The way Ben dodges the lightsaber that smacks Rey across the head.
Implies that he has been smacked with levitated objects before.
As a survivor of abuse I find this terrifying.
This.
You know what I find terrifying? Luke is essentially the trusted family member that blamed the victim for the abuse…
I found the entire subtext of abuse disturbing. Like, adult nightmare disturbing. Snoke is a metaphorical sexual predator with the “Old Man Snoke’s Boudoir”, “Come closer, my child”, “Young Rey”, “Young Solo”, “You’ll give me everything”…. No, just no. Ben has darkness inside because he’s been fending off this shit for 2 decades, so Leia sends him away from home and Luke treats him like the monster in the situation? Oh hell no. Most disturbing subtext in a children’s movie ever.
I think there is another overlooked reason why Kylo wasn’t leaping at the chance to help the Resistance when Rey told him they can still save it.
He turned to the Dark side because of it.
From Adam and Rian’s comments, we know that Han and Leia were more dedicated to the Resistance than their son. Forgotten in the shadows, he was shipped off to live and train with his uncle (who was connected with the Resistance) who betrayed his nephew’s fragile trust in adult figures.
The Resistance has really done nothing good for Kylo his entire life.
So when faced with the chance to help it, why would he honestly want to? He has no motive to want to help them. They’ve made him feel cast out, forgotten and been one of the core reasons for his intense feelings of neglect.
To me, it makes narrative sense why Rian had Kylo want to ditch the Resistance and First Order. To explore a new path, something that is entirely separate from the Light side and Dark side, a new path which Kylo tried to offer Rey, will be so interesting to see more of in 9.
I don’t understand how people are leaving the fandom because of the ending of the movie, I mean look at his pleading eyes and pouty face to his would be empress Rey…he is so in love…
And that is not the face of a man beyond redemption
THIS IS THE LOOK HE GAVE TO REY WHEN HE JUST SAID HE WOULD DESTROY HER TO LUKE. HE WAS NOT BLUFFING WHEN HE SAID IT. HE JUST DIDNT KNOW HE COULD NEVER DO THAT UNTIL HE ACTUALLY SAW HER WITH HIS OWN EYES.
Remember at the start of the movie he attacked the resistance and tried to kill his own mother? HE WANTED TO GET RID OF HIS WEAKNESS, HIS MOTHER BUT WHEN HE ACTUALLY HAD TO DO IT, HE COULDN’T. Kylo think he can destroy all of his weaknesses BUT BEN, BEN IS STILL THERE AND STOPPING KYLO. IN THE NEXT MOVIE, KYLO WILL DIE. AND BEN SOLO WILL COME BACK. That’s all.
This scene was so incredibly important. It could’ve ended with him raging that the resistance escaped but no. They had him kneel down and pick up a trinket from the Falcon while looking up at Rey completely shattered. Guys, that was the moment that he realised he screwed up.
Once again, y’all are making me feel so much better about how this movie went down
It’s funny how I worried that when Adam said “it depends on what you mean by living” when asked if Kylo survives VIII, I was afraid of some dreadful physical injury or being in some kind of state of limbo within the Force, but then it turns out to be a catastrophic spiritual injury and utter personal desolation. Lol. this is fine. I swear.
THIS IS A BEAUTIFUL BREAKDOWN OF THE ICONIC THIGH GRAB AND I’D LIKE TO PERSONALLY THANK YOU FOR SENDING THIS TO ME!!! SHE WAS FIERCELY PROTECTIVE OF HIM JUST AS HE WAS OF HER!!!!!! I LOVE THE OTP!
As a child abuse survivor, I relate so strongly to Kylo Ren. I still tear up every single time I watch him take down Snoke, reclaiming himself and his power as his abuser taunts that he cannot be beaten.
But this? THIS is the scene that resonates down to my bones.
We’re watching him be berated and abused. We’re watching Snoke grind him down into dust. We see him at his breaking point, we see him exhausted and worn down and just destroyed by the years of manipulation and the weight of everything he’s done.
AND HE STANDS UP FOR HIMSELF ANYWAY. This is the man who has tortured his mind for years, brainwashed him, convinced him that he’s worth nothing and led him to throw away everything. And Kylo reaches a point where he can’t take it anymore and rises up to fight back. It may not have worked, but goddamn it, he was not taking one more word of abuse in that moment. It makes his ultimate murder of Snoke that much more satisfying, that we see him stretched so thin and desperate to defend himself against his abuser beforehand.
