masterpiece, and I’m not entirely sure it was all intentional.

In many ways, on the surface and perhaps on paper, Kylo is a simple character: he is someone who is being crushed under the weight of the previous generations and is trying to strike out on his own to find his own path, but who has been drawn toward the darkness in the process. But I think what we learn in The Last Jedi (and we certainly don’t learn much), points toward something much more intricate, much more human than the paper version of Kylo. How much of this is intentional on the part of the story group and the directors, how much of it is Adam Driver’s meticulous and flawless performance, and how much of it is the channeling of a message greater than any single person could create, I don’t know, but there’s so much inside this character it takes my breath away.

I’m going to tackle this post a little differently than my previous ones and break it up into sections; the stream-of-conscious approach worked well for the other posts, despite their length, but Kylo’s just such a hugely multi-faceted character that I need a little organization to focus the different aspects into something clear.

For everyone who’s waited so long for this post, here it is at last. Thank you for sticking it out with me, despite what a sluggish snail I am. ;) I hope it’s worth the wait, but if it isn’t, I’ll do my best to make up for it in the future. ;) So, without further ado, let’s tackle this beast of a man.

The Burden of Legacy

While some hints of Kylo’s real issues surfaced in his scenes from TFA, it isn’t until The Last Jedi that we start to see some of the real motives behind why he’s chosen the path he has.

Although he himself never states any of his thoughts, we can discern quite a bit about what happened to him in the beginning of his life up until his betrayal by Luke from what the other characters say and from hints from the novels. Now, I consider novels to be “secondary canon,” which means they’re only “canon” until something from future films disproves them (this is why I’ve thrown out the TFA novel entirely as a useful tool; as soon as Rey didn’t meet Poe until TLJ, TFA’s novel now moves into an “alternative universe” as far as I’m concerned, because it contains inconsistencies). However, it’s unlikely the novels surrounding Kylo’s past will have any retcons in the films themselves, so it’s safe to use them for now.

In one of the novels (I think Aftermath), we discover that before Ben is even born, a shadowy force is targeting him. This would have been the fate of any child of the Skywalkers--whether Luke’s or Leia’s--because they are somehow at the heart of the galaxy and are a powerful family. It was always going to be a risk to have a child under such circumstances, but if Leia and her husband were strong enough and savvy enough, it still hypothetically was possible to shield any children from such influences.

Unfortunately, Leia’s partner is Han, and she herself is a force intuitive rather than someone trained in it. They’re just not equipped--through no fault of their own--to handle what their union creates. Leia is a key political figure in restoring order to the galaxy and can’t give any child the attention needed, and Han is...not exactly the most sensitive or patient man, likely due to his own traumatic past. When Ben is born, he is born into a world that is already hunting him, already expecting much from him, and already discarding him.

One might say that the fact that Ben takes over 20 years to “turn to the dark” is quite remarkable given the influencing factors of his birth. That is a testament to his natural affinity toward the light as much as it is a testament to his ultimate failure to find enough purpose to withstand the pressure he was under. Unfortunately, we probably will never get to see these years covered in any film, and that’s a real travesty because this is pivotal for understanding the deep well of inner strength that this character has--and that Rey sees so much hope in.

Still, we have enough clues to extrapolate the likely trajectory of Ben’s early years. At first, he was most likely merely a normal child who maybe did some strange things due to his extraordinary force-sensitivity. What his parents may or may not have known was that the shadowy force was likely always there, in the back of his mind, even during his early years. Yet in the beginning, that probably didn’t matter. Leia and Han, being new parents and still in the first years of the rebuilding of the republic, would likely have been very involved in Ben’s life. It’s clear to see in both films that he loves them both, that they both matter to him, despite the actions he takes against them. He couldn’t have been neglected all his life if he still holds them in such high regard. So at least in his formative years he must have been cherished by them.

At some point, this changed, and a few things likely happened. First, he encountered “society,” and this could have happened as early as six or seven. This would be the first time he encountered the burden of legacy that would eventually break him--as the child of two war heroes and the nephew of another (and magical war heroes at that), expectations of his future were likely sky-high simply by virtue of his genetics. If this were all Ben had to contend with, he might have been able to bear it, but adding to that pressure was something else his DNA bestowed upon him--a ridiculously out of control force-sensitivity and prodigy-level abilities in the force. When these abilities fully manifested, I can’t say, but something about the way Luke talks about Ben in TLJ makes me think they didn’t fully manifest until puberty, which is likely when most of his problems actually started.

Before puberty, I would posit that Kylo’s problems were mostly localized to his family rather than the exterior world: he missed his mother, who was likely frequently out of the house and busy; he didn’t get along with his father, who by his own admission (and by Luke’s and Leia’s) couldn’t understand the boy very well and who didn’t “get” the whole force “thing” despite his proximity to two powerful wielders of the force; and, worse, a shadowy voice was likely lurking in the back of his mind, whispering things he shouldn’t be hearing. There may have been other factors as well, such as bullying in school or children being intimidated by him in general simply because of who he was. But something tells me that probably wasn’t the case in his early years because despite his rage-outs during TFA, in TLJ he shows some remarkably savvy social skills when he interacts with Rey, and that doesn’t come out of thin air simply because you’re sexually attracted to someone. I’d say that before his turn to the dark side, he was a well-mannered, kind, and pleasant boy to be around, probably a little too quick to display his heart on his sleeve and likely an empath. He probably was, in general, very well liked early on in his life, even by schoolmates. If this is true, then this makes his downfall all the more tragic because he knows what he’s thrown away; if he’d always been mistreated for his entire life, then he’s more pitiable, but for him to have known both good and bad and to be unable to correct course to return to the good is far more classically tragic in my opinion.

I think puberty (so around 13-14) was when Ben’s force sensitivity probably started going out of control. Likely he was testing the limits of his powers, exploring the boundaries of authority, trolling a bit, and acting out as teenagers are wont to do, and he probably scared the bejeezus out of Han. Han, unable to deal with Ben, shut down on him right at the one moment the boy needed him most--the shadows in his mind were likely growing louder and more insistent and clear, and he needed a strong role model to follow to stay on the straight and narrow. Leia, of course, was torn between her husband, son, and political duties, and so she likely called for Luke’s help because Ben was becoming too much to handle for both of them and they were out of their depth. When Luke saw Ben, he had the same reaction to him Snoke has--he sees all that ability and potential and wants to harness it and be the one who molds it. It’s the natural allure of the mentor, and it’s something mentors have to be very careful about--it’s one thing to want to foster talent, it’s a whole other thing to want to mold talent.

Luke convinces Leia and Han to release Ben into his custody, which we know from his own testimony in TLJ. Han’s reaction is left up to the viewer, but I expect he was probably in favor of dumping the boy onto Luke simply because Han tends to run from his problems (and we know his own deep guilt is the reason he retreats back into his former scalawag ways, so he fully knows where he went wrong with his son). But Leia probably lets Ben go because she genuinely thinks Luke can help him--and we know from her testimony in TFA that she regrets that decision and thinks it was the wrong one in hindsight. Because what Leia’s choice does, inadvertently, is prove to Ben that the voice in his head might be right after all--maybe his parents don’t love him and wish he were something other than what he’d turned out to be. This is something all kids face in their teens to some degree or other--it’s part of becoming an actualized individual--but given how empathic Ben was, and how deeply rooted the shadows infiltrating his mind were, he had a harder road to walk than the typical teen.

So Ben is packed off to Uncle Luke’s faraway foreign retreat, away from everything he’s ever known living at the center of civilization, and thrown into a monastic lifestyle he probably never wanted in the first place. The culture shock alone would have been rough even if Ben had wanted to go to training, but likely he was unwilling yet too obedient to his mother’s wishes to make his own wishes heard. Part of Ben’s problem, and part of the eventual problem Kylo Ren demonstrates, is that he’s too obedient. He’s trying so hard to be the good son to Snoke that I can’t imagine he didn’t do the same for Han, Leia, and eventually Luke. Yet another reason why he and Rey resonate so well together--both of them want to be lovely objects worthy of their parents’ love and affection deep in their hearts.

Ben likely took being sent away to Uncle Luke’s as a punishment from parents the shadowy voice whispered didn’t really love him rather than an attempt to help him, which he may have understood better had there been no shadowy voice. But Ben is a good boy, and we know by how deeply hurt he is by Luke that Luke quickly won him over and gained his trust and affection. Luke becomes the father figure to Ben that Han couldn’t be (and whoa, I just realized how this echoes Rey’s trajectory, like holy crap, Ben wasn’t describing Rey during that force connect moment when he was mocking her searching for her parents--he was describing himself), and Ben manages to make a life for himself.

We know he manages to last about 6 or more years at the jedi academy before Snoke finally gets the upper hand on him. Neither Ben nor Luke give us much information on his life at the academy, but I think we can safely assume a few things:

Ben was highly talented and was the teacher’s pet.

While some of the students became Ben’s friends and bonded closely with him, there were others who envied him and became resentful/bitter. (As I said before in my post on Luke and Kylo, this is likely why not all the padawan were killed when Ben went Kylo-mode; likely there was a fight between Ben’s friends and the kids who didn’t like Ben, and it turned into a slaughter.)

