Ball Dropped

Subtext isn't in movies. Text is in movies. The reason I make the distinction is that people start second guessing the text of the movies (Finn being "sidelined", Rey being related to Palpatine, Ben Solo dying etc) in order to preserve their own special appreciation of the subtext. And in this case specifically they are angry at the fact that they cannot extend the text by themselves to explore the space romance of Rey and Ben (or is it Kylo?) without pretending that Kylo/Ben isn't dead.

It's fairly ironic that the people who aren't fussed enough about the romantic subtext to give it prominence greater than the material effect it has on the story and its main themes (surely, the need for a girl and a boy to requite their romantic love in order for them to save the galaxy is not being considered a major theme of the saga here?) are described as needing everything spoon fed and spelled out, when those that enthusiastically ship Reylo are the ones who compose and/or read material which unequivocally spells out and spoon feeds romantic prose about the two characters.

You might accuse me of using semantics about the nature of subtext being of the movie and not in the movie etc. But that's only because the appreciation for certain areas of subtext is causing some folk to dismiss and denounce parts of the actual text in order to maintain the heightened prominence they have elevated the romantic subtext and their enthusiasm for it.

 

Maybe on planet Vulcan.

Not on our world, though.

 

Vulcan isn't even a planet.

Did you read the whole post about what I said about subtext being of and not in a movie?

 

Well, let's face it, Rian Johnson also saw 'reylo'! So it wasn't just a bit of wishful thinking on 'shippers' part.
And let's face it...romance was at the heart of the Skywalker Saga, from Padme and Anakin's tragic romance onwards. The Leia/Han love affair was a powerful part of ESB...they even had their own love theme, which was the most beautiful part of Williams' soundtrack. There was no real 'romance' in TROS, because although it was pretty obvious Ben loved Rey it was equally obvious she didn't return the feelings, made very 'canon' by the novel, while the Finn/Rose relationship was thrown out with most of Johnson's stuff, and Zorri Bliss was little more than an ex.

The film ends with the protagonist alone, which sums it up perfectly...Rey needed nobody. Which was really the main message of the ST.

 

Perhaps you didn't get the joke. Kinda like how I did indeed say it, but it required some inference on the audience's part. Hmm, seems relevant.

Yes, I did read what you said, and I very much disagree. Subtext can absolutely be written into a scene, either through dialogue, cinematography, blocking, props... did you see what I said about the language of cinema earlier? Because man, if we're limiting ourselves only to what the dialogue explicitly says, you're gonna miss a lot.

 

I don't think I'm missing anything by not caring about knowing for certain that Rey and Ben would have went on space dates if he hadn't died saving her life.

Having said that. Rey would then be dead. So maybe they'd be going on ghost space dates. That's something to ponder I guess.

I guess I'm just not that excited about a subtext of two people having the hots for each other. Not excited enough to imagine there's some crazy ideological struggle between the makers of respective Star Wars films with poor shippers caught in the crossfire.

 

That's fine, but your level or lack of excitement for something doesn't mean that it's not in the film

 

I was implying that it takes a certain amount of excitement for that notion in order for someone to feel the need to raise the subtext of Rey and Kylo being a romance for three movies to text. Especially if it's to criticize the parts of the text that don't compliment that notion and preclude people's enjoyment of it beyond the end of the saga.

 

Here we are talking 'lurve'....and I've just looked again at the title of the thread and....no, can't go there, too naughty!

 

I mean, I'm definitely not here to defend the Reylos that read too much into this thing (though again... I'd suggest just letting them be).

I feel like we're probably going to go around and around with this, but man... Obviously the next movie probably wouldn't see them sharing a milkshake at Dex's (Star Wars apparently doesn't really do happy endings to love stories much, not even with Han and Leia). But man, I hope you can see that there's a happy medium between The Actual Ending of the Musical Grease and there being a romantic subtext between Rey and Kylo written very much into the fabric of the film.

 

"A wise and magnanimous leader will always encourage the less fortunate of mind to consider the grandest of possibilities...."