SPECULATION OFFICIAL Kylo Ren Discussion Thread

true, that!

it's a very small flicker of hope ~ hahaha

it seems Snokie-poke is bent on making sure there are no new Jedi in the galaxy and Luke is the source. so yes, it stands to reason that by "destroyed" Ben pulled a grandpa on the whole affair. there would be no other way to sufficiently neutralize them unless there's something magical we don't know about.

i started out skeptical about this alleged "massacre" because it's so Order 66/let's kill younglings, which seems like an feh thing to want to repeat (though there's a strong chance the students weren't children if Kylo Ren wasn't either).
i also feel like Han and Leia's behavior is a bit curious with regard to this; if their son had killed Luke's students, you'd think Han would react with grief rather than anger when hearing Luke's name, or that it wouldn't be such a casual affair to tell Ben to just come home.
though i guess if Ben's betrayal was undertaken as Kylo Ren and with the other knights, i suppose it's easier to mitigate it than if he acted alone as Ben.

eh ~ i dunno. i'm looking forward to finding out the details.
or not. could be worse than i wanna know ~ hahaha

i don't put much stock in Hidalgo either. he's got biases like anyone else and he isn't afraid to express 'em!

 

This! I get the impression he's never been entirely stable, but that he's reeeeally starting to lose his $#!& in TFA. I mean, if you take just his first few scenes, he seems to have it together, everything's business as usual. And then, as you say, his dad gets mixed up in his plans, Rey arrives on the scene, etc. and Ren becomes distracted, his conflicted feelings get dredged up, he starts making dumb mistakes,... generally, he just unravels.

There's a possibility, isn't there, that we'll never see him that way - as a terrifying, in-control Vader figure - and perhaps by design? OK, how far you can follow me on this line of thinking depends on if you see redemption in Ren's future (and if so, how soon), but: I would suggest that the only way he can stabilize, and achieve his true power, is to turn back from the dark side, not further toward it. Again, this totally depends on how you see him.

The way I see him, he's hanging about where he doesn't truly belong. He's trying his damn'dest to be Dark Side Guy, but it isn't really his nature - which is why he's still, after all this time, struggling with Light/Dark conflict, and failing over and over again to expel that conflict. If he could just let go of his delusion, and stop trying to be Kylo Ren, then he could realize his potential. Anyway, that's me. You may not find ANY truth to that at all.

I'm starting to agree with... oh shoot, I forget who said it? @Obi-Wan Solo? That killing his own father, in this misguided quest for self-control, may in fact be the worst we see from him. Because it didn't work - we can all agree on that much, right?

 

I'm one of the few people who don't care to see a redemption arc for Kylo, but at the same time see the stars lining up for it to happen. I personally don't think (without serious character development) that I'll ever be able to see him as ruthless and methodically cold as Vader. I think you're right that he really isn't a bad guy by nature, he's trying to be and failing at every turn. It just doesn't appear to be in his nature (and why the light side continues to pull at him).

Wholeheartedly agree on the "slaying of the father" mistake. You can see it in his face, the relief he was expecting never came. You could see him doubting himself right there on that platform.

 

I don't know if this has already been posted but I thought everyone might enjoy this:

 

Hi everyone.

Sorry if this question has been posted/discussed before....but I have been wondering since Kylo Ren tries to communicate with Darth Vader hoping to get his guidance, how come Anakin's Force-ghost doesn't appear before him and just tell him that he has gone astray?

Kylo doesn't need any special Force training to be contacted by a Force-ghost as shown in ANH when Luke hears Obi-Wan's disembodied voice or in ESB when Luke sees Obi-Wan after getting caught in the snow storm and on Dagobah.

For me this is something that J.J and Co. might have overlooked in establishing the character and motive of Kylo Ren.

 

I'm sure others have thought about this in more detail but here's my take:

When Kylo is talking to Darth Vader's helmet and asking it to "show him the dark side" I believe he is referring to a vision that the helmet showed him when he first touched it. In the same way that Rey saw a sequence of events (most of them involving the lightsaber) when she touched Anakin's lightsaber. These artefacts aren't actually possessed by the spirits of their owners but hold memories of events they were involved with that can be accessed by those who have the ability/affinity: psychometry if you will. Vader's helmet would naturally possess a very powerful dark side aura and a lot of Vader's negative emotions/memories.