Snoke is getting a stronger and more insistent hold on Ben the more he trains and the more he connects to the force. Snoke by this point is also probably trying to poison Ben against Luke and may be priming the pump by hinting that Luke is afraid of Ben and will one day “prove” that by striking Ben.

At some point Ben learns about Vader, and the galaxy does as well, giving the padawan who may resent him full leave to increase any bullying tactics they may have been employing (or holding back on employing).

Possibly Luke, in order to keep the peace, turns a blind eye to any bullying behavior Ben’s receiving, despite knowing he should do something about it. Or, conversely, he’s just never around and is always out searching for new padawan, and so through neglect he, like Leia and Han, abandons Ben.

Luke at some point realizes that his training isn’t helping Ben and the darkness is becoming greater in him. Luke may or may not know about Snoke (I suspect he doesn’t until he talks to Leia after Ben disappears).

As Rey points out to Luke, Ben’s choice was not made before Luke raised his saber against him. In fact, I would argue (and I think Rey would agree), that by staying by Luke’s side, Ben had chosen Luke. If Luke had kept the faith and believed in the strength of the light in his nephew and the strength of his bond to his nephew, perhaps he might have steered Ben in a more productive direction. But moreover, Luke should have trusted that even if Ben turned, Leia, Han, and Luke were all enough to bring him back, no matter what it took.

Yet Luke didn’t believe in Ben, he didn’t believe in Ben’s light, and so he lost Ben to the darkness. Likely after the attack, Ben probably ran away scared and began gathering up his things only to be attacked by the padawan from the faction who resented him, and who now had a justification for their resentment (his attack on their master). Ben, being cornered, likely lashed out, was joined by his own friends, and a war began while poor Luke was pulling himself out of the wreckage. By the time Luke was free, Ben was gone and some of the padawan with him, leaving Luke to believe Ben slaughtered everyone, because why the hell wouldn’t he believe that Ben was a murderer?

So we can see from all of this that the “Skywalker legacy” brought Ben a great deal of pain and very little joy: likely he was bullied, pressured, neglected, abandoned, feared, hated, and abused simply because of his DNA and his abilities. For an empath as strong as Ben clearly is, this is an unbearable way to live and would send even the strongest straight down the steep descent into nihilism if there isn’t a very strong and clear purpose for them to latch onto.

Ben’s DNA and genetic legacy and the legacy of his family itself buried him beneath their weight. At a time in his life where he needed to make a name for himself and strike his own path and test the strength of his fledgling wings, he was being crushed by the weight of both the dark side of his lineage (the Vader side) and the light side of his lineage (the war heroes). His force sensitivity made him a target to enemies and allies alike--he was likely seen as a tool to be used or an object of envy for those less naturally gifted. And because there was not yet a Rey by his side to give him the love and devotion he likely desperately sought from his parents and uncle in lieu of all the pain, he was left with the only other person who had remained by his side through it all: the shadowy presence who had been there from the beginning, the voice of Snoke.

Welcome to the Dark Side

So what about that loyal shadow presence lurking in the corners of Ben’s charmed life? What on earth would make that presence more attractive to Ben than his comfy home and wonderful family? As with the rest of his past, this aspect of Ben’s life is shrouded in mystery. However, we can assume a few things based on Snoke’s gloating:

Snoke can read and has been reading (for how long is unknown) all of Ben’s thoughts. As in, every. single. thought. Kind of hard to grow up if you have no privacy at all. Poor kid probably couldn’t even have any fantasies. No wonder he’s a 30-year-old virgin. ;) Joking aside, this is actually incredibly sinister if Snoke’s been able to do this Ben’s entire life. That means for the entirety of his life his every move has been “observed” by someone. Living under constant surveillance normally would drive anyone mad in general, but this goes even further than mere visual surveillance. The implications here are horrifying for Ben’s ability to actualize himself in a healthy way and also are an enormous testament to the depth and strength of the light within him--he managed to withstand daily torment from this shadow presence for most of his life. He’s only been truly in its grasp for a brief span of time--at most 6 years, virtually the same amount of time he’d been a padawan.

Before I go into what this means for Kylo Ren in the current timeframe, I’d like to explore what this meant for Ben Solo. I’m not sure how long Snoke was able to communicate with Ben, but given how powerful he is, I’m sure at the very least he was able to send his own thoughts to Ben (perhaps even masking them to sound like Ben’s own thoughts), even if Ben couldn’t respond. When Snoke began speaking with Ben, I can’t say--perhaps he only observed initially and didn’t begin speaking until Ben’s relationship with Han began to fragment and he was shipped off to Uncle Luke’s.

I think we can say for certain that at least during the 6 or so years of Ben’s padawan training, Snoke was messing with his head and his belief in himself and his family. So even if Snoke had started as an unwanted presence in Ben’s mind, or something Ben fought, by the end of the journey Snoke became the only thing Ben “had” that had never rejected or betrayed him, that “loved” him. This is a classic manipulation tactic--to seduce the victim with the idea that you alone hold them as “special” and then to isolate them from other sources of strength and support. This is one of the reasons I suspect Kylo’s Knights of Ren are dead--if Kylo had friends or supporters, he wouldn’t be as vulnerable to Snoke’s influence as he clearly is during TFA and TLJ. Snoke also makes sure to keep Hux and Kylo at each other’s throats rather than letting them form a friendship (which would be more natural given their similar ages). I can’t see him letting Ben keep his friends--likely he “arranged” for the friends to “tragically die” in battle for the First Order, isolating Ben further. (This, I think, may have been part of the vision Rey saw in TFA.)

Either way, Ben goes from potentially distrusting and not believing the voice in his head to placing his hope of a future in its hands. This is likely due to the fact that the voice probably “predicts” what will happen (Leia/Han’s abandonment, the other padawan’s resentment and envy, Luke’s “betrayal”), and thus the voice gains credibility over the other people in Ben’s life who have continued to fail him. This credibility leads Ben to go to Snoke’s side.

I’m not sure at what point Ben “meets” Vader. TFA implies Ben has spoken to Vader before, but isn’t speaking to him by TFA. Since we know Vader was redeemed and has shown himself as Anakin as his force ghost, we can assume whatever “Vader” Ben has been talking to isn’t real and likely is a creation of Snoke’s. Snoke’s probably powerful enough for this simply because he’s the one who creates (or at least manipulates) the force connection between Kylo and Rey; if he can do that, he can surely create a vision of Vader to “convince” Ben that the dark side is the only way for Ben.

But even with all of this, it’s hard I think to see why the dark side would be an attractive option for Ben rather than just striking out on his own and building his own destiny as an unknown person. That honestly would have been the more natural option--most teens in Ben’s situation would simply “run away” (and this would have put him on a trajectory more like Han’s). If he was tired of his force abilities, he could even have cut them off entirely like Luke does in TLJ.

So I don’t think Ben’s actions can be written off simply as “I had no other choice.” Clearly there are other choices, but for unknown reasons Ben doesn’t take them, which implies they don’t fulfill whatever deeper need is operating underneath his desire to be “free” of his family’s legacy. Especially given that all he does is “trade” one form of “legacy” for another--he discards his family’s light side legacy in order to explore its dark side.

As a jedi padawan, Ben would have been subjected to what spotty jedi training Luke was able to give him (we know Luke hadn’t read the jedi texts from TLJ, so Luke’s training probably wasn’t the same kind one would have received during Anakin’s time). We see a hint of the kind of teacher Luke was during the small training sequence with Rey in TLJ; he’s clearly a different kind of teacher than Yoda or Obi Wan. He doesn’t believe in separating the dualism of life--he clearly believes in balance, in the interplay between the light and the dark, between chaos and order. However, he likely makes the same mistake with Ben that he makes with Rey--despite his belief that the dark/chaos has a place in the world, he does not encourage exploring it, which is exactly the very thing that led to Anakin’s downfall and to the downfall of the jedi, though Luke probably isn’t aware of that.

So we come back, again, to Ben’s similarities with Rey--what is it that Snoke (or the womb pit in Rey’s case) has to offer that Luke doesn’t? The knowledge of the shadow side--the full ability to integrate into a whole personality. Snoke can give Ben the other half of the training Ben needs to actualize himself--and I think this is an unconscious desire of Ben’s, not a conscious one, because Ben’s naturally an empath and an intuitive person, not a rationalist. This is the real reason Snoke is attractive for Ben, despite the fact that ordinarily I think Ben would find Snoke repugnant (as he clearly does in TLJ).

Ben’s journey mirrors Rey’s in a lot of ways, though he’s “further along” than she is up until the mirror scene. Once she accepts her dark sides and her anxieties, she pulls ahead of Ben in development, because he gets “trapped” in the underworld when he ventures in to find himself. This is likely because, unlike Rey, Ben did not willingly enter the underworld. He was driven to it. This is the difference between willingly taking a risk and unwillingly being forced to--Rey retains her agency while Ben cannot; Ben is subsumed by the dark forces of the underworld and dragged deeper to become weakened, while Rey is able to touch it briefly and then escape back into the light stronger for the adventure and with a pearl of wisdom at hand.

