SPECULATION Romance - who falls for who in VIII?

we can agree to disagree on that. i believe if someone is incapable of understanding that their action is evil, then it's not evil. you have to have malice and i don't believe Ren Ben acted with malice. he asked for help and permission and expressed gratitude.

would not hold up in a court of law. let's see if we get more information from TLJ.

no, that's not what i'm saying. would the scene have gone different if Snoke asked Ren to pull the trigger? quite possibly. i'm not denying he's an accomplice, but we know he's conflicted and did not approve of firing Starkiller.
also, this is the most helpless kid in the galaxy; he hasn't an ounce of agency except what little he expresses outside of Snoke's agenda, and even that is burdened by a "destiny" he thinks he must live up to.

falling in love with a murderer who earnestly rebukes his past and wants to atone for his sins is.
no one is saying Rey will love Kylo Ren.

 

Why did Luke leave his friends to fight the FO when he could've turned the tide? Why is Luke proclaiming the same ideas as Kylo Ren?
We don't yet fully know what Ren's motive is - or rather, why he needs the strength he is after.
It strikes me that if he thought killing his father would help him get this strength to do something like "bring peace to the galaxy", then you have to stop and think for a second. Especially as he has been manipulated, perhaps from birth, and then told he was the chosen one by Luke - whilst feeling abandoned and lied to by his parents.

 

FWIW, I have said before that I fully believe that he will be redeemed and that he will atone at least for a part of what he has done and that he will end this trilogy fighting for good as Ben Solo. There is just nothing in me that believes that could branch out into a romance with Rey. There are too many good men she would have to friendzone in lieu of the known murderer of the bunch if they are going to romantically pair her with someone.

 

That's not how love works!

 

i get that you're on the redemption train and that's great (really!), but what you express here is exactly why this story could be so epic.
a lot of people are saying, well, fine, Ben can be redeemed, but he's tarnished forever.

that's not how it works (i see @master_shaitan just said that too ~ ha!).

the whole problem with Ben is that he's broken. if he comes back to the Light to only be told: well, that's great kid, but you're still broken and guess what, there's no fixing you--ever, then what's the point?

the power of forgiveness needs to be greater than the power of brokenness. that's heroism.

 

It's almost alarming how much you are willing to twist this.

Not even including what I have already mentioned many times, we have moments like this:

Kylo Ren: Look how old you've become.
Lor San Tekka: Something far worse has happened to you.
Kylo Ren: You know what I've come for.
Lor San Tekka: I know where you come from, before you called yourself "Kylo Ren".
Kylo Ren: The map to Skywalker. We know you found it. And now you're going to give it to the First Order.
Lor San Tekka: The First Order rose from the Dark Side. You did not.
Kylo Ren: I'll show you the Dark Side.
Lor San Tekka: You may try. But you cannot the truth that is your family.
Kylo Ren: You're so right.

Then he cuts him down and orders the village to be massacred. Those are not the actions of a man with peace on his mind.

 

BIG YAWNS.... ŹZZZZZZZZZ

 

I contend that the love required for forgiveness and the love required for romance are quite different. If a drunk driver plows down my family and kills them all, I could surely forgive her. But to then turn and become romantically involved with that same person would be absolutely absurd. If that story showed up on the news there is no way anyone would say "Wow, that's heroic.". The running consensus would be that I was absolutely crazy.

 

Sure, but I don’t think anyone’s forgiveness is what will redeem Ben and his actions.

Only he and his actions can redeem himself, accepting where he’s made mistakes in the past and deciding to better himself for the future.

As for being not tarnished forever, redemption has little-to-nothing to do with fixing that. His actions can’t be undone. The galaxy can say what it wants, but Ben will always carry around the ghost of murdering his father with him, and rightly so.

Only he can fix his broken self.

 

I will add that I am not 100% against a Rey and Kylo thing. It would take a lot of work in the storytelling for it to work for me, but it's not impossible. I mean, we do have Revan/Bastilla (not canon, I know) and Revan did some absolutely horrible things as well.

 

He is embracing the Dark Side - he is following Snoke's instructions because he believes that will give him the strength to do what he believes is right. That's Ren's character throughout TFA - playing "the bad guy" but not actually being bad. And he knows it.

