SPECULATION REY: "I'm no one." Odysseus said the same thing to the Cyclops Polyphemus in the ODYSSEY

No no dude, it's right on topic of the Cyclops imagery and what it means. I really love you posted on that. It's what the thread is for. And yeah, "A Jedi Knight? ... delusions of grandeur." Yep! The whole theme of vision, seeing, sight, perspectives and interpretation are totally in line with the overall theme of dark side / light side and what can be viewed and what cannot. Blindness and vision, darkness and illumination are central to Star Wars.

 

So Emily Dickinson is saying Rey and Kylo are twins...

 

Agreed

 

Bingo. Potentially prescient comment. If she does use the line to escape from something...captivity perhaps...which could be Jakku itself, FO imprisonment, interrogation, eluding her destiny of becoming a Jedi or Knight of Ren, or even just to opt-out of Groupon emails, then that'll be a full parallel to The Odyssey. I can tell you, though, I'll be looking for this potential parallel when I watch the film.

--- Double Post Merged, Oct 29, 2015, Original Post Date: Oct 29, 2015 ---

One of the few cyclops-like characters in the OT:

 

Here's more evidence that strongly supports the Cyclops theory. This is the very early concept drawn May 11, 2013 (according to the date tag on the bottom left of the painting)—and it's the earliest concept art that I know of that's been released. It shows a concept of Kylo Ren holding up a red Wampa claw lightsaber above his head, clearly wearing this helmet that looks like a single eye. It was leaked by IndieRevolver on April 19, 2015.


A month prior to that concept leak on March 21, 2015, Jason Ward at MakingStarWars.net actually wrote an entire article describing the same image he was shown but told not to release. He described the face of the helmet being strongly inspired by what he saw as the CBS logo, which is essentially a logo depicting an all-seeing eye.


I personally feel that Jason's characterization of the art was very apropos. In fact, it was probably the best possible description of an image he saw but couldn't share at the time. He's done this with a lot of other concept pieces and has been a great service to fans who care about these types of details to learn about the process. Both Jason's story and the IndieRevolver story reference how the helmet concept was realized by artist Glyn Dillon.

It's certainly worth noting that the CBS "Eye" logo itself has a very interesting story behind it in a short documentary. See the Youtube link here:

Although that helmet design was ultimately discarded for Kylo Ren in favor of a more "Darth Vader"-esque inspired helmet, we know it was liked by JJ Abrams, so much, in fact, that JJ decided to use that design for other characters that we now know are used in the film: the Guavian Enforcers.

 

It's actually important to clarify this Guavian Enforcer image above is actually a photograph of the toy action figure packaging and the toy itself, with a good concept design on the left with close-up of the helmet and the actual toy encased in clear plastic on the right. It's also interesting that the full name of the characters in the official StarWars.com databank description is "Guavian Death Gang Enforcers." But the toy action figure packaging only uses the title "Guavian Enforcer," likely because parents and kids might be discouraged from buying a product that says "Death Gang" on it. A simple "Guavian Enforcer" is more neutral and less ... well ... violent. Not only might sales be impacted, but it might've been a larger criticism that they're expressly using the words "death gang" to sell a toy action figure aimed at a child audience (although we know many adults collect action figures). Disney would've gotten A LOT of heat for that.

 

Actually, there other possibilities. The possibilities you raise could be classified as character motives or intentions that may be viewed as metaphorical correlations to Odysseus from Homer's Odyssey, a hero finding his way home to family. But there are other literal possibilities of scenes that could mirror to some degree Odysseus' hostage situation with the Cyclops Polyphemus. In fact, some of these have been speculated by a few other people earlier in this thread on pages 2 and 3. Essentially, that line "I'm no one" might be a literal way for her to get out of trouble in TFA in some scene. I said this earlier as a reply to another poster after he basically convinced me this could be a possibility:

"It totally makes sense she would say "I'm no one" during the interrogation sequence...like she would be agreeing with Kylo that 'Hell yeah dude, I'm just a scavenger. I'm no one. A nobody. Why make a big stink over me? This droid kept following me and I tried to sell it, then you guys tried to kill me so I ran. Duh!'"
​

If she's being interrogated by the Cyclops Kylo (and an alternate spelling "Cylo," a non-US individual on some other post used this spelling from his native translation, a spelling that is one letter short of "Cylon"; Cylo itself means "circular," like a big circular eye. ) ...if she's being interrogated by Kylo and she is able to divert his attention or something to escape cleverly, then we can say the literal parallel to the Odyssey is there. In fact, to those of us who have discussed it here, it'll be totally obvious. But I bet you anything the general public won't have a clue that kind of reference is there.

