Discussion about Self-Insert Characters in Fiction (Mary Sue/Gary Stu)

[Asita]

The latter, however, is Oneness.

You mean the one where Luke asks if it controls your actions, and Obi-Wan says partially, but it also obeys your commands? The exact thing I was referencing? Yes, I'm familiar with the scene. It's sort of like the idea of lketing go has been baked into Star Wars since the seventies or something.

No, that is not what I am talking about. I'm talking about the Avatar State of Star Wars, when it feels less like you're drawing on the Force than it is that you were the Force and had merged with it. It's when you become maelstrom of Force energy, surrendering your individual personality to the Force and becoming the embodiment of its will. In religious terms it's the difference between detachment and Buddhahood. It's one thing to say that she achieved detachment. It's another thing entirely to say that she achieved Buddhahood. And whatever your intent, you're saying the latter right now, not the former.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

No, that is not what I am talking about. I'm talking about the Avatar State of Star Wars, when it feels less like you're drawing on the Force than it is that you were the Force and had merged with it. It's when you become maelstrom of Force energy, surrendering your individual personality to the Force and becoming the embodiment of its will. In religious terms it's the difference between detachment and Buddhahood. It's one thing to say that she achieved detachment. It's another thing entirely to say that she achieved Buddhahood. And whatever your intent, you're saying the latter right now, not the former.

You're making the absolute most extreme interpretation of what I and Altnamejag wrote to get to this critique of it. But both Alt and Amyss are right in that Rey is basically doing in TFA what Luke did in AHN (which is actually a major part of the criticism that it is AHN for the new-10's), she's letting the force guide her so that she can use her weapon better. That is all we are saying, that is all the movie supports and it has precedent in AHN. You just keep hyping it up to something much more extreme because that strawman is much easier to fight.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

She is not an invincible fighter. Her defeat of Kylo Ren was due to his injuries and impulsiveness. And kind? She sure doesn?t act that way to Finn and BB-8. The only thing that is true here is expert pilot and that applies to every Star Wars film protagonist.

She's flawless, an unbeatable fighter, always right, fixes everything, speaks all languages, master of the force without any training, beats dark jedi and a jedi master, she's a dictionary definition Mary Sue.

Bad male characters rarely, if ever, get this level of backlash and accusations of SJW agenda (unless they?re non-white). And as for ruining Star Wars, I thought the prequels did that?

Prequels did suck. Jar Jar was terrible, midichlorians was a terrible idea, Episode 1 was terrible. And the sad part is they seem like masterpieces compared with 7 and 8. Episode 1 being bad doesn't preclude 7 and 8 from being worse. What is worse is the way they figuratively tore up all previous lore and canon in order to reinvent it for today's kids, alienating everyone else in the process.

This YouTube video draws an interesting analogy with the Catholic church and Star Wars fandom (go with it). I'm not suggesting to take it as gospel (boom tische), just to hear the concept of how the shift from Lucas to Disney and the direction of the new movies have affected the fandom.

As for male characters, consider this review by Hulk Smash of Man of Steel, wherein the reviewer spends thousands of words shredding the film and Superman. And deservedly so and he's not the only one. It was critically panned almost universally, hated by audiences and the DCCU has received little more than scorn for how badly it was handled. Except interestingly for the Wonder Woman movie that rose above the lows of the other awful films to stand tall as only mediocre with some good bits in. A bad film is a bad film, a bad character is a bad character and it has nothing to do with Rey's sex. I'm also quite sure Anakin in the prequels wasn't well liked by most people either.

what conclusion is anyone to make about why Rey is getting singled out?

It's simple. It has nothing to do with sexism. They levelled the same argument for the failures of Ghostbusters 2016 and Oceans 8. (I'll let you in on a secret here. Almost all women would rather watch George Clooney and Brad Pitt than an "all women remake".) And the same again with Star Wars. All one has to do is call anyone critical a racist sexist bigot homophobe and BAM, one can feel morally superior and invalidate all their criticisms! How easy is that!?

What isn't easy is accepting that the characters and movies are bad and people didn't like them. Rey is a terrible character, Rian Johnson is a terrible director who made an awful Star Wars film and has now been fired. Rose was easily the worst part of the film and removing her character and storyline entirely would have made the film better (still not good tho). Their sex and race have nothing to do with it. But perhaps if they stopped putting "diversity" and "strong-female characters" and inclusion and social justice things first, and actually wrote a decent film with relatable characters, it would be a different story...pun intended.

