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crmediagal · 5 years ago

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I Have A Lot of Thoughts...

Okay. I just got back from seeing TROS. Bearing in mind that I already knew the main spoilers involving my precious boy, Ben Solo, and my beloved ship Reylo, I still have So. Many. Questions. And a flippin’ series of disappointments to whinge about, so get ready.

!!! WARNING: #TROS SPOILERS AHEAD !!!

Lets start with the main and, for me, most important factors: Reylo and Ben Solo

At the end of the day, if Reylo wasn’t ever intended to be end game, I could have lived with that. I’ve shipped whatever the heck I wanna ship and written those ships in fandoms I’ve loved for years, regardless of their basis (or more often, not) in the canonverse. I’d have survived if there was no kiss at the end.

Back in early 2016, when people were still speculating that Ben and Rey were related, I was writing them as lovers and doting parents, so, erm, again, for me, the ship wasn’t contingent upon them becoming canon in order to hold legitimacy/meaning. It shouldn’t for anyone, really. Ship whatever you wanna ship, guys! Love them regardless of screen time or lack thereof!

That being said, I will cherish That Moment™ forever when the Reylo shippers got a glimpse of what this incredible coupling could have been. And in the actual canon material, no less. That’s more than I'd have ever expected to receive and, frankly, was enough for me to be satisfied.

HOWEVER.

I was fully invested in this trilogy from start to finish for Ben Solo. And that is where I've been most letdown, disheartened, and pained.

At the off, sure, Kylo Ren made for an interesting archetype “villain” in TFA, but the moment we learned of his true identity, the Bad Boy™ appeal, for me, melted away. I fell in love with the tortured young man who had never really had the freedom of choice; who had the burden of war heroes for parents and a royal bloodline that traced back to Vader; who was abandoned by his family and left to navigate the enormity of his powers and abilities on his own. I was taken with Ben Solo’s troubled, many-layered complexity and this character took on a whole new meaning for me after TFA.

Like so many other Ben Redemptionists, I desperately wanted to see Ben Solo free of the torture he’d suffered all his life. And that life wasn’t long in years, unlike Anakin’s. By the end of Anakin’s life, he was more machine than man and middle-aged.

All the more reason that I needed to see Ben redeemed in this story...and allowed to walk freely in the sun.

SW is built on forgiveness and redemption, after all, so why would they not bring Ben Solo back to the Light and take him where Anakin’s story never could go? The groundwork was laid in two films and reiterated in countless interview quotes the creators dropped on us for four effin’ years. Disney and the creators seemed as invested in Ben Solo’s redemption arc as the fans were, so I wasn’t too worried about seeing it come full circle.

Hooooo boy. #MyBigFatMistakeThatIWillNeverMakeAgain

Ben Solo’s redemption, while earned in the last few minutes of TROS, was horribly cheapened when the creators decided to ‘play it safe’ by making him sacrifice himself. It wasn’t romantic and tragic, as I’m sure JJ and the creators were aiming for, but, rather, a Grade F example of very poor, very subpar writing. We got to see Ben for a few moments as himself whilst much of his storyline and importance in TROS was cruelly (and, it would seem, very purposely) reduced in the last film, too, when such plot for his character was supposed to be centre stage.

Less time devoted to Ben’s arc and then killing him off sends so many terrible messages, particularly for kids. You’d think Disney would understand that better than most.

Death is not hopeful. Redemption in the form of a young man, who was barely given the chance to live in Light and Love, dying as soon as his true self was realised isn’t hope. It’s been done before in this saga, as it has in many others, so it just makes the whole play-by-play defeatist and devastating. And after 40+ years of Skywalkers and Solos suffering in this universe, haven’t we ALL had enough of that, JJ? Disney?

They made Rey a Palpatine--a ‘surprise’ that had me actually laughing in the cinema and asking myself nervously, ‘Is this a joke?’--who takes the name of Skywalker to renounce her own bloodline but in the end, JJ, Disney, and the creators still sent us the same damnable, harrowing message: that Palpatine won.

#YIKES. That isn’t hope either, JJ! Disney! ABORT ABORT ABORT!

I thought JJ and the creators would be bolder than this PG-level crap. I thought Ben’s journey would be a true reversal of Vader’s, just as the director himself quoted not too long ago, and what did we get instead? Dusty old tropes and the sour takeaway that redemption will always come at a price rather than at its simplest, most exceptional form: the beauty of a second chance.

