Dear Readers,
Last month, I defended Star Wars: The Force Awakens against the numerous criticisms I have heard over
the last couple of months. I
discussed the background, characters, and plot of the story. Today’s post is going to be building
off that information, so I highly recommend checking that out before continuing
on. So, today, I would like to
focus on some speculation for episodes 8 and 9. I think the best way to look at these guesses is from a
character perspective, so I am going to take a number of the characters,
examine their role in the last film, hazard a few guesses about what might
happen to them and how they fit into the grand picture of the trilogy. Many of these theories have been discussed
in other places, so full disclosure, not all these ideas are original to me.
Rey
The biggest questions generated in the last film were in
regard to Rey, the young woman from Jakku with a mysterious past and extremely
strong force capabilities. Who is
Rey’s family? How/why does she
become so powerful with the force so quickly? These big questions comprise a series of smaller
questions—why does the Skywalker lightsaber call out to her, what does she see
in her visions of Kylo Ren, why was she abandoned on Jakku?
Director J.J. Abrams has stated that Rey’s location, on the
desert planet of Jakku is a huge hint toward her identity. There are two, or perhaps three major
characters who are intrinsically associated with desert planets. First, and most obvious are the
Skywalkers. Anakin and Luke both
grew up on the desert planet of Tattooine. Knowing the role family ties have played in Star Wars in the
past, it would be no surprise to have Rey be a part of the force dynasty.
This theory then has two possibilities. First, is that Rey is the child of Han
Solo and Princess Leia. This
theory seems a bit unlikely, but can be made to work. The main problem with this theory is that Han did not
recognize Rey as his daughter, nor did Kylo Ren recognize her as his
sister. While there was certainly
a bond between them, if Han had known that he had a daughter he would probably
have made the connection: the galaxy is a small place with force coincidences
bouncing around. This difficulty
can be bypassed slightly by the assertion that Han did not know that he had a
daughter. How this would come to
be is a little less clear, but the theory goes like this; Han and Leia have
their first child, Kylo Ren, and send him off to train with Luke. Ten years later, Leia is pregnant
again, but a force uses, likely Luke warns her to keep the child’s birth a
secret from everyone, even Han.
Later, when Kylo Ren’s betrayal becomes obvious, he hides her on a
desert planet (because seriously, where else in the Star Wars universe would
you hide a force capable child), and Han never knows he has a daughter. A bit far fetched, maybe, but
possible. This theory matches with
some extended universe scenarios, which often pit the children of Han and Leia
against each other as representatives of the dark side and the light, and might
provide a bit of fan service for all the disgruntled EU readers.
More likely, however, than Rey being the child of Han and
Leia is the possibility that she is the child of Luke himself. The film itself seems to point toward
this possibility, by highlighting the connection between Rey and the Skywalker
lightsaber, her abandonment on a desert planet, her instinctive force use (a
trademark of both young Anakin and young Luke), and some more subtle hints I
will get to in a minute. The
theory isn’t hard to figure out.
Luke had a wife at one point, had a daughter. He trained her in force use, but when Kylo Ren attacked the
new Jedi temple, he wiped her memory and hid her on Jakku to protect her. This explains the recognition in his
eyes at the end of Force Awakens, as
well as Kylo Ren’s fascination with Rey and the weird chemistry between them.
Both this theory, and the theory that Rey is the daughter of
Han and Leia are predicated upon her spending her youth with Luke, likely at
the Jedi temple. This may seem
like a bit of a stretch to some readers, but the film actually gives a lot of
evidence for this suggestion. When
Kylo Ren interrogates Rey, attempting to unlock the missing piece of the map to
Luke Skywalker, he makes this interesting comment, “I see the island…the rock
stairs.” This statement evokes an
immediate reaction from Rey, whose latent force capabilities surge, allowing
her to push back into the Ren’s mind.
The description matches the island upon which Rey later finds Luke,
indicating that she has been there before, and seen the first Jedi temple. As Luke is “the only one” who knew of
its location, it seems likely that she has been there at some point with him. The second piece of evidence that Rey
has been to the Jedi temple before is found during the vision she has after
touching the Skywalker lightsaber.
