"The Force Awakens" (with SPOILERS)

Do you think it would be bad writing to have it turn out he was lying? I think it would be. I realize that he has villainous traits. But, again, that doesn’t mean he gets all villainous traits. The old Checkhov saw is that if a gun is on the wall in Act I, it must go off in Act III. There’s no gun here. You have to provide some clue that Ren is lying or would lie. Otherwise it’s a cheat. And, also, he then becomes just a cipher encompassing any black hat trait you want to imbue him with at a given moment, rather than a fully formed character.

“From a certain point of view” is the “Star Wars” original sin. Lucas cheated because he wrote himself into a corner. They can’t go to that well again. No one would ever believe anything.

 

Also, he won’t be redeemed. He killed his father, the most popular character in the series.

Rey is going to kill him.

 

I agree that Kylo Ren is irredeemable. I don't think he wants to be redeemed. He is trying to bring everyone he can to the Dark Side. He has no interest in joining forces with anyone under their terms. Everything he does is designed to gather power and get people to join him. He has no time for anything else.

 

Include me with Kylo Ren being irredeemable. But who knows? It can go anywhere now.

Think I’ll try to see it again this week. Looking forward to a second viewing with fresh eyes.

 

Same. I also think that if they were going to redeem him, they would have had to establish a bigger bad in Episode VIII. Snoke got got, and General Hux is more incompetent than threatening.

 

How "irredeemable" was Vader after The Empire Strikes Back? Especially before the prequels were a thing?

 

I find the idea that someone can kill his own father in cold blood, but can't be a liar, really fucking weird.

 

I think Ren is irredeemable specifically because Vader was redeemed. If the story arc of the three episodes ends up being Rey leaves desert planet, discovers Force powers, trains with a hermit Jedi Master who sacrifices himself, brings evil, black-mask wearing Sith lord back to the Light, it's going to be really fucking lame.

Luke was supposed to be the Jedi who brings balance to the Force, but I never thought he did that in the original trilogy. If the Sith were destroyed and Light won, I don't see how that achieves balance. It feels like Rey and Ren are both necessary to balance the Force, but Ren would still need to be on the Dark Side. If he comes to the Light, the Force will again be out of balance. If he dies, the Force will again be out of balance.

Luke turning Ben Solo into Kylo Ren and then training Rey to match Ren's powers could ultimately achieve balance in the Force. I think Force Ghost Luke will have an important (though probably small) role in Ep. IX.

 

It’s not weird at all. If the creators wanted to
plant the dishonesty seed, they would have planted it. They haven’t. Not once, that I can recall, has Ren been dishonest or misleading. And he is a fully-formed character by now, so it’s not like we don’t know anything about him or his bag of traits.

Again: Every villain doesn’t carry every possible villainous trait. That would be poor characterization. My wife is a second-grade teacher and when she teaches writing, she tells the kids not to end stories with, “And it was all a dream.” Because that’s the classic cop-out. Ren lying to Rey would be a cop-out, as well. Go back and watch “The Sixth Sense” or other good movies that rely on a surprise. The clues are there, all along. Otherwise, the writer can do anything, at any time. That’s not effective storytelling. That’s just taking a short cut. It’s cheating.

We find out very early in “Gatsby” that Gatsby’s books have never been read or even opened. Fitzgerald is clueing us in that he’s a fraud. He could have chosen to have Gatsby rape or murder someone. I mean, it’s really fucking weird that someone could be a rapist or murderer but not a fraud. But he chose more effectively to reveal a trait that would pay off specifically later.

 

100%.

A lot of people’s answer to arguments that things won’t go a certain way is: “But it did before!”

Well, that’s the biggest reason you can’t do it again.

 

If they do it, it will be cheap because it now has to be. I think they fully intended for Rey to be a nobody, the daughter of junk traders on a shitball planet in the Outer Rim. Thus, the story was written. But after the vague audience backlash the studio suffered for its daring choice in "The Last Jedi," I can see the filmmakers trying to appease an audience that desperately wants Rey to be "someone." There's no way at this point to do it well. So if they do make her "someone," they'll fall back on the "from a certain point of view" trope, and many fans will cheer Rey Kenobi or Rey Organa or Rey Akbar.

The only thing I can think of that could indicate Ren was lying is that in "The Force Awakens," Rey flashed back to her parents leaving the planet in a spaceship, while Ren says they are buried in a pauper's grave on Jakku.

 

The parts of Force Awakens at Maz's place did a lot to set up the expectations that Rey would turn out to be somebody familiar. It wasn't just the flashback. It was Maz talking about seeing familiar eyes, except if I remember correctly, she wasn't talking about Rey. She was talking about Finn. He is the one they set up to have some relation to a familiar character.