Tag: rey

I’ve never seen JJ say Finn is based on Moses. That would be different. I’ve Only seen prince of Egypt aus which seemed inappropriate.

opisrussianonmain:

themandalorianwolf:

lj-writes:

JJ didn’t say so, but the parallels are unmistakeable and blatant (link). I’m not in a place to judge whether a PoE Finn AU is appropriate, but if the ones doing it aren’t Jewish themselves I wish they wouldn’t. It would be so much better to carry forward the common themes in Finn’s and Moses’s stories to tell Finn’s own awesome story.

I personally don’t think SW characters should be written in AU’s about religious figures. That’s just asking for trouble.

But I don’t see anything wrong with people drawing Parallels and metaphors in their stories about Finn being the Moses of Star Wars. Jesus Parallels have been used by movies for decades. Anakin has been called space Jesus for years due to his conception.

If a Stormtrooper rebellion happens, Finn is metaphorically space Moses.

If you ask me then TFA is a Prince of Egypt AU, just done GFFA style.

As for the Stormtrooper rebellion being necessary to finalize that I have to disagree. For one thing it’s an “AU”, it is so to speak “based on Exodus” but it isn’t Exodus. And Finn isn’t Moses, he’s a Moses analogy.

Furthermore it depends on who the story decides to frame as Finn’s people. 

Remember Moses’ story?

Moses’ mother contrives to hide him so that he’ll survive Pharaoh’s edict to kill all male Israelite children and he ends up being found by the Pharaoh’s daughter. Now we don’t know how or when Finn ended up in the First Order, but given that he has no memory of his family and that the FO literally have baby pictures of him it’s a good bet her was tiny indeed, possibly an infant. Like Moses.

Then Moses (Finn) is raised in the house of Pharaoh (First Order) among Egyptians (Stormtroopers) but he’s not one of them and deep down knows he never will be.

And remember why Moses turns against the house of Pharaoh and have to flee in the first place? He watches as an Egyptian (Stormtrooper) strikes down an Israelite, one of his own people. He ends up killing the Egyptian, his crime is discovered and he has to flee into the desert.

You know, kinda like Finn reject the First Order with the massacre of Tuanul when the Stormtroopers slaughters the villagers. He refuses to participate and his “crime” – from an FO pov at least – is discovered and he has to flee and ends up in the desert. Where he meets this girl, like Moses met

Zipporah.

Furthermore when G-d wants Moses to be his chosen and free his people Moses at first refuses and argues with G-d about his choice. Again kinda like Finn tells Maz nope when she says that they all have to fight the First Order. (Which makes JJ’s stand in for G-d in this universe a Black woman, albeit one in alien makeup.)

So who is Finn’s people? The Stormtroopers? Or maybe its the Force worshipers? Or maybe the story will tell us its a bit of both, one does not preclude the other and when the Israelites left Egypt, several Egyptians went them.

And really it fits with many of the other characters too.

Rey is a mix of

Zipporah, Miriam and Aaron. Snoke is the original Pharaoh and Kylo Ren the one who starts as the heir to the throne, but eventually becomes Pharaoh himself and the main antagonist in the story. (This last but is why I always thought the narrative would end up doing away with Snoke one way or another and have Kylo take the reins of power fully.)

No it’s not a one to one translation anymore than Anakin was was a one to one translation of Jesus, but both stories are clearly inspired. Anakin’s story was a Messiah narrative as is so common among fantasy stories – scifi too – told by white Christians. Finn’s story on the other hand, and I still hold out hope all of the ST as envisioned by JJ – is based on Moses’ story.

Do I still want a Stormtrooper rebellion or for the story to do something with the Stormtroopers by and large apart from using them as cannon fodder? Yes, because it reframed them with the little we have of Finn’s background story, but I’ll would venture that a Stormtropper rebellion isn’t necessary for Finn to be the in-universe equivalent on Moses, nor Finn’s story be based on Moses. It already is and much depends on who the story decides to frame as Finn’s people.

This is where I find @lj-writes‘s theory about Finn possibly being from Jakku and at least being the child of a Force worshiping group interesting, it would add yet another layer as to why Finn reacted so strongly to the assault and massacre. Moral decency and the fact that he’s the male, heroic lead of the story is more than enough to warrant his reaction, but it does not therefore follow that there was never meant to be anything more to it than that.

