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What Episode IX needs to do to save the ST


RamonAtila
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Guest Robin

Poe,

 

You brought up Bonds history and training to Tank. Fozzie brought up Bonds history and training. Fozzie responded to my inclusion of Batman with his tragedy (history) and training. You defended Harry Potter to Fozzie on the grounds of luck. The topic of misogyny having wrapped around the term Mary Sue was long running in here prior to me even posting (on that topic), when I amusedily reminisced about Wesley Crushers antics and how the writers chose to write him out.

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Yes, she was captured in The Force Awakens. And she immediately gains all the Force abilities she needs to thwart the villain and escape on her own. Including mind control, which she shouldn't even know is a thing, much less be able to do right off the bat. So, that's not a point in her favor.

 

She knows it's a thing because he did it to her earlier. And then she figured it out because either a) she is just that damn powerful (which TFA is showing and not telling us) or b) she is a Force amnesia-ed Force user like Bastila or c) all of the above.

 

Edit - I just read the story of the game and realized I remembered it wrong. It's not Bastila that's amnesia-fied it's "you" in the game.

 

Well, my theory stands. Rey is a powerful force user (perhaps even an evil one) who has been mindwiped, perhaps by Luke, because she was too dangerous. That's why she catches on to everything so easily, that's why Luke didn't want to train her, that's why the darkness in the cave. So her whole back-story is bunk.

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You brought up Bonds history and training to Tank.

 

Taking a quick look back at my response to Tank. Nope, no mention of Bond's history.

 

 

 

Fozzie brought up Bonds history and training.

 

Taking a quick look at Fozzie's post. Nope. Nothing about Bond's history.

 

 

 

Fozzie responded to my inclusion of Batman with his tragedy (history) and training.

 

Same post and, nope. He only mentions Batman's tragedy as a chronological starting point for his training. Not as a reason that he's not a Mary Sue.

 

 

 

You defended Harry Potter to Fozzie on the grounds of luck.

 

I used the word "luck" in the context of a larger point about circumstances being what thwarted Harry's enemies. I never implied that Mary Sues couldn't be lucky (indeed, sometimes they're very lucky). What I did do is write, book by book, how each of those adults was thwarted, and in each case it wasn't through Harry's actions (aside from maybe the last book). It was from a series of deus ex machinas.

 

Rowling can receive a ding for her over reliance on that trope, and indeed she has. I've seen articles complaining about how Harry didn't actually accomplish much in each of his battles and that he's even overrated by readers because of it. But it is a separate trope from a Mary Sue.

 

 

 

The topic of misogyny having wrapped around the term Mary Sue was long running in here prior to me even posting (on that topic)

 

The foul being committed by others is no excuse.

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Guest Robin

Maybe you should take less of a quick look back and think about it more.

 

Also no foul has been committed by anyone for discussing misogyny and the term Mary Sue.

 

Lastly, it appears you are still agitated at me for: Wondering what your dogged intention was. Recognizing myself in your insistence to be right at all costs. Seeing points made, considering these points and working them into my point. As such, I will be sure to mention to my old psychologist that reflective* listening/response appears to be counter-intuitive bullshit which upsets people and paints the user as a douchenozzle... and I dont really need any more help to paint myself as one of those.

 

*corrected from past tense

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Maybe you should take less of a quick look back and think about it more.

 

I think I'll go by the actual record.

 

 

 

Also no foul has been committed by anyone for discussing misogyny and the term Mary Sue.

 

As stated above, it's a cheap means to shame and discredit. I'm looking around here and no one is using the term for misogyny purposes. Well maybe Tex.

 

But for everyone here who isn't Tex, it's just a low blow.

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Can we put this to bed?

 

I believe Poe that this is not based in misogyny (for some it may be, but not for all). There is evidence to suggest Rey fits the definition of a Mary Sue. At the same time, there are many feminist implications to that term so if some find it a bit offensive, that's understandable too.

 

Anyone interested in continuing this should at least do the most cursory bit of open minded reading over at Wikipedia.

The chapter on Critiscism details some of the feminist thought on the subject and the chapter on Allusions goes into the particular example of Rey.

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Yes, she was captured in The Force Awakens. And she immediately gains all the Force abilities she needs to thwart the villain and escape on her own. Including mind control, which she shouldn't even know is a thing, much less be able to do right off the bat. So, that's not a point in her favor.

 

She knows it's a thing because he did it to her earlier. And then she figured it out because either a) she is just that damn powerful (which TFA is showing and not telling us) or b) she is a Force amnesia-ed Force user like Bastila or c) all of the above.

