The Rise of Skywalker Reactions to "Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker"

[Spider-Fan]

Will you please give it a rest already. No one has been a jerk to anybody. Who are you even arguing with? You are talking into the wind.

I am not saying anyone in here is. But the question of justification for that behavior was being debated, and that's what I am replying to. I am not blaming anyone in here or anything. I am not saying anyone in here is not being civil. As I said before. So you're trying to counter a point I am not making or debating.

 

[Donner]

Spoiler

Can anyone explain what a dyad is? Given what I've read so far, it's real ****ty that JJ killed off Ben

 

[Limonade]

I am sorry, there is no excuse for people being jerks to people. Fan or not. Sorry. You can care about something and bee civil about it. I love Star Wars, Marvel, etc. They are most of what I talk about. But I am not scum to people who make bad movies. I don't care how invested you are, there is no excuse

Again, but every fan who hates TLJ is scum. Not what I am saying. I am saying fans behaving poorly to creatives has no excuse.

Eh...I'm just saying some people have crass personalities. I mean look at the president. It's not just about being toxicity or rudeness.

We all want to set an example. But depending on how the person is... we learn to communicate in a variety of ways. And sometimes it's a compromise.

For close friends, I tend to be blunt and curse a bit. But that's how I choose to express myself with people I know. Other people's filters, on the otherhand, feels they have less of a problem as they see it.

That said, professional athletes, creatives, politicians all have their shares of nay-sayers/trolls and those professionals all usually have relatively thick skins. Which is how they achieve greatness despite all the terrible vitriol they receive day in and day out.

 

[Marvolo]

Eh...I'm just saying some people have crass personalities. I mean look at the president. It's not just about being toxicity or rudeness.

We all want to set an example. But depending on how the person is... we learn to communicate in a variety of ways. And sometimes it's a compromise.

For close friends, I tend to be blunt and curse a bit. But that's how I choose to express myself with people I know. Other people's filters, on the otherhand, feels they have less of a problem as they see it.

That said, professional athletes, creatives, politicians all have their shares of nay-sayers/trolls and those professionals all usually have relatively thick skins. Which is how they achieve greatness despite all the terrible vitriol they receive day in and day out.

Yeah those people are called *******s and are very toxic.

 

[Marvolo]

Spoiler

Can anyone explain what a dyad is? Given what I've read so far, it's real ****ty that JJ killed off Ben

Spoiler

A dyad is two Force adepts that are so connected in the Force that they are like two halves of a whole.

They were basically soulmates.

 

[Donner]

Spoiler

A dyad is two Force adepts that are so connected in the Force that they are like two halves of a whole.

They were basically soulmates.

Thanks for the explanation!

Spoiler

Oh well that's ****ing tragic then. I think ending it like Return of the Jedi (Darth dying for Luke) was lame. I hope they bring Ben back in the books.

 

[Spider-Fan]

Eh...I'm just saying some people have crass personalities. I mean look at the president. It's not just about being toxicity or rudeness.

We all want to set an example. But depending on how the person is... we learn to communicate in a variety of ways. And sometimes it's a compromise.

For close friends, I tend to be blunt and curse a bit. But that's how I choose to express myself with people I know. Other people's filters, on the otherhand, feels they have less of a problem as they see it.

That said, professional athletes, creatives, politicians all have their shares of nay-sayers/trolls and those professionals all usually have relatively thick skins. Which is how they achieve greatness despite all the terrible vitriol they receive day in and day out.

But there's a difference between blunt and just being a troll. I think anybody who actively trolls another person or possibly them used to be held accountable. That's just me. Don't blame the victim. I don't care how much money they have.

 

[godisawesome]

Spoiler

A dyad is two Force adepts that are so connected in the Force that they are like two halves of a whole.

They were basically soulmates.

Thanks for the explanation!

Spoiler

Oh well that's ****ing tragic then. I think ending it like Return of the Jedi (Darth dying for Luke) was lame. I hope they bring Ben back in the books.

If I can offer an ironically reversed perspective, to illustrate how difficult it was for Abrams to try finding a middle ground...

Spoiler

I hate the dyad concept and Rey and Kylo’s relationship in general: to me, it’s another example of Kylo swallowing up other characters or usurping them because they made him the Skywalker and he’s Kennedy’s hand picked actor, and it’s also an artificial, shallow, and abusive relationship. (In my opinion, just to be clear here.)

I think Ben needed to die, not just for the ROTJ-remake part of the film, but also because Abrams recognized that as much as some people would love the relationship and character, there were also too many substantial reasons to hate him, and too many substantial reasons to think that the exceptionalism and double standard he enjoyed would lead to him threatening to usurp Rey’s position as he’d done to Finn.

