jewishcomeradebot:

lj-writes:

jewishcomeradebot:

I don’t understand the people who say that Kylo would have worked better if he had been a random, I really don’t. Kylo’s connection to the Skywalker bloodline, along with the lack of clear motive for his actions, is the entire point.

See, he’s a Nazi.

Okay, so technically he’s an allegory for a neo-Nazi in a space fantasy setting, but given that this hellsite has a distinct difficulty with complex concepts I’ll keep it simple. He’s a Nazi.

Why did Nazis do what they did? Why do neo-Nazis do what they do?

If you peel away all the embellishments and propaganda it comes right down to this: they see themselves as having a special legacy, a special bloodline to protect and they have a right to do so because they feel they’ve been chosen.

JJ has said that the early concept of Jedikiller only started working when they made him connected to the Skywalker bloodline, to the chosen family in Star Wars.

Kylo’s motivation, like that of all Nazis, is that he’s doing this because he belongs to the chosen people and thus have a right to rule. Not because he’s qualified, but because he belongs to the destined people.

No it’s not deep or complex, but it was never meant to be. Kylo is an antagonist and one JJ always meant to emulate a neo-Nazi. Giving him complex motivation would have detracted from this and, like with the real life equivalent, made it possible to justify what he’s doing because he has X, Y, Z motivation. Instead JJ gave him the most basic motivation of Nazis, he’s right because he’s chosen and because he has the strength to do what he does.

It’s not glorious. It’s pathetic, sad and ultimately someone who’s irredeemable. Not because he couldn’t choose differently than he does but because it’s not a motivation that makes anyone want to see him redeemed.

Of course, even people who sees Kylo as a villain and antagonist have a really hard time accepting him being a Nazi, so maybe this view isn’t really that surprising.

I mean the actor himself told us that Kylo Ren is an elitist (link), it’s not that deep people.

[Adam Driver] refuses to see his character as bratty. “There is a little bit of an
elitist, royalty thing going on,” he says, reminding us that the
character’s estranged mom is “the princess. I think he’s aware of maybe
the privilege.”

Cass Sunstein has criticized TLJ in part because Kylo didn’t fall due to losing a loved one (link), but maybe that’s because… Kylo is no Anakin… and is not nearly as sympathetic?

Mr. Dark Side, Kylo Ren, does have a bit of a struggle, and in that
sense, Johnson maintains continuity with Lucas’s vision. But in this
movie, at least, the struggle turns out to be a head fake. Because
Kylo’s descent doesn’t have the precipitating cause of Anakin’s – the
loss of loved ones – and because we don’t see Kylo suppressing the
better angels of his nature, the film doesn’t come anywhere close to the
depths of Lucas’s films.

If anyone is positioned as the new Anakin–but with a happy ending–it’s Rey, in struggling with the loss of loved ones, or at least her idea of them, and also in resisting manipulation by her would-be abusive mentor Kylo where Anakin fell to Palpatine’s manipulation. It’s interesting that Sunstein couldn’t recognize this story when it manifested in a female character, though to be sure it’s a common enough blind spot and RJ didn’t make it easy for anyone.

Precisely.

People, not just Cass here, are obsessed with having Kylo be the next Vader/Anakin, but he isn’t. Not to mention they’re even more obsessed with the reason why he fell to the Dark Side than they are with Rey’s parentage.

But let me ask you something. Did we know why Anakin fell in the OT? No, we didn’t, because the reason for it wasn’t relevant to Luke for whom Vader was a foil.

Is it relevant to Finn or to Rey why Kylo fell? So far we’ve been given not a single reason why this information should be relevant to either of them, so I don’t get why people are so upset about not knowing.

Except as yet another case of prioritizing the white guy over the two actual leads in the ST. Kylo’s motives for turning to the Dark are no more interesting or relevant to the narrative than Vader’s were in the OT. It’s not a plot hole, it’s not a flaw in the storytelling, it’s intentional. Only the parts of Kylo and his actions that are pertinent to Finn and Rey are relevant to the story, and unless someone can come up with a good reason why either of them should remotely care about it it’s going to remain irrelevant.

It’s why I was so attached to the idea of Rey Solo, I admit, because it would reconcile Kylo being like Anakin with the reason for his fall being relevant to Rey. The why would tie into Rey’s story while the how would directly contrast with Finn’s.

But it looks like the ST is going to go the route of only the how being relevant to both Rey and Finn. Rey at the end of TFA and even more throughout TLJ is where Kylo used to be, only to make different choices: she was chosen and groomed by a powerful Dark Force user while vulnerable and alone, but unlike Kylo she told the guy to fuck all the way off and chose to stand with her friends, not murder them. Finn throughout TFA and TLJ continues to present a direct contrast to Kylo Ren at every point, from backgrounds to choices to responses to abuse.

Rey is the one who could have been Kylo, had Kylo succeeded in his efforts. Finn is the one who stands in complete opposition to Kylo, and Kylo hates him for it.

This only strengthens the Finnrey/Anidala feels, by the way. Anakin/Rey was Palpatine/Kylo’s chosen victim-apprentice, but where Anakin chose the darkness and servitude Rey chose the light and freedom. Padmé/Finn was Palpatine/Kylo’s rival and enemy, but where Palpatine succeeded in destroying Padmé Kylo failed because where Anakin turned against Padmé, Rey was steadfast in her loyalty to Finn. We have no idea and no reason to care why Palpatine fell other than his desire for power, and the same is true of Kylo.