Rey is more powerful than the Chosen One, his offspring, any dark side user, everyone

In my playthroughs Bastilla was running in underwear all the time. When I was an early teenager.......lovely times.

 

Always put the dumb headgear on Carth.

Always.

 

You're right. A Star Wars ST discussion board is certainly not the place to defend the protagonist of the ST. What were we thinking?

 

She's really not that strong. Kylo is just a weakling.

 

One more time, in TLJ Rey isn't a Mary Sue, and this is why:

1. Rey needs a male character (Kylo and Luke) to "show me my place in all this"
2. Rey's knowledge about the Force is ridiculed on several occassions by male characters (Luke, three times)
3. Rey needs knowledge digressed by a male authority to save the resistance (rock moving skills)
4. Rey foolishly neglects to heed the warnings of a male character with destructive consequences (Rey goes after Ben, against the advice of Luke)
5. Rey's powers are shown to be insignificant in comparison to another male character (Snoke), she's depicted as trapped and enthralled and the powerful male character literally reads her mind. She has lost all agency.
6. Rey needs a male protector to save her from the overwhelming power of another male character (Kylo kills Snoke, saves Rey)
7. Rey isn't immediately liked by all the male characters in the narrative (most prominently Luke, and in extension Snoke who is prepared to cast her aside)
8. Rey is depicted as aknowledging that something on which she had authoritative skill and knowledge in the previous film is done better by a male character in the next one(Rey does not fly the Falcon (Chewie), but takes quite literally the secondary gunner's position)
9. Rey cries on mutliple times and shows inherent emotional weakness. She is confused and is even forced by a male other to aknowledge a 'truth' about herself ("you know who your parents are, say it")
10. Rey aknowledges sexual tension in a scene with a male character (Kylo's shirtless scene: "[looks away] don't you have a gown or something")

 

Rey is ultimate tool of the will of the Force.

That is her definition in upcoming TLJ novel.

 

To this I would counter:

What is Rey not good at?
What is her character flaw?
What is/are her major defeats?
Does she exercise power and skill beyond what's been traditionally seen (even in using the Force)?

I think you really have to reach to provide answers that don't immediately lend themselves to the Mary Sue trope. There's nothing she's been shown to struggle at, she was as good a gunner as she was a pilot. She takes a shot on Crait that takes out 3 TIEs simultaneously... has anyone ever seen any other gunner do that in all the movies?

She makes mistakes but she has no character flaw beyond "believing in the good in others" and otherwise being naive to the SW galaxy. Oh, she has scowled at those she has been fighting... maybe that could be interpreted as Dark Side? But of course with the franchise pivoting towards balance how bad is having some Dark Side usage anymore? The closest she comes to suffering defeat is being immobilized by Kylo and Snoke, and one time being thrown against a tree. Obi Wan, Anakin, Luke, Finn, and Kylo all have been completely incapacitated by light saber injuries, maimed even. Rey has her arm grazed once in melee battle with energy weapons.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MarySue

She's exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her "flaws" are obviously meant to be endearing.

But you know what? I'm not here to twist yours or anybody else's arm. I'm really not. Feel free to continue to maintain the view that she isn't a Sue. I've made my peace with it. I tried to find ways that she wasn't a Sue, but she is, she absolutely a wish fulfillment character. Good at piloting, gunning, mechanical repairs, language, light saber battle, and force usage (most without training). Flaws that are endearing or otherwise non-existent. Struggles with no capabilities. If this isn't a Sue, what is?

 

I never understood why it friggen matters.
Let's say the label fits of Mary Sue.

My whole complaint over Luke when I was growing up was that he wasn't a Marty Stu.
He was supposed to be heroic and akin to say the Lone Ranger, Zoro, Flash Gordon, or any of the Flynn-esque-era dashing heros and he just wasn't.

