“The name’s Finn and I’m in charge now”
Tag: finn
Rian Johnson has some real problem with male maturity. He took two oldest members of the new cast and gave them storylines about boys.
Keylo is fucking 30 yo, he’s been in his edgelord-space-nazi-killer-of-innocents phase for 10 years now. And yet he’s framed as a “boy” by the narrative, starting with Snoke literarly calling him that, to showing him constantly vulnerable and emo and and cowering or having emotional outbreaks (*cough* tantrums *cough*) He was childish in TFA but in TLJ it’s actually given a sympathetic angle, he’s not “childish” he’s young, delicate and conflicted, he’s “coming to know himself” and all that bullshit. He’s also given a “tragic” backstory and is constantly shown to be somehow abused by older people (snoke, luke). Almost up untill the very end, he’s shown to be coerced/forced/influenced by the circumstances and people older and stronger than himself.
He’s thirty (30) and he’s given a tragic “coming of age/discovering oneself” story fucking 10 years too late.Poe is 32, a commander in the Resistance, a rank you don’t just get overnight and without loads of field experience, and yet, somehow, he’s regressed in TLJ to a stage of a young, hot-headed, irresponsible buck, a kid with too much audacity that needs to “learn a lesson”, needs to mature by being put down. During the entirety of the first half of his arc, he’s not once treated seriously by neither the narrative nor the other characters. He’s treated like a disobedient child who needs to be taught a lesson. Leia, his superior officer, slaps him to punish him. Then when she gets to him during his mutiny, she just wordlessly stunts him into unconsciousness as if he’s not worth any negotiations, any reasoning, cause he’s just a stupid child. The same thing happens later when Holdo and Leia leer over unconscious Poe and say they like him cause he’s a troublemaker – they are two military leaders saying that about a subordinate officer who’s just lead a mutiny, like, they are not once treating the situation with the gravity it deserves. The whole thing is framed into a loving and wise parent forgiving a petulant child for acting out, but it’s a grown ass man, a Captain leading a rebelion against the military chain of command!
And, apart from all of the above, any “coming of age and learning important life lessons to be less childish in the future” storyline given to a 32 y-o grown ass man is completely illogical
Of course it’s symptomatic that the white vile villain is given the sympathetic, “sweet child o’mine” story and the latino hero is reduced to an agressive, irresponsible teenager.
And it’s also symptomatic that the story about being young and finding yourself somehow bypasses the characters who actually need that story.
Rey? She’s like, a literal teenager who did not really have a childhood, she’s nineteen and thrust into a completely new world. She needs to learn about it, she needs to find herself in it. Instead she’s given the tired “woman tries to safe a douchebag” trope.
Finn?? He’s just a little older than Rey, he’s just pretty recently finished his childhood years without having an actual childhood, he’s just come of age and symulteniously has just freed himself from under soul-crushing abuse. He needs a “finding oneself” story on so many levels. His “coming of age” story has so much potential angles to it, so many themes to explore! Yet the only thing he gets to know abt himself is that he’s a Rebel scum (and isn’t it Resistance scum?) but the actual road to him starting to identify with the movement is just not shown at all. You don’t actually see what he’s transitioning from, because the “personal to political” shift in his involvement is just barely sketched out.
tl;dr: rian gives teenager storylines to grown-ass men, and not actual teenagers or young people and that’s fucked up and also racist and pretty sexist, the end
I’m not going to say this interpretation is *wrong*, but…well, there are many points in life that offer us opportunities for change. Adolescence, yes – but again at 25, and 30, and 40..Or after a breakup, a job loss, an illness.
We know that VII was Finn’s first “real” battle. We know that in smaller organizations, promotions can happen quickly when attrition is high. So Finn could be 27 and be a garbage man – and now he has blood on his hands. Poe has been raised in the Rebellion, but his desire to flatten it can outstrip his common sense. And Kylo Ren is coping with his mythical uncle losing faith in him – then losing faith in himself. These are all points for emotional growth – but that growth is messy and nonlinear.
Could you clarify what you mean by Finn being 27 and a garbage man? Because he’s neither, and the FO is not a ‘smaller’ organization. Do you mean he would have been a garbage man at 27 if it weren’t for high attrition among Stormtrooper ranks? He was actually the top of his class, though, considered prime officer material, and he wasn’t promoted out of desperation for warm bodies or anything like that.
