"You still want to kill me...." What does Kylo Ren mean?

Call me sick but I found that romantic, the way he swooped her up when she became unconscious and then carried her on board the ship... I definitely think there was a lot of sentiment in that gesture. He meant to come across as kind of heroic, especially if we concede that he may know by now that she is his uncle's daughter... It's like he wants to "settle this in private", without the meddling of his estranged mom and her Resistance...

 

Aren't first cousins fair game? I'm asking. Depends on the country I guess.

 

I was hoping they'd go for a global market in 2015 I mean, Star Wars gave us the kissing twins. America hasn't died because of that...

I'm not saying they'll end up a couple in the movie. It's kind of difficult to fall for a guy who ordered a village purged, stabbed his own father, and injured the girl's best friend. But from Kylo's point of view, I definitely got the feeling he was romantically attracted to Rey, and he couldn't have cared less if she was his cousin or not.

 

I didn't. I seems much more like people project their own thoughts/ideas onto things, rather than the movie doing anything to set that up. Plus, if she weren't a pretty young heroine, this debate wouldn't be happening. "Oh male villain, female hero, of course there has to be a romantic/sexual element to it." I have to ask, is that tired cliché REALLY the best that people can come up with? Cannot think of anything else that's more interesting?

 

This topic sure is a wandering path.

I think the TPTB also use the forrest scene where Kylo captures Rey to add some 'shades of grey' to the characters in order blur the lines between good and evil, and to prompt the audience to begin to question our own assumptions about the characters. For example, how good is Rey? She doesnt really know a lot about Kylo, but she shoots to kill. She is agressive and acts without consideration. How evil is Kylo? After all, as he points out, Rey shot first and he is forced to defend himself against her. Does a good person kill someone they know nothing about? As Kylo tries to get Rey to question her assumptions and ignorance about him and the FO, should we, the audience, also perhaps question our assumptions and ignorences? Have we made assuptumptions about Kylo and simplified something that may not so black and white and could more complicated than we yet know? Perhaps this makes us want to open our minds a bit, to enable us to question our points of view, and thus create a beachhead for a redemption or fallen hero arc? Are 'simple ignorences easily remedied?'


Also, by the wayside, I think Kylo is impressed and surprised at Rey's agression in the face of her fear and ignorance, about him, the FO and what they are about. He tries to get her to question this. He admires her spirit, but would like her to start to question her oppinion of him and the FO in order to worm his way into influencing her.
I think in the novel, the scene where Rey nearly sells BB8 to Unkar, also makes me want to question, for lack of a prettier turn of phrase, how good Rey and her motivations are. I rember the movie being a bit different, making her appear more compassionate, which I liked. In the novel, Rey switches BB8 off and the droid is reffered to as "just a quiescent piece of machinery, a spherical piece of junk". Also, it wasnt her compassion as such which prompted her to kepp BB, but she sensed in Unkar 'an eagerness that all but translated into triumph." She was stubborn, hated Unkar and didnt want him to triumph.

Anyways, stepping out of the mundane...

Does a hero use agression in the face of fear and ignorence, or do they try to keep an open mind and find a peaceful resolution? Is good and evil black and white, or is it more of a spectrum?

Also, never used the muliquote thingy before. Pretty sure I did it wrong.

 

After watching TFA several times, Ren's comment about her wanting to kill him...more & more I think he is convinced he is on the right side of things & hopes to persuade her to his point of view. I also think we need to remember he is strong w/ the force, but still a human male-hormones, physical temptations, & all! I believe he was clouded in his judgement w/ her because she was young, attractive, strong in the force, & a loner like him. I also got the sense he sees a potential mate, or at least a close friend who can finally understand him....

For goodness sake, his life must be lonely as hell. Who could've related to him on a personal level? I mean he talks to his grandfather's helmet!!

Of course that doesn't mean a friendship or romance will happen...just an interesting layer to the story.

Only my 2 cents. No worries if you don't agree

 

Well, about the pictures... Once again, that perfect hair just blindsides me. How much product, and how much effort, did they have to put into Adam Driver's hair to make it so...Disney Prince?


Aaaaanyway, it's Interesting that Daisy gives Adam credit for helping her "get there emotionally" when her audition was so amazing even without help.


John Boyega's comment is very insightful, and it reinforces not only Driver's statements about how Kylo sees himself, but also makes sense out of Kylo's surprised "You still want to kill me" and the "liars, thieves, and murderers you call friends." What in the world has Snoke fed into this kid's mind to twist him this much?

And perhaps more importantly, what was the Republic doing that Kylo "found out" about (no doubt filtered through Snoke) and made him think of them and the Resistance as "liars, thieves, and murderers." Even worse, how much were his parents involved with it?

 

This brings me back to Kylo and Starkiller. You'd think that if he hated the Republic, then he'd be at the pre-firing rally (even if he hates Hux too) when they get rid of the Republic capital. And yet, there he is on the Finalizer, as the tragic music plays...



Darn Light, darn worries about parents (those disappointments)...they're tearing him apart.

So now I have to wonder...

Could this be an expression of his relief that Han is alive but--as always with Kylo--in a chaotic mix with grief that he's going to have to kill him?

 

I also took the scene in this way, guess we're both crazy or maybe the story writers meant to make Rey even more mysterious with Kylo's behavior.

