#its a story meant for children for yodas sake

[sleeplessant]

Fuck-ups: Why its important that Darth Vader and Kylo Ren were unforgivable

So I’m gonna start with a few disclaimers: I’m a Reylo stan, a feminist, a long time Star Wars fan and I don’t think those things are in conflict. 

Let me explain.

Yes, I know. Rey and Kylo Ren got off to a very rocky start. He abused her mind, she split his face in two. We know the drill. But THEN they discovered that there was more to each other than enemies and that’s when things got interesting. 

It went pretty much the same way with Luke and Darth Vader. Their first actual meeting was far from a cozy father-son reunion. Vader chopped off his own son’s hand, and Luke ended up severely battered, bruised and traumatized by the sword of a man that already knew that he was his father. Kidnapping and torturing his best friends had been Darth Vader’s way of luring Luke out of Dagobah, into Cloud City. There, Vader welcomed Luke with the giving end of some good old Canon Typical Violence. Empire Strikes Back in its full glory. 

Considering the original trilogy, Darth Vader was an awful piece of shit father. He tortured his own daughter (and never apologized, wtf). He mutilated his son and then offered him to a godamn creep (GrandPalpie). He was also a mass murderer.

And that’s only after he had a name change. 

Before going by his stage name, Anakin Skywalker was a massive fuck up. Up from Attack of the Clones on to The Return of the Jedi, he just chugged down mild mistakes, egregious sins and outright crimes against humanity like tic-tacs. 

We, the audience, knew Ani, didn’t we? He started as an innocent and generous child-slave, and later found himself trapped between a dogmatic belief system and feelings too strong for him to handle. He was only 19 when he married Padmé, thus failing as a Jedi. He was just an angry, horny, misguided teen.

But still, as Darth Vader, he proceeded to further fucking up his life trough and thorough. And he had to remain accountable! He murdered his wife, for crying out loud.

But the thing is, Star Wars is hardly about accountability (it was briefly mentioned in TLJ, absolute brilliant script, btw) but about family and forgiveness. And that’s when Luke’s brilliant arc comes in: Luke basically forgave Anakin because FUCK THE DARK SIDE, that’s why. Luke mastered his own fear, rage and anxiety because he wanted to love his father and wouldn’t hold a (well deserved) grudge against him if that’s what it took to keep the Dark Side in check. 

And it was then when Darth Vader, who already knew that he was a monster and well beyond redeeming, finally turned against his master. When showed unrelented compassion, forgiveness and love, Anakin gathered enough strenght to go back to the light. But he was too far gone, had lived long enough in the darkness and all that was left for him to do was sacrifice himself for his son, upend the Rule of Two, and die in the light.

Then Luke and Ani went and partied with some Ewoks and shit. And Anakin still didn’t aknowledge his daughter, but that’s not my point. 

Thirty years or so later (in and out of universe), we came across Ben Solo. He was failed by his father, his mother and his uncle. He was groomed by a fucking telepathic monster. He felt alone and confused and of fucking course he wanted to go to the Dark Side to be finally free of the pain if that’s what the voices in his head kept saying. 

What good were the soothing words of Han Solo, who had disappointed him countless times? Of Leia, pleading him to go back home, from where she herself kicked him out? And don’t get me started on Luke, whom spectacularly undermined his very first Supreme Leader public appearence, instead of, you know, apologizing for trying to murder an innocent boy in his sleep? 

So here we had Ben Solo, aka Kylo Ren. Mass murderer. Kidnapper. War criminal. Awful piece of shit person. Dumpster fire heart. No control of his rage. No understanding of his grief. The ultimate family disappointment. Not good at the light, but also mediocre at the dark. Absolute, ultimate fuck-up.

And we have Luke Skywalker, the legend who ran to an island and hid in shame for years, after fucking up big time with his padawan and nephew. The Jedi who turned his back on the galaxy. Another, older, should-have-known-better fuck-up.

They fucked up. So. Fucking. Hard.

Kylo Ren couldn’t be brought back by the same people that pushed him over the edge. Luke was not going to listen to the very people he had failed.

I think that Rey, as a new, unbiased and untethered player in the Skywalker Family Drama Saga, was supposed to show forgiveness to Kylo Ren. Not acceptance of his Dark Side shennanigans (she didn’t join him, didn’t she? and she gave him that look when closing the Falcon’s hatch on him), but she was supposed to offer a trustworthy hand to help him back to the light. 

She wanted to bring him back just because she knew (the Force thingies told her) that there was still hope for him. If Kylo had found with her the way to forgive himself, and forgive Luke, and finally go back... How cool would’ve that been? How cathartic?

And that would only be a secondary narrative in Rey Nobody’s beautiful character arc. You know, a Nobody finding her way in a complicated galaxy, stirring up hope and kindness. Befriending a First Order desertor. Giving a son back to his mother. Outgrowing the trauma of being abandoned as a child. Finding herself.

Just as Luke, in her first two movies, Rey was personally victimized by the First Order/Empire, Kylo Ren and Luke Skywalker/Vader. She went to “Master Skywalker”, the Dark Side cave and her own abuser and enemy for answers. Found none. She was constantly left confused, sad and alone. She had to find her place, not so much in others, but inside herself.

I believe that Star Wars is about heroes chosing to be kind, loving and hopeful. The very fucked up villains are not defeated: they find forgiveness and compassion at the hands of the heroes. Evil is destroyed by being outright rejected.

That's how we're gonna win. Not by fighting what we hate. But saving what we love. 

PS: The sequel trilogy could have been about Ben Solo learning to walk in the light, or about Rey forgiving herself for failing to bring him back (yeah, still an option for me, as long as it was well done). 

It could have been about what to do with no legacy, what to do with too much legacy, how to cope with your own legacy. 

We got TROS instead. A real fuck up. 

Are we going to bully producers and directors, are we going to wallow in our collective misery, or are we going to build a better, more creative, inclusive, loving, understanding, fandom?