The conclusion is to understand that Rey is a bad character, badly written, badly realised, boring, unrelatable and one-dimensional. I'm fairly sure I didn't even list her sex in that.

The reason for collapsing sales was Marvel?s idiotic business practices. Namely, oversaturation of events, increased prices, poor distribution and over reliance on the direct market.
...
So despite being able to see Thor, Iron Man and Cap in the movies (not to mention the games, t.v. shows and other media) them being temporarily replaced in the comics (one of the oldest traditions in the superhero genre) was too unbearable?

Those are also valid factors, absolutely, but the "diversity" agenda didn't help and alienated swathes of the fandom. And "unbearable" is not the right word...consider this. Video game movie tie ins (eg. Star Wars: BF2) are released alongside the movie, why? So they hope to get more sales while the film is fresh in the minds of the potential buyers. They see the film, look at new games and see the related game on the shelf. Now MCU viewers can't do that. They can watch Cap, Thor and Iron Man, but they can't read their comic books because those characters aren't there. It's idiotic that during the MCU's peak popularity, it's flagship heroes can't be found on store shelves. They fired Axel Alonso for running the business into the ground.

Literally none of these issues apply to Rey. In both of the films she has appeared in, Rey is shown to have faults and insecurities which the villains take advantage of. At one point we even see her running in fear.

She's dictionary definition SFC and Mary Sue.

Some people will relate to Luke more than Rey and others will relate to Rey more than Luke.

Clearly that's not the case because original films are still beloved after 40 years and the new ones are widely disliked. More people, certainly everyone I know, men and women, prefer the original films and characters.

Just because Rey isn?t like Luke doesn?t mean she isn?t relatable

No one suggested that was the case; it has nothing to do with being "like Luke". Taken in a vacuum, she's still awful. She is unrelatable because she's flawless, one-dimensional and the rest I've already gone over above. She's unrelatable in the same way Superman was in Man of Steel. She similarly has no arc at all; she's perfect at the start and she's perfect throughout. She learns nothing, has no character development, doesn't change at all. She's a master at everything from the beginning.

Anyway, I'm beating a dead horse, I've said it all multiple times. The fact Rey's a Mary Sue isn't really a point of debate, it's very apparent. It's also very easy to put people's issues down to sexism instead the fact she and the movies she appeared in were just terribly written and terribly made. Star Wars has been a popular, multi billion franchise for years and Disney haven't done a good job continuing it.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Yes, when i watched TFA Rey did feel "Mary suish" at times. Take away one or two of those scenes where "wow, she just does that" or "wow, she gets aproval of that character in no time" and she'd be fine, but unfortunately those things kinda built up over the course of the movie. That being said it's a small problem with writing(or maybe, pacing), not as bad as other problems with the reboot, and doesn't really break her character as much.
And no, she wasn't nearly as bad as Anakin(for once, she wasn't a twat), and TFA(OR TLJ) don't make prequels retroactively better, gtfo.
Fortunately, Daisy Ridley's performance might been one of the best things about this SW reanimation, and Rey remaining sympathetic is hugely her contribution, despite some problems i had with the script.

 

[Asita]

No, that is not what I am talking about. I'm talking about the Avatar State of Star Wars, when it feels less like you're drawing on the Force than it is that you were the Force and had merged with it. It's when you become maelstrom of Force energy, surrendering your individual personality to the Force and becoming the embodiment of its will. In religious terms it's the difference between detachment and Buddhahood. It's one thing to say that she achieved detachment. It's another thing entirely to say that she achieved Buddhahood. And whatever your intent, you're saying the latter right now, not the former.

You're making the absolute most extreme interpretation of what I and Altnamejag wrote to get to this critique of it. But both Alt and Amyss are right in that Rey is basically doing in TFA what Luke did in AHN (which is actually a major part of the criticism that it is AHN for the new-10's), she's letting the force guide her so that she can use her weapon better. That is all we are saying, that is all the movie supports and it has precedent in AHN. You just keep hyping it up to something much more extreme because that strawman is much easier to fight.

...I'll be honest, Geth, I'm a bit saddened to learn that you have such a poor opinion of me as that.

