Star Wars: The Force Awakens Discussion (HERE THERE BE SPOILERS)
- Thread starter sttngfan1701d
- Start date
The problem here is that we don't have a baseline of what an average force user's natural aptitude should be if they aren't raised by Jedi or Sith for the first few decades of their lives. We only really have Luke and Anakin and they're supposedly outliers. For all we know, Rey is merely above average and if you pay attention, it appears that in the fight with Kylo, she's actually calling on the dark side. Which Yoda himself said is quicker and easier.
Now I've heard it argued that Rey instantly picks up force abilities that took Luke years of practice. But consider this: Rey is clearly a self taught person. Her survival has depended on her watching, learning and picking up as many new skills as she can. In short: she's a fast learner. Also consider that in just a few days she's had a *lot* more exposure to direct use of the force than Luke did in his first adventure. Kylo held her blaster arm, knocked her unconscious and later tried to get into her mind. She saw what he did, learned from it and imitated. Luke only saw the mind trick performed on someone else and got a brief practice session with a training remote. Yet even that was enough to pull off the one in a million shot in the trench run. I'd call that fairly consistent.
Also note that if you actually watch Rey's duel with Kylo, she doesn't suddenly become a lightsaber master, she's swinging that thing around like a barely controlled crazy person, trying to wield it the way she wields her staff since that's what she knows. One should also pay attention to the fact that for the first half of that fight, she's actually running away from Kylo, not able to press him. It's only when he backs her to the cliff that's she tries to call on the force (something that Maz told her to do) and we get a sudden explosion of ability.
But that's all it is, a brief explosion with the force basically "taking the wheel" so to speak. Just like Luke in the trench run, just like Kanan after he was blinded. Just like Anakin on Mortis.
Either way, the Bloodline novel establishes that Kylo didn't betray the Jedi until at most 6 years prior to TFA, so it wouldn't matter even if they were the same age. Rey would have been abandoned something like 10-15 years ago, long before the First Order had come out of the shadows and when Luke's new Jedi temple would have logically been in full swing (though we've yet to see anything of that depicted or even described in detail.)
Last edited:
<<Either way, the Bloodline novel establishes that Kylo didn't betray the Jedi until at most 6 years prior to TFA, so it wouldn't matter even if they were the same age. Rey would have been abandoned something like 10-15 years ago, long before the First Order had come out of the shadows and when Luke's new Jedi temple would have logically been in full swing (though we've yet to see anything of that depicted or even described in detail.)>>
Ah, shit. There goes my theory, then.
Ah, shit. There goes my theory, then.
Of course not, but I was thinking of Force ability as opposed to saber technique.
By the same token, Kylo's an unabashed darksider, and we can infer that he has some training and experience. While also being a you-know-what.
We might compare Rey at this point to Obi-Wan at the end of TPM.
Kill him, a voice inside her head said. It was amorphous, unidentifiable, raw. Pure vengeful emotion. So easy, she told herself. So quick.
She recoiled from it. From the dark side. ( TFA novelization )
Anakin's not exactly "above average". The whole point of that part of Mortis was Anakin's Chosen One status.
Last edited:
Obviously I wasn't comparing Anakin's overall aptitude to Rey's, just citing another instance where a Jedi opens themselves to the force and it pretty much takes control for a bit. But nice try trying to take a single sentence entirely out of context. 
As for Kylo; by that point in the fight he was badly injured, we saw earlier in the film what a bowcaster hit does to *armor*. He took a hit in the flank and is visibly bleeding and seen hitting his would just to keep himself alert. Then Finn also wounds him and Rey suddenly explodes with the force he's not ready and quickly overwhelmed. Not unlike Luke's final outburst in the throne room. And let's be clear about this, Kylo is no Darth Vader. It's implied his training wasn't completed as a Jedi and Snoak himself said he has yet to finish teaching him to be a...whatever doctrine that guy follows. Probably not Sith, but something similar.
Vader had several orders of magnitude more experience than Klyo. He's fought Sith Lords and their trained assassins and untold numbers of Jedi, at the temple and in the years after order 66.
For all we know, this is only the second time Kylo's been in a real fight with another force user. The first is presumably when he turned on Luke and even so, we don't know the details of that yet. For all we know he was smart enough to wipe them out when Luke was away and never confronted him directly.
So yeah, an unseasoned, badly wounded Kylo could be beaten by a talented but untrained force user who he deeply underestimated (and was in the process of trying to recruit.) It's really not that big of a leap.
As for Kylo; by that point in the fight he was badly injured, we saw earlier in the film what a bowcaster hit does to *armor*. He took a hit in the flank and is visibly bleeding and seen hitting his would just to keep himself alert. Then Finn also wounds him and Rey suddenly explodes with the force he's not ready and quickly overwhelmed. Not unlike Luke's final outburst in the throne room. And let's be clear about this, Kylo is no Darth Vader. It's implied his training wasn't completed as a Jedi and Snoak himself said he has yet to finish teaching him to be a...whatever doctrine that guy follows. Probably not Sith, but something similar.
Vader had several orders of magnitude more experience than Klyo. He's fought Sith Lords and their trained assassins and untold numbers of Jedi, at the temple and in the years after order 66.
