I Can't Believe I'm Asking This, But is Rey a "Mary Sue"?

don't know if you're joking (i'm almost sure you are), but in case anyone else doesn't "get" this:

"nuked the fridge" is the modern version of "jumped the shark": the story gets so silly it defies the suspension of disbelief.
"fridged" or "stuffed in the fridge" is a trope in which a character is killed off ghoulishly just to give the lead hero something to cry about.​

 

Oh I know. But this is Star Wars and I can't help but bring up silly Lucas-isms

 

I absolutely agree that it isn't necessarily an inherenty negative term and could be used to initiate constructive discussion. But when it comes to TFA many if not most of the people who use it against Rey only use it as some kind of ultimate "proof" of deeming her character as just a "feminist agenda".

Yes I can read up Wikipedia as well. But that is not how people define the term. In fact, it directly says: "Mary Sue" today has changed from its original meaning (...)"
It used to be nothing really else than just a rubber term for forumers to fill... Nowadays much more like a buzzword.

Just as it was said above I can easely say the same by claiming that people who use the term against Rey only use it to defend the prequels.
But as I mentioned, with the excpetion of teleological context, it dosen't really matter at all who when or why people use an argument. The only thing that matter is the validity of an argument.
Imo for most people "Mary Sue" was a new term that made them reevaluate their opinion about the saga. If one creates a well rounded argument that kid Anakin is a Mary Sue than noone really cares what were the preludes for such argument...

For instance when The Force Unleashed was released I've never seen anyone claiming Galen Marek was a Mary Sue. Yet, nowadays it's pretty much under every singe youtube video... Imo many people knew he was really overpowered just didn't know how to express their opinion properly.

Except they did, just didn't have forum and numbers to state their opinion like the social media- centered review community does nowadays. People complained about many things regarding the PT. Like I said unoriginality and "Mary Sue" charcters were pretty much just nitpicks compared to the other criticisms that basically dissected the movies... And by the time film criticism has become what it is today, noone wanted to beat a dead horse with such nitpick... But like I said TFA opened a new era for criticising Star Wars in general.

Yet it was you who reponened this thread after it was closed in August. So maybe you should ask yourself?

 

So TFA gave her an array Force powers, the Skywalker lightsaber and the Millennium Falcon amongst other things.

In TLJ, what else will the plot give her to be one step closer to Mary Sue-dom?

 

Well, if there’s any sort of ‘agenda’ behind the character, it would undoubtedly be a financial one - not social. The brand has a rep of being a ‘boys club’. Rey was Disney/Lucasfilm broadcasting to the world that the franchise is for everybody.

The more demographics interested in your product, the more money in your pocket and that’s their bottom line. It’s just good business. It’s a corporation attempting to increase their profit margin, not reengineer societal norms. That’s just my take though.

 

That's true, but it doesn't change the fact that girls are not as interested in sci-fi as boys. A female main character is not going to change that, but people certainly imagine this to be the case. Star Wars is still so immensely popular that most of its fans generally don't care what gender the main character has. It's still going to make money.

 

The trick is expanding your audience and fandom through younger people.

From what I see, Rey is doing that for younger girls.

 

It's not like they had a problem with attracting younger audiences before.

I've seen little girls cosplaying as little Jedi Knights since the 90's. Girls who are interested in Star Wars will always be interested in Star Wars no matter what. They don't like Star Wars because Rey is a girl.

 

Disney isn’t interested in cosplayers. They aren’t even truly interested in ticket sales. The far and away core revenue stream for this franchise is (and always has been) the merchandising. They want more girls buying stuff with the Star Wars logo on it. Simple as that. If those odds are even slightly increased by showcasing a prominent female character, then it’s worth it to them.

 

It's not like I didn't know this (the Cars franchise being another great example of merchandise being the true source of money). But what I said still stands: You don't want something you're not interested in. Simple as that.

