A new Star Wars happened, and opinions are released upon us like nibbling hounds demanding biscuits

[Asita]

Now I know the inclination to take these point by point, but it's not that any one of them is a red flag, it's the accumulation of them. Strong in the Force? Fair game. Moral Compass in a hive of scum and villainy? Not the most original archetype but it's a well loved one for good reason. Great pilot? Par for the course, really...although the execution left much to be desired. Strong Force Sensitive who overpowers the not-Sith in the first movie, inherits the Falcon, is chosen by Anakin's lightsaber, apparently gets Chewie as a sidekick, has mysterious but seemingly significant parentage, is a good to great mechanic, shows exceptional piloting ability with a notoriously finicky ship she'd never handled...? It piles up and if nothing else it shows surprising blindness to "Bad OC" habits.

But none of these traits are exclusive to Rey. Anakin, great mechanic, strong in the force, a phenomenal pilot, and a strong moral code in a wretched hive of scum and villainy. The most annoying thing is how repetitive it is, but it's not the Wesley Crusher of Star Trek.

No, she certainly isn't a Wesley Crusher, but Wesley Crusher was a particularly egregious example, considering that even Gene Wesley Roddenberry admitted that he was designed as a younger idealized version of himself. He was pretty much the poster child for canonical Mary Sues for a good long while, so saying a character isn't as bad as Wesley is like saying that something isn't much of a mountain because Everest is bigger.

That being said, it's worth noting that you're both exaggerating and ignoring the nuance with the comparison to Anakin. In Phantom Menace we establish that he's a great mechanic and excellent pilot, but his Force ability is only expressed in the piloting ability (and is suggested to be a 'tell' that someone is force sensitive). And his moral compass is questionable at best (yes, I know it's a deleted scene, but still, it speaks to how Anakin was written). Throughout the franchise he doesn't have any grand acts of kindness or show any particular charity, and by Attack of the Clones he's...kinda a self-important asshole. Even in the first movie he's more driven to be a Jedi by the thrill of adventure than any particular moral calling.

Compare this to Rey, for whom the first hint that she is Force Sensitive is through her unconscious use of psychometry (the vision from grabbing the lightsaber), and reflecting the mind probe of Kylo Ren (himself a powerful Force user and trained in the art) back at him, followed by her conscious use of the Mind Trick and telekinesis just a few minutes later. That is a huge difference in execution.

I can't help but also notice that you ignored the crux of my point that it was the how the details piled up that was the problem. Take a few of them and they don't sound so bad, but it's when you go "she's an extremely powerful force sensitive who can use advanced force abilities without training, and an expert mechanic, and capable of expertly piloting the Falcon without a copilot, and upwards of proficient with a lightsaber the first time she uses it, and Han and Leia very nearly take on parental substitute roles, and Chewie becomes her sidekick, and she inherits the Falcon, and she inherits Anakin's lightsaber..." you start to hit issues.

Ask yourself this, do you think this is a character that would pass muster in a Star Wars RP or fanfic? In most cases the answer would be a resound "no" because it's too good - if not exceptional - at too many things too early in the story and has too many ties to the original cast. Simply taking away the Falcon, Chewie and Anakin's lightsaber would represent a significant improvement. Take away those and the instinctive use of active Force Powers (Telekinesis, Mind Trick, turn the Mind Probe reflection into simply blocking it (still use it to imply she's force sensitive, just with a bit more tact)) and I doubt you would have ever heard "Rey" and "Mary Sue" in the same sentence.

 

[infohippie]

But none of these traits are exclusive to Rey. Anakin, great mechanic, strong in the force, a phenomenal pilot, and a strong moral code in a wretched hive of scum and villainy. The most annoying thing is how repetitive it is, but it's not the Wesley Crusher of Star Trek.

Though Anakin is also widely regarded as one of the worst things about a series of three terrible films, very nearly as bad as Jar-Jar.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

No, she certainly isn't a Wesley Crusher, but Wesley Crusher was a particularly egregious example, considering that even Gene Wesley Roddenberry admitted that he was designed as a younger idealized version of himself. He was pretty much the poster child for canonical Mary Sues for a good long while, so saying a character isn't as bad as Wesley is like saying that something isn't much of a mountain because Everest is bigger.

