Rey's Identity - A Clue from George Lucas' Life?

I highly doubt he adopted them when they were 19 years old.

You adopt kids not adults.

 

I don't think it's as much about adoption as much as those who take on our legacies are not limited to blood.

Rey can be a spiritual successor to Luke without him being a father. The demand that she be his daughter is from fans (many of whom mistake bloodline as the only way to pass on the power of the Force). "You have that power too." versus, "my daughter has it."

 

I think this theory makes a lot of sense.

--- Double Post Merged, Jun 10, 2017, Original Post Date: Jun 10, 2017 ---

Maybe Rey will choose to take on the surname Skywalker at some point.

 

In the next trilogy we'll meet Finn and Rey's baby Han Skywalker.

 

Not true. While I'm not particularly well versed in current US adoption laws (and I take it on blind statistical probabilitythat you're an American since most members of this forum are, but of course I could be wrong, in which case I appologice for the confusion), but I don't think there are many adoption laws out there that prevent people from adopting adults; in Japan (IIRC) it's even a convenient way for gay people to get around a gay marriage ban wherein the two same-sexers can adopt each other to start a family (this as "exploiting" a loophole in an ancient adoption tradition). And then there are the presidences from Ancient Rome where adoption was all the rage; there, Gaius Octavian aka Augustus was addopted by Julius Ceasar in the latters will at age 19 (i.e. Augustus' age), which, unless I'm mistaken, is exactly Rey's age. In fact, the office of Emperorhood of Rome passed to 10 people through adoption during the first 200 years after Julius Ceasar (adoption didn't account for ALL imperial successions, but they account for quite a fair number of them). What I am trying to establish here is that there is no reason why Rey couldn't be adopted, figuratively or even legally, by Luke Skywalker.

That, and the thing about Jedi not dealing in absolutes...

 

This maybe a bit off topic, but I have to give credit for GL for being such a devoted fathher. For all the criticisms he shares( I am not taking those away. They are all valid), the fact he remained committed to his children is admirable. Especially, given his divorce and the challenges of being a movie star and maintaining family lives. So yeah, I give props to GL.

That said, if this is true, honestly; I wouldn't mind. It would be so derivative and unsafe for Rey to be Luke's biological daughter. For granted, Rian I trust could make this work due to his fantastic work at developing characters(I do believe this is going to be a very character-driven movie in the vein of ESB, but that is all it will share).

But I think it would be a powerful statement that Rey adopting Luke's legacy by proving herself. And not being a blood relation. Because, in many ways, it would a nice juxtaposition of Kylo Ren, a Skywalker who ultimately fell. And maybe, Luke's solution to stopping the FO and Kylo is someone outside of that loop. I understand this is all conjecture, but I'd love for Rey(on top of getting some better character development. That matters) to be like Luke in the sense that she has to prove herself and work as hard to eventually earn that trust from Luke of being his successor. Assuming the movie goes down that route.

Overall, this was a great theory. I'm not the biggest fans of theories, but I do love for the sake of how authors and their lives often intersect when it comes to their craft.

 

Hmm, that's a clever take. I never was a fan of the "adopted Rey" theory, but this makes it more interesting, to me.

 

The only person claiming they tossed his treatments, etc is GL. But aside from that it's pretty obvious all along that she is no one and will be grafted in and was chosen by the force.

 

Great post. I think calling attention to the fact that GL has adopted children is a legit insight. We've heard filmmakers talk about how they wanted to tell different stories after they had children, or to tell stories FOR their children, so I think it's highly plausible that the original framework centered on orphan-empowerment and family as something that you build rather than something you inherit.

My personal take is that Rey's story is a variation on Anakin's story: like him, she's parentless (tho an orphan rather than a virgin birth) who is chosen by the Force to be its living embodiment. In this way, she's the true heir of the Skywalker legacy, and I think this sets up an interesting conflict between the blood heir (Kylo) and the spiritual heir (Rey).

 

No, George Lucas himself said his story treatment included the grandchildren of Darth Vader. He said it shouldn't have been a secret because the EU previously did it as well.

[Quotes] George Lucas

George Lucas: “The original saga was about the father, the children, and the grandchildren. I mean, that’s not a secret, anyway, it’s even in the novels and everything. And then the children were in their 20s and everything and so it wasn’t [The] Phantom Menace again. […] I have no idea what they are doing.” (April 2015) “This time it’ll be very thrilling, because they’re doing kind of a different story, and so I don’t know what the story is. I don’t know anything about it.” (April 2015)

George Lucas: “J.J.. What happened to Darth Vader’s grandchildren?” (October 29, 2015)

George Lucas: “Well I’m curious about what happened to Darth Vader’s grandkids.” (November 18, 2015)

George Lucas: "I said all I want to do is tell a story of what happened… it started here and went there – it’s all about generations and it’s about the issues of fathers and sons and grandfathers and… it’s a family soap opera. It’s called a space opera but people don’t realize it’s actually a soap opera. And it’s all about family problems and that kind of [thing]." (November 19, 2015)

Lucasfilm omitted this fact from the Art of TFA book and squashed the publication of the Making of TFA book.

 

I don't really see any adoption angle being played out but thanks to the OP for the interesting quotes re where the storylines originally came from.

I've always found it quite funny, as far as TFA is concerned, that we have this amusing dichotomy whereby a large chunk of fans derided JJ & co for making a stylistically lazy rehash of ANH, whilst somehow believing that these same people had invested an inordinate amount of time in completely ripping up Lucas' original story to come up with something creatively different...

With that in mind, it becomes interesting to consider this:-

A playful clue from Mr Abrams perhaps? (Noting the word grandchildren)

 

True but there is a bio-grand child in play.

Also everyone likes to speak about Mickey killed the EU when previously the EU was never canon more like every changing always retconned rumors. Even on novels Lucas was consulted on he maintained that he would do it differently.

Lastly when Lucas' adopted childrrn have kids of their own do you really think he will not consider them his own.

 

* Fixed.

Yes, JJ and Lucas talked about Vader's grandchildREN. Kylo is not the only one... and they are (or will be) both REN.

 

Great food for thought - excellent post!

 

Very interesting thread, I had not thought of this before.