Yeah, that's an interesting point: is this film the end-point of Star Wars - that is to say, will any new films and tv-shows cover the time post-IX? Or are they doing a Mass Effect ending with no hyperspace and/or no Force anymore ... I doubt that, no money in dead universes ... to paraphrase.

I'll probably regret this, but I doubt she's a Skywalker - as in blood relation. But she could be a "Skywalker", as in created by the Force.

2 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

Aside from the actress saying "no Reylo" there are some definite issues with Reylo. It is not a healthy relationship at all.

Yeah well given how draconian Disney is with their actors about embargoes on what they can/can't say, I don't take that as confirmation. And I agree it's not a healthy relationship in it's current state, but I mean, do you think people can't change and grow? And overcome prior hangups and baggage, and become better people based on their mistakes from the past? that's why I said the Reylo thing would be sort of established, but sort of "long distance relationship" if you will.

1 minute ago, Nytwyng said:

Interesting ideas. There’s also the theory that’s been floating around for months that Palpatine’s spirit has been lingering in Vader’s helmet, whispering to Ben/Kylo to do all sorts of horrible things, built from the conclusion that, if Anakin were truly redeemed at the time of his death, it adds another layer to Kylo’s fascination with Vader’s helmet and talk about “finishing what (Vader) started.”

If he and Rey are destroying his display of Vader’s helmet...maybe there’s something to that....

Huh ... the interwebz never ceases to amaze.

But, it kind of makes sense, with the force lightningy face of Vader (that lightning skull-face always amazed me as a kid), and the no stopping his death at that point - for an unexplained reason ...I mean sure, he was zapped in the face, but all things considered, his suit still (seemed to) worked, why was it so certain that he was dead?

Just now, KungFuFerret said:

And I agree it's not a healthy relationship in it's current state, but I mean, do you think people can't change and grow? And overcome prior hangups and baggage, and become better people based on their mistakes from the past?

I do believe that people can change and grow, I just don't think that Disney would go for it without, at the very least, a lot of change being apparent in the characters.

4 minutes ago, Jegergryte said:

Huh ... the interwebz never ceases to amaze.

But, it kind of makes sense, with the force lightningy face of Vader (that lightning skull-face always amazed me as a kid), and the no stopping his death at that point - for an unexplained reason ...I mean sure, he was zapped in the face, but all things considered, his suit still (seemed to) worked, why was it so certain that he was dead?

I always took it as he knew his life support systems were failing from his being electrocuted, and that he was essentially running on reserves and his own force of will, neither of which were infinite. And so, rather than suffer a prolonged, drawn out, quite possibly painful demise, he opted for the more dramatic option of having his mask taken off and getting at least one good look at his own son before going out. Seeing as how it was Palpatine that placed him inside that armor in the first place, it also serves as a nice "sod off you moldy old twit!" style of dig at his former master.

4 minutes ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

I do believe that people can change and grow, I just don't think that Disney would go for it without, at the very least, a lot of change being apparent in the characters.

While I agree that sort of thing can happen, and does happen in real life, writing it in a believable way in a film can be tricky.

I've seen a lot of complaints about how Beauty and the Beast (one of my favorite Disney animated movies) should have been titled Stockholm Syndrome the Animated Movie. I think that's a load of crap (mostly as Beast was not nearly the abusive sack of malignant pus that those people make him out to be), and that Belle was reduced to being nothing more than his reward (again, a view I strongly disagree with).

But at the same time that sort of interpretation can't really be ignored, especially in today's age where you've got the "super-ultra-woke" crowd that if you make one social misstep, no matter how minor, they'll tear out your throat and piss on your corpse. Recent case in point, Critical Role and the fiasco over accepting sponsorship money from Wendy's to do a one-shot promoting their Feast of Legends joke RPG, due to Wendy's having some admittedly shady business practices. The CR crew meant well, and have generally open and supportive, but that one misstep (even after taking steps to remedy and address things) has lead to Matt and team getting a lot of hate. For better or for worse, it's a factor of the world we live in.