She sees Kylo Ren, lightsaber drawn, standing in the rain with the
knights of Ren arrayed behind him.
We are led to believe that this incident is Ren’s betrayal of Luke and
overthrow of the new Jedi order.
Why would Rey see this? In
the Star Wars films (I can’t speak to all the books, video games, or T.V.
shows), force users are shown to have precognition at times: “I have forseen
it;” but not visions of the past (postcognition?). While it is not a stretch to say that Rey could have a force
vision of a past she had never witnessed, it is also a perfectly reasonable
assumption to guess that she had actually witnessed those events, and had the
memory inhibited. Her contact with
the force, through Kylo Ren or proximity to the lightsaber, causes the block on
her memory to disintegrate, and her recollections of the past to come back. It is also canonical in the Star Wars
universe to use the force to erase or restrain memories. While I do not personally watch the
Clone Wars T.V. show, I have been informed that there has been a precedent
where a character was forced (pun intended) to forget information. If the force can be used to induce a
memory wipe, Rey’s actions and reactions make a lot more sense. The memory of Kylo Ren would have been
particularly traumatic, and to have those images associated with her
rediscovery of her force capabilities would go a long way toward explaining her
initial terror and rejection of the force. It would also explain her surprisingly quick acquisition of
competency with the force; if she trained as a child, she is not just learning
force techniques, she is relearning skills she already had.
While this theory has ample evidence to support it, and,
given the evidence of the film, seems like the most likely explanation of Rey’s
identity, I hope it is not the correct answer. The fact that there is ssooo much evidence for it seems like
a red herring to put viewers off the track for the real answer. Remember, it was not always obvious
that Darth Vader was Luke’s father (yeah, yeah, spoilers, I know) or that
Princess Leia was his sister. Both
those pieces of information came as a shock to people in the theaters when they
were revealed. In light of the
information in episode 7, a “Rey, I am your father” speech from Luke would be
less shocking than a “No, Rey, I am sorry, but I am not your father,” one. We have become so used to the
incestuous Star War’s universe where everyone is related to the other main
characters that it would be a shock if Rey wasn’t a Skywalker. Which is why I tend to lean toward one
of the other options for her family history.
The final option in the context of J.J. Abrams’ desert
comment is that Rey is the daughter or granddaughter of Obi Wan Kenobi. The objections to this theory are as
follows; “Obi Wan was too good a Jedi to ever consider breaking the code and
having a child.” However, there
are suggestions, again in the Clone Wars T.V. show that there was a woman that
Obi Wan would have considered leaving the Jedi order for. He has also, at the time when he is
living on Tattooine, not a member of the Jedi order because the Jedi order has
been destroyed by the clone troopers and the work of Darth Vader. It is not, therefore, as unlikely as
many have made it seem that Obi Wan Kenobi could have fathered a child at some
point after the events of Revenge of the Sith. And much of the evidence
that points to Rey being a Skywalker could also be interpreted from the Kenobi
theory. She was likely still
raised at the Jedi temple by Luke, and made to forget her background and
training. The Skywalker lightsaber
spent nearly twenty years in the possession of Obi Wan Kenobi, (longer than
either of the actual Skywalkers were to wield it), and could have called out to
Rey because of that connection.
The voice of Obi Wan is heard during Rey’s visions, saying “These are
your first steps,” and Obi Wan is also associated with the desert planet of
Tattooine, where he spent many years in hiding as the guardian for Luke
Skywalker, so it fits the criteria for the desert planet being important to
Rey’s identity. Finally, Obi Wan
was particularly powerful in his ability to use the force to alter people’s
minds. Rey is the only person we
have seen in the films be able to use such an ability instinctively, and
without prior experience, perhaps a gift from her grandfather. It would also provide a really
interesting dynamic to the relationship that we will see between Rey and Luke
in the 8th film. If Rey
is the granddaughter of Obi Wan Kenobi, then obviously she is a person of great
significance to Luke, as he becomes the master of his own master’s descendant.
If Rey is a Skywalker or a Kenobi, her path for the next few
films is relatively easy to guess.
She will be repeatedly tempted by the dark side of the force, embodied
in Kylo Ren and Supreme Leader Snoke.