That being said, it's worth noting that you're both exaggerating and ignoring the nuance with the comparison to Anakin. In Phantom Menace we establish that he's a great mechanic and excellent pilot, but his Force ability is only expressed in the piloting ability (and is suggested to be a 'tell' that someone is force sensitive). And his moral compass is questionable at best (yes, I know it's a deleted scene, but still, it speaks to how Anakin was written). Throughout the franchise he doesn't have any grand acts of kindness or show any particular charity, and by Attack of the Clones he's...kinda a self-important asshole. Even in the first movie he's more driven to be a Jedi by the thrill of adventure than any particular moral calling.

Compare this to Rey, for whom the first hint that she is Force Sensitive is through her unconscious use of psychometry (the vision from grabbing the lightsaber), and reflecting the mind probe of Kylo Ren (himself a powerful Force user and trained in the art) back at him, followed by her conscious use of the Mind Trick and telekinesis just a few minutes later. That is a huge difference in execution.

I can't help but also notice that you ignored the crux of my point that it was the how the details piled up that was the problem. Take a few of them and they don't sound so bad, but it's when you go "she's an extremely powerful force sensitive who can use advanced force abilities without training, and an expert mechanic, and capable of expertly piloting the Falcon without a copilot, and upwards of proficient with a lightsaber the first time she uses it, and Han and Leia very nearly take on parental substitute roles, and Chewie becomes her sidekick, and she inherits the Falcon, and she inherits Anakin's lightsaber..." you start to hit issues.

Ask yourself this, do you think this is a character that would pass muster in a Star Wars RP or fanfic? In most cases the answer would be a resound "no" because it's too good - if not exceptional - at too many things too early in the story and has too many ties to the original cast. Simply taking away the Falcon, Chewie and Anakin's lightsaber would represent a significant improvement. Take away those and the instinctive use of active Force Powers (Telekinesis, Mind Trick, turn the Mind Probe reflection into simply blocking it (still use it to imply she's force sensitive, just with a bit more tact)) and I doubt you would have ever heard "Rey" and "Mary Sue" in the same sentence.

Possibly? To outline my point before given I reread it and I wasn't clear, I consider Anakin way worse. The thing is my knowledge of Star Wars extends to the movies, somr of the board and video games. All I have is to compare it to the various protsgs as displayed in the films. I don't read fanfic or the expanded universe stuff.

Frankly I think lightsabers are shit, I'm all about the blasters and vehicles. You show me a line up of unactivated lightsabers, I'll struggle identifying who they belong to. You show me some of the blasters and I'll be like; "Biker guy on Endor. Totally used a pistol like that!" To me the blasters actually have character because they're mash ups of WW2 and early Cold War guns reputposed with sci-fi qualities. So they stick out in your brain.

Now that I've outlined my general stance on how familiar I am of anything SW (being the movies and some games) ... I don't like Rey as s character. But it's because I'm kind of fucking annoyed how jedi seem to dominate this awesome sci-fi fantasy landscape that is painted.

In fact I think many people who love Star Wars would agree all the real Jedi-ish stuff that comes up in the original trilogy isn't why you watch Star Wars. Would you have the same problems if Rey wasn't some jedi to be and used a blaster 90% of the time? Because I would be fine with that.

Frankly the whole Force thing of Star Wars as a literary device for the narration of greater concepts of good and evil in traditional storytelling is childish and threadbare. After all... not the first sci-fi setting to encompass ideas of glorified psychokinesis and other forms of mind-powers over material forces ...

To best illustrate why this matters... the average person like me isn't going to see Rey like a Mary Sue. Wesley Crusher was annoying to anyone with a passing familiarity with TNG, but given what other protags I've seen I can't compare.

Just as I was illustrating to another person above with original (remaster) footage... Han isn't a good mechanic. His mechanical abilities as per commonly accessible material is solidly comic relief. The Falcon-Han symbiosis is the hypothetical bad cop-bad cop partnership played up for laughs. As darker as TESB is, the Falcon-Han relationship is a much needed comic act.