For all we know, this is only the second time Kylo's been in a real fight with another force user. The first is presumably when he turned on Luke and even so, we don't know the details of that yet. For all we know he was smart enough to wipe them out when Luke was away and never confronted him directly.
So yeah, an unseasoned, badly wounded Kylo could be beaten by a talented but untrained force user who he deeply underestimated (and was in the process of trying to recruit.) It's really not that big of a leap.
I hadn't heard about Bloodlines establishing that kind of timeline, so I had assumed Ben turned on the Jedi earlier than that.
^I think most people assumed that the status quo we saw in TFA had been such for something more on the order of a decade. Possibly partly because of how many people were claiming there *must* be a link between Rey & Kylo, which has been now blown out of the water. Personally I never bought into that, but I still had assumed certain events went down earlier then that.
Last edited:
But I don't think the scene in question necessarily depicts an instance of that. You're assuming. And it's not "taking it out of context" to describe how it fails in context as support for what you're arguing. Anakin accomplished what he did because he was a Chosen One, not because the Force took over and gave him a win.
By the same token, Kylo has an order of magnitude more experience than Rey, whose experience started that day.
But how innately talented? That's the question. Is she a little above average, or is it something more?
What if Rey was a child of the Force like Anakin?
Or was Palpatine really his father?
Or was Palpatine really his father?
Exactly innately talented enough to survive a fight with Kylo, obviously.
So you're saying the force dumped her on Jakku? This doesn't really answer everything since even with Anakin the force required use of a Shmi in which to deposit said child.
Unless she's a tank grown clone of Nomi Sunstrider...or, you know just a kid with a natural talent.
Not possible, That man had no sex drive, nor was he capable of companionship. I know this because the alternative to too ghastly to comprehend.
Last edited:
I always thought that it was she was just much stronger with the force then Ben. Ben, could be a force user but have limited abilities. While she can fully tap into the force.
Very well written, especially given the clue woven throughout the film and other material.Obviously I wasn't comparing Anakin's overall aptitude to Rey's, just citing another instance where a Jedi opens themselves to the force and it pretty much takes control for a bit. But nice try trying to take a single sentence entirely out of context.
As for Kylo; by that point in the fight he was badly injured, we saw earlier in the film what a bowcaster hit does to *armor*. He took a hit in the flank and is visibly bleeding and seen hitting his would just to keep himself alert. Then Finn also wounds him and Rey suddenly explodes with the force he's not ready and quickly overwhelmed. Not unlike Luke's final outburst in the throne room. And let's be clear about this, Kylo is no Darth Vader. It's implied his training wasn't completed as a Jedi and Snoak himself said he has yet to finish teaching him to be a...whatever doctrine that guy follows. Probably not Sith, but something similar.
Vader had several orders of magnitude more experience than Klyo. He's fought Sith Lords and their trained assassins and untold numbers of Jedi, at the temple and in the years after order 66.
For all we know, this is only the second time Kylo's been in a real fight with another force user. The first is presumably when he turned on Luke and even so, we don't know the details of that yet. For all we know he was smart enough to wipe them out when Luke was away and never confronted him directly.
So yeah, an unseasoned, badly wounded Kylo could be beaten by a talented but untrained force user who he deeply underestimated (and was in the process of trying to recruit.) It's really not that big of a leap.
Also, Rey seemed to be more open to the way of the Force in that final scene. It reminded me of how Obi-Wan's connection was described in the ROTS novelization that he is an open conduit to the Force and that it moves him subtlety to ensure his survival in his battle with Grievous.
Rey has the survival instinct and the drive to fight just from living on Jakku. Being open to the Force allows her to tap in to something a little bit beyond herself.
Yeah, in comparison to other novice Jedi in the movies, TV shows, and books that are a part of the rebooted canon, Rey is actually around baseline normal for an older, untrained Force-sensitive. And that's before even taking into the account the hints that she has the potential to be an above-average Jedi.
The thing with Kylo seems to be that while he has a lot of raw potential, for most of the film he's deeply conflicted, not at all centred and thus he's easily caught off balance. Now that he's offed Han that may change, but for now his rage seems is wildly unfocused, triggered at the slightest frustration and it appears that the subject of his hatred is himself. That's bound to make him inherently unstable.
Compare for instance the two times in the movie he was thwarted to the time in tESB when Vader watched as the Falcon jumped to hyperspace. Vader just quietly strolled off the bridge, leaving Piett in abject terror and dread while Kylo has a full on paddy...twice. Vader is a trained Sith, he has mastered and directed his emotions. His rage and hate have been honed into a keen blade, while Kylo's is all over the place.
In short: he's formidable while on sure footing but doesn't react well under pressure.
What if indeed.
Honestly there's no reason to suspect that and it wouldn't really change anything if it were the case.
I do't like to think this way, but with all the squirming going on, I can't help but wonder if the reason so many are unwilling to just accept that Rey has hard earned talents and some natural ability really is because of her gender.
Did people scrutinise Luke or Anakin as much? I mean a presumably home schooled slave who can build droids, pod racers and has reflexes well beyond the norm for his species? And can pilot a starfighter with ZERO training? I mean if you just stuck a Formula One driver in the cockpit of an F22 mid-flight, would we expect them to survive a dogfight? Luke is *slightly* more credible in this regard, but it's still the equivalent of a crop duster being trusted with a supersonic jet.