When Luke rejects Ben, this leaves Ben with the only other option that fulfills his deepest desire--go to Snoke and integrate his shadow side by learning from a dark master. This is a very dangerous path and for Ben to take it only as a “last alternative” plays right into Snoke’s hands--Ben now becomes trapped in Snoke’s cage and needs to be rescued or killed in order to be freed from it. It’s a strong prison and one that will take more than what Ben has in him alone to overcome. Had Ben taken the path willingly, he might have overcome Snoke far sooner and with much less torment and destruction.

This is why Ben can’t abandon his legacy entirely though--if he did, he would be an incomplete person. I think the force knew this, and so that’s why it found an alternative to help him. The force seems to be very active in this sequel series, almost a kind of universal collective that’s trying to guide everyone to a greater path, even if it means taking a detour now and then. So we find that Ben has several reasons why Snoke was the only path he could take, despite having alternatives:

He still wants to be loved by a father figure because he’s not actualized as a person.

He’s subconsciously seeking integration with his own dark side, something Luke has denied him out of fear.

Wherever he goes, Snoke will follow anyway. Probably even if he shut off the force.

In addition to these, there’s one more thing that Ben probably would never want to acknowledge that is driving him: in truth, he has no desire to run from the legacy he was born under (he’s actually quite proud of it)--he wants to make his own mark on his legacy. But in a dichotomous worldview (and before Rey), he only has two options for making his mark upon his family’s history: be “good” like his family and probably be forgotten due to there being no great war to fight, or become “bad” and surpass the only member of the family to ever have “gone bad.”

If we assume that Ben didn’t learn about Vader until he was in his late teens/early twenties, it may be that this suddenly opened up a temptation for him that coincided with his own subconscious desire to explore his dark side: he found out his legacy was “bigger” than just heroes--there were “villains” as well, specifically only one villain. While he could never be greater than Han, or Leia, or Luke, maybe he could be greater than Vader--and being greater Vader, as a larger presence than all three of his close kin, would make Ben himself greater than his own family. If he could surpass Vader, he’d be the greatest Skywalker of all--a ruler of galaxies feared and never forgotten.

It’s likely this fantasy (which probably was a fantasy exacerbated by his teenage anger at his family for discarding him and at his fellow padawans for being resentful and his own hubris over how great his abilities were) that Snoke stoked and encouraged. This is the fantasy we see being played out between them, the carrot Snoke continues to dangle before Ben in TFA and which he removes in TLJ: the idea of surpassing Vader, and by extension surpassing the burden of his legacy entirely to mold it into a new legacy, a legacy entirely of his own.

This is why, I think, Ben becomes Kylo Ren--he wants to redefine and reshape his legacy into something he is master of, rather than something he’s crushed under or manipulated by. He wants to devour his legacy and rise above it, rather than being devoured by it. Snoke and his own ambitions seduce him into thinking that this is the only way to truly make his mark on the world, and this is the reason why I don’t think his motive (before Rey and TLJ) is to discard his legacy, despite the burdens it’s placed on him. Kylo can bear his legacy and wants to bear his legacy. It’s all he has. It’s all he’s ever had. He was born with it. It’s the only thing that’s never left him. But at the same time, he doesn’t want to be its pawn. He wants to be in charge of it. To do this, he has to transform himself and join the dark side.

Of course, the problem with this is...unlike Anakin, who truly did fall to the dark, Kylo is playing. It’s a fantasy he’s acting out, and not his true desire, which is simply to actualize himself and find his place in the world. (A positive place, not a negative one.) Kylo doesn’t want to be evil, and this is why he has such a hard time playing the part. We see this in TFA; while he’s good at pretending he’s tough in front of soldiers who he orders to do the actual killing (rather than killing himself) and while he’s snarky and quippy and capable of force-extracting info from resistance members, he’s still an empath who is deeply troubled and deeply sympathetic. We see this when he lets Finn go despite knowing what he’s going to do, we see this when he admits his doubts to the Vader mask, we see this when he takes his temper tantrums out on objects rather than people, we see this when he forgets his goals to try to understand Rey, we even see it when he is moved by his father’s love.

Likely what happens between Ben’s initial choice to “become” Kylo Ren and the events of TFA is that he slowly becomes demoralized and disillusioned about what Snoke has to offer him. He switches from playing the “good son” in order to genuinely please Snoke to playing the part simply to stay alive. Snoke is all he has, but Snoke is abusive, cruel, manipulative, and downright nasty. Kylo isn’t a child--he knows exactly what kind of person Snoke is. And likely as the years pass and he continues to be unable to free himself from Snoke, he begins to lose the last remnants of faith in himself and to crumble under the pressure. This is why we see him plaintively begging Vader for help in TFA--he’s lost and can’t escape. Some dead guy he never met is his only hope. That’s pretty sad.

Fortunately, the force hears him (maybe even with Anakin’s help), and brings him his salvation, though he won’t know she is until the third film I think. For the first time in a long time, Ben receives some of the validation he’s been seeking--in the form of Rey taking him seriously as a threat, but also overcoming him as an equal. The interrogation scene both puffs up his ego and tears it down simultaneously, and, as we see from his reaction when he races to Snoke, it’s an exhilarating experience for him. Snoke, stupidly, doesn’t see the danger of the fox who’s entered the henhouse, and he instead sees Rey as a new way to twist Kylo further.

Then Kylo proves himself by performing the ultimate act--he’s not yet taken by the alternative Rey’s existence provides, and so he continues to pursue his fantasy of becoming greater than Vader by doing what Vader couldn’t--sacrificing a parent. It’s probably easiest to sacrifice Han in some ways because Han was the first to abandon Kylo and the last to understand him. Yet at the same time, which we learn from TLJ, Han’s murder destroyed Kylo and left him unable to continue the path he’d set out to conquer. Rather than making him stronger and firmly setting his dark side as his prominent alignment, Kylo disintegrates and breaks down. All that’s left to him in this moment is the faint thread connecting him to Rey, and this leads to his violent anger at Finn as well as his offer to Rey of training. She’s the last thing he has; all his fantasies and illusions have begun breaking down due to his own actions. But the force separates him from Rey, and he is returned to Snoke because it’s not time yet for her to reach him.

His meltdown continues in TLJ; his loss to Rey shatters the remainder of his pride and his murder of his father and the loss of Rey sunder his foundations, but the encounter with Rey (and how deeply he affected her) has birthed something new within him that’s only fledgling in form at the beginning of the film: a new desire, a new wish, even if he can’t verbalize it or even acknowledge it because of Snoke’s mental spying. Rey’s existence brings hope back into his life--hope of finding a path that allows him to achieve his dream (which is to make his mark on his own legacy) while escaping the clutches of the dark side he’s become trapped and mired in.

We see this begin to play out in his first scene in the film, when he appears before Snoke. There is so much undercurrent in this scene it’s quite a revelation in and of itself. His rivalry with Hux continues, and Snoke stokes it, but it’s not nearly as strong as it was in TFA. Something has changed inside Kylo, and Snoke initially assumes (mistakenly) that it’s a weakening. Snoke taunts Kylo about his failures and rubs salt in the clear wound. He commands Kylo to remove his mask, exposing his vulnerability. Kylo, who in TFA was firmly on the path of playing the “good son” to Snoke, despite knowing the truth of the words his father said to him in TFA long before his father uttered them, now in TLJ has transformed--for the first time in his life, he has taken on the mantle of the rebellious son, and it’s an uncomfortable and unfamiliar role for him.

Gone is the reverence for Snoke, gone is the obedience. Snoke mocks Kylo, throwing his resemblance to his father in his face. Rather than beg for mercy or agree, Kylo snaps back that he killed his father and he didn’t hesitate when the time came. He for the first time defends himself, and this is probably the first time he’s ever done this in his life. It is the mark of something new that has awakened in him, something that his own actions and the small thread of connection to Rey have sparked. Having destroyed his own father, he has toppled the paradigm of fatherhood itself and has opened the door to rebellion against authority for the first time in his life.

Unfortunately, this role isn’t one Kylo’s comfortable with, so Snoke quickly shuts him down by pointing out that he’s a hot mess, which Kylo is forced to acknowledge even though he tries to stick his nose in the air and maintain his pride--Snoke’s words are true, as they often are. And then Snoke makes his first mistake of the film--he tries to diminish Kylo’s achievement by pointing out his lack of balance and, of course, his failure to defeat Rey.

What I find interesting at this moment in the scene between them, and what will reverberate later in the final red room sequence, is that Kylo has probably never actually attempted to fight Snoke before in his life. Yet the minute Snoke tries to diminish Rey and use her as a weapon against Kylo, Kylo moves. Now, a casual viewer might say that the reason Kylo attacks Snoke is because Snoke poked his pride. The problem I have with this interpretation is that Kylo would have needed to move after Snoke said he failed. But Kylo is already in motion while Snoke is speaking the failure line, meaning the point Snoke made that pissed Kylo off to the point of wanting to fight was the comment about Rey.

Now, we know Kylo doesn’t feel ashamed of himself for being bested by her. (Mostly because I don’t think he was, and I think he knows he wasn’t--not that he let her win, but that he didn’t want to best her, and honestly I’ve always believed that he was okay with her killing him in that moment simply because of how much he likely hated himself. I think he kind of saw her as an avenging angel in a way, and would have been all right being defeated by her.) The reason we know he wasn’t ashamed of being bested by her is because his first reaction upon seeing her again is to light up like it’s Christmas. That’s...not a normal reaction for seeing someone who’s caused you to feel ashamed of yourself. =P (More on that later of course.)