Speaking as someone that us liable to be like those 95% of crowds that will see it solely for being SW without any grand universal knowledge of the setting. I don't see a Mary Sue, because I think people play up the idea that using a lightsabre is hard.

Luke beats Darth Vader with his through brute force despite legitimately only training for a few years. Anakin eventually defeats Dooku despite supposedly being lousy at his lightsabre training.

Luke is blocking droid simulated bolts blind folded within days. There isn't a consistent baseline idea of skill. If there is, please show me in the movies. One poster's arguments is Chewie is a great pilot! Okay, where? Han is a phenomenal mechanic! Um... no... a no-really, actual royalty, princess seems to actually know how to fix Han's ship more than Han does.

In this universe where being the Star-Christ at 9 years old and building artificial intelligences and pod-racing despite underdeveloped spatial awareness and thr limited physical force pressures a child can reasonably withstand... But then again, Star Wars isn't exactly science-fiction... it's fantasy with lasers.

Does Rey seem like a wunderkind? Yeah, I'll grant that... but then again I would have been fine with a Force-sensitive youth that uses Obi-style deception, trickery, stealth, street smart mechanical engineering and manipulation to get the job done.

Let's say if Rey used her Force-sensitivity to instead of fight with a lightsaber, but use it like Jackie Chan uses the environments in his fight choreography...? Would you have a problem of this Force sensitive rogue that puts their faith in their blaster and merely using their lightsaber as a tool rather than a weapon? Because I would be more than happy seeing a Force-sensitive rogue and scavenger that doesn't look like your average Jedi, but rather emulates the scrappy barbarism of their youth.

But I don't see that as a victim of being a Mary Sue, but bad characterization. Like instead of a lightsaber duel... what if she force-pushed a mound of blade heated rock shards into Kylo's face and chest and seemingly fends off his advances like that? Also suit the theme of the distortion of the flesh mirroring the darkness within the soul.

Such would be a cooler character. No questions (at least in my opinion) ... but would that be enough to escape the Mary Sue indictment inspite of its own lore?

It's what I would do with a big laser deathstick and the ability to move stuff with my brain. Why fight fair when you have infinitely more ways to not fight fair ...?

Moreover, that would have been cool. Because you have Kylo that was seemingly classically tutored, and some force-sensitive punk of whom he wouldn't be used to fighting fighting dirty and getting the better of him. Not what looks like any other conventional duel. So you have a twisted idea of pride begetting failure, the class differences between a student and some street smart punk, and it would have actually shown why it's important to use a laser deathstick better.

But you'll forgive me if I don't chalk that up to being a Mary Sue ... I chalk that up to simply bad writing.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Beware incoming "Rey is a mary sue" arguments.

It's not as egregious in this movie, fortunately, though...

Spoiler: Spoiler from the movie!

...of course she has to best Luke in a duel.

Other than that they toned down the Mary Sue thing.

Good to hear. I was hoping they explain whether they she received force training as a kid, which would be a decent save in my book. Haven't seen the movie yet, ofc., but if they resolved it in a different way, and it works, then...

For undisclosed reasons, she was left by her (almost certianly important) family in a cutthroat town where she had to scavenge parts to survive. The work was hard, the food in short supply, but despite growing up in a hive of scum and villainy, she kept her moral compass and would sooner go hungry than turn over a droid she just met. She's a talented scrapper, a capable mechanic. She quickly becomes a pilot on par with Lando (Return of the Jedi), Han, Chewie, and Leia almost immediately become fond of her, oh and she isn't just Force Sensitive, but insanely powerful and gifted in the Force (to the degree that the antagonist - also noted to be insanely powerful in the Force and trained in its use - found her countering and overpowering his force abilities despite the fact that she at the time wasn't even aware that she was Force Sensitive). Oh, and she ends up in possession of Anakin's Lightsaber and the Millennium Falcon, and as Chewie's apparent new BFF.

Yeah, they buttered that toast a tad too thick for my taste. It's not even the overcompetence, but the fact that she gets so well with everyone so fast, what rubbed me the wrong way. I'd like more bickering.