With Reylo, it's tricky footing given Kylo's rather stalkerish vibe in how he pursues his interest in Rey. If that was the sole plot of the movie, then maybe it could be done, but at best it's one of a few main plotlines and at worst it's a b-plot, neither of which really provide a way to make it work without tripping up somewhere along the line and drawing a lot of backlash. Then again, if the Avatar: The Last Airbender taught me anything, it's that the whole business of character shipping is both weird and fraught with landmines.

22 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

I always took it as he knew his life support systems were failing from his being electrocuted, and that he was essentially running on reserves and his own force of will, neither of which were infinite. And so, rather than suffer a prolonged, drawn out, quite possibly painful demise, he opted for the more dramatic option of having his mask taken off and getting at least one good look at his own son before going out. Seeing as how it was Palpatine that placed him inside that armor in the first place, it also serves as a nice "sod off you moldy old twit!" style of dig at his former master.

Fair, that was my assumption too, but the theory, or hypothesis, that you referred to, could imply another or additional "mechanism" in the reasoning, one even Vader was unaware of, and that tied Palpy's spirit to the suit.

Or tied his spirit to DS2, hence why they're going looking for it. I mean, there's something important with DS2, possibly something completely different, from super-important to borderline trivial...

But, presupposing that Palps has dialogue, it's a possibility. If we only presuppose that Palps has lines, monologues, then ... who knows.

We do know however that the voice-overs in the trailers don't necessarily mean they're lines from the film, so presupposing that Palps is anything more than mentioned isn't necessarily safe grounds.

Then again, perhaps there's a mausoleum; someone found his corpse and made a floating crystal city mausoleum (or deep within DS2). There's is that blue flash after he falls down the bottomless pit ... it signifies his death, I assume ... but why blue stuff everywhere? Could be something there too... if we look hard and with enough coffee

EDIT: Also! The line about "No one is ever really gone" is from Luke, at the end of TLJ. Probably common knowledge. Just realised as I re-watched it last night. Puts that scene in a different light ...

4 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Then again, if the Avatar: The Last Airbender taught me anything, it's that the whole business of character shipping is both weird and fraught with landmines.

? Huh? I've missed this.

Just now, Jegergryte said:

? Huh? I've missed this.

If you mean the animated series Avater: The Last Airbender (or The Legend of Aang as I believe it was called outside of the U.S.), it's worth catching as it's not only beautifully animated with some solid grounding in real world martial arts, but also tells some very good stories, especially the B-Plot with the initial antagonist Prince Zuko but also just for the wisdom and compassion of Uncle Iroh, who for my money is one of the best mentor figures in 21st century media.

If you mean the shipping wars that existed in and around that franchise... I envy your ignorance. The fandom could get awfully scary when it came to their preferred couples, especially the ones that the series' canon didn't support.

30 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

If you mean the animated series Avater: The Last Airbender (or The Legend of Aang as I believe it was called outside of the U.S.), it's worth catching as it's not only beautifully animated with some solid grounding in real world martial arts, but also tells some very good stories, especially the B-Plot with the initial antagonist Prince Zuko but also just for the wisdom and compassion of Uncle Iroh, who for my money is one of the best mentor figures in 21st century media.

If you mean the shipping wars that existed in and around that franchise... I envy your ignorance. The fandom could get awfully scary when it came to their preferred couples, especially the ones that the series' canon didn't support.

Yeah, I was wondering about the shipping thing. Googled. Get it. Not going to go look for it.

I'm very well acquainted with Avatar: The Last Airbender. Great series.

7 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

If you mean the animated series Avater: The Last Airbender (or The Legend of Aang as I believe it was called outside of the U.S.), it's worth catching as it's not only beautifully animated with some solid grounding in real world martial arts, but also tells some very good stories, especially the B-Plot with the initial antagonist Prince Zuko but also just for the wisdom and compassion of Uncle Iroh, who for my money is one of the best mentor figures in 21st century media.