So this leaves me with only one conclusion for why he stands against Snoke for probably the first time in his life in that first scene--Snoke insulted the bae, and you don’t insult the bae and escape. This scene is foreshadowing for his choice later in the film. It’s also foreshadowing for the manner in which he kills Snoke--we see here that a full frontal assault against Snoke is useless, and thus cunning has to be employed instead. For the first time in his life, Kylo will have to use his own strength and knowledge to outwit a being far stronger than he is.

In this moment, Kylo takes the first step toward what is a journey, at last, into manhood--his stunted and frozen growth is at last thawing into spring. It’ll be incomplete in TLJ, of course, because this is the midpoint of the story. But the key points of the first Snoke scene are three-fold: foreshadow Kylo’s ultimate alignment and choice in the red room sequence, establish his switch from “good son” to “rebellious son,” and to demonstrate that Kylo, in the murdering of his father, has torn down the mystique of the “father figure” and so father figures no longer hold any power over him.

This is further emphasized by Snoke calling Kylo a child at the end of the sequence, and Kylo storming off in anger to the elevator. The first thing he does is destroy his mask. What does the mask symbolize to him in that moment? Likely it’s the obedience to the father. And so he, like any good prodigal son, heads out to go destroy some people and prove his worth in his own way. But for the first time he’s begun to contemplate rebellion and what rebellion means. He’s picking up on the lessons he’d left off on in his teenage years, when Uncle Luke betrayed him and helped push him down the path of exploring the underworld alone. Now he’s more conflicted and lost than ever, as the remainder of his choices will demonstrate. He’s been unmoored by his actions in TFA, and although he never speaks a word about them, they seep out of everything he does.

Love for Mother

My brother said to me that he doesn’t believe Kylo has any special feelings for his mother over his father, and that if Leia had gone to Kylo first, Kylo would have killed her. I thought about this for a while, but I still don’t buy it. Kylo’s very focused on authority/order/father figures. He has virtually no animosity toward the feminine in any way--he’s open with his emotions, he’s sensitive, he’s compassionate under the right circumstances. All of this implies, to me, that he’s a mama’s boy who was abandoned by mama, not a sociopath who doesn’t care about either of his parents and could have easily killed both of them. The reason I think Han was arguably the “easiest” simply is because Han was the one he was the furthest from emotionally--even fighting Luke was harder for him than killing Han.

The scene with Kylo coming to attack Leia is so subtle but it breaks my heart to pieces. This boy knows the inside and outside of her ship; he’s the first to get into her hanger and blow up her ace’s vehicles. Yet even though he knows every inch of the resistance ships, he still hesitates when the moment comes to take his mommy down (and seriously that face could not kill mommy--Adam Driver does such a phenomenal job at breaking down like a child in that scene--that’s clearly a boy who wants to come home but who knows he can’t). And when two other First Order pilots do the favor for him, he clearly is distraught by the choice being taken from him.

I’m pretty sure his first instinct was to go after her when he saw she was blown out of the command center. That’s why we get that bizarre sequence where Hux tells him to pull back because he’s too far out--what other reason would he have to do that other than to search for Leia? Of course, once Hux shines a spotlight on him, he has to pull out or risk whatever punishment Snoke’ll be sending his way, which is why he gets snarly about complying. While he was willing to rebel a bit, he’s fresh off his failure to actually achieve anything in that scene. There’s no way he could rebel against Snoke for Leia in this instance.

Still, it’s telling that he wanted to try. This is more evidence of how torn up he is--on the one hand, he’s destroying his mother’s allies and helping bring her down, but on the other his impulse is to go save her the minute she’s in danger. Snoke as usual has it right: his light and dark sides are out of balance.

The reason I don’t think Kylo is willing to betray Snoke for Leia, but he will for Rey, is for the same reasons why he won’t join Rey to fight the First Order, which I’ll get into more later. But in short, Leia (and Han before her) can only offer him the same thing he left Luke over--more neglect and a return to the status quo, where he’s buried under their legacy and unable to distinguish himself and--worse--due to his own actions, now unable to avoid the vitriol of those he fought against. He can’t return to Leia yet. There’s no place for him in her world yet. This was the same problem he had with Han’s offer--Han could only give him a return to the place he (rightfully) no longer believes he can return to because of how much damage he’s caused. He’s gone too far down Snoke’s path, he’s lived too long in the underworld, to come back to the light on his own. Like Eurydice, he’s going to need someone to bargain with Hades and lead him out into the light.

Anther factor in why Leia can’t save Kylo, I think, is because in all those years she never tried. She never dropped her duties and obligations to the resistance and the republic to chase down Snoke and get her son back. It’s the same reason why Luke can’t save him--Kylo spent nearly 6 years under Snoke’s thumb and his family never came for him. They’re only trying to “save” him now because he “happened” to be in their vicinity--he had to come to them, not vice versa. And this is another reason why Rey will ultimately be the only one who can reach him--just as he will tear the galaxy apart for her, she will fly to wherever he is no matter the risk or the cost. Both of them will place the other above their duties and obligations, and that’s what each of them is seeking.

Speaking of, I guess it’s now time to dig into Kylo’s side of the Reylo in this film. ;)

First Love, True Love

It’s hard to fathom how much development happens across four short scenes between Kylo and Rey in the middle of TLJ, and even more astounding is how much depth those scenes contain. For easy reference, just note that I’ll be referring to the force connection scenes as FC1 (the first scene where Rey shoots Kylo), FC2 (the rain sequence), FC3 (the shirtless sequence), and FC4 (the hand touch sequence). Shorthand helps in long posts like this. ;)

Before I go into the sequences themselves, I want to talk about what is--and is not--revealed by Kylo about himself in these scenes. For a film whose deepest purpose was to explore Kylo Ren himself and help us answer questions as to why he ended up where he was, we get remarkably little information from the man himself.

I think the reason for this is actually two-fold:

As I said earlier in the “Welcome to the Dark Side” section, Snoke has access to Kylo’s mind at any time and can be reading it at any moment (how often he actually does this is anyone’s guess--but the mere threat of it is enough to affect how Kylo reacts). That raises the likelihood that Kylo is constantly filtering what he says and even what he thinks. It’s honestly a travesty Rey isn’t allowed to see glimpses of how Snoke infiltrated Kylo’s mind and broke him down, but even worse is the effect this has on the viewer--how much of what Kylo is saying a trustworthy and honest representation of his viewpoint? How much of it, much like Rey, is thinly veiled behind “appropriate” (but this time for Dark Side users rather than Light Side) thoughts for a First Order man to have? The threat of Snoke’s presence makes it virtually impossible for us to know the “real” Kylo because Kylo is likely censoring or veiling his words and his thoughts--he speaks cryptically to Rey in regard to anything about his family or his real reasons for doing things (such as the murder of Han Solo, which, I might add, we still have no idea why he actually went through with it).

The other reason I think is that Kylo himself views his actions and motivations as reprehensible but due to reason 1 above and due to how far he’s gone into darkside territory, he doesn’t see any hope for himself other than to keep treading the path he’s on. He isn’t nihilistic enough to contemplate suicide, but he’s not finding any meaning in the dark side either. To explore any third option, he needs to break completely from the dark side.

Honestly, Kylo’s character leaves me completely flummoxed. Ordinarily a villain would try to justify his actions to the hero, but despite having the opportunity, Kylo never does that. When Rey throws barbs at him about being a monster and a murderer, he never once tries to help her see his point of view or justify his actions to her. For a man who killed his father to clear his head (supposedly), this is just ridiculously bizarre behavior. He’s obviously hurt on a personal level by her judgment of him, but he never once says it’s unreasonable of her or disagrees with her (he even acknowledges she’s right). For him to accept that he’s a monster is an odd thing to do for someone who thinks their actions are heroic or justified.

Given that, as I established earlier, Kylo is becoming disillusioned with what Snoke has to offer him and what the dark side itself has to offer him, it does make sense that he wouldn’t view his actions from TFA and before in a favorable light. Given that he comes from the dichotomous world of light/dark of Luke’s jedi training, he should have at least something of a moral compass, even if it’s been deconstructed due to misuse. It reminds me a bit of how the idea of an “ideal” is two-sided: on the one hand, it’s a North Star and a goal to chase and pursue, on the other hand it is a judge, flooding a spotlight on all your imperfections and inabilities to live up to the ideal. There is some ideal in Kylo’s head, I think, that he’s failing to live up to and he’s lashing out against it--perhaps this is part of the light side legacy he’s running from. But it seems to me the reason he so desperately wants to cut all his ties to the past and bring the whole house down on his own family is that they remind him of what he should have been but is not because of his own choices.