Also, the part just before the ending, with the infamous hug she received from Leia, reminded me, strangely enough, about Man of Steel critique i've heard one day... So Han dies, probably the most dramatic moment in entire movie, and then Rey gets rewarded with almost everything that was dear to him.

Though Anakin is also widely regarded as one of the worst things about a series of three terrible films, very nearly as bad as Jar-Jar.

Which is too bad in this context, because Ridley >>> Christiansen.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I don't believe for a second space, much less interstellar travel, will be ever so easy that a novice with a blowtorch-spot welder looking thing means the difference between being stranded somewhere and moving FTL... thank fuck I'm watching a sci-fi fantasy story with MAGICAL MONKS.

Yet here you are, looking for technicisms to justify the mechanical proficiency of a fictional character against another fictional character. The fact remains that introducing a brand new YA character who is immediately better at everything than all of the established characters is a fanfic move. Imagine Lord of the Rings Episode IV introducing a random young orphan from the desert who has taught herself to be a better swordsman than Aragorn ("Hey you're pretty good at this, have my kingdom"), a better magician than Gandalf (Let's say his staff "chooses" her or something) and teaches a lesson in humility to Sam. You can scrounge up every little technicism to explain to me how this could possibly be feasible... or just admit the writers are a bit desperate to get you to worship such an awesome character.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

I just wish both the warring factions in Star Wars are on equal footing rather than the one sided big and powerful Empire vs underdog and persistent Rebellion.

I want it to be the Big and Powerful Republic and Jedi Order vs Big and Powerful Empire and the Sith Order. Like how it is for The Old Republic.

 

[Natemans]

I just wish both the warring factions in Star Wars are on equal footing rather than the one sided big and powerful Empire vs underdog and persistent Rebellion.

I want it to be the Big and Powerful Republic and Jedi Order vs Big and Powerful Empire and the Sith Order. Like how it is for The Old Republic.

In the comic series called Legacy, there was a war between a split side of the Imperial Empire between the Sith and the defector Emperor Fel. Jedi still existed, but very few because of another purge. Although the Imperial knights for Emperor Fel were Force users and used lightsabers.

But yeah, I dig the Old Republic era despite my underwhelming thoughts on the books. (Well, okay, I love the Darth Bane trilogy and Annihilation as well as Knights of the Old Republic comic run).

 

[09philj]

Other than that they toned down the Mary Sue thing.

Can people please outline this argument for me?

It didn't really come to the forefront until the tail end of the Force Awakens, but by the time the film ended she'd become a fairly paint by numbers fanfic OC. I mean let's outline her character for a minute.

For undisclosed reasons, she was left by her (almost certianly important) family in a cutthroat town where she had to scavenge parts to survive. The work was hard, the food in short supply, but despite growing up in a hive of scum and villainy, she kept her moral compass and would sooner go hungry than turn over a droid she just met. She's a talented scrapper, a capable mechanic. She quickly becomes a pilot on par with Lando (Return of the Jedi), Han, Chewie, and Leia almost immediately become fond of her, oh and she isn't just Force Sensitive, but insanely powerful and gifted in the Force (to the degree that the antagonist - also noted to be insanely powerful in the Force and trained in its use - found her countering and overpowering his force abilities despite the fact that she at the time wasn't even aware that she was Force Sensitive). Oh, and she ends up in possession of Anakin's Lightsaber and the Millennium Falcon, and as Chewie's apparent new BFF.

Now I know the inclination to take these point by point, but it's not that any one of them is a red flag, it's the accumulation of them. Strong in the Force? Fair game. Moral Compass in a hive of scum and villainy? Not the most original archetype but it's a well loved one for good reason. Great pilot? Par for the course, really...although the execution left much to be desired. Strong Force Sensitive who overpowers the not-Sith in the first movie, inherits the Falcon, is chosen by Anakin's lightsaber, apparently gets Chewie as a sidekick, has mysterious but seemingly significant parentage, is a good to great mechanic, shows exceptional piloting ability with a notoriously finicky ship she'd never handled...? It piles up and if nothing else it shows surprising blindness to "Bad OC" habits.