Poe was similarly a commander in the Republic army–again, not a small organization and an army in peacetime so not one with high attrition–before he resigned and joined the Resistance, where he was given the same rank before hostilities commenced. Again, not a case of jumped-up wartime promotion.
If there’s a case of rapid promotion by attrition it’s Kylo Ren, and that’s because he attrited the competition himself.
Sorry – “sanitation engineer”. The beginning of TFA, that’s his *first* time in battle. He’s been A JANITOR.
I’m sorry this movie is more complicated than you wanted. But it’s the most HUMAN – humans are messy, and hot-headed, and selfish (yes, Finn is being selfish when he tries to run away again – he’s doing it for Rey’s sake, but the Rebellion *needs* Rey, and he doesn’t see that). We don’t just learn lessons in adolescence, but we (hopefully) *keep learning* things about ourselves, keep growing and changing.
I’m not the same person at 46 that I was at 25 – and thank goodness for that.
He. Was. Not. A. Janitor. He was a CADET who had duties around base just like the other cadets. Did you read ANYTHING I told you or do you just live in racist la-la-land?
And it’s cute how you think anyone who doesn’t worship at the altar of your precious movie just doesn’t have your intelligence. Nice job not even being able to stay on topic, this post said nothing about Finn being selfish and was actually in part about Finn NOT getting a proper finding-himself arc, and how Kylo and Poe are treated as adolescents while Rey and Finn aren’t.
Maybe try more coffee and less painkillers next time? Pretentious fucking asshole.
This asshole piece of shit, after being rude for no fucking reason to someone who was politely asking a question and presenting canon facts: Is mad at being called names.
This lying piece of shit, after being shown a literal screencap showing why they’re wrong: Calls their racist misinterpretation of the movie “facts.”
This weak-ass piece of shit, after veering off topic and having every word refuted: Oh ho ho, you can’t refute my argument! Blocked!
What a piece of shit.
Rian Johnson has some real problem with male maturity. He took two oldest members of the new cast and gave them storylines about boys.
Keylo is fucking 30 yo, he’s been in his edgelord-space-nazi-killer-of-innocents phase for 10 years now. And yet he’s framed as a “boy” by the narrative, starting with Snoke literarly calling him that, to showing him constantly vulnerable and emo and and cowering or having emotional outbreaks (*cough* tantrums *cough*) He was childish in TFA but in TLJ it’s actually given a sympathetic angle, he’s not “childish” he’s young, delicate and conflicted, he’s “coming to know himself” and all that bullshit. He’s also given a “tragic” backstory and is constantly shown to be somehow abused by older people (snoke, luke). Almost up untill the very end, he’s shown to be coerced/forced/influenced by the circumstances and people older and stronger than himself.
He’s thirty (30) and he’s given a tragic “coming of age/discovering oneself” story fucking 10 years too late.Poe is 32, a commander in the Resistance, a rank you don’t just get overnight and without loads of field experience, and yet, somehow, he’s regressed in TLJ to a stage of a young, hot-headed, irresponsible buck, a kid with too much audacity that needs to “learn a lesson”, needs to mature by being put down. During the entirety of the first half of his arc, he’s not once treated seriously by neither the narrative nor the other characters. He’s treated like a disobedient child who needs to be taught a lesson. Leia, his superior officer, slaps him to punish him. Then when she gets to him during his mutiny, she just wordlessly stunts him into unconsciousness as if he’s not worth any negotiations, any reasoning, cause he’s just a stupid child. The same thing happens later when Holdo and Leia leer over unconscious Poe and say they like him cause he’s a troublemaker – they are two military leaders saying that about a subordinate officer who’s just lead a mutiny, like, they are not once treating the situation with the gravity it deserves. The whole thing is framed into a loving and wise parent forgiving a petulant child for acting out, but it’s a grown ass man, a Captain leading a rebelion against the military chain of command!
And, apart from all of the above, any “coming of age and learning important life lessons to be less childish in the future” storyline given to a 32 y-o grown ass man is completely illogical
Of course it’s symptomatic that the white vile villain is given the sympathetic, “sweet child o’mine” story and the latino hero is reduced to an agressive, irresponsible teenager.