He’s a remarkable character who actually takes responsibility for his evil, but doesn’t seem to know what to do to rectify the wrong he’s done, so he continues to commit wrongs in order to try to reach an equilibrium in his own tortured mind. Maybe he’s even hoping to a degree that if he keeps it up, if he keeps doing further into the dark, one day the light will cease to torment him and he’ll be free of it. This to me is more reminiscent of a terrorist or a war criminal than a sociopathic mass murderer, despite the egregious nature of his crimes. Hux seems to be more in line with a genuine monster--a man who has thrown away his humanity in order to pursue an inverted goal of meaningless nihilism; Kylo, on the other hand, just seems to be unable to find a way to extricate him from the prison he’s constructed around himself. Yet he’s still self-centered and childish enough to want to try to save himself from the consequences of his actions; he’s not yet ready to legitimately take on the burden of the mantle of what he himself has contributed to the misery of the world. We all have the ability to tune the world slightly more toward heaven or hell, and Kylo has tuned the world toward hell. He’ll need to pay for that at some point, and to bear those consequences with a willing and humble heart.

So given all of this, we begin this sequence of force connection scenes with a Kylo who is cagey and unable to fully express himself--yet is desperately seeking to explore this new connection with Rey. Because of this, what I think he does (and we can see evidence for this in the way he talks to her) is attempt to help her both understand him and warn her against making his mistakes by using her own history and actions as dual-layered metaphors for himself. And for some reason, I think Rey understands this weird way of speaking, probably because their minds are bridged and she can see “what he means” in a way most people wouldn’t be able to.

In FC1, their first force connection moment, we establish a couple interesting things about Kylo. First is that he’s not unhappy or displeased to see Rey--rather, the minute their minds connect, his eyes and face light up. Her presence is welcome to him, almost a gift he hadn’t been expecting. This tells us immediately that he holds no grudge against her for what she did to him in TFA, nor does he feel diminished by her (after all, he still bears her scar, and though he’s healing it up so that it’s not a gaping wound, he’s not removing it entirely and he’s not ashamed to bear her mark at any point in TLJ)--instead, he still holds all the admiration, respect, and adoration he held for her ever since he first saw into her mind in the forest. Even more interesting, her first response is to attack him, and rather than attempt to deflect (as he did in TFA), he flinches, fully believing he’s been shot. So right away we can see this man leaves himself deliberately vulnerable to this young woman, even though he fully knows she has a penchant for “shoot first, talk later.” So for the second time it’s confirmed that he is okay with whatever “justice” this young woman wants to enact upon him--she, and only she, may take him to account for his wrongdoing. This probably will be significant in the future for Episode IX.

After the shooting sequence, he goes racing into the hallway, skidding like an eager schoolboy, searching for her. When he turns back to see her, he tries one last time to bring her to him (in an acceptable way of course; with Luke in tow lol). She’s too strong for any mind games now, and he gives up the minute he realizes it. It’s like he just doesn’t even care anymore; it was just a test. There’s a wonderful scientific bent to his personality that implies he was probably a huge nerd when he was Ben Solo--he’s testing the limits of this new connection, what it can do, why it works the way it does. Rey’s busy fuming, and he’s like a kid in a candy store babbling about the limits of space and time.

We not only see his experimenter’s mentality, we see his intuitive perception as well. He should by rights have no idea where Rey even is--as he says himself, he can’t see her surroundings, he can only see her. Yet the minute she turns her head upon Luke’s arrival, he knows who has arrived. What’s weird in this moment, at least to me, is that there’s virtually none of the vitriol toward Luke that he shows toward the end of the film. He doesn’t spit Luke’s name like it’s venomous or snarl or show anything other than curiosity. It’s something I’m not sure what to make of yet, other than perhaps it has something to do with how his world crashes down around him when Rey rejects his proposal. More on that later.

The one last thing we see in FC1 which is just mind boggling given by this point in the story they’ve had only a whopping three small scenes together is how he looks at her when he says he can only see her--it’s like he’s seeing this vision of angelic beauty and is experiencing some transcendent idea of grace in that moment. Again, props to Adam Driver for his amazing performance (I have no idea why he wasn’t nominated for the Oscars seriously it’s a shame), but I think given his expression it’s very clear that the boy is mad about this girl and it has nothing to do with her abilities or power. I think if she were just a normal girl with no ability at all, he’d probably still be this wild about her. Her ability may have been the first thing that interested him, but at this point he’s gone beyond that, and in such a short time on top of it.

We don’t get to see him again until FC2, and unfortunately unlike Rey we don’t get to see how he feels about FC1. When we pick up with him again, he’s standing alone, quietly contemplating something as he observes the First Order hangar bay. Honestly, from his body language and the way his head gently curves down upon their next connection, I’d say he was waiting for them to connect again. He’s highly intuitive as a character, and I can’t imagine he thought it wouldn’t happen again.

In all their scenes there is a deep sexual undercurrent between them, and this is the first scene where it’s palpable not just in the subtext but also in the visual metaphors. He gets to have a bit of the voyeur’s experience while he watches her revel in the rain. The rain’s a powerful symbol of the feminine, as rain heals and brings new life. This is the scene of their mutual sexual awakening, and it culminates in the rain itself appearing on his cheek. This is simultaneously a metaphor for a wet dream in his case and also foreshadowing for his ability to force project into her space the way he will by FC4. In essence, as far as I can tell, this is the mutual “hitting puberty full speed” scene for both of them, which makes sense, given both of them have been “frozen” up until this point. After this scene, the sexual undercurrent between them changes form and becomes more akin to that between teenagers in teen flicks. We’re still not yet at the adult range these two should actually be interacting within (they’re both actually adults), but I’m sure that will happen in the third film, when they’re both ready to take on the responsibilities of adult partnership.

Beyond the sexual subtext, Kylo is a gabby gus while Rey is still unable to move on from her own anger and rage that she’s projecting onto him (not without good reason of course). Poor Kylo is still trying to figure out why this cool thing is happening to them and Rey just does not give any shits, haha. This shows they’re on different pages still, and what I love about how Kylo handles her is that he gently backs off and follows whatever direction she wants to take the conversation in. If Kylo had a zodiac sign, he’s probably a cancer or a scorpio haha. He just screams water. Rey’s more fire/earth (I’m not sure which yet since she seems to have elements from both--maybe she’s got one as a moon and one as a sun). Though it’d make sense if Kylo was a cancer (the deepest/furthest point in the zodiac) and Rey a capricorn (the highest/loftiest point in the zodiac). Anyway, that’s neither here nor there.

In this scene though, Rey hurts Kylo the most. When she calls him a murderous snake, his face becomes immediately crestfallen and his early cheerful questions fall away. He then asks her if she knows what happened between him and Luke. She then hurts him again, but he’s ready for it this time. What I love about how he handles his hurt though, is that he never attacks her or defends against her; he accepts her spears in his heart and lets her stab him over and over again. Rather than attacking back, he plays up the rising sexual tension between them (another reason I think he’s better socialized than TFA lets on, because this is not something a man as stunted as he is should be able to do with this level of dexterity) to seduce her instead. Rather than reading her mind, he looks deeply into her eyes and croons agreement with her, which immediately throws into doubt how much truth is in her barbs. He then reminds her of their encounter at the end of TFA, which shows how deeply that scene affected him.

Then Rey does something for him which I think is very important, though I’m not sure she knows it--she validates him by asserting he is a monster. Remember, this guy just went through a scene with Snoke where Snoke told him he’s still a child in a mask. Rey acknowledges Kylo’s destructive power as a man, which reaffirms him right after Snoke has torn him down. Obviously this isn’t a healthy affirmation, but the point here is that Rey rebuilds what Snoke has torn apart. Kylo’s pride is beginning to heal because she sees and accepts the existence of the very real and powerful darkness within him here. And he, fully knowing himself and knowing how far gone he is, affirms her assertion. What I think is interesting here is that despite it seeming clear he’s hurt that she sees him as a monster, he doesn’t disagree with her assessment. It’s just that he seems to wish she’d see he’s more than “just” a monster--that rather than being a bogeyman, he’s a man--capable of both the monstrous and the altruistic. I think this is a sign that he wants her--and only her--to see him as “more” than he himself sees himself, which is a sign he’s beginning to realign with the “ideal” again because of her. Yet he can’t refute her assertion, because he’s not a dishonest person and that’s his own assessment of himself. It’ll take something more to pull him out of this.

So yet again, between FC2 and FC3 we don’t get to see Kylo’s thoughts, but given how...deliberately...he’s staged himself in FC3, and how bizarre it is for him to be removing his shirt in the middle of the damn day, I’d say chances are higher on the “waiting around for the next connection to show off his assets to the bae” side of things than “just happened to be working out when Rey force skyped him” side of things. =P Plus the way he says “yeah, me too” to her before she sees the state he’s in just screams “liar.” He was waiting for her and hoping to connect again. =P

What I love about his reaction to Rey in FC3 is that he just doesn’t make anything easy on her--this boy has decided to seduce the pants off her and by golly he’s not giving her an inch. But what’s really cool about this is that he leaves it as subtext; he’s offering himself to her as feast for her eyes to devour, but he doesn’t try to make her uncomfortable, nor does he actively provoke her. FC3 is actually one of the deepest connections they make in the film, despite its silly beginning. She gets worked up and upset that he killed his father and begs him for an answer--he’s clearly moved to compassion by her pain, but given the restrictions on his ability to speak about his true motives, he can only offer her an insubstantial “I didn’t hate him.” This is the closest he’s come to being able to admit there was more going on with the Han scene than even we the viewers may know--I still lean toward the interpretation that he never wanted to kill Han, but that Snoke had made it clear that in order to “stay” with Snoke, if he and Han ever crossed paths, Kylo had to kill Han or he would lose his place. Of course, this doesn’t absolve Kylo of the consequences of his choice, but it does make the whole thing more nuanced than merely “Kylo is an evil villain who kills his dad for ‘reasons’.” Unfortunately, I’m not sure we’ll ever get to find out what was really going on because...Rey honestly doesn’t give two figs for why Kylo really killed Han, which...we’ll get into that more in the future Reylo post, lol. For now it’s enough to say that we can now reinterpret TFA through this new lens--Kylo’s anger and hurt with his father did not mean he hated him, and his desire to go home with his dad now that his dad had finally come for him was likely very real. If Han had come with Leia, I do wonder if Snoke would have had a chance and it just breaks my damn heart over and over again that they both ran away from their son and left him in Snoke’s hands rather than uniting their strengths and tearing the galaxy apart to get him back.