Plus, Rey is just irritating, and not in an endearing way like Luke was. We're willing to put up with all the stupid shit in Luke's story arc because there's just enough character in the writing to make him likeable. Rey has essentially no character traits other than competence, so when she does some bullshit, the audience does not think "Oh wow, she's so cool", they think "well, that's some bullshit".

There's also the dimension of whether the writer appears to have any interest in the suspension of your disbelief, and how it meshes with the tone of the work as a whole. The original trilogy were and are able to get people to accept a lot of stupid shit because they are a particular kind of campy pantomime that the audience recognises as such. The recent films, on the other hand, are modern action-adventure films that appear to want the audience to treat them with a degree of seriousness.

 

[McMarbles]

Other than that they toned down the Mary Sue thing.

Can people please outline this argument for me?

A female character was competent.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Yet here you are, looking for technicisms to justify the mechanical proficiency of a fictional character against another fictional character. The fact remains that introducing a brand new YA character who is immediately better at everything than all of the established characters is a fanfic move. Imagine Lord of the Rings Episode IV introducing a random young orphan from the desert who has taught herself to be a better swordsman than Aragorn ("Hey you're pretty good at this, have my kingdom"), a better magician than Gandalf (Let's say his staff "chooses" her or something) and teaches a lesson in humility to Sam. You can scrounge up every little technicism to explain to me how this could possibly be feasible... or just admit the writers are a bit desperate to get you to worship such an awesome character.

Looking for technicalities?

I'm sorry if I walked away with different impressions of primary reference materials. I mean you've yet to show me one scene where Han's supposedly being techno-savant has come into play. Everytime I've seen Han try to be a mechanic it's a comic act. Also, Aragorn is kind of a dick in the books; "Check out my magical sword. Look, don't touch. Grrrr." Hell, Aragorn in the books isn't all that comparable to other heroes in the tale.

Why the fuck are you comparing Rey to LotR ... maybe we watched different movies and read different books, but all the POVs from the LotR books are total Mary Sues, and Aragorn and Gandalf are the Mary Sue-ist of the bunch. Sorry, you're telling me to think Rey is more comparatively wunderkind to Gandalf and Aragorn? Have you actually read the books?

Gandalf isn't even shy about it. "I'm more badass than anything you'll meet, save for being brought before the seat of the Dark Lord..." (paraphrasing, but not all that much). As for Aragorn, don't even fucking start. The guy is a comparative giant. Lived three times longer than mortal men, in the books he's convinced he'll just simply take the throne of Gondor and Arnor as if taking candy from a baby because Elrond makes it a part of his condition to be eligible to wed Arwen.

In the books, the only major moral choice he faces is; "Do I help Frodo, or do I just kick in some doors at Minas Tirith because thrones are awesome? Questions--questions--..."

The books aren't shy about the nature of fate (indeed fate is everything) and that fate of Elendil's heir (not Isildur, Elendil... Isildur is like vanilla Elendil, kind of the son no one really wants when compared to his father) is pretty fucking "anything you can do..." territory.

Yeah, no. It's apples and oranges.

 

[The Lunatic]

I've always found the argument around Rey to be strange.

Some people seem to take it as some political disagreement to accept that a horribly written character is horribly written.

Obviously she's absurdly Mary Sue, basically to the point of being a parody of it.

But, I guess accepting that a specific female character was poorly written is somehow a condemnation of half of the gender divide.

Anyway. Overall, meh.
Star wars has really lost the appeal since Disney took over, it really doesn't feel like it anything other than a cynical design-by-committee cash-in.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

And say what you will about Han and Chewie and the state of the Falcon, I don't believe for a second that some lonely self-taught scavenger from a desert planet who's never been onboard an actual flying ship would figure out the Falcon in minutes and have the people who have been professionally manning it for decades at her mercy.