I can't help but wonder if JJ actually will make such an obvious reference to the Odyssey, since originality is a chief objective for contemporary filmmakers. They don't want to borrow too much from any one source for inspiration for fear of being called unoriginal. But if it does happen, we can likely expect other scenarios that loosely hearkens back to some element of Greek/Roman mythology. Not only that, but we'll know with certainty that by including such a sequence mirroring myth that JJ Abrams was giving lip service to not only Homer and the other great classical poets, but to sophisticated contemporary artists and filmmakers and future artists and filmmakers/storytellers-to-be (we might be them) and any sophisticated viewer who more deeply and cerebrally contemplates the intention and message and inspiration of the filmmaker beyond the surface alone, possibly including Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

He's speaking to anyone who can see this connection, and if he didn't directly intend for the connection to be seen, still constructed the story to allow for anyone to project a variety of potential meanings. He's already done that with the trailer, hence my original post. It's something he planned for and expected. In fact, JJ revealed the following insight earlier this week (Mon, Oct 26) in an interview with Extra:

"I'm always interested in seeing people's theories ... You want people to be debating things even before the movie comes out. It's a dream." ​

You can tell he's not merely trying to generate buzz for the film to translate into revenue, but to genuinely facilitate a more intimate cerebral engagement, probably hoping to ignite our imaginations and, with as much ingenuity he's able, find a way that makes a lasting impression. It's his job. In fact, he's trying to do such a good job so he can at least touch the bar set by his predecessors, to follow in the footsteps of the previous storytellers of the Star Wars Universe: George Lucas, Kershner, Kasdan and Marquand; with the tantalizing realization that, if he does it right, he could surpass their achievements, particularly with the original trilogy. His aim is to create an original, contemporary film, a work of art that is set apart from not only other films, but sufficiently different from all other Star Wars films, to create a story that genuinely engages our minds and hearts, a film that truly earns its stripes, potentially laying claim to a historical legacy in society's long-term memory and, just possibly, to actually achieve it. To create a work that becomes, for all intents and purposes, enduring magic.

 

Thank you! To answer your question, yes, I've previously noted the comparison on Reddit starwarsspeculation 16 days ago (can be seen in my Reddit comment history). I knew it referred to Hamlet holding Yorick's skull here.

It's from Hamlet Act 5, scene 1, 179–188, with Hamlet holding Yorick's skull!

First Clown: A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! 'a pour'd a flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was, sir, Yorick's skull, the King's jester.

Hamlet: This? [Takes the skull]

First Clown: E'en that.

Hamlet: Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a thousand times, and now how abhorr'd in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it.​

All that this passage tells us is the fondness Hamlet has for Yorick and that he possibly wants to avenge his death. That's it.

The image above brings to mind the possibilities presented by the early theory proposed nearly a year ago (Oct 2014), that Luke is the cyborg holding Vader's helmet in the concept art. On the face of it, that's what these superficial details might suggest. I'm not yet convinced. And the whole Luke-being-evil theory has been vigorously fought by many in the past week. I lean towards him not turning because it would negate the payoff in the OT, but I'm also open-minded.

And yes, I've noticed the podium that Vader's melted mask is placed on is triangular. A triangle is a VERY prominent shape used in TFA. It's directly on Vader's mask. The area covering the mouth is a triangle. I think that's what all other triangular design elements is hearkening back to. From Kylo Ren's command shuttle to the Finalizer's wide hallways. It's a consistent design element in the First Order. And a triangle is 3 points...well, Kylo's long saber is three-pronged. I've also made the correlation of Poseidon's Trident earlier in the thread...which the Cyclopes created, along with the Hades' Helmet of Invisibility and the Thunderbolt of Zeus. I hope you read that post earlier.