 

. . . . . until there’s something about it that does interest you

 

....Which is exactly what I talked about in my very first post. Girls are not as interested in sci-fi as boys, and will never be. Rey being a female character is far from groundbreaking. In fact, throughout history sci-fi films and TV series have proven to be the most progressive and forward-thinking out of all genres - Star Trek being a great example of this when it introduced diverse casts and female protagonists back in the day. Ellen Ripley being the first true action heroine in Alien, also a sci-fi film.

You just have to look at history. It's very, very helpful.

 

George Lucas set out to write Star Wars as a fairy tale set in space. I assure you, girls are very much fans of fairy tales. They just need the right entry point - like a high profile heroine.

True. You also have: Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Ariel, Belle, Rapunzel, etc. You just have to look at history

 

I am sorry for my choice of words, but this is bullsh*t. Throughout my whole life I've been surrounded by girls and women who enjoy sci-fi as much as I do. My sister, my classmates (one of which introduced me to Dune saga,) my friends, my mother (she's not much into action sci-fi, like Star Wars or Mad Max, but she likes hard sci-fi flicks, like Ex Machina or Arrival,) etc. Just because something used to be marketed more towards male demographic it doesn't mean that female audience members cannot enjoy it as well.

 

I think you are deliberately trying to skew the discussion while at the same point missing every point I am making. Calling it a fairytale in space and putting emphasis on fairytales while forgetting that it still takes place in space is a large stretch. George Lucas did not use Snow White and Cinderella as his inspiration for making Star Wars, he used mythological history, Flash Gordon and Japanese war movies. But you choose to make these comparisons, which is totally out of context.

You make the same mistake as most people do when jumping to conclusions: I never said that NO girls are interested in sci-fi. And you being surrounded by girls and women who are just as much into sci-fi as you tells more about you than it tells about the world. And please, don't use the same argument and say "No, it says more about YOU".

Also, you do not need to call something for "bullsh*t" just because you don't agree with it.

 

I only make the comparisons because the guy who created this thing did it first.

source

Star Wars is first and foremost a fairy tale by design. Whether you like it or not. You know who made their bread and butter off fairy tales? The company that now owns this one. You better believe that fact isn’t lost on them. Have you seen Tangled? Frozen? Moana? Rey is the very model of a modern Disney heroine. That's not by accident.

 

42% percent of TFA's opening weekend audience was female. (this is from: http://money.cnn.com/2015/12/21/media/star-wars-the-force-awakens-box-office-numbers/index.html). it's just one number, but it's telling: not a deeply significant percentage gap. so girls are apparently 8% less interested in Star Wars. people studying data would never reasonably extrapolate generalizations about a gender preference from such a narrow percentage margin.

the problem with generalizations is that they are absolutely meaningless without data. but by all means, opine away! : D

p.s. @Pawek_13: my mother was a huge Trekkie and loved all things sci-fi. : D

 

You just choose to make the wrong comparisons. Flash Gordon is also a fairytale, but it doesn't mean its the same kind of fairytale as, for example, Cinderella. Like I said, George Lucas didn't use Snow White and Cinderella as his inspiration for making Star Wars. You are just trying to skew the discussion by bringing in stuff that's out of context to fit your argument.

Let's make a comparison: Rey has much more in common with Luke and Anakin than she has with Elsa in Frozen. You just choose to make the comparisons with Moana, Elsa and others because they have the same gender as Rey. If you look at the context instead of just looking at gender, perhaps we could have a discussion.

And the problem with vague statistics from one specific event is that they can never explain the whole picture. TFA was the biggest movie event for decades, plus the number doesn't break down how the audience was divided in terms of family, friends, husbands, wifes, sons and daughters. Take with that what you will.

 

eh. it's an actual statistic (not vague at all for its purpose) rather than just what i've heard in my narrow circle of influence. i'm sure there's probably other data out there more specifically about women in science fiction, but for me this number actually says enough about who went to see TFA despite the marketing not really being about Rey.

like i said, it doesn't tell the whole picture. but at least it's data and not hearsay.