However, that still doesn't answer your question as to why some Force ghosts, Anakin in particular, didn't approach Kylo to put him on the right path and it's a difficult question to answer conclusively.

Perhaps FG only contact those who they knew in life, the person becomes their anchor to the material world? On the other hand, I think we have some examples of FGs in extra materials where FGs (both Sith and Jedi) have appeared before Force Users who they had never met before.

Perhaps FG fade away over time from the moment of their death until they can no longer appear? But then Qui Gonn wouldn't have been able to communicate with Yoda or Obi Wan years after his death (at least a decade after) and, again, I'm sure that extra materials have FG appearing many years after their death.

A better explanation could be that a person has to be willing to let these FG in, to communicate with them? If a FS is guarded and hostile then perhaps these FG cannot commune with them unless this person is willing to let them in. Maybe part of the "call to the light" that Kylo feels is actually the FG of Anakin (and others) trying to reach him but he is so corrupted by the DS and resisting that he can't hear or see them.

More importantly, I believe that even if Kylo was visited by the FG of Anakin it wouldn't do anything to change his mind. I'm sure someone told me that the novelisation of TFA revealed that Kylo knew Vader had redeemed himself before the end and that Kylo saw that as Vader's greatest failing. So I doubt that Kylo would take FG Anakin's advice on aboard, he'd probably start criticising him for being too weak to "finish what he started", so to speak.

 

Thanks for the feedback @JustPassingThrough.

Hopefully we'll get a definitive answer in Ep 8 or 9, or any future novels.

 

These are great observations. It does seem weird that no FG appeared in this movie, but then... we are just now seeing Luke. They could have been appearing to him helping him to get ready for the new confrontation ahead. How cool would it be to get one last Yoda FG appearance in the ST?

 

It's a good question, because no one really knows for sure.

My personal take is that Kylo Ren once had some kind of Dark-side vision, perhaps with some kind of power demonstration, that he thought was from Darth Vader--perhaps it was real in terms of residual Dark-side energy or something (related to relics like the helmet), but I think it was more likely something manipulated by Snoke, perhaps even when Kylo Ren was very young and Snoke first got his claws in him. But who knows?

As for the Force ghosts, I think perhaps they are a Light-side phenomenon only, and only Light-side users can see their manifestation. I would suppose Kylo Ren's use of the Dark side would eliminate the possibility that he could see or communicate with Anakin's ghost.

However, I personally wish Anakin would show up, smack some sense into Kylo Ren, and kick him toward the Light, but that's probably too much to hope for.

 

i wonder if his "original" vision came from Anakin's lightsaber (if he did indeed have it in his possession at one time--and that would mean it's spoken to both Rey and Ren). but since he lost it he's been trying to connect with Vader (or what he believes is Vader). and the helmet is a point of meditation, but doesn't have any actual anima because, as we know, Anakin is all Light side now.

i don't know that Ren would reject Anakin if he showed up (i'd really like to see that maybe happen). but i do agree that Anakin probably can't reach him right now because he's too mired in Snoke's Dark (and probably has been almost forever, so it's never been possible).

i hope that if they can nail his foot to the floor and get him to let the Light in, Anakin might be able to give him some useful advice to finish turning him around.

 

All my musings aside, the simple reason for the FG not appearing is that TPTB simply don't want to include them anymore because of the awkwardness of fitting them into the plot. I think it would be cool if the FGs do appear but not visibly, if that makes sense. Like if we just saw Luke seemingly talking to himself but he's actually communicating with Yoda and Obi Wan (and Anakin) but the audience (through the perception of other characters) thinks that Luke's gone crazy.

It's possible that Kylo saw a vision from Anakin's lightsaber but I assumed that it had been lost to the Skywalker family until Rey brings it to Luke at the end of TFA. I think it would make more sense if Kylo got his vision from Vader's helmet which is why he keeps it in a shrine and talks to it occasionally, begging for it to show him something again, to reaffirm his faith. It's why I think he says: "Show me again the power of the darkness".

I also think it's more poetic if Kylo and Rey have received visions from "relics" related to Vader and Anakin, respectively: One from his time as a Jedi and the other as a Sith. The different negative and positive energies influencing the people who interact with them.