Fandom’s main excuse for hating on Finn is basically “op literally killed the Egyptian for striking the Jewish slave but go off I guess,” with healthy doses of both sides are wrong uwu violence is bad uwu uwu. It’s funny how an enslaved soldier refusing to kill unarmed prisoners, escaping to freedom, and defending himself and others from imminent death raises more ire than the slavery and genocide he was running from and defending others from.

The First Order claims to have trained Finn from birth, according to the Visual Dictionary page that you excerpted, which leads me to wonder if he was taken very shortly after birth (like Moses) or actually born in captivity (also like Moses, who was born in slavery). I firmly believe the deleted scene where Finn lets the woman in Tuanul go (link) was meant to be a callback to Finn’s own kidnapping, at least in the sense of him wondering if this was how he was torn from his family. The woman seems to be holding a baby, from the way she clutches the bundle closer rather than drop it in her fright. It’s probably a deliberate choice to cast her as a Black woman, too.

Also does this mean the lightsaber is the burning bush? XD Finn and especially Rey are afraid of/refuse the lightsaber at first before they embrace its power. Y’know, the divine fire that burns without consuming its source…

Kylo Ren is like the Rameses character from the PoE adaptation, I think, minus the personal rapport with the male protagonist. Though he had no real relationship with Finn, there was something that passed between him and Finn at the village. Kylo also fixated on Finn and took the “betrayal” very personally in a way Snoke and even Hux were never shown to.

The PoE Rameses-Moses connection has a stronger parallel in Kylo Ren and Rey, in no small part because RJ could give a rat’s ass about Finn and his story, but it is a continuation and intensification of Moses’s story being split between Finn and Rey. Even in TFA, Kylo Ren wanted to destroy Finn but wanted Rey to join him. (In TLJ he evidently forgot Finn exists, much like RJ did.) They share an actual connection in TLJ where he further works her over, building rapport while isolating and manipulating her, all to convince her to join his side much as Rameses dreamed of ruling with Moses by his side. Kylo then becomes the successor to the original ruler, the one who had the perfect chance to end the destructive policies of his predecessor and was urged by Rey to do so, but ultimately refused and tried to kill her instead.

When Kylo was gazing up at Rey and she literally shut the door on their connection, it was a bit like that last moment between Rameses and Moses in PoE when Rameses (also on his knees, defeated and vulnerable, realizing that the link to his father has slipped between his fingers) screams Moses’s name in rage and loss while Moses looked across the divide to say a silent farewell. It’s not as wrenching in TLJ because the bond between Kylo and Rey was false on many levels and Rey feels so little for Kylo at this point, but the moment is still there where the bond is broken for good, or acknowledged as broken.

Coming back to Tuanul/the Church of the Force possibly being tied to Finn’s origins, it’s been pointed out that Finn may have awakened in the Force on Tuanul. My variation on that theory is that he is Force immune and Kylo Ren sensed this in the ruins of Tuanul (link), which Moth and @themandalorianwolf speculated as Finn being a wound in the Force like the Exile in KOTOR 2 (link). There’s also the fact that Jakku has all kinds of lore tied into it, as you pointed out re the Wadi Rum shooting location (link).

I mean if Finn is Force immune or otherwise Force sensitive as a result of trauma like the Exile, being in the middle of a massacre like one he may have experienced as a baby would be enough to activate those abilities. For me God tier is Finn being a descendant of Jedhan refugees who were Church of the Force members in the disapora. Mega Ultra God tier is Rose also being from the Jedhan diaspora. I know, I know, there are no confirmed links, but that’s a whole another tinfoil hat rant that is way off topic and will be in a separate post (link).

Rey Nobody is terrible

themandalorianwolf:

I’m not saying everyone who believes Rey Nobody is terrible, or that it comes from a terrible theme, but in truth Rey Nobody isn’t just confusing and unoriginal, it’s also used to erase Finn’s role in the movies, among other characters from the other trilogies.

The most common argument for Rey Nobody isn’t even about what makes sense, it’s about a theme. The theme that a hero, Rey, can come from nowhere and be the Jedi protagonist. People say it’s great that to have other Jedi than the Skywalkers in the movies as the protagonist, even better that she’s a woman.

Now here’s where the lie comes in.