This inner darkness will likely take the form of the anger we saw in Rey
at the end of her fight with Ren in The Force Awakens, and will be fueled by her grief over the death of
Han Solo, and the ongoing tension between her and Ren, and they sight out the
now generational struggle between the dark and light sides in the Skywalker
family. As she struggles to overcome
her own inner darkness, she will also join the fight to defeat the First Order,
after having undergone her force training with Luke at the beginning of the
next film. Her relationship with
Finn will continue to develop, with the two of them likely fighting and moving
apart in the 8th film, only to reunite once and for all in the 9th. Typical Star Wars stuff.
While the three previous theories about Rey are the most
likely, given J.J. Abrams comments about the desert planet and the general
history of the Star Wars universe, there are a couple other options for Rey’s
parentage that I would like to mention that might be more interesting in the
long run.
Child of a Sith.
Yep, that is one of the most interesting possibilities that I could see
for Rey’s familial background. The
Sith, unlike the Jedi, are not forbidden from having children, and it stands to
reason that at some point, one of them besides Anakin Skywalker probably had
kids: force sensitive kids. If Rey
were the descendant of Emperor Palpatine, Count Dooku, or even Darth Vader, it
would be a really interesting twist and provide vast swathes of potential
character development for both Rey and Kylo Ren. Just as Ren feels the perpetual call toward the light from
his Skywalker blood, Rey would feel the call toward the dark. It would create an interesting tension
between hero and villain to have both characters fighting against their
internal natures. It would also
create a great dynamic between Rey and Luke at the beginning of the next film,
where the audience can assume she is Luke’s daughter, and fail to understand
Luke’s hesitation to train her, only later to find out that she is a descendant
of Emperor Palpatine, and Luke is worried about training another pupil who will
turn to the dark side, particularly one with Rey’s natural capability. While there is not a lot of evidence in
the text to support the idea that Rey might be the child of a dark force user,
there are a couple of small clues that could later turn out to be
foreshadowing. First, is Rey’s
ability to see visions. In the
Star War’s films, such an ability has been limited to the most powerful force
users. Luke saw visions once in
the films, regarding danger to Leia.
Anakin saw several visions of Padme Amidala’s death. Yoda is said to have the ability to see
the future on occasion, but the one character with access to the most accurate
and stable visions of the future has always been Emperor Palpatine. He speaks with assurance that events
will happen because he has “forseen” it.
Such a talent, while not unknown to very powerful users of the force,
evidences itself most strongly in those with a connection to the dark side, and
particularly to the Emperor. The
second hint comes in Rey’s fight against Kylo Ren, where she seems
instinctively to call upon the dark side.
This might come as a bit of a surprise to some, as Rey is our heroine,
who is fighting for the good guys, against Ren, the dark force user. Consider the evidence, however. In the Star Wars universe, the two
sides of the force are associated with opposite values. The light side is about reason,
emptying yourself of emotion, and letting the force flow through you. In their greatest moments of triumph, a
Jedi is calm, collected, unemotional.
Yoda is the ultimate example of what it is to be a Jedi. Contrast this with the dark side. The mantra for the dark side is
“unleash your anger,” and the Jedi say of them, “fear leads to anger, anger
leads to hate. Hate is the dark
side.” In Rey’s battle with Kylo
Ren, however, she channels her anger into her fighting, eyes wide and teeth
bared as she casually slices and disarms him. It is only the convenient opening of the chasm between them
that prevents Rey from actually killing Ren in her anger. Now, I am not saying that anger is
unjustified, or that Rey is evil, but I am pointing out that in the moment, her
actions were more reminiscent of a Sith than a Jedi. If you look at Rey’s confrontations with Ren through the
whole movie, they bear a startling resemblance to the fear, anger, hate
progression. Rey’s first personal
encounter with Kylo Ren leaves her terrified. She is armed only with a blaster, and spends the entire
“fight’ running away from the steadily advancing Ren. He easily overcomes her, captures her,
and takes her to Starkiller base.
The second confrontation between the two characters, Ren is interrogating
Rey, attempting to learn the information on the final piece of the map. He breaks into Rey’s head using the
force, and she turns it back on him.