So I was thrilled when Rey popped out and was capable and assertive all around.
At least my girls get the hero I didn't, but had wanted Luke to be.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

I felt the same way about Luke the first time I watched ANH. Fast forward a few years and I came to appreciate that Luke didn't immediately learn how to use a lightsaber and defeat Vader in Episode IV. SW would have fizzled and died had GL gone that way.

It doesn't bother me that much that Rey is a Mary Sue, as long as the story isn't compromised by it. It does take something away, but it doesn't in and of itself completely destroy the ST. There's more than enough of other stuff to add to her Mary Sue to do that (lol, sorry, I had to).

The debates raging on to defend her are humorous. Most every Mary Sue has their fandom who vouches they're not, so it's to be expected.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 26, 2018, Original Post Date: Feb 26, 2018 ---

In fairness... those characters were re-written in a way to support it and yet it still feels contrived. Hey, I'm happy you like the new trilogy. Some of us just won't ever. Call it head canon, call it 6 movies and idk how many hours of cartoons that built our understanding that we simply can't suspend our disbelief. Honestly though, go enjoy it. I just hope spin offs stay away from the Force if they'll keep up this new version of it.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 26, 2018 ---

Ben Solo doesn't have to be redeemable for it to be a Skywalker Saga. Luke's force ghost as a final salute would be enough for that, and of course Kylo's demise. Ends the Skywalker saga, and I'm pretty sure that's what we'll see.

 

Welcome to the beginning of the Reywalker Saga!

 

Yeah, I'm fine with Luke as he is now that Rey exists.
I just always had this slot of "Oh well" in Star Wars because there was no one who just straight kicked ass anywhere in it and those are my favorite heroes.
I don't mind if they fail and have struggles, but I really do get bored with crippled hero after crippled hero since it's so much the norm at this point.
Even Superman can't be permitted to just romp anymore...Superman!

It's great to have flawed heroes who struggle with capability, but at some point I'd like just a tad of a boost in pure heroes who have struggles about choices and not capabilities.

I like that about Rey. Rey's struggles are choice-based and not whether she is capable of doing something. There's more to explore this way.
If I had to watch another Luke-like hero, just female, who struggled to do the basics all over again I would have been quite bored.
I've seen that Star Wars hero already, so I don't really need to see that again and only get a capable hero for a 3rd of the story..ish.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

I'd have been on board had Rey entered TFA as a 25-30 yo force adept. Heck, even keep her age but make her Force adept (even self taught, but highly aware of her powers and practicing certain aspects of it for x number of years) already so it's not such a stretch that she can do what she does. The problem is they picked her up at the beginning of her story in regards to the Force.

 

The entire premise of the thread is incorrect. She's actually quite powerless in many ways. She has no political power, no capital, no assets and precious few allies.

Her force ability is raw and untamed and at times, even dangerous. She was easily seduced by Kylo to help him murder Snoke and have her take the blame for it. So in addition to no capital, allies or power, Rey is also now the most wanted person in the galaxy for a capital crime.

She's also confused and still very vulnerable to the dark side.

She's very fragile right now, in deep peril and without a lot of means to defend herself.

And if we must measure "power" like it's a slider on a character creation screen or insist it can be quantified and measured like liquid, then let's remember Luke made an impossible shot without computer aid in a vehicle he'd never flown before and saved the entire galaxy within mere hours of being liberated from his boyhood home. He also faced down the Emperor and Vader and WON...and did it with minimal tutelage and time. He also built his own light saber on his own with no direction on how to make one.

It's ridiculous to assume Luke could be measured against Rey on some kind of power grid. The Force is an abstract concept and it is often the Force itself, not the user of the Force that decides anyway, remember it not only obeys your commands, but it also partially controls you, it flows through you. Force users channel energy, they do not create it and so trying to measure "power" in different eras and circumstances requires you add multiple variables to truly measure it.

Darth Revan did amazing things with the Force, amazing but also in a whole different era and with technology no longer available when Luke blew up the Death Star. So how can one measure him in context? You can't.