But this small comment is as much as Kylo can give us; when Rey demands further explanation, he redirects the focus back to her. As I said before, he speaks to her in a sort of mirrored way--what he says about her is equally true about himself. He reminds her that her parents threw her away like garbage but she’s still unable to free herself from him. Now at this point, this guy knows nothing about her parents--he himself doesn’t find out the truth until he receives whatever is in his vision when they touch hands. All he knows is what he gleaned from her mind in TFA, which is her own loneliness from all the years of waiting. Of course, he’s intuitive, so his words hit the mark because in the end he’s right. But his words are still about himself as well. He tells her that she’s looking for her parents inside these alternative father figures (Han, Luke). The funny thing is...I don’t really think she sees a father figure in Luke. Han, for sure, she did. But Luke is more like...a legend to her, an unreal being. So what Kylo’s doing here is actually revealing his own actions--he is the one who was looking for Han inside Luke, and then Snoke. And of course you can’t replace the father with other father figures very easily, especially not when your own father is still alive and a very real presence in your life.

He then asks her again if Luke told her want happened the night he burned the temple. What’s so weird here is the way Adam delivers the line. It’s not at all accusatory or angry--it’s tender and gentle. He’s trying to help Rey see something here, and this is why I think he’s trying to help her avoid the mistakes he himself made. He gives her his alternative version and warns her that there are men out there who will be afraid of her power and seek to destroy her. This is as much about Snoke as it is about Luke, but he hides it behind Luke. And then he gives her the most helpful advice he could have at the moment--he encourages her to get stronger by letting the past die. Now, he of course adds “kill it if you have to,” which most people I think would assume he’s talking about his own father. But I don’t think he is. I think this is yet another mirror into his own psyche--he intends to kill his own past by taking down Snoke. I’d read somewhere that Rian said Kylo was planning to kill Snoke by the time we reach the elevator scene before the red room sequence, and if that’s true, then it’s something he’s been considering for longer than the elevator scene. Snoke is his past, like Han and Luke, and the one who will be taking the full variant of his own advice is Kylo himself. However, his advice also gives Rey the push she needs to face her own dark side, and ironically he becomes what he wanted to be in TFA--her teacher and her guide to the “ways of the force,” or full integration, if you will.

What I love about this is that unlike Snoke (who wanted to control and direct Kylo as a tool), when Kylo sees Rey’s potential he wants to help her integrate and actualize herself to her full potential. His true motives are freaking altruistic and in her best interest. In a true sense he frees her from herself and her own prison by encouraging her to face the test head on. It’s just brilliant that Rian had him do this. Kylo does for Rey what Snoke would not do for him, and thus he helps transform her into the very thing that can save him in the end, and that can restore order and true balance to the galaxy. Simply by encouraging her to become a fully formed human being, simply by giving her the freedom to find what that means for herself, he opens the door at last to the light he’s been desperately seeking beneath his pretenses of darkness.

This leads us to FC4, which reiterates Kylo’s role as Rey’s mentor in the dark side--he listens patiently as she pours her heart out, and all he offers her is a gentle reminder that he’s here by her side and she’s not alone. He never once diminishes her achievement, and he’s completely supportive of her discovery, yet at the same time he doesn’t attempt to “preach” to her what her experience meant or lord his superior wisdom over her--at all times, he is just a supportive presence allowing her to interpret the experience for herself. And because he has freed her, she sees him in a whole new light--she sees that there is “more” to the monster than she she knew. To his compassion and support, she at last offers him the only thing that could ever have moved him--her affection and loyalty. You can see how much this moves him playing out on his face the minute she extends her hand to him.

When she extends her hand, Kylo at last makes his choice. And this time he truly doesn’t hesitate--the minute her hand is offered, he whips that glove off and reaches for her. What’s remarkable about this moment, and what completely underscores it, is that we actually see him literally force project himself into the room with her; Luke actually sees him when he bursts in on them. Kylo clearly chooses his “side” and it’s to be with her, and that brings him to her.

What happens next for him, sadly, we don’t get to see. But given how unsurprised he is to see her ship herself to him in her little coffin, I’d say he intuitively knew she’d come for him. Being the troll he is, and wanting to fool Snoke, he still has to give her a bit of trouble before they enter the throne room. But his expression when he sees her again is a bouncy, cocky one--he’s got his spunk back, and while he’s delighted that she came for him, he’s also leaning a bit toward the “why are you doing this to yourself you dummy” side of things. But I think we can assume at this point that whatever he saw in his own vision when their hands touched, it gave him just as much confidence as it gave her that things would work out if they were together.

Before I leave the force connection section and head into the meat of their story in this film, I want to point out how important it is that Kylo believes their connection is natural and unconnected to Snoke. Kylo is as genuine as he can be under the circumstances, and he allowed himself to be more vulnerable than perhaps was wise. Rey rewarded his vulnerability with acceptance, and the sincerity between them is hugely important to Kylo. To have it tarnished by Snoke’s interference is a huge blow to what the force connection means to Kylo, and it has some seriously detrimental effects on how he handles Rey after the red room scene. But, hey, why not just get to the fun part and cease stalling?

Decision Point

So the elevator scene is mostly remarkable from a combined Reylo perspective, but I’ll briefly touch on it from Kylo’s end because there’s a few nuggets to enjoy here. Kylo’s body language is very self-contained and controlled, but his face is a different story. Clearly he’s trying to maintain his composure because he’s preparing for what he knows he has to do in the next sequence (take down the man who, only a few hours before, bested him handily the minute he even tried to rebel). He’s not nearly as gabby with Rey anymore--he’s now the more stoic character while she’s the talker. It’s super cute how they switch roles in this scene--she can’t resist talking away while he just listens. Still, his body language alone speaks volumes--he’s chosen her and now he’s openly adoring everything about her. She came for him, she dressed up for him, she’s looking at him like that--all of this serves to strengthen his resolve to be by her side at all costs. How warm and wonderful she is, how openly seductive, how natural--all of it is what he knows he wants for himself, more than any crusty old mentor. ;) He does offer her an alternative to her own naive vision of them, but honestly...I’m not so sure his vision is wrong. I’ll talk more about the visions in the future Reylo post, but I suspect their visions weren’t from the same time period. Even hers might not be. i think they both may have just assumed the visions were about the near future, when really they’re about Episode IX’s events. Or hers were of the near future while his weren’t. But more on that in a future post. For now it’s sufficient to say that her response to him in the elevator sequence is more than enough to bolster his courage for the next trial.

There is a lot going on subtextually in the red room sequence, but before it even starts there’s this wonderful little moment where Kylo gently guides Rey forward with his hand on her elbow. This is traditionally a reassuring position, and this is reiterated when he releases her--he doesn’t shove her or push her forward, merely allows his hand to fall and hover in the air slightly before he kneels before Snoke. Kylo’s body language is really important throughout this scene, and the interplay between him and Snoke is actually the crux of the scene, though the strength of his bond with Rey is also important. I’ll be dealing with his bond with Rey in the Reylo post; for now I want to focus on the Kylo vs. Snoke dynamic, and how that will influence the proposal sequence.

The first thing Snoke does here is restore Kylo’s “place” as the “good son.” Remember, Snoke had stripped Kylo of this previously. But this restoration is actually meant to tear apart Kylo’s bond with Rey--Snoke knows Kylo thought his connection with Rey was genuine, and he’s making it clear that even in this Kylo was merely Snoke’s pawn. It’s a reminder to Kylo that he has no agency and no way out. He’s a bird in Snoke’s cage, and anything that happens to him is at Snoke’s pleasure.

As I mentioned in the earlier “Welcome to the Dark Side” section, Snoke stupidly sees Rey as yet another means to twist the knife in Kylo’s side. Like any manipulator, he’s trying to use Kylo’s attachments against him to further Snoke’s own goals. This is where he underestimates Kylo, because he’s looking down on him and on the power a connection--a real connection--with Rey means to him.

Throughout the conversation with Rey, Snoke is using his words to actually needle Kylo. Snoke has no interest in Rey other than as a tool to tear Kylo apart. He knows Kylo is affected by Rey (how could he not when he reads Kylo’s mind), and so he purposely twists the knife, pulls it out, and stabs it back in to twist it again as much as he can in this scene. I know Snoke comes across as a bit over the top and cartoony in this scene, but I think some of that is because he’s really playing it over the top in order to make a point to Kylo.