She's not self-taught, she was abandoned to Unkar Platt and helped him scavenge ships. She has been on starships before, just never off planet. When she and Finn bump into each other after shooting down the Tie Fighters, she's babbling saying that she'd flown ships before but never anything offplanet. So we can assume, given that she works for Platt, that at some point she helped him scavenge and modify parts of the Falcon. She shows familiarity with the ship and how long it has been since it flew, so she's been on it before, and perhapes even flew it at some point while Platt owned it.

 

[Smithnikov_v1legacy]

Imagine Lord of the Rings Episode IV

There'd already be problems considering that evil never truly rose again after the end of that Age....

introducing a random young orphan from the desert who has taught herself to be a better swordsman than Aragorn ("Hey you're pretty good at this, have my kingdom"),ote]

In other words, a standard elf in Middle Earth

Seriously, I don't know if you read Tolkien, but he jerked off the elven race to the point of eyeball rolling. They are literally the Better Than Everyone race.

a better magician than Gandalf

Unlikely unless she's one of the Maiar anyway.

or just admit the writers are a bit desperate to get you to worship such an awesome character.

I don't think it was deliberate so much as thoughtless.

 

[thepyrethatburns]

This video should be used every time someone discusses "saving" the Escapist.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Yet here you are, looking for technicisms to justify the mechanical proficiency of a fictional character against another fictional character. The fact remains that introducing a brand new YA character who is immediately better at everything than all of the established characters is a fanfic move. Imagine Lord of the Rings Episode IV introducing a random young orphan from the desert who has taught herself to be a better swordsman than Aragorn ("Hey you're pretty good at this, have my kingdom"), a better magician than Gandalf (Let's say his staff "chooses" her or something) and teaches a lesson in humility to Sam. You can scrounge up every little technicism to explain to me how this could possibly be feasible... or just admit the writers are a bit desperate to get you to worship such an awesome character.

Looking for technicalities?

I'm sorry if I walked away with different impressions of primary reference materials. I mean you've yet to show me one scene where Han's supposedly being techno-savant has come into play. Everytime I've seen Han try to be a mechanic it's a comic act. Also, Aragorn is kind of a dick in the books; "Check out my magical sword. Look, don't touch. Grrrr." Hell, Aragorn in the books isn't all that comparable to other heroes in the tale.

Why the fuck are you comparing Rey to LotR ... maybe we watched different movies and read different books, but all the POVs from the LotR books are total Mary Sues, and Aragorn and Gandalf are the Mary Sue-ist of the bunch. Sorry, you're telling me to think Rey is more comparatively wunderkind to Gandalf and Aragorn? Have you actually read the books?

Gandalf isn't even shy about it. "I'm more badass than anything you'll meet, save for being brought before the seat of the Dark Lord..." (paraphrasing, but not all that much). As for Aragorn, don't even fucking start. The guy is a comparative giant. Lived three times longer than mortal men, in the books he's convinced he'll just simply take the throne of Gondor and Arnor as if taking candy from a baby because Elrond makes it a part of his condition to be eligible to wed Arwen.

In the books, the only major moral choice he faces is; "Do I help Frodo, or do I just kick in some doors at Minas Tirith because thrones are awesome? Questions--questions--..."

The books aren't shy about the nature of fate (indeed fate is everything) and that fate of Elendil's heir (not Isildur, Elendil... Isildur is like vanilla Elendil, kind of the son no one really wants when compared to his father) is pretty fucking "anything you can do..." territory.

Yeah, no. It's apples and oranges.

Addendum. This isn't that hard.
Any brand new character who is inserted in an established fictional canon written in such a way that the character is immediately better than everyone at everything and is recognized for it is a Mary Sue, who gets the blessing of the older characters to take their place as the focus of the attention. Rey is textbook.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Addendum. This isn't that hard.
Any brand new character who is inserted in an established fictional canon written in such a way that the character is immediately better than everyone at everything and is recognized for it is a Mary Sue, who gets the blessing of the older characters to take their place as the focus of the attention. Rey is textbook.

I think you're missing my point ... Aragorn was Mary Sue right from the start. He is literally everything and more that you think is problematic in Rey (barring things like being a mechanic, because apples and oranges ... Aragorn makes up for it by knowing Elvish medicine, history, poetry, etc). Also, yes. She's a fucking protag. And I have serious qualms about your level of general discernment given you compared Rey to Aragorn and Gandalf. Aragorn is to humans what Heracles was to your average Greek (slight embellishment, but not too far off).

