“[Rian Johnson] tells us that after reading The Force Awakens’ script and watching Abrams’ dailies, he realised that there was a follow-up story that he wanted to tell: ‘It makes me very happy that [The Last Jedi] felt unexpected to the actors,’ Johnson says. ‘That to me is a compliment, but I don’t think it would ever be good to start a storytelling process by saying ‘let’s be unexpected, what will they never see coming?’ That’s never where you want to begin. I think, to me, unexpectedness is a byproduct of telling a story honestly. So I started with the characters and I said: ‘Where does it make sense for these characters to go in my mind?’ And that’s going to lead you in unexpected places if you let it. But hopefully, when it leads you to unexpected places, it’s the sort of thing like in life where you never could have predicted it but it seems inevitable after it happens.’“
and the Iraqi people welcomed the Americans with flowers. I wanted to set a historical event to teach Bush a lesson from the Iraqis, telling him you lied, we did not welcome you with flowers, and instead we are saying goodbye with our shoes.“
Muntaza Al Zaidi, the Iraqi reporter who became known as the guy who threw a shoe at Bush and later ended up in jail for three years because of it.
I don’t really know how to put this into words, but I think we need to consider which point of view Adam Driver is coming from when he says what he says about Kylo’s character and his arc.
If a villain is good, well-written, and fleshed out, there will be more going on in his mind than just, “Mwahahahaha, I want to kill people! Just…you know! Just because!” The best villains tend to think they’re doing the right thing, and the reason they’re so terrifying is that in thinking they’re doing the correct thing, there’s not a lot of chance in convincing them of the wrongness of their actions. They need a motive, a personal reason for committing their crimes. That’s what makes for a more interesting conflict.
Adam, as a method actor, tries to get in his character’s mind so he can deliver the best performance they can get from him. As a method actor, he mulls over various things Kylo is thinking, feeling, and doing. And just because Kylo might be sitting there going, “Oh, well my parents fought a lot, so I think I’m justified in killing my dad!” doesn’t mean the story is going to present this as entirely one-sided and in favor of Kylo’s reasoning. After all, we still have other characters to consider: Daisy says Rey hates Kylo for killing Han. Mark says Luke is utterly destroyed after Kylo betrayed him, especially given how much Luke invested in his nephew’s training. Carrie, God rest her soul, used to make jokes about how her son is an asshole and a space fascist. And, in the words of Pablo Hidalgo:
Consider that, in this story, we’re not supposed to root for Kylo in the same way we root for our heroes, who are Rey, Finn, and others. People who want a redemption arc for him would, in theory, want him to face the things he’s done and make up for them, which would absolutely require that the story and Kylo acknowledge that what he did was under no uncertain terms terrible. But, other than that, you’re not supposed to expect Kylo to win. With Rey and Finn as our heroes and protagonists, you’re supposed to consider their opinions of the situation as higher priority than that of Kylo’s, because they’re the ones Kylo is actively hurting and causing trouble for. They’re the ones who truly want what’s better for the galaxy, even if Kylo is out there trying to claim otherwise.
Anything Adam is saying about how Kylo thinks he’s in the right doesn’t mean the story is suddenly going to do a switch on us and tell us to start chanting for #TeamFirstOrder. Adam “thinks” Kylo is in the right because that’s what he does for his own benefit as an actor. In order to play Kylo properly, he needs to “understand” Kylo. And Kylo, as a villain, believes that what he does is right, or at the very least is trying to convince himself it is.
Yeah I think–or hope–that’s what Adam meant, that he just wasn’t being entirely clear about which perspective he was coming from. The method actor angle fits, too. I’m still irritated that the interview is out there to give fuel to Kylostans, and that Kylo stanning is such a big thing in general (we know why), but I’m trying to give Adam the benefit of the doubt mostly because the alternative is too awful.
L.J.'s Obsessions 