If you look back at this conversation you might notice that I've repeatedly alluded to a belief that what people intended was not the same as what they were conveying. That there was a severe difference between the statements "let the Force guide you" and "Let the Force act through you, rather than trying to control it". Much of this conversation has been me trying to explain why those were different. Hell, the very post you're responding to was disputing the implication that Oneness (not what Rey did, the concept of Oneness itself) was described by Obi-Wan in the first film as basic Force Philosophy rather than a pinnacle state.

And the post that Something Amiss was quoting? I drew the same distinction you're making myself. And I quote: "The former's a basic Force ability that would inevitably form the foundation of her training, so while I'd still say that would be bad writing (or at least bad direction) for her to grasp it so suddenly in the heat of a duel with even less guidance than Luke got, it's at least plausible. The latter, however, is Oneness."

I am not above admitting error, Geth, especially when it comes to misreading. I've certainly fallen victim to it before, and in all probability it'll happen again in the future. However, I will thank you not to assume malicious arguing tactics on my part, especially not when my point is "you're invoking concepts you probably don't intend to".

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

I am not above admitting error, Geth, especially when it comes to misreading. I've certainly fallen victim to it before, and in all probability it'll happen again in the future. However, I will thank you not to assume malicious arguing tactics on my part, especially not when my point is "you're invoking concepts you probably don't intend to".

Fair enough, I've been a bit on edge lately and it was not my intention to take it out on you. I'm sorry that I obviously ended up doing so anyway.

 

[Asita]

I am not above admitting error, Geth, especially when it comes to misreading. I've certainly fallen victim to it before, and in all probability it'll happen again in the future. However, I will thank you not to assume malicious arguing tactics on my part, especially not when my point is "you're invoking concepts you probably don't intend to".

Fair enough, I've been a bit on edge lately and it was not my intention to take it out on you. I'm sorry that I obviously ended up doing so anyway.

S'alright. It happens to all of us. If I'm being perfectly honest, I probably got a bit testy myself in the course of this thread, and I apologize for that as well.

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

First off, I'm really upset that the title of this Thread wasn't Ma-Rey Sue.

Secondly, I didn't see the Last Jedi, but I did see the Force Awakens. And I thought it was a decent film. The idea of Finn being a Jedi is more appealing to me, because I think he's funnier and it would have been great to see him trying to reconcile his character into the old Jedi ways.

But I did see this Mary Sue comment come up a lot. And I never understood why.

The Prequels already stated that the Jedis' ability to tap into the Force was dwindling. Part of the reason why some people moved Anakin in faster wasn't just his strength of the Force, but the prophecy that he would bring balance to it. No one knew what that meant, but I believe they thought he would be able to restore it so others could use it like they once did.

And he balanced the hell out of it. Helped kill the Jedi order. To which a handful of Jedi remained. The two recorded top tiers (now that the extended universe was poofed out of existence) being Obi Wan and Yoda.

And speaking about the extended universe not existing, all the Force witches and Force Sensitives are now non-canon. As far as I know (like I said, I didn't see Last Jedi), we just have the Sith and the Jedi.

Obi and Yoda are gone. It's just Luke and Leia, but Leia never trains. Meaning that for a time, only Luke was tapping into the Force. Meaning he was Uber at that time. It is the only plausible reason (other than plot armor) that Luke soaked a Force Lightning blast as long as he did, as one sent Mace Windu (one of the strongest Jedis to ever live) out of a Tower without any hope of resisting.

Maybe the Linege is explained in the Last Jedi, but as far as we know, there are Two Light Side users, and two Dark Side users. And supposedly Luke wasn't using it that much.

So Rey at the time was the conduit of a lot of unused Light Side Force. Yeah, it makes sense that she's powerful. But she's raw power. Which a lot of the movie was showing. So what's the problem?

 

[Cicada 5]

She's flawless, an unbeatable fighter, always right, fixes everything, speaks all languages, master of the force without any training, beats dark jedi and a jedi master, she's a dictionary definition Mary Sue.

You ignoring what I wrote and just yelling. ?Mary Sue? doesn?t make it true.

Prequels did suck. Jar Jar was terrible, midichlorians was a terrible idea, Episode 1 was terrible. And the sad part is they seem like masterpieces compared with 7 and 8. Episode 1 being bad doesn't preclude 7 and 8 from being worse. What is worse is the way they figuratively tore up all previous lore and canon in order to reinvent it for today's kids, alienating everyone else in the process.

Whatever issues the new movies have, there is no universe in which they are worse than the prequels. The new movies may have turned off a few old fans but the prequels made Star Wars a pop cultural joke.