And it’s also symptomatic that the story about being young and finding yourself somehow bypasses the characters who actually need that story.
Rey? She’s like, a literal teenager who did not really have a childhood, she’s nineteen and thrust into a completely new world. She needs to learn about it, she needs to find herself in it. Instead she’s given the tired “woman tries to safe a douchebag” trope.
Finn?? He’s just a little older than Rey, he’s just pretty recently finished his childhood years without having an actual childhood, he’s just come of age and symulteniously has just freed himself from under soul-crushing abuse. He needs a “finding oneself” story on so many levels. His “coming of age” story has so much potential angles to it, so many themes to explore! Yet the only thing he gets to know abt himself is that he’s a Rebel scum (and isn’t it Resistance scum?) but the actual road to him starting to identify with the movement is just not shown at all. You don’t actually see what he’s transitioning from, because the “personal to political” shift in his involvement is just barely sketched out.
tl;dr: rian gives teenager storylines to grown-ass men, and not actual teenagers or young people and that’s fucked up and also racist and pretty sexist, the end
I’m not going to say this interpretation is *wrong*, but…well, there are many points in life that offer us opportunities for change. Adolescence, yes – but again at 25, and 30, and 40..Or after a breakup, a job loss, an illness.
We know that VII was Finn’s first “real” battle. We know that in smaller organizations, promotions can happen quickly when attrition is high. So Finn could be 27 and be a garbage man – and now he has blood on his hands. Poe has been raised in the Rebellion, but his desire to flatten it can outstrip his common sense. And Kylo Ren is coping with his mythical uncle losing faith in him – then losing faith in himself. These are all points for emotional growth – but that growth is messy and nonlinear.
Could you clarify what you mean by Finn being 27 and a garbage man? Because he’s neither, and the FO is not a ‘smaller’ organization. Do you mean he would have been a garbage man at 27 if it weren’t for high attrition among Stormtrooper ranks? He was actually the top of his class, though, considered prime officer material, and he wasn’t promoted out of desperation for warm bodies or anything like that.
Poe was similarly a commander in the Republic army–again, not a small organization and an army in peacetime so not one with high attrition–before he resigned and joined the Resistance, where he was given the same rank before hostilities commenced. Again, not a case of jumped-up wartime promotion.
If there’s a case of rapid promotion by attrition it’s Kylo Ren, and that’s because he attrited the competition himself.
Sorry – “sanitation engineer”. The beginning of TFA, that’s his *first* time in battle. He’s been A JANITOR.
I’m sorry this movie is more complicated than you wanted. But it’s the most HUMAN – humans are messy, and hot-headed, and selfish (yes, Finn is being selfish when he tries to run away again – he’s doing it for Rey’s sake, but the Rebellion *needs* Rey, and he doesn’t see that). We don’t just learn lessons in adolescence, but we (hopefully) *keep learning* things about ourselves, keep growing and changing.
I’m not the same person at 46 that I was at 25 – and thank goodness for that.
He. Was. Not. A. Janitor. He was a CADET who had duties around base just like the other cadets. Did you read ANYTHING I told you or do you just live in racist la-la-land?
And it’s cute how you think anyone who doesn’t worship at the altar of your precious movie just doesn’t have your intelligence. Nice job not even being able to stay on topic, this post said nothing about Finn being selfish and was actually in part about Finn NOT getting a proper finding-himself arc, and how Kylo and Poe are treated as adolescents while Rey and Finn aren’t.
Maybe try more coffee and less painkillers next time? Pretentious fucking asshole.
Remember the time Leia electrocuted Han for leaving the Rebellion in A New Hope? God, that scene was so funny. Remember also how she punched Han across the room in Return of the Jedi as he was recovering from being frozen? A laugh riot. What a wacky, endearing character!
These things didn’t happen, of course, because it would have been completely off in tone and made Leia look like a weirdo. It would have cheapened Han’s character and the story as a whole.
So why is it okay for Finn, and why are viewers falling over themselves trying to find excuses for Rose? “She lost her sister-” Leia lost her planet. Next excuse.
I’m not saying you’re a Bad Racist Person if you liked The Last Jedi. I hope you enjoyed it and it rekindled your love of the franchise. That’s what we’re all here for, the fun and joy of loving these adventures.
