SPECULATION OFFICIAL Kylo Ren Discussion Thread

For the sake of the exercise, I tried to stay away from the motivational and judgemental side of things, and just look objectively at what Vader did that could be percieved as a demonstration of strength.

Moreso, the crux of it is, how was Vader stronger than Anikin? As it was Darth Vader he idolised, not Anikin, so I guess it could be surmised also that Kylo saw Anikin as weaker than Vader.

 

i think you're overthinking.
Kylo Ren is a bundle of fear and rage and grief.
he's trying to get his sh!t together.
that's what he wants strength for.

 

Ah, I see it more clearly now. Vader was a mass of fear, anger and grief too, so that's why Kylo relates so well to him. Vader turned his fear and rage into an asset through utilizing the dark side of the Force, and so Kylo seeks to turn his weaknesses into strengths also. Well, use what you've got in abundance, I guess.

So the thing that Vader started that Kylo will finish. I'm leaning towards it being to be bring order to the galaxy under Skywalker rule. I know Vader ostensibly turned to the dark side as he wanted to save Padme, but he was also thinking about bringing the Emperor down and ruling the galaxy before she died.

 

Kylo Ren is an completely missleaded idealist, loyal to is fixations and things he is convinced to be the right thing, a big problem, that all fantatics have in common. He thinks, by himself, all he has done already and has to do in future is part of a big quest to bring order to the chaos (like his grandpa thought). Perhaps one of Kylos endgoals is to find Luke and kill him, like Vader did with his old Jedi-Master (..as strong as Vader..), a test, even bigger than murdering his father.
How could the path to sorrow, guilt and anger overcome Ben? His parents just focused on themselfs and their own "important" stuff, did not see the need to be there for their very sensitive son, he was loneley, missunderstood in a world of corrupt politicians. I really can understand his "start up" setting (reminds me of my own childhood). There are different ways to handle this lack of positive familiy backhold, depending on your tempers and people you meet in teenage times. The better one would be, reflect about motives of your parents and yourself being depend on positive feedback that will never come (for ex. from your father) and accept that (metaphoric) "someone that has only learned to bake bread in live will never be able to give you a selfmade sausage". Means when your father is not able to show you his love with words or gestures, than accept that come over it and look for friendship outside the family to fill the emotional gaps.
Ren met Snoke at a point of his youth, where he was completely dissapointed and felt lost. A easy thing for a cruel old devil to posses him from beginning.
Typical family disaster with big affects because of the powers within this Skywalker-Solo Family.

Solution: Rey and Kylo get in trouble with Snoke at the end, Kylo saves her, Luke finishs Snoke.

 

since we don't know exactly what it is Kylo Ren thinks he's doing, we can't yet ascribe motive except in a general sense (or speculate about it all the live long day ~ hahaha). but it seems clear to me (from what we can see of the character's behavior) that the strength he's looking for is about courage and self-control and endurance.

this is how i see him too, @oldbert!
Snoke has given him what he needed as a child: support, guidance, something he's mistaken as love/affection/care even.
so of course he trusts the fishy-eyed toilet monster and whatever Snoke says.
because for all his powers, his worst character traits (insecurity, naivete, loneliness, desire to be special/loved) have made him vulnerable to the kind of predatory interests of a creature like Snoke.
and chances are Snoke crafted him that way to begin with for just that purpose.

 

@FN-3263827;
Ben trusted "the fishy-eyed toilet monster"?.. Hahahaha.. Great man. I am impressed what special pieces of your language you are able to present spontanouesly.. Hahaha! .

 

This is one of my favorite phrases from @FN-3263827 too! Very apt.

 

He is a bundle of fear and rage and tormented right now. Agree. I don't agree that is chief reason why he wants strength, or even that those things actually precede his desire for power (I think they happen as a result, not as a cause). It's not merely to get his $h!t together, having given it more thought I'm starting to think that Vader being lauded as the Chosen One is the power that Kylo wants... a pre-ordained destiny with galactic impacts that gives him purpose and a sense of identity that he didn't get though Han's and Leia's parenting. If he is the most powerful being in the galaxy he will be revered as he imagines Vader was (Vader was actually feared not revered but to someone aspiring to power they probably look the same).

Thus, merely being one of many Jedi in Luke's (emphasis on Luke's) Academy just wasn't enough for him... it was far too non-descript, too pedestrian, too devoid of the history changing relevance that he seeks and thinks should be his birthright by blood.

He has wrapped his identity around being powerful and he is afraid that he would never be viewed as the most powerful being of his time. A very easy point of hubris for Snoke to exploit. Neither Sith nor Jedi ever froze mass or energy the way Kylo has been taught, that might be all Snoke needed to teach him in order to convince him that he could make him the most powerful being ever.

 

he's still never going to get himself together without basic fortitude (which he knows he lacks more than power).

and i just don't see any evidence of him craving temporal power in TFA. the Knights of Ren are his only subjects and he's not even commanding them. his only title is "Ren". he technically has no authority over the ground troops, though nobody would countermand him. and the whole of the FO is, by design, not structured like the Empire ~ no one bows or salutes or kneels or calls anyone master.

like i said, i think he has more "noble" (and much more warped) aspirations.

 

Gotta disagree here.