This YouTube video draws an interesting analogy with the Catholic church and Star Wars fandom (go with it). I'm not suggesting to take it as gospel (boom tische), just to hear the concept of how the shift from Lucas to Disney and the direction of the new movies have affected the fandom.

So it?s Disney?s fault a bunch entitled twats decided to harass an actress, commit copyright infringement and just generally make public asses of themselves and embarrass the Star Wars fandom?

As for male characters, consider this review by Hulk Smash of Man of Steel, wherein the reviewer spends thousands of words shredding the film and Superman. And deservedly so and he's not the only one. It was critically panned almost universally, hated by audiences and the DCCU has received little more than scorn for how badly it was handled. Except interestingly for the Wonder Woman movie that rose above the lows of the other awful films to stand tall as only mediocre with some good bits in. A bad film is a bad film, a bad character is a bad character and it has nothing to do with Rey's sex. I'm also quite sure Anakin in the prequels wasn't well liked by most people either.

Putting aside that you?ve greatly exaggerated the backlash to MoS.
1) TFA and TLJ both got great reviews from audiences and critics. It?s a certain segment of the SW fandom that is making hell for the cast and crew.
2) Nobody decided to harass Anakin?s actor for his role. They weren?t crying about how Lucas? SJW politics was ruining SW.

It's simple. It has nothing to do with sexism. They levelled the same argument for the failures of Ghostbusters 2016 and Oceans 8. (I'll let you in on a secret here. Almost all women would rather watch George Clooney and Brad Pitt than an "all women remake".) And the same again with Star Wars. All one has to do is call anyone critical a racist sexist bigot homophobe and BAM, one can feel morally superior and invalidate all their criticisms! How easy is that!?

And I?m sure the harassment Leslie Jones suffered or the fact that both these films had people faced backlash for being female led reboots before a trailer was even dropped doesn?t play any role in the accusations of sexism at all.

What isn't easy is accepting that the characters and movies are bad and people didn't like them. Rey is a terrible character, Rian Johnson is a terrible director who made an awful Star Wars film and has now been fired. Rose was easily the worst part of the film and removing her character and storyline entirely would have made the film better (still not good tho). Their sex and race have nothing to do with it. But perhaps if they stopped putting "diversity" and "strong-female characters" and inclusion and social justice things first, and actually wrote a decent film with relatable characters, it would be a different story...pun intended.

we have reports of the actresses being harassed and pointing out that it was fueled by sexist hatred of their characters.
http://time.com/4438463/daisy-ridley-quits-instagram/
https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/8/21/17763610/star-wars-kelly-marie-tran-new-york-times-instagram-harassment
I really do not understand how you can be so blind to this. This is not mere dislike of a character. The accusations of sexism aren?t coming from nowhere. You hating the characters doesn?t make them bad nor does it make the very real sexism they and the actresses have faced any less real.
And Johnson wasn?t fired. They just realized that releasing one SW move per year wasn?t a good idea.

The conclusion is to understand that Rey is a bad character, badly written, badly realised, boring, unrelatable and one-dimensional. I'm fairly sure I didn't even list her sex in that.

No you just called her a Mary Sue and ignored her flaws and weaknesses while giving Luke and Anakin a pass for all the ridiculous crap they pull.

Those are also valid factors, absolutely, but the "diversity" agenda didn't help and alienated swathes of the fandom.

If by swathes, you mean a very loud minority on the internet.

And "unbearable" is not the right word...consider this. Video game movie tie ins (eg. Star Wars: BF2) are released alongside the movie, why? So they hope to get more sales while the film is fresh in the minds of the potential buyers. They see the film, look at new games and see the related game on the shelf. Now MCU viewers can't do that. They can watch Cap, Thor and Iron Man, but they can't read their comic books because those characters aren't there. It's idiotic that during the MCU's peak popularity, it's flagship heroes can't be found on store shelves. They fired Axel Alonso for running the business into the ground.

The vast majority of the people who watch the MCU don?t read nor care what happens in the comics. This is also the second time you?ve misused the word ?fired?.

She's dictionary definition SFC and Mary Sue.

Real strong argument there.

Clearly that's not the case because original films are still beloved after 40 years and the new ones are widely disliked. More people, certainly everyone I know, men and women, prefer the original films and characters.

Yes because your limited circle of friends is clearly reflective of the wider movie viewing audience.