The PT had a mess load of other Jedi than Anakin. In fact, Anakin wasn’t even a Jedi till the 2nd movie of the PT, little moptop didn’t even have a lightsaber. The OT had Obi-Wan. In fact most commonly I see people show a picture of the Skywalkers to prove their point, but it’s always misleading since forgetting Han and Padme, weren’t Jedi or Skywalkers, they just married into the family. Leia rejected the name and never became a Jedi in the new canon (Fuck you Disney/Lucasfilm), so that leaves only Luke and Anakin. Also, put into perspective that Rey is pretty much a genderbent Anakin and Luke mashed together, and she even has the same journey as Luke did in the OT, beat for beat. And lets face it, Daisy Ridley also looks just like a young Mark Hamil and

Natalie

Portman. Rey as a nobody, isn’t original or refreshing. It’s just the same thing…but with the last name missing.

We’ve had hero Jedi from nowhere: Luke, Ezra, Ahoksa, Anakin himself. Hell Obi-Wan struggled to even become a Jedi and had to train twice as hard to even become a the Master he became. 

The themes of Rey being a nobody who goes on to become a hero always have one recurring similarity, they never see Finn as the other protagonist of the ST and think giving him the force is a bad idea and would “ruin” his story or the movie.

In fact, in the first official trailer for TFA, one of the most racist comments under the video was “Great, they gave the nig** a lightsaber. This movie is ruined”. It was even so hard to believe that there could possibly be a black stormtrooper, that these people actually acknowledged the prequels just to hate on Finn.

People wanted Rey to be a Nobody for the story because they didn’t want to or couldn’t even think that the force wielding hero from nowhere could be Finn, so they latched onto it.

And not only was Rey Nobody used for the racists, it was also used by the sexists who thought that Rey didn’t deserve or earn right to be a Skywalker and so Kylo Ren had to be the Skywalker of the ST. Yeah, there were other people who wanted Rey not to be a Skywalker cause they thought Rey and Kylo should hook up, but those people aren’t valid to begin with.

I understand that Rey Nobody to some people means just that anyone can be special, regardless of where they come from, but that isn’t Rey. TLJ tells us that Rey is a nobody who is special and doesn’t need any training or to earn anything because where there is darkness, there has to be light, so the light made Rey stronger than anyone and she downloaded Kylo’s powers like a torrent. No struggle, no strife, and even after her mentor dies, her comrades are reduced to less than a dozen people, learned that her parents are nobodies, Rey still shows no signs of character growth and is the same as was in her introduction. 

People say they want Rey to be a nobody because it makes her relatable…It doesn’t and it didn’t. It just made her an OP character that has no flaws and doesn’t struggle, and gave every sexist and racist argument against Finn and Rey, a louder voice.

A theme shouldn’t trump a well written, with compelling characters and a cohesive plot. Giving Finn the force, wouldn’t have ruined anything, connecting Rey to the Skywalkers, wouldn’t have been bad writing. But ya know what would ruin the story? What would be bad writing that screams a forced agenda? Rey being nobody.

So, no I don’t think Rey Nobody is a good idea, and I will never think it’s a good idea. Regardless of why some people like Rey Nobody, the majority uses it to erase Finn as the protagonist or give the protagonist slot to Kylo, and IMO, fuck that noise.

I hope Rey is a Skywalker in IX. I hope Finn picks up a lightsaber in IX. Why? Cause I’m tired of seeing Rey and Finn get undercut time and time again. The worst part of TFA is the batch switch with Finn and the mystery arc with Rey. The movie would have been ten folds better if they just revealed Rey as a child who was taken from the Skywalker family and just confirmed Finn had the force. And I’m sticking to that. Hopefully IX fixes that.

I’ve compared Rey to Korra from Avatar: The Legend of Korra in that both characters are not allowed to develop their supernatural powers from hard work, but rather because some dude physically and mentally violated her. I saw a post yesterday that I’m kicking myself for not reblogging because I can’t find it now, that one way to fix Rey’s plot is by her realizing that her powers are tainted from the source and she has to start again the right way. It would also tie into my meta about a new order of Force users (link) and all the main crew training in the Force with Rey (link).

Barring a development like the above that shows the Force actually does belong to everyone and not just specially chosen white people, yeah, fuck Rey Random. So far it has been handled terribly in a way that mangles the lore and makes any possible theme incoherent while erasing Finn. If it’s just going to be a validation of the worst of Star Wars fandom, that only certain superhumans with inborn powers matter, then I don’t want it.

It really is time for the Jedi to end

lj-writes:

Morality, Trust, and the Force–toward a new model of Force instruction

What went so fatally wrong with the Jedi Order?

It’s a recurring and fundamental question. Through the prequel, original, and now sequel trilogies we’ve watched the Jedi Order fall, rise, and then fall again. Unless they can end this cycle the end of Episode IX won’t be an end, but rather a prelude to a new tragedy.