If you mean the shipping wars that existed in and around that franchise... I envy your ignorance. The fandom could get awfully scary when it came to their preferred couples, especially the ones that the series' canon didn't support.

Coincidentally enough, Alex Damon of Star Wars Explained recently watched Avatar: The Last Airbender for the first time, and has explicitly stated that Zuko’s character arc across the series actually made him support the notion that Kylo/Ben’s redemption could happen and not be unbelievable.

8 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

but also just for the wisdom and compassion of Uncle Iroh, who for my money is one of the best mentor figures in 21st century media.

Ah yes, Uncle Iroh. His story arc in that is so dang good. That show was really good about showing how each of the bending styles had a "dark side" variant, to try and balance out the fact that the antagonists were all fire benders, which biased people to thinking "Fire=Bad". But Iroh, from the start, was the reverse of that. Since the rest of the fire nation was in the antagonist camp, he was the single example of how you could be a decent person, and a fire bender. How someone would balance the innate nature of the fire cultivation, and not being a weapons grade deuchebag. They expanded on that even more later of course, but i just loved how he was just this chill grandpa, who liked his hot tea, liked hot tubs that he powered himself, and tried to just enjoy life, without the inherent need to burn it all down .

Such good writing on that show.

2 minutes ago, Nytwyng said:

Coincidentally enough, Alex Damon of Star Wars Explained recently watched Avatar: The Last Airbender for the first time, and has explicitly stated that Zuko’s character arc across the series actually made him support the notion that Kylo/Ben’s redemption could happen and not be unbelievable.

Jenny Nichols on youtube, has a video where she brings up the points that strongly suggest that Kylo will be redeemed, and survive it. And it's a very interesting video, as she pointed out details that I didn't really think about from a narrative/thematic structure stance. I've personally always felt he would survive, for multiple reasons that are more the business/marketing side of the equation, but narratively its always made sense to me too.

5 minutes ago, Nytwyng said:

Coincidentally enough, Alex Damon of Star Wars Explained recently watched Avatar: The Last Airbender for the first time, and has explicitly stated that Zuko’s character arc across the series actually made him support the notion that Kylo/Ben’s redemption could happen and not be unbelievable.

With Zuko, they had time to build to his eventual heel-face turn, even if his actions at the end of Season 2 made the fandom cry out in disbelief.

With Kylo, they'd have to do that sort of thing in a single film. Not saying it's impossible, just that it'd be tricky to pull off well.

I'm just worried about the implications if Kylo goes from series primary antagonist to getting redeemed and getting the girl (Rey) would be. Again, I'm not totally against the idea of Kylo getting some manner of redemption and even surviving, but I think it'd be better if him and Rey simply remain as friends.

Again, just one random internet poster's opinion; that and a couple bucks might get you a cup of coffee.

4 hours ago, KungFuFerret said:

Was that his destiny though? Because the only thing I remember them saying was "Bring balance to the Force." Which isn't the same thing as "Destroying the Sith" to me. Granted it's been probably over a decade since I've seen any of the prequels, so maybe I'm missing some lines where they did specify it was a Destroy the Sith thing, but I don't think so?

This is a problem whenever you do prophecies in your story though, if anything else happens after, it risks devaluing what was previously done. Personally though, I always interpreted the prophecy as "he stopped the Emperor from completely snuffing out the light, by destroying him, and bursting the Imperial bubble that was threatening to overtake the galaxy. Basically he just equalized the pressure in a container that was about to rupture. Doesn't mean things couldn't happen later that would be bad as well, just THAT really big explosion was thwarted because of his actions.

So I don't think, personally it invalidates his sacrifice based on the prophecy, I think it invalidates it, because the badguy he killed is back again for nothing more than a surprise fanservice reason. That's my take on it anyway.