 

Edit - I just read the story of the game and realized I remembered it wrong. It's not Bastila that's amnesia-fied it's "you" in the game.

 

Well, my theory stands. Rey is a powerful force user (perhaps even an evil one) who has been mindwiped, perhaps by Luke, because she was too dangerous. That's why she catches on to everything so easily, that's why Luke didn't want to train her, that's why the darkness in the cave. So her whole back-story is bunk.

That's the best god damn theory I have heard, and if it is that I will actually be stoked.

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Thanks. I like this theory so far. I'm sure I'm far from the first to think of it, but I haven't looked yet.

 

So maybe the flashes Rey sees in TFA are not from the lightsabre, they're her own suppressed/Force-wiped memories. That would mean she was there that night. So was Kylo mind-wiped too or is he in on it?

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Guest Robin

The two issues with Rey being that neat nod to the Knights of the Old Republic is that if Rey was a mindwiped darksider; Why havent Kylo and Snoke said so? Why have we seen her as a child? Granted the latter was a vision, a flashback, but to make that theory happen those moments have to be explained which could result in even more confusion.

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I thought about both those things. The child vision is easy. It's part of her implanted memory OR she was a child when she got dumped on Jakku. A dangerous child. I prefer the implanted memory angle I think.

 

Snoke just didn't know about her. Kylo came to him after all the business with her happened.

 

The Kylo problem, yeah, that one I'm not sure how they explain. Maybe he was mind-wiped too. Maybe he DID the mind wiping. Perhaps the good in him spared her in the Luke school massacre. He mind-wiped her and dumped her on the other side of the galaxy because he cared for her and now he keeps that secret - from her, from Snoke - and hey! maybe that's why he went easy on her on Starkiller Base. Luke sees her and puts it all together quickly, but he won't explain it to her (yet), he wants nothing to do with it anymore.

 

OR she wasn't part of the school, she was someone else so Luke never even knew her.

 

There are lots of ways for this to work.

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Who said its great art? They are movies with big foots who can pilot ships, puppets who are the wisest beings in the galaxy, pig men who play catch with a robots head, little hooded creatures with seemingly no bodies and glowing eyes scavenging the desert, a giant slug like thing that is a crime lord.

 

 

It has wizards and dark knights and princesses and smugglers.

 

Its supposed to be a fun 2 hours or so. That's it. Do we all overanalyze them? Ofcourse. I'm as guilty as anyone. But if you allow this over analyzing to affect your enjoyment of the movie, that's on you.

 

I had more of a problem with the simile you used to describe over-analysis, not with your categorization of Star Wars.

 

But this brings up something else. How have we changed as a culture, and what do we consider good entertainment? ANH debuted in the age of gritty movies in the theater and silly sitcoms on TV. The prequels debuted in the era of The X Files and The Matrix. Today? Completely flipped from 1977. We go to television (not "TV," television) for complicated, gritty storytelling. We want mindless tv, we let the Kardashians give us complicated, gritty storytelling. We go to the movies for "mindless" fun, so Star Wars should be a no-brainer (heh), except that the highest grossing movies mix superheros and fantasy characters with deft political and cultural commentary (key word here being "deft"). We've become more sophisticated consumers of media.

 

And calling it a kid's movie doesn't help, kids entertainment became prestige all-audience affairs between now and then, too. Moana, Coco, The Lego Movie, Avatar: The Last Airbender/Legend of Korra all had tie-in toys and Trapper Keepers and kid-sized footie pajama sets, too... and were all brilliant and entertaining for any audience member, regardless of age.

 

You can't say "it's just fantasy" in the age of Game of Thrones. You just can't. The art form has been elevated. Star Wars can't survive on the name alone. Especially when it's being managed by a company we KNOW can produce prestige all-audience sci-fi/fantasy stories. Star Wars needs to be able to stand up to scrutiny.

 

 

I'm with Poe on this one.

 

I love Rey as an idea for a character. I love Daisy Riddley to play the character. I love the origins of Rey and how we find her, her tomboyishness and her excellent resourcefulness and survivability. F_ing LOVE Rey. Okay?

 

What I DON'T like is that there hasn't been a single threat to challenge her, in any way. At all. Except that she has to recognise her own importance. Which isn't much of a hurdle to be honest.

 

What's so difficult to understand about that?

 

We are fast approaching the third installment of a trilogy in which a character is finally supposed to step into the light and shine like a badass, and Rey hasn't had a single bit of failure to learn from. Not even a bump along the way to learn a lesson from.