I know he took a big step backwards afterwards, and that he’s continuing to make poor decisions, but that narrative of Kylo as Abuse Survivor hits me so hard because it’s so fucking real.
Healing takes time. Recovering agency and learning how to interact with anger and grief in a healthy way takes time, and it comes with a lot of mistakes along the way. You can never go back to being the person you were before the abuse, but you can transcend it.
I still believe in Ben Solo.
“She sensed pluck and wit, and steel blood and a sharp mind… and by the blood of Alderaan is this one going to be a fighter.”
“Kid’s gonna get in trouble one day. Every kid does, but with the blood of a scoundrel and a rebel princess in his veins, his defiance will shake the stars. ”
Leia and Lando knew what the fuck they were talkin’ about. B)
(no but seriously these quotes make me feel so much. Gives me hope)
Probably it’s not really relevant, but I find quite interesting that when the first force connection happens you see Ben calling Luke by his name, for the first time.
“You’ll bring Skywalker to me”
Finding Skywalker is his top mission. But he still isn’t aware of how close Luke might be…
This is what Kylo Ren wants, this is how Kylo Ren was created, he’s the Jedi Killer…HE NEEDS TO FIND SKYWALKER, that’s his mission, based on revenge and betrayal
But as soon as he starts to sense him, you can see his face changing and you can see how he probably had been thinking about that meeting before, but suddenly he’s not prepared……he’s scared
After THAT night at the Jedi Temple, he never saw Luke again, he probably never sensed him again, he has vanished after all.
Kylo Ren was built upon that betrayal. Kylo Ren is the mask Ben Solo created to be stronger, to overcome the fear and the trauma of that night.
Suddenly he’s facing the reality of the moment, sensing his uncle after long years. In that particular moment, all the masks he built break and he’s BEN SOLO, who remembers that night, who still thinks that his uncle betrayed him.
That’s why he calls him “LUKE” and it’s the first and last time we heard him calling him in that way; there’ s a certain familiarity in his voice, because Ben Solo is taken by surprise.
At the very end, he finds Skywalker, his mission is completed, he can destroy him and the Jedi order…or that’s what he likes to think. But when he slays Luke with all his rage, what he finds out instead is that EVEN REVENGE can’ t fill that void he has inside.
He’s so sure to have slayed him in half, he hesitates to look back, but when he does and he sees that Luke is still there, beyond his understanding, you can see those same wide frightened eyes. He’s AFRAID, like he was that night, the trauma is still there.
That fear of failure, that fear of betrayal, is still there, it will always be in some places of his heart, until he will find a way to overcome what happened that night, until he will understand that he won’t win his inner war by killing what he hates, but by fighting for who and what he loves.
Rey and the future they saw together are the shifting point, why it’s still worthy to fight.
like, she at once feels very familiar as a heroine, and yet I can’t think of other female characters (except in a certain niche genre of 80s/90s young adult fantasy with strong heroines, a la Tamora Pierce and Robin McKinley and Patricia Wrede) that really resemble her in any real way. her literal presence in star wars refreshes the Whole Damn Story.
she’s a character who actually doesn’t have that much personality growth to achieve (if that makes sense)—instead, her whole story is one of self-acceptance, of realizing that she herself is enough, that she is worthwhile by herself, as herself. she doesn’t need a luke skywalker-esque heroic bloodline–she’s enough as is. she doesn’t need a mentor to teach her how to balance her emotional and analytic selves—her instinctive self is not one where she has artificially separated those selves.
(also side note: kylo ren is Wrong when he says she’s needs a teacher, but that says more about him than her. what she needs is connection; this is also what he needs. he of course only has relationships of unequals: master/student, modeled on parent/child. it’s his model for how people connect and interact: one person instructs, the other follows. one person commands, the other submits. kylo ren has never had a normal conversation with a peer in his life (again, what a fucking great character))
rey is Emblematic of the kind of heroine i have always loved, and that i feel like we need right now. she’s not overly serious or cynical or jaded—she’s a character whose faith in the world *changes* the world. she’s innately powerful, and her character arc stems out of *realizing that she is powerful*.
I know Kylo had to lie to Hux about who actually killed Snoke, but I love how you can feel the weight of all he isn’t saying about what happened because he says it in such a distracted way and isn’t facing Hux, instead looking into outer space and clearly thinking about Rey and how she just left him.
Reylo Source 