Just because Rey isn?t like Luke doesn?t mean she isn?t relatableNo one suggested that was the case; it has nothing to do with being "like Luke". Taken in a vacuum, she's still awful. She is unrelatable because she's flawless, one-dimensional and the rest I've already gone over above. She's unrelatable in the same way Superman was in Man of Steel. She similarly has no arc at all; she's perfect at the start and she's perfect throughout. She learns nothing, has no character development, doesn't change at all. She's a master at everything from the beginning.

Anyway, I'm beating a dead horse, I've said it all multiple times. The fact Rey's a Mary Sue isn't really a point of debate, it's very apparent. It's also very easy to put people's issues down to sexism instead the fact she and the movies she appeared in were just terribly written and terribly made. Star Wars has been a popular, multi billion franchise for years and Disney haven't done a good job continuing it.

Yeah they did such a terrible job that TLJ was the highest grossing movie of 2017.
At this point, Mary Sue has become so overused it?s lost all meaning.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

She's flawless, an unbeatable fighter, always right, fixes everything, speaks all languages, master of the force without any training, beats dark jedi and a jedi master, she's a dictionary definition Mary Sue.

What? Did you and I see the same The Last Jedi? In which she's shown to be a deeply insecure person who desperately wants her parents to be some people special so that she isn't just some orphan that got shafted. In which she is easily manipulated by Snoke into thinking she can 'save' Kylo Ren, which ends up nearly killing her and let's Kylo Ren take control over the First Order. In which she utterly fails to convince Luke to train her and it is only the intervention of R2D2 that makes Luke change his mind. In which Luke continuously chastise her for being reckless and unprepared.

The definition of a Mary Sue is a character around which the entire fiction contorts to make it fit. Rey doesn't stand out more then Anakin or Luke does in that regard, as the idea of the Force essentially makes the protagonist The Chosen One since they are given plot convenient super powers. If we accept the more common "overpowered" version of Mary Sue, she still isn't worse then Luke or Anakin, especially since her entire arc in TLJ is her failing forward without realizing what she's getting herself into (which mimics the later half of Luke's arc in ESB when he goes to Bespin).

 

[Agema]

What is worse is the way they figuratively tore up all previous lore and canon in order to reinvent it for today's kids, alienating everyone else in the process.
...
But perhaps if they stopped putting "diversity" and "strong-female characters" and inclusion and social justice things first, and actually wrote a decent film with relatable characters, it would be a different story...pun intended.

Criticisms come in multiple flavours. There's no "one group" of people unreasonably hostile to the new movies.

A certain percentage of fans are upset because the new Star Wars is not the old Star Wars, and nothing much else. They just want the 30+-year old movies they loved remade again and again. The first three movies are essentially the paragon of what a Star Wars movie should be, and everything after that should be completely consistent and effectively identical in feel, style, and so on. Thus whilst newer films have their own inherent flaws or problems, to a certain class of fans newer films are subjected to far harsher scruntiny and doomed to be compared to idealised films that - realistically - they can never live up to.

The second major class of overdone criticism I've seen of Star Wars is undeniably the "straight white man brigade" of people who hate diversity. They're obviously not so explicit as to say "Fuck this film if the core hero isn't a straight, white man", but sitting through one of their godawful You Tube or reddit thread rants reveals a weird and undeniable fixation on non-white, non-male characters for criticism and abuse. In a way these guys deserve to be annoyed. If they didn't experience the world actively seeking to find some diversity to be offended and annoyed by, they wouldn't ruin their own potential fun. That they can then pile onto YouTube and Twitter and add some generic complaints about plot or character doesn't disguise the fact they've needlessly triggered themselves into disappointment and rage.

These sorts of people (of both groups here and others) mostly can't separate a film's standalone quality from hype / expectation, or ideological complaints. This prejudice they bring to the movie themselves drives them to resent it; because they hate it, they have to rationalise their annoyance. So they become hypercritical and sweep through the movie assuming the negative at every step on character, plot, etc. And for the rest of us, once we know this is where someone is coming from, switch off that waste of space analysis and look for someone who is not burdened with so much pointless baggage.

This is not saying that the new films are necessarily great films. They're better than the Anakin-centred prequels, because god knows Jar-Jar Binks, mitchondria midichlorians and Anakin's catastrophically protrayed fall to the dark side has to be the current main low. But the originals had an aura of novelty and are cemented in legend, the nostalgia for those of us who will have been wowed by them at an impressionable early age. If we were to remove that, are they really much better films?