The only other way I could interpret it was if he thought she was his little sister. I could see a big brother doing something like that.

 

You all aren't crazy. The bridal carry is a pretty deeply coded Western cultural thing.

However, I spent the first two viewings convinced that Rey was Kylo's little sister until I realized--hey, that's a bridal carry, what's going on here???? (Guess I'm a little slow on the uptake ). Then I figured there was no way Disney was going to have these two be that closely related if anything romantic was implied (not after the Luke-Leia kissing debacle).

I do think it was full of feeling on Kylo's part (whether he is aware of it or not), but what makes is read creepy for me is that it's completely one-sided. And also, of course, Kylo is scary messed-up.

 

Thank you for posting those!
May I allow myself to fangirl a bit and say that Adam is just too pretty.

Back to the serious stuff. What Boyega says is interesting indeed. Especially the part that he think Kylo (in his delusion) beliefs that "what he’s doing is right and it’s true and good for the world"...The part about "true and good" is striking. The right part we knew, but that he thinks what he is making is good? (There is a nuance between "right" and "good" I should think). Of course we know it's delusional, but the intriguing underling thing that Boyega's statement suggests is that in his heart Kylo wants to be good, so it is the method that is wrong...

I agree that we are made to/we should question our black and white thinking and I really like that, although it does confuse, apparently, a large part of the audience who are too much used to think whatever a good character does is fine (even if it's wrong) and whatever a bad character does is always wrong. It is interesting that I have not seen anybody saying that if one thinks Han Solo is good for Leia then you support drug abuse (let's remember that Han Solo has smuggled drugs among other things), whereas in the case of Kylo we have all those people who are saying all sort of things...

For instance it is very interesting to me that there is hardly any talk about how easily Finn (betrayed) killed his former friends without as much as blinking an eye...Everyone commends him on breaking his conditioning and not killing those (strangers) villagers on Jakku, but I have not seen anybody questioning how disturbingly easily and without any moral dilemmas going on he quickly turned back on people he had known (the only people he had known!) and had personal relationships with...How easily it is glossed over that he rescued Poe not because he believed in the Resistance (as he himself admitted) the real reason was he needed a pilot to get out of there...

My question is, why do we condone and even appload mass murder if it is done by the "good guys" and when the bad guys are doing the killing, because they are on the wrong side the same act (murder) is suddenly different...My biggest problem with Finn as a character is that he really is a traitor and I'm disturbed with how he cheered on Poe shooting down the TIES as if that's a sport, and then he has zero moral trouble killing his former friends (not to mention that Poe killed his stormtrooper friend in the beginning which triggered his break of conditioning)...Now that we know that as Finn those troopers are kidnapped children who were conditioned from childhood to be what they are - basically doing their jobs, I'm personally a bit in a dilemma how do I think about the "good guys" like the universally liked Poe who is, let's say it, a mass murderer with a skill...
So Kylo is right to question how easily Rey wants to kill him and is shooting first based on her preconceived ideas - the only justification she has to start shooting at him is becuase she knows he is with the FO. While of course Kylo's understanding of things is skewed (I don't want to say he is right) it is indeed interesting that metaphorically speaking - when one of the "good guys" shoots first it's all fine and good (becuase they are defending themselves), but when the "bad guys" are shooting back suddenly they are in the wrong...
This also goes back to the "innocent" heavily armed villagers in the beginning of the movie who start shooting before the door of the transport with the troopers is even fully open...I know, I know they feel attacked, but if they didn't open fire in the first place and start shooting first the question remains would the troopers have shot them or simply gathered them and questioned Lor San Tekka. I seriously doubt that even the FO would have started killing the villagers if they didn't perceived them as military tread (as in this case they had a lot of reason to think that)...

We have seen Kylo kill 2 people in this movie and we have seen all the "good guys" kill many more compared to that...Why is the murder when done "for a good cause" not questioned, even cheered, but murder done from a perceived "bad cause" suddenly a huge deal...?

I don't know if I'm clear. What I want to say in not so many words is that - Violence cannot be stopped by violence (paraphrasing the Buddha here) and murder is never justified, full stop, no matter what the cause is. So, I'm counting heads on both sides. So far, the heroes are mass murderers, Kylo is a (deluded) executor (henchman) with a slight personal agenda. Hux and Snoke who have built and are not hesitant to use the SKB weapon are beyond the count as they are responsible for the death of billions.

So to go back to Kylo. He thinks what he is doing is right. No doubt Snoke has skewed his perceptions and manipulated him. By the way in the novelization there is one line (that is not in the movie) where an interesting bit of dialogue between Han and him on the bridge adds to the whole Snoke manipulation forming Kylo's skewed understanding can be glimpsed:
After the part when Han tells Kylo that Snoke wants him to believe Ben Solo is destroyed, but that that is not true and "My son is still alive" Kylo says:

What is amusing is that Rey is shown to feel such admiration for Han as a smuggler (and this interestingly is juxtaposed with Finn's reaction to Han being a Rebellious hero) earlier in the movie. So what we are shown that Rey admires about Han (him being a smuggler) is something that Kylo apparently resents (and even probably he secretly prefers his father to be a hero)...

OK. That turned out to be a very long post...sorry if it sounds like only ramblings...