 

So the next time someone comes along saying any criticism of Rey its cause "eww girls, they can't be strong, she's a Mary sue" I'm gonna tell to f_off because they're clearly missing the f_ing point.

 

Cosigned.

 

Really, all of the issues with her come down to one thing: TFA and TLJ take course over a few days. It'd be easier to argue that Rey is suffering if it weren't "Dude I just met died. Dude I just met doesn't want to be a Jedi. Dude I just met who tried to mind rape me doesn't want to be a good guy."

 

On the other hand, Finn makes sense given the time frame. Dude hasn't changed since TFA because he's barely had time to change his underwear.

 

This is the first time it's been made clear to me that it's only been a few days. Finn being out of commission after almost dying at the end of TFA made it seem more like it was a few months in between the two movies. I forgot how fast bacta works, apparently.

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Well, TLJ literally picks up where TFA left off. We're in the same moment. And TFA makes it seem like Rey pretty much left right away to find Luke. So even if we say it took a week for her to leave on the super urgent trip, and the trip took a week, that's still an incredibly short period of time. I don't think there's any way it could possibly be months based on what we see on-screen.

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Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to question your reading of the movie, I meant that "Honestly?" as "Seriously, get this, can you believe that this is the first time I've realized this, and it had to be spelled out in no uncertain terms, I mean, wtf?!?"

 

Which I realize now did not work without vocal inflection, my bad.

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Well, TLJ literally picks up where TFA left off. We're in the same moment. And TFA makes it seem like Rey pretty much left right away to find Luke. So even if we say it took a week for her to leave on the super urgent trip, and the trip took a week, that's still an incredibly short period of time. I don't think there's any way it could possibly be months based on what we see on-screen.

If anything the beginning of TLJ takes place before the end of TFA. In fact it pretty much does.

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How can you say Rey hasn't failed. She flat out fails in TLJ. When she goes to meet Kylo what is her stated goal? To turn him good. Does she turn him good? No, not in the least. That is failure. I don't see any way it is not. You can fail in ways other than getting your butt kicked in a fight.

 

She goes with the goal and thinking Kylo will turn good. Instead he has her taken prisoner and brought before Snoke. Where she is tortured and Snoke uses The Force to get Luke's location from her, which she was trying to hide. Snoke could have killed her but he decided to let Kylo do it, Kylo saves her life. They fight together, she thinks Kylo has turned, he hasn't. She manages to escape.

 

From this failure she learns that Kylo is beyond redemption and this is shown by her closing the door of the Falcon on him.

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When a person is on a bad path you can take it upon yourself to point that out to them, offer to give them a map and/or lead them to a better path, but the final decision of whether to continue on the bad path or switch to the better path is ultimately that of the person on the bad path. Rey didn't fail, Ben did. The only misstep on Rey's part there is thinking she can "save" a guy she barely knows (and who mind raped her and actively tried to kill her) when the dude's own family couldn't do it.

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Star Wars isn't the real world. In the real world you are right. If I have a friend who is doing bad things or going down a bad path and I confront that friend, try to help and the friend doesn't change his or her ways, that isn't a failure on my part. You are right about that.

 

Star Wars though doesn't work that way. Turning someone good or evil is something we've seen done before. Palpatine's goal is to turn Anakin evil. Luke's goal is to turn Vader good. It's a much faster process. You don't go to a therapist for months or years trying to figure out why you are on this destructive path. You embrace evil in an instant when it can suit your needs in Star Wars. You reject it in an instant and seemingly have all your past sins washed away because you did that. It's a stark thing.

 

In Star Wars going to try to turn someone is a legit goal, we've seen it before. Rey going to try to turn Kylo isn't out of line with what we've seen before. She fails in trying to do it.

 

And really Rey fails in her training. When Luke is telling her to reach out and all that, she immediately goes to the darkness. Luke tells her to resist. Later she can't resist it even to the point of physically going into that dark place. What she sees down there prompts her to have that force connection with Kylo where they touch hands. Which is what really convinces her Kylo can be turned. Her failure to resist the cave is what leads to her failure later in the movie.

 

Both Luke and Rey fail in their training in the middle movie. Luke when he goes into the cave and sees himself in Vader and also when he can't raise the X-Wing. Rey when she repeadetly can't resist the temptation of the cave.