I think they're not.

 

[Palindromemordnilap_v1legacy]

She's flawless, an unbeatable fighter, always right, fixes everything, speaks all languages, master of the force without any training, beats dark jedi and a jedi master, she's a dictionary definition Mary Sue.

Going to have to take objection to these, as I find them objectively wrong rather than just matters of opinion.

Flawless: Oh she's got several flaws. She's far too eager to believe that reality should go how she believes stories should go, leading her to (for example) trust Kylo Ren, who just turns her right over to Snoke then uses her to his advantage, or believe that Luke will instantly accept her when obviously he does not. She's naive with a head full of fairy tales (hence why finding out her parents were just no name junk scavengers hurt her so much, she was desperately hoping she'd turn out to be a princess like she was Cinderella or something) and things go very wrong when she tries playing them out. She's also got very obvious abandonment issues, which is why she clings to first Han and then Luke because they're replacement family figures for her. Kylo actually points that one out in-universe, so you know its obvious.

Unbeatable fighter: You mean apart from that time when Snoke pretty effortlessly batted her down every time she tried something? And those red guard guys got the better of her a few times, only not killing her because Kylo intervened. A few of her fights have the odds stacked in her favour, largely for plot reasons so she can actually stand a chance, and ones where they aren't tend to give her trouble.

Always right: Nope, she makes the wrong call several times. I'm fairly sure I could through other topics like this and find you yourself criticising her for making dumb decisions (see the aforementioned belief she can turn Kylo because she thinks thats how the story should go).

Fixes everything: I'm assuming you're talking about mechanical stuff here, rather than just any situation ever (many of which she makes worse), but even then, no she doesn't. And even then she "fixes" precisely one thing; the Falcon. And even then it's a patch job to get it to fly rather than a complete overhaul. But thats a ship she's obviously familiar with (she's known it long enough to know how long its been since it last flew) and its not like her skill with tech comes out of a nowhere: she knows how Star Destroyers work well enough to know which bits of it would be valuable, and can apparently take care of that speeder of hers. So she knows what the parts do and knows how they fit together on the Falcon so what is your problem with her tinkering around with the Falcon?

Speaks all languages: ...does she? I only remember her speaking two languages: Basic (or Common or whatever the not-English of Star Wars is called) and the droid language BB-8 speaks. Neither of which is pretty uncommon or spectacular. What other languages has she demonstrated knowledge of? Is she capable of understanding Chewbacca, I honestly don't remember them actually talking to each other much.

Master of the force without any training: No, she's really not. She's in tune with the Force, yes, but she has very little actual control over it. It's why she's instantly drawn to the dark side hole when she's training with Luke, she really can't help herself. Saying she's a master of the force is like looking at someone floundering in the ocean trying not to drown and saying they're a keen swimmer. She demonstrates only the most basic of skills and uses them fairly crudely.

Beats a Dark Jedi and a Jedi Master: Mostly true but as I pointed out earlier, she does so with the odds heavily stacked in her favour. She sort of beats Kylo Ren...but only after he's been blasted with the hand held artillery piece Chewbacca lugs around and has already fought with Finn. He's tired, badly injured, more than a little shaken and hasn't actually completed his own training yet (something Snoke mentions later) so is holding her own against him really that unbelievable? It'd be like putting you in a fight against a toddler with a broken arm, of course you're going to find it pretty easy. Similar with fighting Luke, he's been atrophying on that island for...what, decades? How long has it been since he picked up, or even held a lightsaber before Rey came to his island? How much combat training do you think he gets stabbing the occasional fish? Plus he's deliberately cut himself off from the Force, aka the basic source of all Jedi powers. I couldn't outrun a car normally, but I could definitely outrun a car that had no petrol in it.

 

[Hawki]

Not going to get too in-depth, but a few points:

-There's a difference between Anakin and Rey in that while Anakin has a skillset in Ep. 1, he actually has very little agency in the film itself. He leaves Tatooine because Qui-Gon buys his freedom. He participates in the race because of Qui-Gon. He spends the film tagging along. He gets in a fighter, and most of the time is surviving through luck - he never takes out a single fighter for instance. So while Anakin has a lot of raw power, his application of it isn't that spectacular in the first film. In contrast, Rey gets far more agency than Anakin. She doesn't survive because of someone's patronage, she survives because of skills and an absurd amount of skill with the Force.

