Is Ben Redeemable?

I desperately hope he is.

Otherwise, the whole saga would just be about the tragedy of the Skywalkers. Of how despite their best efforts, they always fell to their darker side.

What a hopeless message that would be. Just dismal as hell.

--- Double Post Merged, Dec 16, 2017, Original Post Date: Dec 16, 2017 ---

Basically this.

I like how it looked like she was going to do all the heavy lifting for him until they totally subverted it.

He's going to have to make the painful trek all by himself.

My headcanon is that he loses his connection to the force as penance for his sins.

 

he would be a lot happier for it, i think. it's brought him nothing but suffering.
my hope is that with or without his own connection, he spends his exile/penance/whatever teaching the balance to new generations.

in that way, they (and we) will ultimately all be Skywalkers and the legacy will never die.

 

compassion and empathy are powers we all have.
Star Wars expresses it in the Force, but the magic isn't what matters.
love is the Skywalker legacy we should care about.

 

Everyone is redeemable in this universe, especially someone from within the Skywalker's bloodline. Even Palps could become your lovely uncle here.

 

I want to see our first ever Exiled Villian. Maybe he goes on his own, realizing he is so broken. OR he is tricked to an outer rim planet (By rey, or maybe one of his own knights of ren) And is now alone to think about what he has done. Maybe he can find the forgiveness in himslef and gets to talk to his parents and luke again. (Force ghosts) OR.....he becomes bitter and finnaly goes insane and he is tormented by the ghosts of the sith mocking him.

It would be unique, Subvert expectaitons, and not rely on killing Kylo ren. (And Lucasfilm get to keep adam driver for the future!)

 

I don't think so, after killing Han I thought he was to far gone in the eyes of the viewer but killing Snoke and naming himself Supreme Leader only solidified his heel turn and I feel that going back on it will be very harmful to the story. That being said there should be a time jump and they could always have Kylo have a kid by Ep.IX and that kid is Kylo's redemption in the sense that the kid isn't swayed to the dark side, so the ultimate legacy of Kylo is redeemed even if the person himself isn't.

 

There is no feasible way for them to have Rey and Kylo have a relationship. It was already damn near impossible after TFA but TLJ just solidified that.

 

Possible for her to accept his turn? sure.
Possible for her to be emotionally or sexually interested in him? No, I really don't think so.

 

Lol,

1. Anakin murdering children= redeemable

2. Ben killing Han Solo=
irredeemable

That's all I can think whenever this conversation comes up. So based on this, I would say YES he is definitely redeemable.

 

Redeemable yes, Forgivable no
and I think Poe's got more of a chance lighting Rey's fire than Darth Emo

 

That ties in with my "darker timeline" version of future events (that is, just a bit of fun).

Ben Solo is placed on trial for war crimes. As punishment he is severed from the force completely and sent to prison. As a final scene, we see him in his prison cell arguing with Han, Luke, Leia, Rey etc... the audience knows that this is impossible, that he has been severed from the force completely and wouldn't even be able to perceive a force ghost. He has completely lost it. He will return in future films as a Gollum-like character.

"Have you ever heard the tragedy of Ben Solo?"

 

i don't think they'll redeem Kylo Ren, and i don't think this will hurt the idea of a family saga.

Kylo Ren is now the big, bad, evil guy in the galaxy. unless they throw a total curve ball and put a bigger baddie into play, we're looking at our top villain at the end of TLJ. Ben Solo is now at the absolute height of vanity: he proclaimed himself Supreme Leader and feels that, with Luke dead, he finally finished what Vader started. Ben is, in his own head, the most powerful person in the galaxy. he is the essence of everything that was wrong with the Jedi and with Luke.

the thing that Luke was all bent out of shape about was the hubris of not only the old school Jedi, but himself. he laments that, thinking himself as some legendary Skywalker/Jedi master, he was too vain to pay attention and truly help Ben when he needed it. it was only after seeing the poisonous lies of Snoke in Ben's mind that he realized the damage done, and in that instance made a grave error.