Sweet Rey of course defends Kylo, because she truly does believe in him, but Snoke makes light of her assertions. Here is where he cuts Kylo to the point where doubt begins to form again in Kylo’s mind--he asserts that he is the one who bridged them together (which honestly I still call BS on--I firmly believe the force connected them during the interrogation scene and again during the snow fight, but I’ll explore that in the Reylo post). Regardless, what this does is place a kernel of doubt inside Kylo about the legitimacy of his connection to Rey (Snoke is really good at this crap; this is probably how he got Kylo to doubt his family too, with these tiiiiiny little “truth” bombs). On the surface it looks like Snoke is trying to deflate Rey’s belief in Kylo, but in reality he’s cutting down Kylo’s belief in Rey. The reason we know this is because when Snoke speaks of their minds being bridged by him, we don’t cut to Rey--we cut to Kylo. It is Kylo’s reaction to this that matters, not Rey’s (mostly because I think Rey, like me, knows this is BS and knows “where” their connection came from--it’s the very connection that she, as I mentioned in my Rey post, fled to Luke to figure out in the first place--a connection forged by their encounters in TFA). But Kylo has had to deal with so much betrayal in his life that this (as Snoke surely knows) is a blow to his faith in Rey. Rey hasn’t had as many betrayals as Kylo (and I’m really not sure she considers her parents’ situation a betrayal per se, honestly), so she’s hardier in this sense than he is and more resilient to Snoke’s little truth bombs.

Snoke then twists the knife further by saying Kylo’s vulnerability and offer of connection to Rey was merely a honey trap to lure Rey to Snoke. This hurts Kylo on a completely different level (as Snoke surely knows)--that his very desire to connect with Rey has brought her into danger and potentially this revelation by Snoke will destroy Rey’s faith in Kylo. In this moment, Kylo could potentially lose Rey simply because he doesn’t know for sure if she has faith in him that’s stronger than Snoke’s barbs. (Of course she’ll prove she does later in this very scene when she continues to call him by name.)

We’re only allowed one small glimpse at Kylo’s reaction when Rey’s mind is probed by Snoke, and it’s the one you’d expect--he doesn’t want the bae to be hurt like this, but he knows he can’t do anything yet (Snoke will just destroy him if he tries). He’s forced to endure her torment while doing everything he can to remain a blank slate. The only way he can do this is by turning his eyes away from her pain, but his resolve is hardened.

We don’t get to see much of his reaction to Rey trying to fight Snoke until Rey takes his saber and Snoke sends it back to him. When the saber lands at Kylo’s feet, I’m fairly sure that’s when the idea at last comes to him on how he’s going to take Snoke down. He just has to wait for the right opportunity now. We get a very deliberate shot of his face looking from the saber to Snoke with determination. But we get a hint as to his plan during the Snoke diatribe as he places Rey before Kylo as a sacrificial lamb--Kylo’s eyes shift from Snoke to her face, and the expression within them is even in this moment revealing of his true feelings for her. He will not betray her.

Snoke tells him here to complete his training and fulfill his destiny. Kylo takes him at his word. To fully actualize himself and escape the underworld, a sacrifice must be made--and Kylo intends to make it. What I love about this part of the scene is that when Kylo at last stands, he looks at Rey and tells her softly that he knows what he has to do. Rey’s fear probably breaks his heart, but his words were all he could offer her in that moment in order to reassure her and still keep Snoke in the dark. Yet again, his soul is in his eyes--he never looks at Snoke even once; he locks his eyes on her face, and his expression is still gentle and determined. As Snoke’s continuing his diatribe, Kylo’s eyes remain steady on Rey’s face, and I’m sure in that moment she understood that he was going to stand at her side.

And here is where Kylo at last fulfills his destiny, foreshadowed at the very beginning of TLJ when he stood against Snoke--he not only “completes his training and fulfills his destiny” but he also takes his own advice to “let the past die and kill it if he has to.” Snoke is his past, Rey is his future, and it is here that he makes the choice to reach for freedom. He at last steps outside of the box of “son” to enter the beginning of the journey into manhood. This rebellion is the last rebellion.

Kylo’s choice is rewarded by Rey’s beaming “you’re getting laid tonight” face, which is a perfect segue into their absolutely impeccable synchronicity when they turn to fight the remaining Praetorian guards. There’s not much in the fight that’s particularly remarkable as far as Kylo’s individual psychology other than his desire to protect Rey and his faith in her abilities. (Though it’s funny that she’s like this little feisty terrier dodging around and stabbing anything that might hurt him lol.)

What I think this sequence establishes is that Rey is the first thing Kylo has ever truly wanted for himself. She is not a legacy imposed upon him, or some other mentor’s wishes or desires being forced on him. All she really has to offer is herself and a connection--and this is something Kylo has been hungry for all his life. Because she is offering him the deepest, truest thing he’s ever wanted, by pursuing and accepting her offer he is at last able to begin the path to actualizing himself. This desire for someone who loves him completely is something that’s reflected in Rey’s own desires for herself, and something that makes them deeply compatible as future romantic partners. They both are looking for someone who will tear the galaxy apart for them, who will come for them no matter the cost, and who will not place other priorities above them. This, they find in each other, and for the briefest instant they both get to taste how good the world would be if they could remain at each other’s sides.

But all good things must come to an end in the second film in a trilogy, and things break down when the fight comes to its conclusion, despite the wonderful teamwork between Rey and Kylo and the hint of possibility their partnership offers the future of this world.

The Botched Proposal

Before we dive into the botched marriage proposal (and yes, I interpreted it as a marriage proposal because...that’s what it was--Kylo’s a “go big or go home” type lol; all or nothing if you will), let’s reiterate a few things going into it:

Kylo just took the biggest gamble he’s ever taken in his life for a girl he barely knows. If what he’s done gets out to the First Order, he could be killed as a traitor.

The seed of doubt as to the strength of Kylo’s connection to Rey has been sown by Snoke’s pronouncements in the red room sequence.

Han already failed to bring Kylo back by using the “just come home” method. Kylo knows he can’t return to either the light side or the dark--with his actions in the red room sequence, he has rejected both sides of his legacy and must find a third option in order to survive.

The proposal sequence is the first time Kylo has ever tried to make a decision for himself in his life. Because he’s a n00b at this, what he does is try to merge his old fantasy (surpassing Vader and ruling the galaxy) with his new desire (have a life with Rey). It’s not that his old fantasy is particularly attractive to him, I think; it’s just that Kylo literally has no clue what else he can do because of how much damage he’s done. On top of this, I don’t think he’s confident in Rey’s feelings for him--Rey only recently shifted from calling him a monster. He’s likely a bit insecure about what it is about him that Rey suddenly finds attractive and doesn’t have the confidence to just offer himself to her and let her decide; instead he tries to offer something greater than just himself to her--the greatest thing he can think of, which is power.

I think of it this way: Kylo probably knows what Rey really wants (for him to just drop everything and come home with him). But he also knows a few things Rey doesn’t:

For one, it’s going to be tough for them to escape the First Order together.

For another, he’d have to basically kill all of the First Order high command in order to get control of the troops. After all, as we’ll learn later, Hux is actually the head of the military, not Kylo.

If they manage to save the fleet, Kylo is going to be put in irons and likely tried for war crimes. The punishment for that is either death or long-term imprisonment. Kylo wants to live with Rey, not live the rest of his life in a tiny prison.

Given these factors, it’s pretty obvious why Kylo wouldn’t be keen to join the resistance and help Rey’s friends. With this all in mind, I think it’s easier to understand why Kylo botches the proposal the way he does.

After having killed both his light side father (Han) and his dark side father (Snoke), Kylo is now ready to forge his own path. This is where he finally completes the idea he began with his advice to Rey in FC3--rather than just letting his personal past die, he broadens the philosophy to include the political and societal as well. It’s time to let everything from the past die and completely start over from scratch. This includes the sith, the jedi, Snoke, Luke, the resistance, etc. Kylo doesn’t say the First Order, but likely that’s because he intends to take over the First Order and use it to accomplish his goal.

Now, this is a horrible idea. Because the past never truly dies; it’s a burden that is carried forward thanks to the survival of our DNA and the cultural legacies and tragedies brought forward and passed down from our ancestors. Our ultimate job isn’t to burn it all to the ground and start over, but rather to integrate and revive the past so that it can be useful to the present and future. But Kylo doesn’t know this because he’s a n00b at self-actualization. Unfortunately, Rey only managed to get herself started on the path to integration hours previously, and thus she has literally nothing to offer him to counter this idea.

After espousing this new ideology, he tells Rey that he wants her to join him. This is his clumsy admission that everything he’s done and everything he’s thrown away was for her, in order to find a way to be by her side. The only thing he can offer is this path, because right now he can’t see any alternative. Notice, he doesn’t tell her to join the First Order--his goal is to create something “new” with her, a new order for the galaxy unstained by the legacy and burden of the past.

Of course, Rey, being further integrated than Kylo, knows something is very wrong about this offer, but she’s not yet able to articulate why it’s wrong or offer an alternative solution for him. Now his reaction to her reluctance here is rather interesting. He becomes agitated with her for the first and only time in the two films. On first viewing I think it’s hard to understand why he’s raising his voice to her here, but when I keep in mind where his mindset is (he’s just sacrificed his entire life for her, and her body language and words are implying that she’s about to reject him), it’s pretty clear that his agitation is fear-based. He’s afraid that their connection means less to her than it does to him, and that he’s about to lose her (which he is). But because he’s kind of stupid, he tries to pressure her rather than backing off and saying “well, what should we do next, my dear?”