Ergo, it’s a compromise: Abrams gives the audience the relationship some will love and some will hate, but ends it before it can become too divisive, and because Rey “Skywalker” needs Ben dead.

*I* still hate it, but it seems to have been a better compromise for other people.

 

[Limonade]

But there's a difference between blunt and just being a troll. I think anybody who actively trolls another person or possibly them used to be held accountable. That's just me. Don't blame the victim. I don't care how much money they have.

I do see it as a fine line... with plenty of wiggle room though. I've seen lots displays of displeasure/hope/glee on plenty of other properties. Rarely do we see an extreme case of a particular person going overboard. Eventhough it may seem that way to some.

 

[Infinity9999x]

So...it was fun. Plot was a mess, and it’s pretty clear that they had no plan going for this trilogy. But hey, it was still better than AOTC. So there’s that.

 

[Donner]

If I can offer an ironically reversed perspective, to illustrate how difficult it was for Abrams to try finding a middle ground...

Spoiler

I hate the dyad concept and Rey and Kylo’s relationship in general: to me, it’s another example of Kylo swallowing up other characters or usurping them because they made him the Skywalker and he’s Kennedy’s hand picked actor, and it’s also an artificial, shallow, and abusive relationship. (In my opinion, just to be clear here.)

I think Ben needed to die, not just for the ROTJ-remake part of the film, but also because Abrams recognized that as much as some people would love the relationship and character, there were also too many substantial reasons to hate him, and too many substantial reasons to think that the exceptionalism and double standard he enjoyed would lead to him threatening to usurp Rey’s position as he’d done to Finn.

Ergo, it’s a compromise: Abrams gives the audience the relationship some will love and some will hate, but ends it before it can become too divisive, and because Rey “Skywalker” needs Ben dead.

*I* still hate it, but it seems to have been a better compromise for other people.

Have you read any of the books?

 

[godisawesome]

Have you read any of the books?

I’d need you to be more specific about which books and which continuity... and to be aware that I’m also someone kind of cursed to bear two major biases as well:


-1) I was a huge fan of the Legends continuity that the Sequel Trilogy replaced, and thus am comparing the constantly comparing the romances and characters of that timeline against this one, and generally finding them wanting (which is bad for Ben Solo, because his inadequacy in my eyes compared to Jacen Solo increases my bitterness, while I simultaneously love to hate Kylo Ren beyond the extent which I hated Darth Caedus (Jacen’s dark side persona.)


-2) A huge part of my issues with TLJ and TROS rise from being a major fan of TFA... because I loved Finn and his interactions with Rey. I regard TFA as containing too many events of substance compared to TLJ for TLJ’s interpretations to have much merit in terms of quality, especially regarding the characterization of Rey, and the way that her relationship with Finn (whether platonic or not) seems so much more substantial, healthy and genuine compared to TLJ’s take on it. I mean, I love Kylo Ren!... as a foil to Rey and Finn where his loathsomeness highlights their strengths and maturity compared to him.


Sooooo.... in detail, for a response to your question:

Spoiler

If you are referring to the novelizations and expanded material for the ST, I am 100% comfortable admitting that my knowledge of them is *spotty* at best... so feel free to inform me of anything I don’t know.


I know that ADF’s novelization fo TFA definitely played up the assault vibes of Rey and Kylo’s first scene together from *her* perspective... while also giving him more affably evil dialogue. I know that the TLJ novelization varied a little bit between the junior and adult novelizations, but both seemed to want to increase the idea that Rey was suffering loneliness when she reached out to Kylo, while neither was necessarily more informative on substance, but more in explicit tone (an advantage writing can always have over film, where film’s advantage is saying much while saying little).


I know that most TLJ-TROS-centered material became more “Rey is intrigued by and compassionate towards Ben” as time went on... but that an early comic released after TLJ had Rey and Poe confirm that, yup, they’re “torture buddies” thanks to Kylo. I also know that “The Rise Of Kylo Ren” being published right now is trying to walk back some of Ben’s crimes, by making it so that the Jedi Temple was blown up by someone else, stunning him, and by contriving a method for the other students to instigate fatal combat with him as issues pass. As you might be able to tell from my tone and the word “contriving”... I regard this as shameless white washing that is ultimately insubstantial and meaningless as far as the movies go, and especially in regards to what Rey knows.


(By the by, get ready for a longer argument, and if it bores you... please skip down to the other book recommendation from the current Star Wars continuity. I feel it’s good enough *everyone* should like it, regardless of whether or not they like “Reylo” or not.)