I believe the old Jedi Order’s reliance on inborn Force power became warped into blood worship in Luke’s new Jedi Order, and Kylo Ren was a product of this repugnant and ahistorical belief. To overcome the mistakes of the old and new Orders, a new model of Force instruction must arise: One that does not rely on inborn talent and certainly not on the nonsensical idea that a lineage confers a special destiny or rights. Rather the new model must recognize and nurture the Force powers inherent in everyone, and instruction itself should be a horizontal process where the students teach each other.

Below I will lay out these ideas in more detail. First I will explain the progression from the old Jedi Order to the new one, and how discontinuity in history led to Luke’s mistakes and Kylo Ren. Then I will lay out the new model that I believe must take the Jedi’s place in order to prevent new Kylo Rens from arising, or at least minimize their damage, while also avoiding the mistakes of the old Jedi Order.

Keep reading

The TLJ novelization seems to validate part of what I said here about Luke’s role. From Snoke’s point of view:

Luke, in other words, knew that the Jedi were flawed and he needed to turn to sources older than the Jedi to understand the Force and perhaps seek other ways to organize around it. Snoke saw this path Luke was on as such a threat that he used his knowledge and a young Ben Solo to manipulate Luke into rebuilding the Jedi.

Much like the history of the Jedi itself, Luke’s attempt to rebuild the Order was defined by fear and temptation, not faith–fear of his nephew falling to the Dark Side, and the lure of power. In doing so Luke seems to have abandoned his earlier attempts to seek the origins of the Force faith that Snoke found so threatening. History repeated itself, and the Jedi came down again in blood and fire.

Luke did take another apprentice, however, who received barely any instruction from him other than the basics of the Force, the roots that Luke had been seeking before Snoke’s interference and sought out again when Kylo Ren destroyed his fledgling Academy. In addition to these basics, Rey also has the first Jedi texts which Finn discovered in the Millennium Falcon. It seems the stage is set to realize Luke’s original vision for a new/old way of Force instruction, the one he was groping toward before Snoke distracted him.

I don’t get how Rey’s skin change is brownface. I get why it’s absolutely disgusting, but her tan didn’t make her look non-white, so it’s not brownwashing unless I’m missing something?

diversehighfantasy:

lj-writes:

I mean they did decide that a white girl with a careful, aesthetically pleasing tan and a few cute freckles–but not, like, scarred and splotched from the sun–is better than a brown or Black woman. And even the tan and freckles had to go at the first opportunity because being pale is way more important than being consistent! Maybe there’s a better term than brownface, but it’s really racist at any rate.

It’s not brownface. I get it – they could have cast a brown or Black actress instead of a white actress with a tan (which fits the narrative) in TLJ, but it’s not like they gave her a tan and said she’s the daughter of Luke and Nikari or she’s the bio daughter of Bale and Breha (I know those wouldn’t add up, just as examples). That would be brownface. There has to be an ethnic element, and Rey isn’t coded as any particular race. Which means she doesn’t have to be white, and I agree with questioning why a race-neutral character was cast as yet another white brunette. The term would be white prioritization, as in they couldn’t imagine not having a white lead even with an inclusive cast.

RJ making Rey look fairer in TLJ when she’d still have a tan is sketch tho, because he clearly wanted to make her more “attractive,” including the out of place full face of makeup. 

shorelle:

☆ DOWNTOWN ☆ the trio exploring the streets of Coruscant on a night out! (surely even the Resistance has some downtime when not on missions, right… and imagine experiencing the scale of this bustling city planet for the first time!!)

I was listening to the song Downtown a lot, which is ridiculous and catchy but also the chorus makes me want to dance down the streets of an intergalactic city too /o/ also just imagining the First Order trio running into them and doing the dance-off in the video haha

nola-midori:

reylo-more-like-reyno:

oforlikelalune:

reylo-is-just-bad:

incestreylo:

reylo-is-just-bad:

She- she’s literally restrained on a torture rack????? And your take away is “ah yes they want to be close to each other”?????

Way to take an entire post that far out of context.

By the way,

“In Kylo Ren’s voice there was unexpected gentleness. Not quite sympathy, but something less than the hostility with which he had confronted her in the forest. “You’re my guest.”

With an ease that was more frightening than any physical approach, he waved casually in her direction. A couple of clicks, and the restraints fell away from her arms.”

Yes, thank you for this “Tea” I’m SUPER glad that it’s romantic to be kidnapped as long as your attacker is nice to you.