In a sense, I'd argue that makes Rey a better character (least in the context of Phantom vs. TFA), but on the other hand, her 'Sueness' is more upfront than Anakin's 'Stuness.'

-But on the subject of Stus, Han from Solo is very much a Gary Stu. We have a street rat who's somehow an ace fighter pilot, who pilots the Millennium Falcon for the first time and does a better job than should be possible, can speak Wookie, and generally stays on top of things. Still, we don't hold that against him. Partly because female characters are subject to more scrutiny, partly because Han's a pre-established character, whereas TFA was Rey's first introduction.

-Speaking personally, I did find Rey a Sue in TFA, but it's toned down in TLJ in a way that's natural to the plot. And I say this as someone who does like Rey as a character - a character can be a Sue/Stu and still be engaging, least to some extent.

Rey's a Sue and I like her. Solo's a Stu and I like him. Kvothe (from 'Kingkiller') is a Stu that's absolutely insufferable, because unlike Solo or Rey, he's got no redeeming qualities to offset his Stuness.

 

[Agema]

Taking things apart is literally the basis for learning how to put things back together.

Not necessarily, particularly when you consider most things need to be assembled from component parts before they can be dissassembled.

But sure as hell you'd get some insight into how to put things together by taking them apart; not least because you'd better know a little about how things work when you disassemble them if you want to avoid accidents.

"Hey, you did remember to shut down the reactor before you removed the coolant device, didn't you?... WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN, 'WHAT REACTOR'?"

 

[Trunkage]

I really need this sentence:

So my question is... why is it not okay for female characters to not work? For many, Rey doesn't work and then she's seen as some affront to culture.

Err what? She's not an affront, she's just a badly written, badly thought out Mary Sue character.

To meet this sentence:

So, to me, Rey from the new Star Wars isnt a great character. Even if you like her, you'd probably recognize that she gets called a Mary-Sue.

She's called that because that's what the character is. She's completely perfect in every way. Despite establishing that she grew up penniless on a desert, she's an unbeatable fighter, speaks every language, an expert pilot, kind, generous and loyal, she beats a trained Dark Jedi the first time she picks up a lightsaber, is a master of the force with no training, beats a jedi master and so on. She exists because that's what Disney execs and Kathleen Kennedy want to portray in their world. It's social justice dialled up to 11.

You know what you could also claim as SJW dialled up to 11? Black Panther. Wonder Woman. Blade. Star Trek. Hell, the original Star Wars was incredibly progressive for its day. Because, the 'anti-SJWs' only think diversity is bad during bad movies but dont comment how good it is during good ones.

Pulling from a another comment you made: Yeah, Ghostbuster 2016 was bad. But I dont think the original was that great in the first place (nor do I think GB2 is really bad compared to number 1.) But because it has females in it, that HAS to be the reason why it fails. Not poor writing, directing, casting, comedic timing. None of that. It's because they went diversity. You could claim Star Trek Discovery is bad, but once you claim its bad because Michael is a woman or diversity, you're being silly. You're getting so affronted by gay people or women that bad writing etc doesn't come into it. And while I like the series, the first episode was truly terrible on many fronts.

Yep, those 'anti-SJWs' are affronted. Females lead have to be perfected (oxymoronically by not being perfect and thus labelled as Mary Sue) or these guys are just triggered all over the place. Remember when Miles Morales was seen as evil diversity hire by these guys? Now he's getting his own movie.

And this doesn't stop Rey from being a potential Mary Sue. It's a great way to analysis and comment on a character. Also, notice those quotation marks around 'anti-SJW'? They're there because these guys are just SJWs fighting for causes like all Male leads, that are definitely straight. Claiming they aren't fighting for Social Justice (as they see it in their eyes) is silly.

PS Didn't see Oceans 8, but I did see it did pretty much the same as Oceans 11. So I don't think that fits in the same category as Ghostbusters

 

[Palindromemordnilap_v1legacy]

So, to me, Rey from the new Star Wars isnt a great character. Even if you like her, you'd probably recognize that she gets called a Mary-Sue.