 

possibly! and i like that idea of two relics from the two different sides (though i sorta question the lightsaber since Anakin used it for evil).
it could also raises the question again of whether the helmet periodically "talks" to him, or if it was a one-time-thing (and so why is it silent now?).
i'm curious to see whether they develop this further in viii. it's sorta peripheral stuff, but it's interesting!

 

Oh my goodness, this! I think you've nailed it (well, maybe not the appearance that Luke's off his rocker, haha) but -- THIS is how you bring in council from Jedi past without weirdly shoe-horning Force ghosts into the ST movies.

Sadly, I kinda don't expect LF to use such an elegant method -- but then again, R. Johnson is supposedly treating this more like an indie film. I can see him being down with this level of restraint.

 

I agree with @Choose Light that when Kylo says, "show me again the power of the darkside" (implying he's seen something before) it's probably a vision that Snoke made manifest. I don't think Anakin came to Kylo at all. Think about it, if Rey (who is not even a trained Jedi) could sense clearly that Kylo was afraid he'd never be as strong as Darth Vader, how much more would it be obvious to Snoke? It would be an easy task to manipulate him using what he knows is Kylo's fear (which presumably is a Dark Side characteristic... I say presumably because up to this point it's mostly been Sith, so I don't know if it's a Sith tradition or a Dark Side tradition because they have been mostly one and the same for thousands of years).

Of course if Snoke could speak to Kylo through objects such as Darth Vader's mask... I see no reason why Luke couldn't have been calling out to Rey through the Force and subsequently the Light Saber.

Speaking of which... is Anakin's Light Saber that unique that Kylo knows it as soon as he sees it?

Also another thing that's been bugging me... Kylo knew he had the best pilot in the entire Resistance in his possession. He is able to extract from him that BB-8 has the map. Why doesn't he kill him afterwards? What purpose did Poe serve alive for Kylo Ren after divulging that BB-8 had the map?

 

Maybe he did actually own it at one point, so he would recognize it.

"Sentiment" perhaps? (Poor Kylo Ren just can't get rid of that family weakness. ) Or maybe he just figured they could get more info out of him later. After all, they had to resort to tracking the recon. flight to find the location of the Resistance base.

 

@Rayjefury , @Choose Light :

i agree that it's strongly implied that Kylo Ren once had his hands on that lightsaber. hopefully we find out the deal with it in viii.

as for Poe, i have two completely crack theories on that:

• seeing as Poe's parents were friends of Leia's, Poe and Ben might have once known each other. so yeah, may be sentiment there.
• Ren does violence in the heat of things. after he's cooled off or when he's distracted about other stuff, he seems less bloodthirsty. the prisoners were ordered to be captured on Takodana--completely a whim since the droid was all they needed.

and then there's the fact that mind torture takes a lot out of you and he probably needed a nap. hahaha

the Poe torture scene makes almost no sense: letting Poe live, telling Hux to go fetch the droid.
it's pure exposition to introduce the characters and the scenario.
that doesn't really bother me personally. you can make up stuff in your head to explain it.

like Ren needed a nap and Poe actually was ordered to be executed, but the guard that was supposed to take him down ate too much Mexican food for lunch and got sidetracked and Finn arrived before he returned from the fresher.

 

Can anyone that has read the novelization tell us about the relationship between Lor San Taka and Kylo? It's something that get's overlooked in the shuffle that the First Order obviously knew who LST was and what he had, do he and Kylo have a past? Also considering how difficult it seemed to be for Finn to find a blaster just sitting around on Jakku when the First Order came after them, it was interesting to see how the "village" prepared so quickly for the First Order invasion. They had guns at the ready before the troop transport doors even opened. Very interesting

 

we don't get "more" information about LST or his relationship to Kylo Ren or the Organa-Solo family (obviously he was close to Leia from all sources).
the dynamic of their exchange is a little different.
LST actually seems to bait Ren into killing him after Ren repeatedly warns him to shut up.
in the movie Ren seems much more short-fused.

the defensive reaction of the villagers also feels directly like the reason Ren orders them shot--he considers them hostiles.

 

Yeah, Ren doesn't think about things before he acts .

 

KYLO REN: (I could mind-probe Lor for information!)
KYLO REN: (Nah, nevermind. Death it is!)