Her response in the moment is both angry and calculated to make Ren
respond with the type of fear that she felt earlier. Her strike, “You are afraid that you will never be as
powerful as Darth Vader,” hits home wit Ren, and he is the one forced to
retreat from the confrontation.
But consider the way in which Rey makes this statement. It is not the calm, unemotional response
we would expect from a light side practitioner, like Yoda; her voice is angry,
and deliberately pitched to wound, both in tone and content. Anger is the critical component of this
confrontation, Finally, in her
duel with Ren, Rey embraces the final step to the dark side; hatred. She has every reason to hate Ren, he
has just killed the man that she viewed as a father figure, a man that he
should have respected and loved.
He had also endangered her life, and the life of her best friend
(Finn). Of course it is reasonable
that Rey should hate Ren, but the Jedi are notoriously unreasonable in their
outlook on fear, anger, and hatred.
Those emotions are the dark side, and controlling them, not unleashing
them is the path to the light.
Killing an enemy like Kylo Ren, in cold blood, as Rey would have done,
would have been the act of a dark side user, not of a Jedi. Again, I am not saying that Rey is
evil. Her actions in the final
duel, however, seem to indicate a natural proclivity to the dark side that
would be explained by her being the descendant of a Sith not a Jedi.
There is a final option for Rey’s parentage that I would
like to mention briefly, although of the options, I consider it the least
likely. That is that Rey does not
have parents, that she is entirely conceived by medichlorians (I know: gag!),
and is the true answer to the prophecy spoken of in The Phantom Menace as the child that would bring balance to the
force. It would explain her
startling and instinctive capability with the force, her connection with the
Skywalker family (previously assumed to have been the subjects of the
prophecy), and her mysterious background.
While I believe this option might open up some interesting ground in the
relationship between Kylo Ren and Rey (see my later discussion on Ren and the
force), it seems a trite solution to the problem and does not seem to serve the
story in any significant way. That
being said, it works with the desert motif (messiahs can only come from the
desert after all :P ), so I decided to include it as a possibility.
Kylo Ren
Ren is another interesting character for speculation. Some critics have posited the first six
Star Wars films as the story of the fall and redemption of Anakin
Skywalker. If this is the case,
then great attention should be paid to Kylo Ren as the successor of that
legacy. The new series could
potentially be viewed as the story of his fall and redemption, or (more
interestingly) of the redemption of his fall. This being said, there are two paths that I forsee for
Ren. He is too interesting a
character to simply be left as “the bad guy” like Emperor Palpatine was. He is going to be given the chance to
develop, and that chance will either result in him returning to the light side,
or choosing to remain a dark side force user, despite his Skywalker lineage.
The first option allows his path to mimic that of Darth
Vader. A powerful force user
manipulated by agents of the dark side, in the final episodes of his story he
will make the decision to return to the light. This decision will probably result in an act of self
sacrifice, and Ren will die in the process, mirroring Vader’s decision to
return to the light and sacrifice himself for Luke. Another variation on this possibility ends with Rey
sacrificing herself to save him which provides the catalyst for the Ren’s
transformation. This scenario ends
with Ren assuming the mantle of Luke Skywalker and becoming the “last Jedi” and
the agent of the light side. This
would also set up a sequel trilogy, in which Ren must struggle with his pull to
the dark side while taking on his own apprentices and dealing with the
hostility of his new comrades in the Resistance, a possibility that provides
potential story arcs for episodes 10-12.
The second, and potentially more interesting arc for Ren
causes him to remain a dark side force user, but systematically redeems the
concept of the dark side. The
foundation for such a premise has already been laid in episode 7, and would go
a long way toward explaining Ren’s apparent struggle to embrace the dark
side. The key to this arc would
lie in the concept of balance in the force that was introduced in Phantom
Menace, and that came up a number of times
in The Force Awakens. The question then becomes, how is the
force out of balance in The Phantom Menace, and how is similarly unbalanced in Force Awakens? In the
Phantom Menace,, the Sith return
for the first time in centuries to threaten the Jedi council. It is this occasion, combined with the
rise in power from the dark side that leads the Jedi council to assume that
Anakin might be the “chosen one.”
Similarly, in Force Awakens
the audience assumes the force is unbalanced because Luke is missing, and the
First Order has created the Knights of Ren, an order of dark side force users
that has unbalanced the force.