Bring balance to the force was supposed to mean destroying the Sith (according to Lucas). It all depends on your concept of balance. If the universe is in balance only when the Sith are gone, then he did it...although it apparently didn't stop the Sith for long....so how useful that was is up for debate.

Although thousands of Jedi and two sith, or thousands of Jedi and no sith don't really sound like balance if you look at it from another point of view. Anakin helped Palpy bring about the end of the Jedi order and reduce their numbers to two (obi and yoda) while the Sith were also just two (Vader and Palpy). Balance! Obi and Yoda die, and again Anakin balances the force accounting book once again by killing Palpy while also throwing off his own mortal coil.

Either way it seems he balanced things out. But then again, even Yoda admitted that prophecies can be misinterpreted.

Just now, Donovan Morningfire said:

With Zuko, they had time to build to his eventual heel-face turn, even if his actions at the end of Season 2 made the fandom cry out in disbelief.

With Kylo, they'd have to do that sort of thing in a single film. Not saying it's impossible, just that it'd be tricky to pull off well.

I'm just worried about the implications if Kylo goes from series primary antagonist to getting redeemed and getting the girl (Rey) would be. Again, I'm not totally against the idea of Kylo getting some manner of redemption and even surviving, but I think it'd be better if him and Rey simply remain as friends.

Again, just one random internet poster's opinion; that and a couple bucks might get you a cup of coffee.

The groundwork’s been there all along, with the running commentary of his struggling against the light, how even killing his own father didn’t tip him to the dark but left him conflicted, his choice not to attack the Raddus ’ bridge and kill Leia, and so on. Even his rejecting Rey’s entreaties to stop the attack on the Resistance are in line with his desire to be the bad guy despite impulses to the light. If TRoS tosses in a heaping dose of being manipulated by Palpatine towards his darker actions, then it’s not as tough a road.

In-story, I think he’d still need to pay for his crimes; it wouldn’t be like the end of whichever one of Dark Horse’s Infinities stories had a redeemed Vader in white armor join the Rebellion.

Out-of-story, I think the biggest hurdle to clear is that (for the audience) his biggest moment of “Lookit me! I’m a bad boy!” pique was killing Han. Would the audience be willing to forgive him not for killing his father, but such a beloved character?

7 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

With Zuko, they had time to build to his eventual heel-face turn, even if his actions at the end of Season 2 made the fandom cry out in disbelief.

With Kylo, they'd have to do that sort of thing in a single film. Not saying it's impossible, just that it'd be tricky to pull off well.

I'm just worried about the implications if Kylo goes from series primary antagonist to getting redeemed and getting the girl (Rey) would be. Again, I'm not totally against the idea of Kylo getting some manner of redemption and even surviving, but I think it'd be better if him and Rey simply remain as friends.

Again, just one random internet poster's opinion; that and a couple bucks might get you a cup of coffee.

I don't think it's been something they've done over just one film. The seeds of it have been there through both films really. I mean we hear from Kylo himself that he's constantly fighting "the pull to the light", so it's an already established idea that a significant part of him doesn't want to be Dark. That he's misguided, and listening to some really bad impulses in his own head, as well as some really bad mentors in the form of Snoke.

In Last Jedi, we see him clearly refusing to fire when he senses his mother is on the ship, so he's got a direct example of him showing restraint, and not just giving into his emotions, which is a cornerstone of the Sith philosophy. His personal kill count of Important Characters is at best 2 (if you count the old dude at the beginning of TFA, which I don't as he was basically nobody), but honestly more like just 1 person (Han). He doesn't casually murder underlings like Vader would do when they made mistakes, or even just brought him bad news. Instead he vents on inanimate objects, which is far more restrained than your typical Sith. And several other little things.

Plus, he's the only living Skywalker (as far as we know) at this point in the narrative, and if he dies without having children, it would :

1. Contradict the title of Episode 9, which is just highly unlikely. That would be as silly as having the Sith NOT get revenge in Revenge of the Sith.