Rey is a beautifully rendered character. A hero with a destiny, a hero with great ability, but she is NOT POWERFUL. It's actually her LACK of power and identity that drives her entire narrative. That's what makes her interesting.

 

That doesn't bother me in any way.
That's how I like my prophetic heroes.

Then their capability is not about them exclusively. They aren't really that great, as in a skill.
They are imbued with a power. That they can do things becomes irrelevant. That's not what their narrative will be about, thankfully.
It'll be about other things, but it won't be about what they can and cannot do because their abilities are not earned; they just exist.
All the hero has to do is adapt to the ability and control them; like John Carter's massive leaping ability.
He doesn't try to get to the point of doing that; he just can and has to learn, instead, to control it a little bit.

To me, that's actually far more interesting because the hero didn't ask for it; it happens to them and even if they try to reject it, they ultimately can't because it's beyond their control. What they have control over is choice - how they use their capability becomes the focus.

This, to me, is far more interesting.
Anyone can work hard and get better at something, so it's easy to imagine being someone who works at learning the Force.
This kind of hero is easily related to, and is an every-man style of hero. These are skill training based heroes.
They have limitations based on what they've learned and their maximization of their abilities. Basically variations of real-world martial arts.

On the other hand, someone just bestowed abilities is beyond relation. They are simply iconic and truly heroic in stature because no one can do what they are doing because they, as a sentient elective, aren't even doing it. They are, more or less, submitting to it, taken over by it, and attempting to survive as their self in spite of it.

The interesting narrative of Superman, for example, isn't that he can beat everything that he encounters, but instead that he has to try to hold on to an identity of self in spite of his heroic stature and the weight of responsibility to use his abilities which he didn't ask for, nor work towards developing. They just were because that's what he is.

Again, these are conduit style of heroes.
Rey is this; a conduit which so far in all showing has been more like a hose which water has been pressured up out of far outside of her control. She didn't ask for it; she rather much wanted just the opposite repeatedly, like most of these heroes.
Her struggle is choosing what to do with this "gift/burden" and to retain her self-identity in the midst of being taken over by an identity equated with her ability.

Ironically, she started off treating Luke exactly the same way; approaching Luke as if his ability was his identity. Luke was, to her, a utility. This is very much what he isn't interested in, and also what she is repeatedly trying to avoid being her self.


The cool thing with these heroes is that you get really awesome action scenes out of them quickly, and yet the heroes still have plenty of room to grow.

If they were romping all over the place because they worked on it, then they would be a grown and mature character who hasn't much room to grow. All that's really left is to just watch the events unfold.
But a prophetic hero doesn't have their own self figured out yet and their appointment with their ability becomes a catalyst to resolving their self identity issues.

Another great example of this is a somewhat light-hearted film, Kung-Fu Hustle.

That said, however, several Biblical heroes fall into this category as their abilities are bestowed upon them by a divine force (their god).
Samson isn't about how he gets strong, but instead about his ego in thinking that his ability is who he is, and having to learn humility and independence of identity from his bestowed ability.

Again, Rey is more along these lines.
Her story, to me, is far more fascinating because of it.
We now get to watch her try to come to terms with her ability happening unto her, and watch her try to uncover her self and retain her sense of self along the way.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

We've talked about this before and my issue with Rey will likely always be less Rey and more my understanding of the Force. I never perceived the Force as sentient or "god/God-like". To me the force was manna, and those in the know could tap into it. I think that's the issue with a lot of people who can't accept Rey or the ST.

It's not that I can't appreciate Superman and his dilemmas, but it's not SW and to me doesn't belong in the SW universe. I have no issue having already powerful characters in SW (Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan in the PT for example) as long as there's backstory or perceived explanation. To me, after 6 movies and many hours of cartoons that are canon, that's how this universe works, even for the Chosen one.

Heck, if Rey was an alien and that was an explanation as to why she learns so quickly I'd be okay with that too. Her species instinctively knows what her ancestors did and some ancestor was a force user. But again, that's not the narrative that we're given.