What if both these assumptions are wrong? What if Anakin’s bringing balance to
the force was actually accomplished through him becoming Darth Vader? What if everything we assumed about
light side being inherently good and dark side being inherently bad was
actually false? Consider the light
side and dark sides respectively; the light side values pure reason, the
ability to make decisions without the clouding of emotion. They forbid love and marriage for their
practitioners, and advocate a monastic way of life, separating themselves from
the world (hence the Jedi temple).
The dark side, on the other hand, promotes the expression of all
emotion, eagerly thrusts itself into politics and social manipulation, and
allows for such relational connections as family and children (although not
necessarily successfully). From
this perspective, neither side is inherently good, and both have their
drawbacks. What if the lack of
balance in the force in Phantom Menace
came, not from the dark side, but from the light. The Jedi had been in control of the republic for years. In overthrowing the Jedi Order, Anakin
Skywalker restored a balance of numbers to the force… two Jedi (Obi Wan Kenobi
and Yoda), two Sith (Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine), and two undecided
(Luke and Leia). This balance was
maintained in the original trilogy through the death of Obi Wan, and Luke’s
subsequent assumption of his Jedi mantle, and then through the death of Yoda
and of the Emperor. With Vader’s
death, however, the force again became imbalanced toward the light side. Luke, unaware of the necessity for
balance in the force, and convinced only of the inherent goodness of the light
side, begins to train his own apprentices, teaching them only the light
side. The scales become more
severely imbalanced toward that side, until eventually, things are forced to
snap back the other way. Kylo Ren,
a force user with a natural affinity for the light side (a fact which explains
his struggle to embrace the dark side fully), sees the lack of balance in the
force, and is convinced that he has to restore the balance by embracing the
dark side and destroying Luke’s new Jedi order.
Here, the redemption of Kylo Ren comes, not from denying the
dark side, but by finding his own balance within the dark side. As Rey grows into the powerful light
side practitioner, Kylo Ren has to learn how to be a dark side user without
allowing it to turn him into a power hungry maniac like Snoke or Emperor
Palpatine. This would also create
an interesting dynamic with Rey, should she turn out to be the child of a Sith
family. Then you have a balance
created by the two; Rey a light force user with a proclivity toward the dark
side, and Ren the child of a great light side family who chooses the dark side
for the “greater good.” Balance is
restored, and Ren’s sacrifice is not giving his life to return to the light,
but choosing the path he would rather not take in order to ensure the ultimate
balance in the force. Such a
stance would radically change everything we know so far about the Star Wars
universe, but at the same time, such a view of the force fits with what is
already established. Instead of
viewing the force as good and evil in a Western sense, the force becomes much
more like the Yin and Yang of the Eastern mythos, energy created by thought and
emotion that must be balanced, a power that is both day and night, creation and
destruction, that is a part of all life.
Morality then becomes separated from the force, and is placed at the
feet of human beings. The force
does not determine whether something is good or evil; the actions taken by
those who wield it do.
Sundry other Characters
I realize I have gone on a bit long here, so I will try to
keep thing quick with the other characters
Finn
Some speculation has anticipated that Finn might also be
force sensitive. I think that this
is highly unlikely for a number of reasons. First, Finn was a storm trooper for the First Order. The First Order has a number of force
users, including Supreme Leader Snoke, Kylo Ren, and all the knights of
Ren. Force users can generally
sense each others' presence, so given the prevalence of force users in The
First Order, it seems unlikely that Finn’s abilities would have gone
unnoticed. It also seems likely,
given the capabilities of force users, that the First Order would be actively
recruiting them, testing recruits for force ability. Even if Finn could have somehow passed such a testing, and
remained unnoticed by other force users in the First Order, the capabilities
that force sensitivity produces would have opened different pathways in his
basic storm trooper training. Force
sensitivity tends to produce better reflexes, empathy, and greater
understanding of technology. If he
was a force user somehow missed by the first order, it stands to reason he
would have become a pilot not placed in charge of sanitation. It is a small detail, but given Finn’s
precarious position in the First Order, it seems highly doubtful that he is a
force user. Instead, he becomes
the new Han Solo or Princess Leia character, highly capable in his own right,
growing into a leadership position instead of that of a warrior.