 

They then both leave despite their masters wishes. Luke to save his friends, Rey basically to save Kylo from the darkside. Luke fails and has to be saved by Leia and crew. Rey fails and has to be saved by Kylo. Just because she doesn't get her hand chopped off doesn;t mean she didn't experience failure and learn from that failure.

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And Im not saying Rey, or any other character, is perfect. She probably should have struggled some in TFA. But I think the overall point that I made earlier about how Rey being a nobody and not receiving much formal training goes against the past Star Wars notion that Force powers are either genetic or handed down through an elitist institution. Rey is a real nobody who doesn't receive that formal education. The whole thing is about making the Force less elitist. Which is a good thing. By showing the power come to her naturally it reinforces that point that she doesn't need the Jedi to whisk her away to their lavish Temple to train. She doesn't need to be related to the space messiah.

 

The flip of that coin is Kylo Ren, who is both related to the space messiah and also was trained in a formal academy by a Jedi Master. He is elitist. He is the one who fails constantly. Maybe the story is more about Kylo trying to overcome Rey than Rey trying to overcome Kylo?

 

Kylo Ren is the grandson of the Chosen One, son of two great heroes, nephew of the Last Jedi. He is trained at a Jedi Academy. He is the embodiment of elite bloodlines and institutions. Rey is the everyday person who has the natural talent and has to overcome these elitist things. She is the everyday person saying "I don't need these things to be successful, I can do it myself." Only she doesn;t quite realize it yet. She thinks one of these elite Skywalkers have to save the Galaxy. She is indoctrinated to think that she, an average person, cannot help. She will realize this is wrong and inspire others to realize the same.

 

For me one of the main themes of the ST is the idea that these elite institutions are not good, even if they are well intentioned. The Jedi were well meaning, but they failed in training their most important student even, the Chosen One, and they allowed the Sith to take over right under their noses. Luke, who tried to start a new formal Jedi Order, also failed. The idea is power to the people, they don't need to be deemed as worthy at birth by some weird sect of warrior monks. They don't need to be related to the Messiah.

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Three in a row, yes!

 

My point about the nose to the canvas was probably poorly explained. I get that by looking closely you can see the brush strokes and appreciate the craft and talent of the artist. Just like with a movie if you break it down you can try to see the craft of all the many people who are involved making a movie. I understand that and I'm not saying we shouldn't look closely at Star Wars movies.

 

But, I'm sure you'd agree, that looking that closely at a work of art can't be the only way to appreciate it. You also have to step back and see it as a whole. I think some people arent doing that at all. They are looking so closely and IMO looking for certain things that they want ot be there or think should be there. When maybe they need to take a step back, see the whole thing, realize the big picture of what the movies are trying to do and then go back, look closely and see if the movie is doing what it actually is trying to do rather than what you think it should be trying to do.

 

Now a person could do that and either just not like what the movie is trying to do. Or they could still think they failed at doing it.

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Guest Robin

One summer my mother, who suffers from fibromyalgia and various other ailments, declined to run the vacation bible school for a church we attended. The vacation bible school was cancelled, citing no one to run it. I went to the churchs message board, which I had never been to before, to discuss with other members ways to keep the vacation bible school running. A couple of the members had written snarky disparaging remarks about my mother, others just talked about how no one could take up the slack dropped by my mother. I raked them over the coals for their petty comments and the fact that our church had three men with the title pastor and yet apparently no one could run a vacation bible school except an old lady. They defended themselves saying yes the church has several leaders but members had to do their part. I argued you cant say someone is leading a flock when all we do is sing on Sunday. We left that church. Over the years Ive realized I may have failed them and the church more or equally to what I thought was just their failure at the time.

 

There are many types of failure, and life is so complex obviously multiple failures will overlap.

 

Rey isnt responsible for Bens actions, but if there was a way to help him then her own actions may have gotten in the way. Reys first capture, at Mazs, is due to her running from the Force as it tries to contact her. In Reys cave vision she says she finds a measure of calm, but doesnt appear to take any moment to examine the visions implications. While Luke admits he thinks the Jedi should die, he does offer some guidance and Reys ultimate reaction is to turn away from what little he is offering. Perhaps Reys character flaw/failure is best encapsulated by how we met her, she is focused on living, surviving, meal to meal. There is even a brief moment where she sees who she could end up being, if she continues living meal to meal, in an old lady sitting across from her as they both clean tech... but before she thinks about it too much Rey becomes distracted. Im not sure its fair to say Rey is impulsive, but it appears she only exists in one moment. And so, in a side note, maybe thats why these films, so far at least, have been set within such a limited scope of time.

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