The films’ substance is all that really matters to me regarding this. And the substance of 97% of Kylo’s actions towards Rey are violent, traumatizing, manipulative, or otherwise callous and life-endangering. I’m *not* going to list them *this* time, because I’ve done that far too much and it’s obnoxious. If you’d like me to, ask.


The bigger issue is that, from TLJ’s second conversation between the characters on, in my opinion, Rey is twisted to ignore damage and violence done to herself and her friends and have a pro-Kylo/Ben bias, and to care about him and keep offering him second and third chances... even while he continues to hurt and “abuse” her.


I also reject the idea that Rey has any actual similarities to Kylo that could trigger her attraction to him as kindred spirits; the scripts are ignoring her other friendships, like with Chewie (on Ach-To), or with Finn (in general) because they threaten the “she’s lonely” narrative, and Kylo’s problems are his own damn fault. So, not only do I think Rey is being written as being attracted to an abuser... but I believe there’s no solid writing reason for it; it’s just happening, because the script wants it to.


I get the argument about “Ben Solo” being such a distinct and separate personality from Kylo, and Kylo being created by Palpatine-induced Force Shizophrenia... it’s just a story element that, to me, can only solve the abusive relationship dilemma if we remove so much of Ben’s agency and *existance* when Kylo is dominant... that Ben kind of ceases to exist in the films until TROS’s Act III... at which point I’d question whether this ethereal “Ben” character should really serve as Rey’s romantic interest, considering the shallowness that the idea inevitably depends on. But As long as he has any real agency and any amount of self-control... then the relationship is still abusive.


For the record, I don’t think that Rey and Kylo/Ben’s relationship had to be abusive; there were ways to write away from that. They just didn’t follow them, and no amount of book white washing or after-the-fact clarification can help that.

The book recommendation I’d make to both “Reylos” and “Anti-Reylos” is “Lost Stars” by Claudia Gray. It’s got a complicated “good guy/bad guy” romance like “Reylo”... but it comes at the idea from an angle that most “Anti-Reylo” fans can also enjoy.


It’s also usually more highly regarded by Star Wars book readers than other spin off material.

 

[Donner]

Thank you for your response! I haven't read the books myself, I was more curious if they follow the movies canonically or if they go off tangent a bit.

It feels like this movie was also discombobulated in the sense that they could have gone a few ways with it and pieced it together last minute. I'm curious if the novelization will explain more of the movie.

Spoiler

Do you think the dyad concept was in the cards at TFA or did it evolve in the later films? I'm trying to find the reasoning for it and if it's just a fan pressure sort of idea.

 

[sueb1863]

Is it true that

Spoiler

there were alternate endings to TRoS that had Ben surviving? I've seen claims that the ending images with Rey and BB8 were altered to erase Ben and that Adam Driver was filmed with Daisy Ridley on the Tatooine set.

 

[Karelia]

Is it true that

Spoiler

there were alternate endings to TRoS that had Ben surviving? I've seen claims that the ending images with Rey and BB8 were altered to erase Ben and that Adam Driver was filmed with Daisy Ridley on the Tatooine set.

Man I hope so. Bring on the JJ cut.

 

[godisawesome]

Thank you for your response! I haven't read the books myself, I was more curious if they follow the movies canonically or if they go off tangent a bit.

It feels like this movie was also discombobulated in the sense that they could have gone a few ways with it and pieced it together last minute. I'm curious if the novelization will explain more of the movie.

Spoiler

Do you think the dyad concept was in the cards at TFA or did it evolve in the later films? I'm trying to find the reasoning for it and if it's just a fan pressure sort of idea.

My hypothesis goes like this:

Spoiler

The Dyad concept seems likely to be a patch added into TROS as a multi-functional plot tool, distinct from the creative philosophies and likely plans of TFA and TLJ, though TLJ probably inspired the dyad idea .

TFA, if I can be frank, is almost impossible to picture as *not* having some genesis in a Rey Skywalker or Solo idea as the reason for her power, especially given what we know about the development of the film; all the way back in Lucas’s first outlines, which were mostly ditched, it seems clear that the female lead and the male lead/future antagonist were both grandkids of Anakin. A lot of things changed when Lucas’s outlines were abandoned, but the male and female lead are reported to have had a clear evolution: the female lead and hero became Rey, while the male lead split into Finn and Kylo. TFA has far more Skywalker parallels and hints than anything else, and doesn’t have a yin-yang thing going on with Rey and Kylo, as well as a far more overtly aggressive and antagonistic relationship between them.