Addressing your underlying point, as I told Asita I think Rey isn't that interesting as a character and I'd rather see a down and dirty fighter as representative of the largely barbaric conditions she was raised.

I offered ideas how I would of handled it, and frankly I think lightsabers are fucking shit. But that's not the same as being a Mary Sue... because frankly if I can read LotR happily enough, and nothing in the Star Wars galaxy there seems to have consistent baseline of skill with a laser deathstick wielding, I don't really see it as a problem.

She's had extensive hand-to-hand training. More over she's probably had more real combat experience than Kylo who I would imagine had a sheltered upbringing and sheltered education, and didn't face the same tests that Rey would have. She built a landspeeder from a wreck, she intimately surrounded herself in the bellies of machines, and she made a living scavenging starship parts.

Unless people want to argue that fighting for your life with a quarterstaff doesn't have some formal application to fighting for your life with a bladed weapon.

They taught me bladed weapons and body combat in the army. Pretty sure I could port them to some conception of a laser deathstick. After all, none of the laser deathstick fighting seems all that improbable in the original trilogy. As in you could see someone wielding a cavalry sabre or arming sword in a similar fashion. And frankly I thought the laser deathstick fighting in the prequel trilogy just looks awful and weird.

Frankly I don't see why they went with glowy laser straight edges to begin with. Why not an actual sword? Dress it up a bit. Give it some sci-fi accoutrements, but actual swords could have had some visible character beyond something that you look like you can make in a hardware store.

Kylo and Rey's duel at the end of VII seems pretty fucking awesome to me. It looks like they were actually using weapons.

I would have prefered to watch that duel than any of the garbage in the prequel trilogy which looks like half of them are swinging around their blades hoping to cause an epileptic fit as opposed to actually being warriors with laser deathsticks.

Remember this....


And if this is something people honestly want to watch and inflict on others who have done nothing deserving of such stupid choreography and bullshit, confusing cinematography... well, I'm sure there's a punishment somewhere in the City of Dis worthy of your eternity.

Look at this cinematography and choreography...


Cleanly shot, desperate, savage and in the end, cruel. You actually get the feeling she's fighting for her life and she uses Kylo's arrogance against him, in the end showing a glimmer of potent anger and using it... It's a rugged, aggressive, almost petty engagement of one character driven to the brink of her psychological defences and uses that growing sense of malice to inflict pain on a surprised opponent.

Is there anything structural you find problematic with that?

Because if I want fight scenes to look like ballet recitals, I'll go to the fucking ballet. It's quite obvious Kylo could have finished her off with his feint and then off-balancing her over the cliff side. If anything, it's Kylo's sense of mercy and arrogance that leads to his downfall ... and Rey tapping into that darkest anger, that pettiness, and that malice that he abandons himself in that moment of hopeful restraint from killing her.

That ... seems pretty inline with Star Wars. It's an homage to Luke beating his dad down in a fit of rage that Vader could not emulate in that moment, to his own detriment.

And you know what? It made for a fucking good way to close up a duel and you don't fix what ain't broke.

Now, any other complaints? Honestly feels like I've touched upon most things at this point.

With reference materials, might I add...

Consider if you will my side of the argument coming from this as having a knowledge of Star Wars that would be consideredfairly generalized to the primary reference materials and some board and videogames ... I'm far more willing to watch more duels like that than I am anyh dancing, twirling, flourishing fucking nonsense in the prequel trilogy.

Assuming I'm goiung to watch the latest installment for the same reasons 95% of people that will watch it, maybe you might have a problem with your argument given someone like me doesn't feel the same way for reasons of the primary source materials themselves.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Addendum. This isn't that hard.
Any brand new character who is inserted in an established fictional canon written in such a way that the character is immediately better than everyone at everything and is recognized for it is a Mary Sue, who gets the blessing of the older characters to take their place as the focus of the attention. Rey is textbook.