2. Kill off one of the most marketable, and brand recognized names of the entire franchise. Which is just dumb from a business angle. Just like it would be dumb to get rid of the term Jedi, for the same reason. Those words have significant weight in our cultural collective understanding of the franchise, and removing them would just be really REALLY dumb for Disney, from a marketing standpoint.

So yeah, I think he's going to live, at least long enough to sire some kids with somebody (maybe not Rey, but at least someone), and that means, since he hasn't had any children that we know of yet, means he has to live to get busy with someone later on.

Here is that video I referred to about Kylo's Redemption, if anyone was curious.

3 minutes ago, kmanweiss said:

Bring balance to the force was supposed to mean destroying the Sith (according to Lucas).

Well, Yoda questions this interpretation of the prophecy, speculating that it could've been misread. So, this is the interpretation under which the Jedi operated, but it isn't necessarily "true". We don't have the prophecy as such.

5 minutes ago, Jegergryte said:

Well, Yoda questions this interpretation of the prophecy, speculating that it could've been misread. So, this is the interpretation under which the Jedi operated, but it isn't necessarily "true". We don't have the prophecy as such.

While the movies are not necessarily beholden to work with the other media, Claudia Gray’s recent novel Master and Apprentice has this as the text of the prophecy:

“A Chosen One shall come, born of no father, and through him will ultimate balance in the Force be restored.”

1 hour ago, Nytwyng said:

ultimate balance in the Force be restored.”

..................... 😒 .....yeaaaah, that's so vague as to be useless, just like real prophecies, they are only ever "realized" after the fact, and filling in whatever details the person wants to justify their position.

2 hours ago, KungFuFerret said:

Plus, he's the only living Skywalker (as far as we know) at this point in the narrative, and if he dies without having children, it would :

1. Contradict the title of Episode 9, which is just highly unlikely. That would be as silly as having the Sith NOT get revenge in Revenge of the Sith.

2. Kill off one of the most marketable, and brand recognized names of the entire franchise. Which is just dumb from a business angle. Just like it would be dumb to get rid of the term Jedi, for the same reason. Those words have significant weight in our cultural collective understanding of the franchise, and removing them would just be really REALLY dumb for Disney, from a marketing standpoint.

So yeah, I think he's going to live, at least long enough to sire some kids with somebody (maybe not Rey, but at least someone), and that means, since he hasn't had any children that we know of yet, means he has to live to get busy with someone later on.

Well, if the speculation that Rey either adopts the surname of Skywalker herself, adapts Skywalker to be a title of whatever version of the Jedi Order she helps build, or uses Skywalker as the name of the new order of mystical warrior-monks that replaces the Jedi Order are accurate, then both those points are moot, as the Skywalker name will live on without needing to keep Kylo around.

One of the elements of Rey's story that I enjoy is that she hasn't been part of some illustrious bloodline, that she was just a girl from pretty much nowhere (even Luke agreed that jakku was pretty much nowhere, and he described Tatooine as the planet furthest from the bright center of the universe back when he was her age), and yet she's just as capable of being the hero of the era as Luke was for his, or that Ben could have been had he not been turned to the dark side. Keeping Kylo around to breed more baby Skywalkers starts to subvert that notion that anyone with the drive and opportunity can become a hero, and while Lucas was going for the "blood of kings" angle in his movies, the sequels seem to be steering away from that.

22 minutes ago, KungFuFerret said:

..................... 😒 .....yeaaaah, that's so vague as to be useless, just like real prophecies, they are only ever "realized" after the fact, and filling in whatever details the person wants to justify their position.

My hat is off to Gray for wording it as vaguely as most “true” prophecies. It allows a lot of wiggle room for the franchise’s contributors.