TLJ recontextulized the character of Rey more around Kylo, though I think Johnson genuinely thought Kylo was magnetically intriguing and that he’d written a story where Rey being attracted to him made sense. He also helped design the “Prime-Jedi” artwork based off the Yin Yang idea, and offered up the idea thatnhis Rey “Random” was a natural reaction against Kylo’s darkness. However, I still don’t think he’d contextualize it as firmly as the dyad idea was.

For TROS, Abrams, I think, was trying to create something that could be used to address *some* complaints about Rey and Kylo’s interactions, Rey’s power, and create an excuse for powering Palpatine up. The “soul mate” part of the dyad concept would allow him to try and bypass complaints about why Rey could ever feel attracted to Kylo, the idea its some special Force occurrence would let him more formally codify Johnson’s “equal and opposite” idea but give him the flexibility to turn Ben good and ignore the “opposite” part, and serve as some McGuffin idea that could charge up Palpatine.

So it’s a TROS thing that has some inspiration from TLJ and fan theories, but is likely to just be a tool Abrams and Terrio created.

 

[Orba]

Is it true that

Spoiler

there were alternate endings to TRoS that had Ben surviving? I've seen claims that the ending images with Rey and BB8 were altered to erase Ben and that Adam Driver was filmed with Daisy Ridley on the Tatooine set.

Spoiler

I have seen videos of the death scene that do seem to show that when Rey is lowering Ben's body it actually uses a shot of Rey pulling Ben upright that is played in reverse. If thats the case then it would mean that there was no 'death scene' footage filmed in during the shooting of the film and that it was a very last minute change done in the editing room. It might also explain why Leia's body did not disappear until then if originally she was only mean to go once she had fully saved her son.

 

[Donner]

I want to see any and all alternate/original endings.

 

[sueb1863]

Spoiler

The idea that the decision for Ben to die came after shooting would also explain why there doesn't seem to be any real reaction by anybody to Ben's death. After that scene it's like Ben and Kylo never existed. The rest of the movie just rolls to its conclusion and nobody says anything about it.

I don't think they can undo Ben's death since he disappeared, it's not like Maul or Palpatine who still had physical bodies after they died. A Force ghost seems to be the only option.

 

[Pittman4Two]

Saw it last night and have to say...I had a smile on my face from start to finish. I thought it was a fun, entertaining Star Wars movie and will say that it's a great end-cap to the saga.

For background, I'm not a fan of the prequels, but have generally enjoyed this new trilogy with the ROS being my favorite of them and TFA and TLJ following respectively.

Spoiler

Minor critique would be that I would've left Chewie and C-3PO dead. I think those scenes would've had more of a lasting impact if we didn't see them again. Also, as a self-proclaimed Vader fan, I would've like to see Anakin's force ghost at some point, however I know that wasn't necessary.

 

[Donner]

Did anyone see the test screening or knows what happened? Apparently the ending was much different.

Spoiler

Also, I want to know what Rey says to Ben after they kiss to make him smile. She's clearly talking in that scene.

Edit: so test screenings for Star Wars isn't a thing, but that ending was weirdly edited it makes me wonder if there was an original one that they reshot.

 

[Limonade]

Saw it last night and have to say...I had a smile on my face from start to finish. I thought it was a fun, entertaining Star Wars movie and will say that it's a great end-cap to the saga.

For background, I'm not a fan of the prequels, but have generally enjoyed this new trilogy with the ROS being my favorite of them and TFA and TLJ following respectively.

Spoiler

Minor critique would be that I would've left Chewie and C-3PO dead. I think those scenes would've had more of a lasting impact if we didn't see them again. Also, as a self-proclaimed Vader fan, I would've like to see Anakin's force ghost at some point, however I know that wasn't necessary.

Spoiler

They're probably saving them for other Disney+ shows or movies, keeping their options open as they can be played by anyone now and they're seemingly timeless--my guess.

 

[Nemeres]

 

[C. Lee]

Saw it for the second time tonight. Liked it even more this time.

 

[SupermanFan]

Saw it last night I enjoyed it, easily better than the crap that was TLJ. Yeah it felt kinda rushed but I think JJ managed to do well with what was almost an impossible job or fixing the mistakes of the previous entry. One thing that was hugely important was that it felt like it belonged in the SW universe whereas in the previous films certain scenes & set places didn’t fit at all. I didn’t think that at all in this.

The only things in it I really had a problem with were some of the performances;

Spoiler

Mark Hammil phoned in his cameo, Ian McDiarmid hammed it up again and Oscar Issac was all over the place.