in TLJ we hear about how Luke wants to destroy the Jedi because they took themselves far too seriously: "as if the light would die out just because the Jedi are gone," to paraphrase Luke. he's saying we don't need a "Skywalker," we don't need some legend to guide us: we have that power to do the right thing inside all of us all along.

cue Rey, the nobody with tremendous abilities; the broom boy looking up at the stars in hope: these are the people that will take on the mantle of Skywalker/Jedi to defeat the ultimate characterization of pride and evil: Kylo Ren.

i am convinced that Ben Solo is the end-all-be-all bad guy, that he will go down spitting and hissing, and that Rey will find other Force sensitive "nobodies" with which to proclaim together, "we are all Luke Skywalker." (via that one book about Luke's various legends and, to a lesser extent, the final scenes of TLJ)

 

JJ has a hard task.

In some ways Ben Solo has to be redeemed. Turn back to the light or all of the saga is too convoluted in its messages.

But I don’t see how or what would make him return to the light. And if he did, then what would the galaxy think of him anyway.

I think for him to turn to the light the first thing he must do is ditch the first order and go looking for Rey. She is literally his only link to the light at the moment. So that would be essential. At this point I can only see her wanting to kill him, and without another enemy force to unite them I can’t see them ever teaming up.

I would not want to be JJ in this situation and be responsible for making this new film satisfactory for the audience.

 

I think yes. I think there'll be more from Snoke in Episode 9. Not quite sure how, either he was a force projection of someone else, or he was able to transfer himself into another body, something along those lines. I think, in the end, it's going to be Kylo and Rey facing down Snoke/whoever the real big bad is. I'm probably wrong on that, and it's probably wishful thinking, because I just don't find a battle between Kylo and Rey to be all that interesting as the main plot point for the climax of this Trilogy. They both seem so young, inexperienced, non-threatening etc (yes Kylo killed Han, but he's not menacing in the way Palpatine was, for example). I'm not sure how seriously I can take Kylo being the main big bad, even though I love the character, and Rey, yeah she's fine and inexperienced in much the same way Luke was in the OT, but again, no training blah blah etc etc, I just think all the amazing things she will inevitably be able to do in the next movie are going to fall a little flat for me.

 

The subject line and poll question are two different things - Is Ben redeemable vs will he be redeemed?

The question of "Is Ben redeemable" is going to depend on your philosophy in life. I personally believe everyone is redeemable, though there are consequences for our actions. So I think it is technically possible that they could have Ben change his ways and redeem himself, though I imagine he would live the rest of his life as an exile and pariah. I don't see how they could include him in a buddy shot of all the heroes at the end of Ep 9.

But will they redeem him? For story reasons probably not. Who else could be the bad guy now? The only possibility I see now are the Knights of Ren, whoever they are. But really Ep 9 will have the most emotional impact if it's a Rey vs Kylo showdown. Trying to bring in some bad guy out of no where is just not going to work.

 

Yes, he is. I've already expressed it, but let me repeat: if he ends up being the ultimate villain, I'm going to be extremely disappointed, which could potentially ruin the trilogy for me. It would make Han's death completely pointless, Luke's failure as a master more tragic than it needs to be (it already is) and too dark of an end for the Skywalker lineage. Yes, we're moving past their story, sure. But to me finishing it on that note would be quite disrespectful to the whole Saga (RotJ in particular).

A bitter conclusion for Ben is enough. He doesn't have to be the ultimate hero in IX. He just needs to see through his mistakes. This way Kylo Ren may die (your ultimate villain, if you will) but Ben Solo can live on in exile. His deeds will haunt him for the rest of his life even if he turns, so there's no perfect happy ending for him. And that's enough for me.

The fact that Snoke is gone can play into that. I mean, Snoke was the main force dragging him down. Now there is only Kylo and his conflict. It's 50/50.