Supreme Leader Snoke
I have two theories about Supreme Leader Snoke. They are not necessarily exclusive, but
either would provide an interesting twist on the character. One widely speculated theory I have
come across is that Snoke is actually Darth Plageus, the Sith Lord who trained
Emperor Palpatine (Palpatine claimed to have killed Plageus, but that can
easily be written around).
Speculation springs primarily from questions about physical similarities
to the way in which the character has been described in the EU, and claims that
the music that plays when Snoke is introduced is similar to that which plays
when Palpatine describes the legend of Darth Plageus. This would be very interesting because the characters would
have to deal with an enemy who is extraordinarily old and powerful, an enemy who
has survived the worst the Star Wars universe had to throw at him, and who had
the wisdom of centuries of experience to back him up.
My second theory about Supreme Leader Snoke is that he is
not as powerful as he initially seems.
There is not a lot of speculation in this regard, but after I walked out
of episode seven for the first time, my first thought regarding Snoke was that
he was probably not a force user.
This might seem strange considering his position at the head of the
First Order, and his mastery over Kylo Ren, but hear me out. Kylo Ren, while an intimidating user of
the Dark Side, is not as powerfully intimidating as Darth Vader. In a context of will against Rey, Kylo
Ren ultimately loses, and must confess as much to his master. The construction of his lightsaber, and
the relatively jagged nature of its plasma flow also indicates a lack of
experience in its creation. If
Kylo Ren has had training from both Luke Skywalker and a Sith as powerful as
Snoke is made out to be, it seems unlikely that either of these facts would
occur. Similarly, we never see,
nor does Snoke ever claim to have used the force. The closest he comes is the statement/ question, “There has
been an awakening in the Force…have you felt it?” While the statement implies that Snoke has felt this
awakening, it does not specifically say so. Furthermore, we have characters in this film, most notably
Maz Kanata, who “know,” (can sense the force), but cannot use it. This theory is also indicated by the
constant repetition of the warning to Kylo Ren, “Snoke is only using you for
your power.” Now again, this
sentence can be taken two ways; it either means that Snoke is manipulating Kylo
Ren because he is a powerful force user (like the Emperor and Darth Vader), or
it could mean that Snoke does not actually have access to the power of the
force, and is using Kylo Ren as a weapon to wield power he does not inherently
have. While I think that this
theory is relatively unlikely, it would provide an interesting path for exploration
of the character, and mesh very well with the question of balance I mentioned
earlier: when Luke Skywalker gets killed (and I think it very likely that he
will in the next couple of movies), having Snoke as a powerless puppet master
will allow the question of balance in the force to shift to the new generation
in Rey and Kylo Ren.
In an even more concise summary of my speculations about the
next film; I think Luke will die (because all mentor figures in the force die
in the Star Wars films), I think that Princess Leia will be the only one of the
original three to survive to the end of the new trilogy. I think that General Hux will
ultimately become the villain of the story, as Kylo Ren discovers he can be a
dark force user and not be evil. I
think commander Phasma will come back (hey, no body, no death), and take on a
role similar to that we see in Boba Fett in the original trilogy, as the bad-ass
side character with cool gadgets. She
will probably serve as a foil for Finn through the trilogy, much as Fett was
for Han Solo, and Kylo Ren will be for Rey. Someone seriously needs to get a hand or arm chopped off
sometime in the next film, because that always happens in Star Wars, and I am
guessing it will probably be either Finn or Poe Dameron. We should have some force ghosts show
up, hopefully Ian McGregor as Obi Wan Kenobi. Also, I am really looking forward to getting backstory for a
number of characters, particularly Maz Kanata. Whatever comes next, I am very excited for episode eight,
and I look forward to seeing how the foundation built in episode seven supports
the rest of the story.
I apologize for the rambling nature of this piece, particularly the end... I had so much I wanted to cover, I am not sure that I was able to make all of it make sense. Please feel free to leave your own speculations, or any thoughts you have on my ideas in the comments. Also, if you want to be consistently updated when I post a new blog, please sign up for email updates over in the right toolbar. I will see you all next month, for more discussion on politics and pop culture.
Well, back to reality.
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