--- Double Post Merged, Nov 27, 2017, Original Post Date: Nov 27, 2017 ---

Exactly. And no one kicked off about that. Everyone has based their views off of TFA. I'd recommend seeing what he does in TLJ and having a better look at his past before we condemn him to hell for an eternity.

 

the more out of the realm of expectation, the more heroic. what can i say? holocaust survivors who forgive nazis aren't crazy.
they are paradigms of the power of forgiveness.
has a survivor ever married an SS officer? i didn't actually have to look far:

http://www.ldsliving.com/How-a-Nazi...vivor-Found-Each-Other-and-the-Church/s/76639​

i didn't say that. have never said that.
in fact, i keep saying the opposite: Ben needs to get his shoebuttons together before he and Rey could even hope to think of sharing a life.

 

Except that a naive young man who was all-but conscripted into the Nazi regime is not exactly a great example of what you are trying to convey. This young man is guilty by uniform, not by his actions.

"In distant Norway, when news of war between England and Germany came, Gustav Palm felt it was far away and cared little about it. But when Germany invaded Norway, Gustav, with little political knowledge and no one to turn to for advice, decided to join the National Socialist Party, which he found full of bold ideas and ambitious members.

In 1941, Gustav was offered a job as a traffic policeman in the city, where he was confused to be put through harsh military training. However, Gustav’s first assignment in 1942 was not as a traffic policeman, but as a guard at the newly opened Berg prison camp. He quickly realized, “We, as guards, were also prisoners, even though technically we had our freedom. None of us had voluntarily sought the task we were tricked into. The Nazism I had been in contact with so far was not at all what I had imagined it to be. I had simply been very naïve. I was now fully convinced that the organization to which I belonged was wrong.”​

 

I was referring to your last point in particular (the power of forgiveness must be greater than the power of brokenness), which didn’t seem too clear given the context of you’d been talking about prior.

I’ve read it again and I know what you mean

 

Familial love and reunion wasn't enough to cure the galaxy in the OT. It brought balance which was the starting point towards peace but what is needed is so much bigger. This can playout through Rey and Ren. Ren represents the Skywalker family and those who serve the dark side. Rey represents the rest of the galaxy and those who serve the light side. By coming together the conflict can truly end.

--- Double Post Merged, Nov 27, 2017, Original Post Date: Nov 27, 2017 ---

There doesn't need to be real life examples. This is a fantasy story. Anakin was redeemed and loved by his son despite being the go to representation for evil. At the end he floats off into the netherworld of the Force with his old pals. It would be hard to find a real life example of this. It's the metaphor that counts.

ReyLo = forgiveness, pure compassion and unconditional love.

 

That is why I believe that he will be redeemed at least personally. He was the antithesis of the old Jedi. While they fought hard to resist the dark, he had to fight hard to resist the light. I do like that about his character. What I don't like are his deeds and there is an incredible level of evil deeds that needs atoning from.

As I said, I am not 100% against it. I would say that I am at least 95% against it though lol. They could sell me with a good story.

 

That’s an interesting perspective, but I don’t think that they would have to necessarily end up in a romantic relationship for this to be achieved. They can come together and accept one another as friends and this could still be achieved.

Out of interest, if TLJ doesn’t make a strong case for Rey and Kylo becoming romantically involved, and their relationship isn’t take in that direction in the film, will you continue to support ReyLo going into IX?

 

yeah, and Ben will also be fully convinced that the organization to which he belongs is wrong.
this man was a guard at a prison camp. he saw what was going on and it convinced him it was wrong, but still didn't walk away because he was "trapped".
Ben is in the exact same place. of course Star Wars is waaaay more dramatic with Ben all lightsaber and everything--because he's actually brainwashed whereas this guy seems to have shaken it off (like Finn) pretty quick. but we're just quibbling about degrees, which is irrelevant to redemption.

my point in sharing the article is that i'm sure a lot of people thought: you're a Jew, how can you marry a Nazi??? you're crazy. but they fell in love anyway because forgiveness and healing is powerful. powerful enough for Luke to be willing to forgive his very very evil father without his father even asking for it.

 

Absolutely. Though romance is more appealing to 12 yr old girls.

Depends on the extent of "[their] relationship isn’t taken in that direction in the film", I guess.
But for me, ReyLo will likely happen to some extent (even if it is just one way) and the only that would stop it in TLJ is Rey Skywalker.

 

a new Adam and Eve in the garden of the Force? ; D