I’m saying that Hollywood and audiences alike have a bias when it comes to whose pain is given respect and whose pain can be played for a laugh. And that bias is not only hurtful to fans caught on the wrong side of the empathy gap, it also hurts the quality and integrity of the works themselves.
It’s possible to love a work and also see how others might not feel the same way about it. Being a fan doesn’t mean you have to be a dismissive jerk or wilfully deny a work’s flaws. It’s fun to be a fan, but it’s imperative to be a person.
@i-want-to-bethlieve replied:
The movie is honestly a joke. It thinks it is a progressive take on Star Wars, but it is really a poorly written mess. Every character is dumber than the next, all so the movie can have about 2 hours of B story-lines to distract us from how bad the main story-line is.
Having started to watch the thing and already waist-deep in frustration, I can see this point.
@captain-sorrow replied:
This makes good points but ultimately the fact that the original trilogy movies mentioned came out 40 years ago plays a big role in how things are going to be presented and depicted.
So if the OT were made in the late 2010′s do you think Leia would have electrocuted Han into staying? Or lashed out violently at an injured Han? Is that more in keeping with the times, would that make things more feminist or something? Would it have improved the emotional resonance for a modern audience?
Because from where I’m standing the OT has aged pretty well. It’s not perfect, but I can’t envision any improvements from Leia hurting Han for comic effect.
THIS MOTHERFUCKER
FUCK RIAN JOHNSON
“There would have been a big ‘I saw your sister die’ scene, which I didn’t want to write.”
He flat out admits that he’s a fucking loser who can’t write and doesn’t give a shit about Finn’s arc I hate him so much
Rian Johnson has some real problem with male maturity. He took two oldest members of the new cast and gave them storylines about boys.
Keylo is fucking 30 yo, he’s been in his edgelord-space-nazi-killer-of-innocents phase for 10 years now. And yet he’s framed as a “boy” by the narrative, starting with Snoke literarly calling him that, to showing him constantly vulnerable and emo and and cowering or having emotional outbreaks (*cough* tantrums *cough*) He was childish in TFA but in TLJ it’s actually given a sympathetic angle, he’s not “childish” he’s young, delicate and conflicted, he’s “coming to know himself” and all that bullshit. He’s also given a “tragic” backstory and is constantly shown to be somehow abused by older people (snoke, luke). Almost up untill the very end, he’s shown to be coerced/forced/influenced by the circumstances and people older and stronger than himself.
He’s thirty (30) and he’s given a tragic “coming of age/discovering oneself” story fucking 10 years too late.Poe is 32, a commander in the Resistance, a rank you don’t just get overnight and without loads of field experience, and yet, somehow, he’s regressed in TLJ to a stage of a young, hot-headed, irresponsible buck, a kid with too much audacity that needs to “learn a lesson”, needs to mature by being put down. During the entirety of the first half of his arc, he’s not once treated seriously by neither the narrative nor the other characters. He’s treated like a disobedient child who needs to be taught a lesson. Leia, his superior officer, slaps him to punish him. Then when she gets to him during his mutiny, she just wordlessly stunts him into unconsciousness as if he’s not worth any negotiations, any reasoning, cause he’s just a stupid child. The same thing happens later when Holdo and Leia leer over unconscious Poe and say they like him cause he’s a troublemaker – they are two military leaders saying that about a subordinate officer who’s just lead a mutiny, like, they are not once treating the situation with the gravity it deserves. The whole thing is framed into a loving and wise parent forgiving a petulant child for acting out, but it’s a grown ass man, a Captain leading a rebelion against the military chain of command!
And, apart from all of the above, any “coming of age and learning important life lessons to be less childish in the future” storyline given to a 32 y-o grown ass man is completely illogical
Of course it’s symptomatic that the white vile villain is given the sympathetic, “sweet child o’mine” story and the latino hero is reduced to an agressive, irresponsible teenager.
And it’s also symptomatic that the story about being young and finding yourself somehow bypasses the characters who actually need that story.
Rey? She’s like, a literal teenager who did not really have a childhood, she’s nineteen and thrust into a completely new world. She needs to learn about it, she needs to find herself in it. Instead she’s given the tired “woman tries to safe a douchebag” trope.