She's called that because that's what the character is. She's completely perfect in every way. Despite establishing that she grew up penniless on a desert, she's an unbeatable fighter, speaks every language, an expert pilot, kind, generous and loyal, she beats a trained Dark Jedi the first time she picks up a lightsaber, is a master of the force with no training, beats a jedi master and so on. She exists because that's what Disney execs and Kathleen Kennedy want to portray in their world. It's social justice dialled up to 11.

You know what you could also claim as SJW dialled up to 11? Black Panther. Wonder Woman. Blade. Star Trek. Hell, the original Star Wars was incredibly progressive for its day. Because, the 'anti-SJWs' only think diversity is bad during bad movies but dont comment how good it is during good ones.

Pulling from a another comment you made: Yeah, Ghostbuster 2016 was bad. But I dont think the original was that great in the first place (nor do I think GB2 is really bad compared to number 1.) But because it has females in it, that HAS to be the reason why it fails. Not poor writing, directing, casting, comedic timing. None of that. It's because they went diversity. You could claim Star Trek Discovery is bad, but once you claim its bad because Michael is a woman or diversity, you're being silly. You're getting so affronted by gay people or women that bad writing etc doesn't come into it. And while I like the series, the first episode was truly terrible on many fronts.

Yep, those 'anti-SJWs' are affronted. Females lead have to be perfected (oxymoronically by not being perfect and thus labelled as Mary Sue) or these guys are just triggered all over the place. Remember when Miles Morales was seen as evil diversity hire by these guys? Now he's getting his own movie.

And this doesn't stop Rey from being a potential Mary Sue. It's a great way to analysis and comment on a character. Also, notice those quotation marks around 'anti-SJW'? They're there because these guys are just SJWs fighting for causes like all Male leads, that are definitely straight. Claiming they aren't fighting for Social Justice (as they see it in their eyes) is silly.

PS Didn't see Oceans 8, but I did see it did pretty much the same as Oceans 11. So I don't think that fits in the same category as Ghostbusters

I'm just concerned that "kind, generous and loyal" are traits he thinks belong to a Mary Sue, as opposed to just a character. Apparently that makes pretty much any good guy automatically a Mary Sue

 

[Cicada 5]

So, to me, Rey from the new Star Wars isnt a great character. Even if you like her, you'd probably recognize that she gets called a Mary-Sue.

She's called that because that's what the character is. She's completely perfect in every way. Despite establishing that she grew up penniless on a desert, she's an unbeatable fighter, speaks every language, an expert pilot, kind, generous and loyal, she beats a trained Dark Jedi the first time she picks up a lightsaber, is a master of the force with no training, beats a jedi master and so on. She exists because that's what Disney execs and Kathleen Kennedy want to portray in their world. It's social justice dialled up to 11.

You know what you could also claim as SJW dialled up to 11? Black Panther. Wonder Woman. Blade. Star Trek. Hell, the original Star Wars was incredibly progressive for its day. Because, the 'anti-SJWs' only think diversity is bad during bad movies but dont comment how good it is during good ones.

Pulling from a another comment you made: Yeah, Ghostbuster 2016 was bad. But I dont think the original was that great in the first place (nor do I think GB2 is really bad compared to number 1.) But because it has females in it, that HAS to be the reason why it fails. Not poor writing, directing, casting, comedic timing. None of that. It's because they went diversity. You could claim Star Trek Discovery is bad, but once you claim its bad because Michael is a woman or diversity, you're being silly. You're getting so affronted by gay people or women that bad writing etc doesn't come into it. And while I like the series, the first episode was truly terrible on many fronts.

Yep, those 'anti-SJWs' are affronted. Females lead have to be perfected (oxymoronically by not being perfect and thus labelled as Mary Sue) or these guys are just triggered all over the place. Remember when Miles Morales was seen as evil diversity hire by these guys? Now he's getting his own movie.

And this doesn't stop Rey from being a potential Mary Sue. It's a great way to analysis and comment on a character. Also, notice those quotation marks around 'anti-SJW'? They're there because these guys are just SJWs fighting for causes like all Male leads, that are definitely straight. Claiming they aren't fighting for Social Justice (as they see it in their eyes) is silly.

PS Didn't see Oceans 8, but I did see it did pretty much the same as Oceans 11. So I don't think that fits in the same category as Ghostbusters

I'm just concerned that "kind, generous and loyal" are traits he thinks belong to a Mary Sue, as opposed to just a character. Apparently that makes pretty much any good guy automatically a Mary Sue

Hell those traits apply to Luke and not having those traits was one of many reasons people hated movie Anakin.