2 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Well, if the speculation that Rey either adopts the surname of Skywalker herself, adapts Skywalker to be a title of whatever version of the Jedi Order she helps build, or uses Skywalker as the name of the new order of mystical warrior-monks that replaces the Jedi Order are accurate, then both those points are moot, as the Skywalker name will live on without needing to keep Kylo around.

Very true, but I personally don't think that's what's going to happen. Especially since there is a very much actual, living Skywalker alive, and a main player in the story. Could it happen? Sure, I just consider it a low likelihood of ways Ep. 9 will end up.

3 minutes ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

One of the elements of Rey's story that I enjoy is that she hasn't been part of some illustrious bloodline, that she was just a girl from pretty much nowhere (even Luke agreed that jakku was pretty much nowhere, and he described Tatooine as the planet furthest from the bright center of the universe back when he was her age), and yet she's just as capable of being the hero of the era as Luke was for his, or that Ben could have been had he not been turned to the dark side. Keeping Kylo around to breed more baby Skywalkers starts to subvert that notion that anyone with the drive and opportunity can become a hero, and while Lucas was going for the "blood of kings" angle in his movies, the sequels seem to be steering away from that.

I've never seen the idea that only Skywalkers can be heroes. I mean the prequels clearly show thousands of different people all being able to be Jedi just fine. It's never seemed something that is established at all, that it's only Skywalkers. I've used this comparison in another thread, but to me, I think the issue is that people commonly equate Jedi with Force User, which is true, but they forget that Force User, does not always equal Jedi. To make an analogy I've used, let's say that Force Users are red heads, the lovely gingers of our genetic buffet. And let's say that Jedi are people trained in gymnastics. Now, Order 66 didn't kill all Gingers, it killed all (and not even all, just most) Gingers who had been trained by this one school of gymnasts. But there are still plenty of Gingers in the galaxy, and the books that teach someone how to be a gymnast still exist, and multiple (growing with every new thing it seems) members of that destroy gymnast school survived, and continued to pass on their training to other people. The idea that one of the children of the founder of the gymnast school didn't die, and has been able to keep having children who have something of a heritage and legacy connection to the school, doesn't exclude plenty of other people from being equally, if not more important to the...gymnastic peace and order in the galaxy...ok the analogy falls apart a bit there at the end, but you get what I mean!

That's never really changed as I see it, and I don't see why it's necessary for the Skywalkers to die off (especially given how marketable the name is) just to elevate the non-Skywalker heroes. Maybe Kylo just swears off using the Force entirely, cutting himself off from it, just like Luke did, as penance for his crimes. Maybe he does some really powerful "take a bullet for Rey" thing, and the backlash burns out his capacity to tap into the Force somehow. Maybe he just decides he doesn't want to do anything other than go farm moisture, and to heck with all the galactic stuff. Let Rey handle it, she's perfectly fine. It's not hard to have a Skywalker be born, and perhaps doesn't have the inclination for the Force, or just no desire to use it (Like Leia clearly did, she had other things more important than Force training), but have them still be in the franchise.

11 hours ago, KungFuFerret said:

In Last Jedi, we see him clearly refusing to fire when he senses his mother is on the ship, so he's got a direct example of him showing restraint, and not just giving into his emotions, which is a cornerstone of the Sith philosophy.

We know that Kylo is no Sith, nor is Snoke. We only know they are dark side force users, but any assumption about them being Sith is only that, an assumption, that is not supported by the films, nor ancillary media. What they are is never really explained - except the references to the Knights of Ren seems to imply they are ... Rens? But then, there are Sith Troopers in Rise of Skywalker ... so ... perhaps .... a three way fight? Resistance vs First Order vs Sith/Empire (remnant) ?

11 hours ago, KungFuFerret said:

I mean we hear from Kylo himself that he's constantly fighting "the pull to the light", so it's an already established idea that a significant part of him doesn't want to be Dark.

This is one of the moments in TFA that I felt changed a lot. I think I like it.