Finn?? He’s just a little older than Rey, he’s just pretty recently finished his childhood years without having an actual childhood, he’s just come of age and symulteniously has just freed himself from under soul-crushing abuse. He needs a “finding oneself” story on so many levels. His “coming of age” story has so much potential angles to it, so many themes to explore! Yet the only thing he gets to know abt himself is that he’s a Rebel scum (and isn’t it Resistance scum?) but the actual road to him starting to identify with the movement is just not shown at all. You don’t actually see what he’s transitioning from, because the “personal to political” shift in his involvement is just barely sketched out.
tl;dr: rian gives teenager storylines to grown-ass men, and not actual teenagers or young people and that’s fucked up and also racist and pretty sexist, the end
I’m not going to say this interpretation is *wrong*, but…well, there are many points in life that offer us opportunities for change. Adolescence, yes – but again at 25, and 30, and 40..Or after a breakup, a job loss, an illness.
We know that VII was Finn’s first “real” battle. We know that in smaller organizations, promotions can happen quickly when attrition is high. So Finn could be 27 and be a garbage man – and now he has blood on his hands. Poe has been raised in the Rebellion, but his desire to flatten it can outstrip his common sense. And Kylo Ren is coping with his mythical uncle losing faith in him – then losing faith in himself. These are all points for emotional growth – but that growth is messy and nonlinear.
Could you clarify what you mean by Finn being 27 and a garbage man? Because he’s neither, and the FO is not a ‘smaller’ organization. Do you mean he would have been a garbage man at 27 if it weren’t for high attrition among Stormtrooper ranks? He was actually the top of his class, though, considered prime officer material, and he wasn’t promoted out of desperation for warm bodies or anything like that.
Poe was similarly a commander in the Republic army–again, not a small organization and an army in peacetime so not one with high attrition–before he resigned and joined the Resistance, where he was given the same rank before hostilities commenced. Again, not a case of jumped-up wartime promotion.
If there’s a case of rapid promotion by attrition it’s Kylo Ren, and that’s because he attrited the competition himself.
Finn: Chooses to runaway from the First Order in shame and disgust in what they brought him up to be
Finn: Spares the life of the villagers he’s supposed to be slaughtering because he’s not fucking braindead evil
Finn: Sees Rey (a complete stranger at that point) being attacked; instantaneously runs to her defence because he sees danger
Finn: Takes Rey’s hand when he hears TIE Fighters and realises he’s marked her
Finn: Assures Rey if she’s okay after caught up in the blast
Finn: Takes care of Chewie after he was shot
Finn: Literally fucking requests Rey if she wants to go with him to the outer rim because he KNOWS how fucking dangerous the First Order are, and wants her to be safe from that shit
Finn: Warmly accepts her decline and says “take care of yourself. Please.”
Finn: Cancels the fuck out of his plans when star destroyer is used and fights
Finn: Fucking screams R E Y at the top of his lungs when she’s kidnapped by Ren
Finn: Goes back to his trauma, what he wanted to run away from to get his friend back
Finn: Fights Ren and literally ends up in a coma to defend himself as well as Rey
Finn: Wakes up in a coma and his first inquiry is Rey’s whereabouts
Finn: Literally wants to runaway with the beacon to ensure that when Rey returns, she doesn’t return to danger
LucasFilm: Finn needed to go to Canto Bight so he could learn to stop being a selfish assh0le!!1!1!
I agree with what @reystars, @rose-tico and others are saying about the intended *purpose* of Finn’s storyline: after a lifetime of being enslaved and brainwashed his instinct was to flee as far away as possible and take Rey with him to safety, and it was important for him to understand that there was no safety anywhere in the galaxy as long as the FO existed, because the war affected everything and people were supporting it for their own profit, and therefore Finn needed to join the Resistance and actively fight to defeat the FO in order to create a galaxy where the satefy for him and Rey and everyone else could become a reality. I understand that.
