Calling Luke a mary sue for the first film is asinine.. his arc (meant to be a standa alone film ) was perfectly done. I believe mary sue is how we might think of a character.. particularly in a world that was already established.. in aNH we were seeing the world for teh first time.
Shit like this is counterproductive to fixing the issue at the core of this term Mary Sue: the result of lazy writing. And I don’t mean characters like Rey, (who is great and is only called one as a result of butt-hurt) I mean characters who have no flaws outside of the kind that are endearing and are perfect, wish fulfilling characters. The same goes for male counterparts. Lazy writing is always going to exist, but to say it’s not a thing because you disagree with the term is only hurting content overall. It’s absolutely an overused as often incorrectly used term, but that’s about it. Mary Sues usually happen when the background of the character was lazily written so events in her (or his) background will allow her to solve immediate problems without effort or because she is special. If she and her friends come up against a language barrier, she will have it in her background that she knows how to speak. She always has a hair pin to break out of prison, etc.. but the use of Mary Sue extends beyond these conveniences (however justified they may be by her background) to how the audience thinks of the character.. if they feel that too many of these things stack up one after the other and the character always gets out of situations and is above reproach and is always special, then the audience will find themselves not becoming invested into whether the character WILL succeed because they know they will. Rey knows systems on STarkiller base and was able to take out the right fuse (in a shot cleverly echoing her taking a conduit out of the wreck at the beginning of the film. ). She can speak droid. She can speak wookie. She REMINDS characters that she can speak droid when they can't. She REMINDS characters that she can speak wookie when they can't or even when they can (Why did she need to translate Chewie for Luke). She can fly a ship that has not flown in years and pull maneuvers unlike anyone else. She knows the ship BETTER than the previous owner (that the audience knows) and can remove tech device to get it to work. She can perform a mind trick despite never have seen one be performed. She beat an experienced swordsman the first time she ignited a lightsaber (regardless of whether she was injured, the audience by the point in the film kind of doesn't feel any real gander because of all the other things she's been able to do. Further, his being injured should have made him more dangerous, particularly with his ability to channel the Dark side). So in my opinion, whether someone is a Mary Sue is all
about how an audience perceives their abilities stacking up, over the course of the film, and whether this makes the suspense lesser or greater
it's very different. You couple all the mary sue aspects of her character (that she knows how to fly, wield a lightsaber, knows all the alnguages) with the fact that we no nothing about the background of the character.. coupled with the fact that we don't know what DRIVES the character (why is she doing the right thing, except because the writers need her to) and those three elements combined make her a mary sue .. and the fourth element is that the audience is detached from her, never truly worried about her or surprised when she succeeds
That was the journey.. and it was fine for the pulp story that it was.. no one minded until they made Rey later.. and people still don't mind except when they want to defend Rey as a valid comparison.. the hollow comparisons to the old trilogy that actually works as a story and also has withstood 30-40 years of time won't work.
But let's talk about Rey. There is nothing wrong with Rey. her only flaws are that she sees the good in people HAHA. there is no hardship for her, no cross she has to bear.. she is not greedy, prideful, self-centered, emotionally stunted, emotionally unstable, selfish, reckless, overconfident, naive, blinded by love, womanizing, stupid, psychotic, psychopathic, self righteous, narcissistic, inexperienced, overly ambitious,narrow minded, morally ambiguous, or arrogant. She has no vendetta, addiction, superiority complex, bloodlust, jealousy, or lust for power, she has no flaws that she could on personally, yet she is automatically incredible at every activity she does engage in, As a result she is a mary sue, as there is no room to grow (and despite what you keep saying Luke GREW as a character in those old films, both how he looked, how he acted, and how he thought) and there is nothing for her to learn, to change about herself, as she has already made it, she is better than every character at everything, Worse, she imparts lessons on the other characters, including the legacy characters, people that are far more experienced than her, It is very difficult to relate to her as a result. I'm not perfect and have never met perfection. I'm always assured that the writing will take good care of her. This is exemplified by the fact that at the end of the second film she shot down three TIES in one shot! YES and was in a great mood "I like this!" while at the same point in the original trilogy, Luke was barely alive, hanging upside down and calling for help, and his whole world had changed, Even if she earned all those traits (which she didn't) she is still all those things at base, and therefore is not a character..
In addition to what i said above the real difference between Luke and Rey is the same as the difference between active and passive .. Luke, and characters like him, have clear goals (learn the force and save the princess, or fighting crime or avenging their puppy) , characters like Rey don't.. their goals are mired in "the right thing" in the vaguest way, and by definition she doesn't ASK for anything (even Daisy Ridley when talking about Rey, admits she never asked for anything) .. and while characters like Luke might be special because they are powerful, characters like Rey are powerful because they are special. That means that characters like Luke must continually prove themselves.. they gotta keep doing the awesome shit, and sometimes they will fail, sometimes they won't .. but in the process he is constantly creating who is he is.. the mary sue, by contrast, just is.. she is just awesome by virtue of existing .. and who she is often more important than what she does .. and even if a character like Luke has natural ability, we see them working to keep that ability, it is being tested all the time .. where as Rey and the other mary sue is just born amazing, is gifted the powers when she needs them (why was Rey able to perform a mind trick without having seen it performed?) , she is given powers by needs of the plot, or she was given all her powers in her tragic and unseen backstory, nullifying the need for us to question any of it.. or the need to work that hard for any of it on screen. Even the male characters like Harry Potter than lean toward these traits, there is still a sense that they have many conflicts to overcome, goals that are specific that they want to accomplish, a sense of agency in their own story, Rey like characters will often appear weak and vulnerable when.. as far as the story goes, they are invincible. Take Han in Disney Solo movie, within two minutes of the film and after the character is established, he had three clear goals (to leave Corrilia, to get a ship of his own, and to be with the girl) where as Rey.. eh wants to leave, except she wants to stay and wait for her parents, yet she knows they aren';t coming back, and she doesn't really want to help, and she doens't really want to take Solo's job offer, and yet we know she will do the right thing despite the fact there is no reason considering her background for her to do it. Oh and about that Han solo movie, that three year time jump early on.. implies that he had some kind of training ..
yes.. actual training
I'm not saying that Luke is a super deep character.. it is a heros' journey.. a formula that might be as old as the hills, but popular culture really needed a new take on it when it came out. He was peppered with more complexity as the story went on.. peppered.. like sprinkled,, they didn't really radically change the simplistic aspects of his character too much.. unlike TLJ which decided "let's make Luke an asshole and totally different and fool people into thinking he is the same character because thirty years later he COULD be like that, but let's not earn it through real storytelling"..