In part because I think you have to ask the question, "Why do you think Kylo wears a mask that he does not need for survival?" They go through the trouble of introducing each one of the 3 main characters with a mask. And in each instance, the mask belies their true nature. Finn is not a born storm trooper, Rey is not a born scavenger, and Kylo is not a born Sith. The only difference between the 3 is their character trajectory. Finn and Rey are quick to dispose of their masks while Kylo is trying to find identity in his. The mask, Rey's discovery that he was afraid he would never be as strong as Vader, Kylo promising to finish what Vader started... all of that points towards a desire to be seen as powerful (imo).

Also, he doesn't need subjects to be the most powerful being in the galaxy. Darth Vader, the man he admires, was never emperor and therefore never had subjects either, but people feared him more than anyone else.

 

well i agree he wears the helmet because he needs to demonstrate authority (and be intimidating) ~
because we all know he looks like a sad lamb without it.
and yeah, in thematic terms, everyone casts off their masks and he's the least successful at it (though he does actually try).
and here's the thing: the mask is power, but more importantly it's his place of hiding.
he's used it to create the persona of Kylo Ren to help him separate himself from Ben.
because Ben was weak and foolish like his father.
and he's not referring to physical or authoritative power when he says that about Han.
he's talking about sentimentality/compassion/basic human foibles.

we might see him come back in viii with actual ambition for power, but his whole trajectory in TFA is about quelling his inner conflict, struggling with his lack of self-control, failing spectacularly at attempting to exercise agency.
when he begs Vader for help, he's not asking for a power hand-me-down, he's asking for encouragement.

none of which is about acquiring power in the sense that, say, Hux is so clearly after.

we both agree he believes he's got a destiny/job to do in the universe.
you think that job has to do with Vader's acquisition of power/rule/superiority.
i think he's more idealistic than that--i think that's how Snoke's managed to brainwash him.

and again, maybe this is all just way more obvious in the novel because he talks so bloody much about it in there ~ hahaha

 

I think this ^^ is what you meant to say. (Joking, of course!) But I can't get over some of the deadly dull soliloquies ADF has Kylo Ren making in the novel. Poor Mitaka would probably rather have been Force-choked than compelled to listen to him monologue!

Sorry for the interruption. *static* We will now rejoin the discussion already in progress.

 

hahaha ~ that exact one to Mitaka was one i had in mind, actually. he does wax rather rhapsodic, doesn't he?

 

--- Double Post Merged, Apr 26, 2016, Original Post Date: Apr 26, 2016 ---

Did not even read what this guy wrote but quoted him anyway just to say something, why you guys writes a about just to explain some philosophy about Kylo Ren food or something?

Heres a song, Thr Kylo Ren Song,

 

Kylo Ren can never become a Sith because there aren't any around to train him. Snoke probably knows the way of the Sith but he isn't one himself. Sidious and Vader were the last of the Sith as far as we know but it's possible that there's a Sith out that has yet to be discovered.

 

He has his mask on at the time, so it's impossible to know what he's thinking, but what do we imagine was going through Kylo's mind as he watched the Star Killer round fired at the Hosnian system go flying past? Was he conflicted? Was he still feeling the pull to the light? What do we think?

 

the two things that come to mind are:

• definite conflict; he's going to swallow this because Snoke approved it, but he's not actually cool with it.
• he's bracing himself for a kick to the groin when all those billions of voices suddenly cry out in terror, and are suddenly silenced ('cuz he's likely gonna feel it and it ain't gonna feel great).

 

It's weird because as I watched the scene a couple times again, even though we can't see his face, the music seemed to suggest (to me) that he was unsettled with it. Like he's not crying underneath the mask, but the resolve isn't there, the certainty in what's being done isn't there, the unwavering belief in all that the First Order does to restore order... doesn't seem like it's there.

I don't think that necessarily makes him a good guy (again, he isn't stopping it from happening) but he doesn't seem indoctrinated here.

On the flip side, Vader seemed to do just fine with the destruction of Alderaan, and we know there was still good in him. But he is more disciplined and resolute at this point than Kylo. I'm not sure if Kylo even knows to brace himself for that sudden clamor and then silence through the Force.

 

it's the music too ~ it's rather melancholy.
i dunno about the indoctrination. he still seems to be on some other track with Snoke specifically vs. what the FO is up to, so i can see him just tolerating this as a necessary piece of a larger puzzle. and by tolerating, i guess i mean not fighting it.
he puts up a slightly bigger fight the second time they threaten to shoot it off, but even then, he seems to sort of founder.

 

If the Sith were not all destroyed when Vader killed Sid, and then died himself, then it sorta cheapons the Prophecy about the Chosen one destroying the Sith, and thus the permise of the first six movies.

If there were Sith existing anywhere at that point in time, then it calls into question the validity of the prophecy, which invalidates Anakin as the Chosen One. So for that reason, I don't think there were any other Sith around at that point.

The grey areas come into it in that this doesn't mean that there weren't former Sith around at that time, and I guess even though they were no Sith at that point, you could possibly have them come back into existance after that point. I don't see that as being very likely though. It would be hard to do well, and really why would you bother? They were top notch evil villans, but they got owned.

I tend to think the Sith are extinct, and we'll get a new brand of dark side baddies going forward. Have to admit, it will be a challenge to top the Sith, but I have faith it will be done.

So yeah, agree Kylo will never be Sith.