I think you're missing my point ... Aragorn was Mary Sue right from the start. He is literally everything and more that you think is problematic in Rey (barring things like being a mechanic, because apples and oranges ... Aragorn makes up for it by knowing Elvish medicine, history, poetry, etc). Also, yes. She's a fucking protag. And I have serious qualms about your level of general discernment given you compared Rey to Aragorn and Gandalf. Aragorn is to humans what Heracles was to your average Greek (slight embellishment, but not too far off).

Me, I have qualms with your reading comprehension. I compared Rey to a non-existent character in a hypothetical LotR sequel that ingratiates herself instantly with the old established characters - NOT to Aragorn or Gandalf. This to make it clear what makes a Mary Sue, and you might as well re-read my previous post for the definition.

 

[Marik2]

I'm reading the supposed spoilers for it, and it looks like a train wreck.

 

[Asita]

*snip*

Apologies that I'm addressing so little, but experience tells me that exploding post length is one of the 'best' ways to kill a discussion (both in terms of amicability and interest). Regarding the "dirty fighting Force user" angle: That would certainly be an interesting future direction, but if it had shown up in TFA it would have made a bad situation worse due both to it implying greater proficiency with the Force than anyone that new to the power had any right to be and necessarily bringing up questions on whether or not that should be pushing her to the Dark Side. That can certainly work for someone who had training to keep from getting caught up in the heat of the moment, but for a newbie without training it toes uncomfortably close to "my character's a grey Jedi who can use darker powers and aggression without falling to the Dark Side" territory.

In retrospect, I think this is a major point of disconnect between the two sides. It's not necessarily that Rey shouldn't have reached this point, it was that it happened too quickly without adequate reasoning. Rey reaching that point and surpassing it was to be expected. The problem is in large part that she grew to that point in a span of minutes. The first flight in the Falcon, for instance, had her start off rocky to emphasize her inexperience, but by the end of that same flight she was expertly ducking and weaving in an "aerial canyon chase", which is generally the kind of thing you reserve for when you really want to convey that a pilot is skilled and can beat enemies purely through superior piloting ability (think the canyon chase in Independence Day, the asteroid chase in Empire Strikes Back, and the trench run in Hunt for Red October). Similarly, in the span of a few minutes during a lightsaber duel she went from a hit and run approach which compensated for her lack of experience with that weapon type (this being the first time she'd ever wielded a lightsaber, as opposed to a metal staff which had a much different balance and way of handling) to simply outclassing and overpowering her opponent in a more standard duel.

Much of this I actually attribute to Abrams being terrible at pacing and far too in love with spectacle (see the supernova in Star Trek 2009's backstory, Starkiller Base, Kylo Ren seemingly freezing a plasma bolt in spacetime...). Which is to say that I feel that he didn't consider what the scenes implied, he just wanted to make them "cool".

That said, in TFA's case it didn't help that Rey was accompanied by upwards of a few "paint by numbers bad OC" practices. These included the original cast immediately bonding with her (made worse by the writing flub of Leia apparently deciding that Rey rather than Chewie needed comforting over Han's death), inheriting the Falcon, "inheriting" Chewie, inheriting a protagonist's lightsaber (made worse by being "chosen" by it, a first for Star Wars), and near effortless discovery and use of active Force powers even before she knew she could use the Force (made worse by the fact that the first power she used (psychometry) was a rare Force ability most associated with Quinlan Vos). These are the kinds of things in particular that raise red flags and make the audience less accepting of other points that they might otherwise have excused. After a certain point it feels less like a developed character and more like the writers were simply asking "how can we make the character cooler", which is part and parcel of how bad Original Characters are made.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

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Me, I have qualms with your reading comprehension. I compared Rey to a non-existent character in a hypothetical LotR sequel that ingratiates herself instantly with the old established characters - NOT to Aragorn or Gandalf. This to make it clear what makes a Mary Sue, and you might as well re-read my previous post for the definition.

And? Frankly the rest of the post stands on its own, you've done nothing to back up your argument. What about the rest of my post?

If this is what can be expected ... not interested. Have a good day.