HOWEVER
– if the only way the director could think of to achieve this was to put Finn in a sideplot which nearly every reviewer agrees had no impact on the main storyline and felt tonally disjointed from the rest of the movie;
– if Finn, the male lead, is put in a sideplot instead of the main plot, period (and it was percieved as a sideplot, just check how few TLJ reviews in non-fandom media even mention the Resistance storyine at all);
– if Finn is not allowed to learn the truth about Canto Bight on his own e.g. by observing or overhearing something, figuring it out himself and only then asking Rose for a confirmation/more information, but Rose has to explain the world to a naive Finn instead;
– if Finn, the male lead, is repeatedly used for comic relief; repeatedly physically harmed, often for comedic effect as well; and generally not treated with the necessary respect and seriousness by the narrative (e.g. his duel against Phasma lasting only a couple of minutes and its gravitas diminished by silly quibs like “chrome dome” and Finn and Phasma’s relationship and shared past not further explored; scenes that would have given Finn more character depth and background about his childhood and life as a FO stormtrooper and set up a possible stormtrooper rebellion storyline for episode IX being cut; or even just Finn’s shirtless scene in the bacta suit being presented as something comedic and ridiculous (and used for queerbaiting) with his recovery from a life-threatening injury not further commented on, while Kyle was shown recovering from his injuries over time and his shirtless scene was presented as “sexy”);
…so in short, if the male lead is treated this way then it’s small wonder most viewers do not care about his arc or even realise what his arc is supposed to be in the movie.
Intentions: good, execution: piss poor 😦
Countless fanfiction authors have proven that it is absolutely possible to write a narrative where Finn learns about the state of the wider galaxy and decides to commit himself to the Resistance’s cause wholeheartedly *without* sidelining or disrespecting him, so TLJ could have and should have done better.
(Also Disney really needs to have a serious word with the guy in charge of the SW Facebook account 😦 )
Finn: Chooses to runaway from the First Order in shame and disgust in what they brought him up to be
Finn: Spares the life of the villagers he’s supposed to be slaughtering because he’s not fucking braindead evil
Finn: Sees Rey (a complete stranger at that point) being attacked; instantaneously runs to her defence because he sees danger
Finn: Takes Rey’s hand when he hears TIE Fighters and realises he’s marked her
Finn: Assures Rey if she’s okay after caught up in the blast
Finn: Takes care of Chewie after he was shot
Finn: Literally fucking requests Rey if she wants to go with him to the outer rim because he KNOWS how fucking dangerous the First Order are, and wants her to be safe from that shit
Finn: Warmly accepts her decline and says “take care of yourself. Please.”
Finn: Cancels the fuck out of his plans when star destroyer is used and fights
Finn: Fucking screams R E Y at the top of his lungs when she’s kidnapped by Ren
Finn: Goes back to his trauma, what he wanted to run away from to get his friend back
Finn: Fights Ren and literally ends up in a coma to defeat himself as well as Rey
Finn: Wakes up in a coma and his first inquiry is Rey’s whereabouts
Finn: Literally wants to runaway with the beacon to ensure that when Rey returns, she doesn’t return to danger
LucasFilm: Finn needed to go to Canto Bight so he could learn to stop being a selfish assh0le!!1!1!
so Finn is like my favorite character and I love him and I would die for him I’m not exaggerating and everything in this post was absolutely TRUE
BUT I think maybe what people are misinterpreting from the Star Wars facebook comments and The Last Jedi is what Finn’s arc in this movie was meant to be
it’s not Finn going from SeLfIsH AsShOlE to SELFLESS HERO
Finn has always been a selfless hero, he’s proved that time and time again (like all the points in this post).
But as a result of his upbringing and the events of TFA, he’s all about self preservation. He’s had to be. He hasn’t had any other choice. He joins the rebels out of necessity, not because he cares about the cause. His self preservation, once he meets Rey, extends to her now because she’s the most important thing in the world to him. He has morals, he’s a genuinely good person, but because of how narrow his life experience has been, he’s not worried about the cause, he doesn’t get the cause, he’s worried about Rey.
When he goes back to Starkiller, he doesn’t care about the mission. He says, “I’m just here for Rey.” He’s helping them because they’re helping him find the person who’s most important to him. He helps the mission succeed but ultimately he’s there for one reason, and that’s to save Rey. Otherwise, he would want nothing to do with the Rebels OR the First Order.
It’s not that he doesn’t care (he’s seen what the First Order can do and he knows they’re evil) but he’s just very singularly minded. He’s genuinely good hearted but that focus is on his own survival and the survival of those he cares about. That’s why at the beginning of The Last Jedi, Finn is on his way out. He’s abandoning the resistance because he wants Rey to be safe. And when Rose discovers a way that they might be able to save the resistance, Finn decides to help her because a. he does care about the people and b. because he wants to find a way to keep Rey safe. It’s still a very narrow field of view for him.