Rey herself doesn’t seem to be offended or afraid of his outburst, which reiterates to me that she understands his fear and that he’s not trying to hurt her. He then tries to convince her that she’s alone by reminding her about her parents. This is a fairly manipulative tactic, but it’s not done out of malice--it’s done because he’s desperate to keep her by his side. Again, he just sacrificed everything for her sake. Literally everything he’d worked for in the past 6 or so years. To lose her now, after he was finally able to accomplish this for her, is likely a horrifying prospect to him.

After pressuring her into admitting the truth about her parents, he places his final card: her parents may have been shit (and I just love the way Adam delivers this line; it gives me the chills how much disdain and disgust he has for what her parents did to her), and she’s nothing in the grand scheme of things (I don’t think he means she’s nothing to the resistance or her friends, but rather that there’s no “grand legacy of destiny” for her to uncover for herself), but she is not small to him. In fact, she is so large a presence in his life that he literally threw away everything he’d ever wanted for her sake. Now, of course, this is a rather self-centered perspective (like, really Kylo, you’re not that great a catch right now, sexy 8-pack or not =P) and he’s still being manipulative here because he’s trying to keep her at all costs, but there is truth in his words here: this story isn’t her story (at least not yet).

Consider this: not a single thing in this story has actually been related to her own quest or her own desires. She just gets caught up inside other people’s stories (really the larger meta-story of Kylo, Snoke, Luke, Leia, and Han). Even Finn for the most part is “caught up” in this larger meta-story. And yet Rey (like Finn, and like Rose) is the key element to revitalizing this dead story--she must make the story her own and forge a new chapter in it. This is exactly what she has done by drawing Kylo to her--now she, not a Skywalker, not a Solo, is the centerpiece of the story, simply because she has connected herself with the Skywalkers and decided to draw one of them to her. But this isn’t something that’s fully evident yet to Kylo, and certainly not to her, and thus despite the manipulative nature of the words he stabs her with, there is still truth in them to cut her.

When this tactic fails as well, he has nothing left to offer her, and his pride and hubris won’t let him back down. All he can do is extend his hand again and reiterate his request. When she still hesitates, he gives her the most plaintive, desperate “please” I have ever heard in my life and probably shatters her heart into a million pieces. The remainder of his existence depends on her answer, and she has to say no.

But rather than talk to him about this, Rey makes a huge mistake. She holds her hand out in a feint to make him think she’ll take his hand when in reality she’s calling her saber to herself. This was probably the worst choice she could have made, though it’s understandable why she did so (Kylo’s a freaking powder keg, who knows how he’d have handled a full Elizabeth Bennett-style rejection lol), but this does to Kylo exactly what so many of Snoke’s truth bombs had done to him in the past--it confirms that Snoke was right. Their connection was a false creation crafted by Snoke, it wasn’t real, she would never stand at his side, she would never choose him as he would choose her.

This sends Kylo spiraling back down into the underworld. He tries to stop her from taking the saber, and it’s a testament to how balanced he now is (and how much darker she herself is) that the saber is torn between them and splits. They are now equals in ever sense of the word, and that is important for the future.

Sadly, when Rey rejects him, she leaves him nothing but the position he’s been groomed to take by others. He now has no choice but to return to the dark side and try to pursue the now dismally inadequate fantasy of “surpassing Vader and ruling the galaxy alone.” Kylo’s true desire was to break free of this dichotomy with Rey, but her rejection leaves him with nothing but his legacy or despair. Although he wanted to form a new place for himself, he just ends up falling back into the tangled web of the “story” of the other side of his family. Rather than standing on his own, he’ll now become part of that “dark side” story. How much further he’ll fall now is anyone’s guess, but he’ll be falling fully aware of everything he’s lost until Rey can stop his descent with a proper third path that gives him what he truly desires--freedom from the burden of his legacy and a place by Rey’s side. This time, the offer will have to come from her.

Despair on the Heels of Resignation

We don’t get to see Kylo again until Hux finds him sprawled on the ground in the throne room. There are two possible variants of this scenario, and I’m not sure we’ll ever know which was true:

Rey is the only one who awakened before Hux’s arrival, and thus she’s the one who returned his saber to him.

Kylo awakens before Hux’s arrival, and decides to “stage the scene of his defeat at Rey’s hands” in order to keep his place in the First Order.

I lean toward #2 myself, given how prepared Kylo seems to be with excuses and reasons for Hux. So likely he waited until Hux checked to see if he was dead, then he magically awakened in perfect time to give Hux the “story” of how “the girl” (love that she’s back to being “the girl”) managed to “magically” best himself and Snoke and all the Praetorian guard by herself. =P Hux, predictably, smells a rat, but Kylo shuts his immediate questions down by threatening Hux’s life and taking something more important from Hux--his army. Hux now has bigger things to worry about than how the hell an upstart kid managed to best two powerful force users and their guards.

Still, I think it’s clear that Rey’s rejection cut Kylo to the core and he’s now completely unhinged and unmoored. He has no idea what he wants to do or accomplish; he’s just a burning ball of rage, and he regresses quickly into a childlike fanaticism. His decision-making becomes impaired to the point where Hux has to course correct for him. He becomes myopically focused on his own past and destroying every last remnant of it. Yet all of this is really just a cover up for how hurt and betrayed he feels by Rey’s rejection, which is of course no excuse for his actions. =P One shouldn’t go around blowing people up because the girl you like wouldn’t go to the dance with you. =P

I do think this this is why he suddenly becomes insanely angry at Luke to the point of irrationality; he was much more collected about Luke prior to losing Rey. But, having lost the only thing he ever wanted for himself outside of his family’s love and approval, he now turns his venom toward the last person standing that he feels justified to hate: Luke. Luke reminds him that hope isn’t lost and that he’s not the end of the line.

Kylo knows exactly who Luke’s referencing, and he foolishly asserts that he’ll destroy “her” and Luke himself and “all of it.” This is quite an interesting line because it implies he’s fallen into despair and nihilism for the first time in his life. This is genuine nihilism talking. Because when he destroys “all of it,” he’ll have no reason to live. Fortunately trolly Luke doesn’t intend to let him end up that way, and so he makes a sacrifice in order to be part of what will save and restore Kylo in the end, placing the remainder of his faith in Rey to do the rest.

Kylo ultimately fails to destroy Luke himself, robbing him of that sin as well as the sin of killing his mother. Luke protected him from that at least, and paved the way for Kylo to return in time. The resistance manages to escape, and Kylo is left to infiltrate an abandoned base. There he finds his father’s dice, falling to his knees to pick them up. It is here that the last spark of hope reaches him--a force connection! With Rey! While Snoke is dead! He looks up, and his face is so full of hope that maybe, just maybe, she’s changed her mind.

Yet her impassive expression says otherwise, and then she shuts the door. It’s telling that Kylo flinches here: her second, final rejection drives the nail into the coffin of his dream and it shatters completely, represented by the dice disappearing in his hands. All hope is lost, and he sinks down further in resignation that will inevitably lead to despair.

And here is where we leave our fearless Supreme Leader--on his knees, having lost everything. It’s actually a place where you leave heroes normally, in the second film of a trilogy. =P The second film is always the “all hope is lost” moment--yet it is Kylo who carries this narrative beat, not Rey. It is not her pain we focus on; it is his. This says to me that despite his “narrative position” as Rey’s antagonist, he is probably the protagonist of the story--whether he can transform it into a comedy or is unable to overcome his flaws and it remains a tragedy is up for Episode IX to determine. For now, he has sunk to the bottom, and it’s going to take one heck of a reckoning to get him a third chance. He’d better be willing to take it this time. There won’t be a fourth.

What’s in a Name?

Just a quick little side note, but honestly I’m pretty torn about how I feel about Rey trying to push Kylo back into “Ben” as a name. I get the sentiment--in a way it’s revitalizing his name and restoring it to him, but at the same time, I feel like it’s just Rey being in denial about his dark side and trying to “separate” him from it. So I’m kind of torn about how I want his name situation to unfold in Episode IX.

Personally, my preference is a renaming ceremony where she gives him a fresh first name and restores either the Solo/Skywalkers/or Skywalker-Solo name to him. That would be a proper marriage of the “old” and the “new,” which would encompass all that he is. But honestly I don’t know what way Rian and JJ intended for us to take Rey’s resurrection of Kylo’s old name, so who knows how it’ll unfold. A renaming ceremony at the end of Episode IX would just be my preference, but I’ll dive into this more in my conclusion post to this First Impressions series. For now, I think this post has gone on for long enough. =P

To everyone who made it this far, congratulations: you’ve read a fifth of a novel (17k words!) attempting to dissect a fictional character. ;) You get a virtual cookie. For everyone who waited so patiently for this post, I’m sorry I took so long, and I hope my turtle self will be able to scuttle over the finish line for the remainder of the posts sooner rather than later. =)

Until next time!

#the last jedi #tlj #kylo ren #ben solo #reylo #star wars

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