I should have expected as much from someone who’s username is literally “Incest Reylo”

You CANT MAKE THIS SHIT UP

Also, that excerpt is from the novelization that is non-canonical because it literally diverts from movie canon but yeah. That’s TOTALLY a sign of Reylo.

Yes because that is closer than this

why would they be so close if they’re “just friends”?!?!??!?

Re: TFA. The best explanation I heard and I don’t remember if it was from DHF or someone else who writes regularly about racism and fandom was that JJ Abrams as a liberal white didn’t get that a storyline that would have been fine for a white character does not work for a black character. No one would be shitting on Finn or saying he was peripheral if he were white, so the subversion at the end of TFA would have been ok overall. It needed to change when John was cast and it wasn’t.

themandalorianwolf:

lj-writes:

I don’t think Finn fans should put any trust in IX. It will
treat him better than TLJ but that’s only because TLJ buried the bar
under the ground. JJ was the one who pulled the rug and left him in the
dirt giving Rian the option to safely ignore him. JJ was the one who
forced Rey into Kylo’s path and made her his foil, so that Finn could be
sidelined when there was the natural choice. I don’t think we’ll see
Bendemtion, but Rey will be the one who shines in IX and Finn is
sidelined completely.

Why do I think this? Because it’s what JJ, the man you all put
your faith in, set him up for. Look at the end of TFA, there’s nothing
else there for Finn. his story has no clear progression but is left
hanging like some appendix they can deal with in whatever way, there is
no clear progression. Rey is set up on Kylo’s path and she’ll be the one
to ultimately take him down. Finn might get to be a bit of a hero in
the Resistance part but he’ll still be secondary to Rey.

JJ set up Finn to be A Leia in the ST. He’s plot relevant in the
first movie and drives it forward and then he’s dumped because the real
hero, Rey, has stepped up. So if you ask me Finn fans should get out
while they can and before it hurt to much. If they’re looking for
another major scifi franchise with a Black lead Discovery season 2 looks
promising after they showed the latest trailer and there’s a lot of
others out there. But don’t bother with Star Wars, it won’t treat Finn
well.

Finn being sidelined is a possibility every fan should be prepared for, obviously. I don’t want to tell anyone to get their hopes up for JJ or IX, and I encourage people to disengage from SW if that’s what they need to do.

That said, I disagree with the arguments there. For one thing, I don’t think Rey was made to be Kylo’s foil–it’s clearly Finn who’s been set up as Kylo’s opposite in every way. Foil does not mean simply an enemy, it’s a specific literary term for a character that contrasts with another character. The foil relationship between Finn and Kylo continued even in TLJ. If Rey was set up to be anyone’s foil it was Luke in TLJ far more than Kylo.

For another, Finn’s story was not directionless at the end of TFA. You might as well say Luke’s story had nowhere to go at the end of ANH because his arc was complete. Comparing him to Leia is plain inaccurate when Leia did not have a protagonist’s arc or hero’s journey in ANH like Finn had in TFA. Luke had the hero’s journey in ANH, and Leia was in charge of his call to action. It wasn’t a case of Leia stepping aside for Luke, it was Luke’s story from the start that Leia had a role in.

It’s also disingenuous to validate RJ’s writing choices as flowing organically from JJ’s when multiple people involved with TFA and the franchise–Mark Hamill, Alan Dean Foster, John Williams, and Simon Pegg just off the top of my head–have publicly voiced doubts and disagreements with different aspects of what RJ did.

As a black fan myself, I also disagree. 

Saying Finn’s storyline could go nowhere after TFA, is like saying Rey’s storyline could go nowhere after meeting look. A lack of imagination is all to blame for Finn’s role in TLJ and certain fans not caring about a character who doesn’t look the way Hollywood has taught them to care about. I’m not going to just re-write what @lj-writes just said, but I can think of a million of ways Finn’s story could have gone after TFA, hell I can still think of ways his story could go after TLJ.

The fact is, some people have no imagination on what to do. Johnson being one of them.  

Considering Mandalorian Finn is such a popular fan theory, I wonder if this new Mandalorian TV series has anything to do with him. Who knows, maybe the person under the mask in that first screenshot is one of his parents!

grinningloner:

lj-writes:

I don’t have much hope of that, personally, but if Mandalorian Finn is at least hinted at I’ll be happy.

Prepare for more Rey parentage theories and Finn to once again be ignored. Y’all know they’re coming. 

If it’s true that Pablo Pascal is the Mandalorian people are going to be saying he’s Rey’s dad 😂