We're just told that she is and to accept it. No further explanation required and I can't follow that after everything else. If this were a new sci-fi, I'd most likely be on board, but not in SW. Not without reasoning. Not without the yellow sun giving her power, or a green lantern ring or a comet that mutates her. I need that bone, without it I can't suspend my disbelief.

Now quite possibly my definition of the Force is flawed, but I prefer my version of it over this one. I'm either too old, too stubborn or just too dumb to learn this new trick lol.

Thanks again for your take, as always it's enlightening.

 

I can see that.

To me, it works regardless if the Force is sentient or not.
To whip on Superman again, his abilities don't come from a sentient force either. He just has them by consequence of being his kind of body in the place that he is at.

The Force, to me, isn't really something I see exactly as sentient, but more like a force of universal nature that has a wax and waning periods, and this is the waxing phase.
To borrow the solar lingo, Fortia Maximum.
Folks are attuned, or not. Some are more attuned than others.
To me, it's like conductivity. For some things, you can work on making them more efficient at conducting a circuit, while other objects contain a make-up which is by default simply far more efficient at being electrically conductive than other materials. Equally, you also don't need to worry so much about the efficiency of that circuit the more you supply greater amplification (more or less...it's not exactly always the case considering engineering needs such as integrity, but meh).

Rey is like the gold wire to the Force in the middle of a Fortia Maximum period when the amplitude of the Force is greater than the Fortia Minimum period, so it just pours out and it's not something she's really needing to coax out of herself.

To me, it doesn't mean that the Force is picking and literally bestowing, but that someone is imbued with it like a charge.
From this perspective, it can be seen as either sentient or not and still result in the same net effect upon Rey.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

I think it's the second time we've conversed on the Force (and by extension Rey) and I find it funny it always seems to end all debate haha. Everyone leaves as we discuss our points, thoughts and opinions. I think you're theory/way of thinking is awesome, now if only RJ or JJ could have included 30 seconds of that explanation in the movie. I suppose one could argue that's what the title TFA implies, but it is rather vague.

If the only issue I had with TLJ was Rey and the Force, I could probably take your explanation and run with it and get some enjoyment out of TLJ (until they burst my bubble again and redefine the force in another way to switch things up). As much as Rey's use of the Force pulled me out of some of her scenes (not to mention Yoda's lightning), it's the mess of all the other issues that keeps me from enjoying it.

Still, next time I watch it I'll try to remember this definition and hopefully I get more out of it than I did the first time around.

PS: It's hilarious that people on both sides of the Mary Sue debate don't know how to respond to you. I love it lmao.

 

I get the gist that it's intentionally vague so that there's mysticism and interpretation.
I think the fun in that is that we each can design our own way of seeing things. It's able to be taken quite a few ways.
I have a hard time saying that anyone is right or wrong, with few exceptions, and equally I can't really say my view is it.
It's just my view.

I suppose I'm lucky. I don't have any problems with the film.
I've seen the issues folks have; none of them were issues for me, and the problems that I see outlined don't work as problems to me.

Cool!

HA!
Yeah, I tend to do that in just about anything I dig into (just the other day I talked with a hard-line Republican for about an hour and what started off with absolutely only one view ended with them softening to "I see what you mean; good points. I'll put a thumbtack in it"...I'm not a Democrat or Republican...I was just commenting on their ideas with my thoughts. The topic was the "winner-takes-all" rule in the electoral system and whether it functions well for the intention of representation).
Something about the way I see things, I suppose.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

The thing that seems weird to me is WHY she has to be this powerful. I mean how does it serve the story. There are tons of ways how a weak character can survive sticky situations without deus ex machina forcepowers. If this story had someone like Ahsoka Tano or Kanan in Rey's place how would the plot change? Rey is a nobody. Why not give her the power levels of a nobody. There is no need for her to be as powerful as she is.