That all changes when he goes with Rose to Canto Bight. His reaction upon walking inside is “This is awesome!” He’s only experienced a small slice of the universe after breaking free of his storm trooper training so he’s taking in the sparkling lights and sounds and unfamiliar surroundings. It’s not until Rose tells him the reality of the place, that it was built off of dirty war money, that his attitude begins to change. He begins to really understand what the resistance is fighting for, and he gets to see that through the eyes of Rose, someone who has just lost her sister and who is passionate about the cause. Slowly she changes the way he sees the resistance and what it stands for. Instead of his focus being on himself and Rey, he starts to widen his scope and realize what the resistance is about and what it stands for.
by the end of The Last Jedi, Finn is actively fighting on behalf of the resistance because he’s finally found that he understands why they’re in the fight. And it’s no surprise that once he commits himself to their cause, he believes it to the point that he’s willing to sacrifice himself and die for it, because that’s who Finn is. He’s someone who gives his whole heart to the things he cares about, whether it’s the desert girl he just met, the pilot he helped escape, or the ragtag band of resistance members who are fighting an evil and corrupt organization.
that’s why his detour with Rose was important, and why Rose as a character was important. With as little as he’d experienced he needed time to grow as a character and open his eyes up. Finn has always been selfless, brave, and loving. Now, he’s also fighting, but this time he’s fighting for something he believes in, and by his own choice, not because circumstance has placed him somewhere.
This entire analysis above manages to be both antiblack and anti-Asian. Congratulations! Just when I think the Star Wars fandom can’t go any lower, I’m unpleasantly surprised.
Seriously. I tried to give @reystars’s analysis a chance, but all I got from it was that Finn must have a very shallow and abrupt arc indeed if all it took for him to go from “I only care about me and Rey” to “I will literally physically die for the Resistance” is a lecture from a character whose deep reserve of wisdom (barf) exists for the benefit of another character’s growth. It’s like a perfect storm of the naïve Black character who must be instructed about the realities of the world (despite having lived them for himself) and the wise Asian character who spits Truth and Wisdom with every breath. The way Rose is described in spoilers she doesn’t even sound like a character, she sounds like a thematic dialogue generator.
I honestly don’t get why people have this trust in JJ? Like he referred to Rey as Cinderella and Kylo Ren as her dark prince in The Force Awakens commentary, he began to put down character arcs of Han and Leia and Luke, he ignored Mark Hamill’s criticism and he is known to not be able to write endings (see Lost).
That’s not at all what happened. JJ Abrams in two separate parts of the commentary said that he thought Rey was Cinderella, and then later said he thought Adam Driver looked like a prince. He didn’t say one after the other which is important because that means he wasn’t making a connection between the two. He said this at two separate points of the commentary and one was talking about a character and her storyline and the other was talking about an actor’s physical appearance in a scene. Those weren’t connected events. I know r*ylos love to claim they were but they aren’t. You guys need to stop making shit up to suit your narrative. JJ Abrams supposedly said that what Kylo did to Rey was “mind rape” but people just love to claim that was “debunked” because a writer (writers in movie writing are meaningless and have no power) didn’t know JJ Abrams said that. We do know JJ Abrams did feel that scene was a torture scene though. So he filmed a scene between r*ylo which was supposed to be torture. So fucking romantic right?
Also, it’s not that JJ Abrams is a magical solution. What JJ Abrams will do is make a compelling arc for Finn. In my opinion, Rian Johnson didn’t give a damn about Finn and Poe and it made their storylines underdeveloped. Abrams was the only one who wanted to cast John Boyega as Finn, he was the one who wanted this interesting dynamic storyline for Finn.
That’s why people want Abram’s back. I agree that I don’t think Abrams did an amazing job with Luke, Han, or Leia, but he did an incredible job with Rey and Finn. That can’t be denied. And I don’t think him being back guaranteed a better ending at this point but at the very least we know Finn won’t be sidelined like he was in this film.
Help us JJ Abrams you’re the least worst of our available options
Jedha’s Survivors
“It says here my parents were from Jedha.”
“I knew them. I still do.”
L.J.'s Obsessions 