In the end, Ben Solo’s never to know freedom from Darkness? He's never to have the opportunity to make right of his wrongs by living in the Light? He's never to grow old? Instead, he’s to die a too-young death in the hands of a woman who actually loves and cares about the role he has to play in this whole saga; perhaps, the only one who cares at that point?

That’s cruel, JJ. Disney. And, again, utterly hopeless.

Hell, Ben’s not even one of the Force Ghosts Rey sees in the last scene of the movie! (A convenient loophole, yes, and the flicker of an opportunity to, perhaps, bring him back but it’s a wildly overlooked mistake if that wasn’t intended by the creators...and I don’t think it was intentional to make him Not There™.)

I don’t get this saga anymore. I failed to grasp the overall message of Hope in TROS. At all. I’m beyond disappointed at the assassination of Ben’s character to give others, who shall remain nameless, more screen time and a beefier storyline which was, frankly, always quite thin to begin with. I feel like I’ve been cheated on...and it hurts so badly to be so letdown by something you’ve loved and supported for so long.

And some other ridiculous absurdities in TROS while we’re still here:

Why was this film ALL about Rey’s lineage, a direction that seemed to come out of nowhere when it was already established in TLJ that her background wasn’t important or crucial to her part in the story? She came from nowhere, so why did this become a central thing?

I’ll admit that I never really cared whether Rey was a Skywalker or a Kenobi or had any given name. I rather enjoyed the idea that she had built herself up from nothing. That was an empowering message, in fact, and a strong one, I think. It was certainly leaps and bounds better than the, ‘HA! GOTCHA! SHE’S PALPATINE’S GRANDDAUGHTER!’ reveal that was laid onto us way too thick in the Final Act.

Ew. Gross. No thanks. I hate it. Take it back. It’s a passe trick to try and pull on the audience at the last minute.

One of many more examples of poor writing by the creators, I suppose.

Also, since when is Finn a Force sensitive? Did I miss something in TFA or TLJ that suggested he possessed that gift? No? Ah. More lousy writing.

Additionally, why does Finn spend the entire movie running after Rey? Why was his romantic storyline with Rose completely dropped and nonexistent in TROS?

It’s almost as if JJ and the creators were giving TLJ director, Rian Johnson, the middle finger throughout the entire finale that was this garbage of a movie. Nice work in undoing all the innovative things Rian brought to the saga, JJ. TROS is even worse™ than the Prequels...and THAT’s saying something.

Why did all the voices of Jedis past speak to Rey but never the helpless Ben Solo who had Palpatine raping his ear from the time he was a baby? It seems sketchy and unfair?

Again, lots of TROS makes little sense. It felt like an entirely separate movie to me--separate from the rest of the saga--and doesn’t wrap 40+ years of this series up all too nicely. It’s anything but. It’s confusing, heartbreaking, and leaves one without much hope.

So...we come to the end of my ramblings and wailings:

Ben Solo was the most interesting, convoluted, and beautifully crafted character from this new trilogy and a true redemption would have served the legacy upon which the SW saga is built--Hope™--so much better, including but not limited to its utilisation in making Han’s death carry meaning. Because his son would have not only returned to the Light but gotten to Live™ and experience it fully.

What a remarkably hopeful ending that would have been...

Instead, we got garbage writing and the redundant SW tropes.

Ben Solo deserved better. JJ and the creators absolutely wasted his potential in this story and I’ll be forever crestfallen..and retreating more and more into my own Ben Redemption fics because to hell with this elementary-level bullsh*t.

Han Solo deserved for his son’s part in his demise to not be utterly pointless at the end because, hey ho, guess what? YOUR SON DIED ANYWAY?!

Leia Organa deserved to not only see her son redeemed but to have that emotional reunion many of us were craving. She had already lost so much, but I guess JJ and the creators decided to just...serve the general more pain in the end. Wow. Rude. Such disrespect. Carrie Fisher wouldn’t have stood for it.

And Rey... My gawd, she deserved better, too. She should never been tied to Palpatine in order to make her seem more important. That grossly underserved her character.

She also should have had her other half. The yang to her yin. The only other person in the entire ruddy galaxy who understood her: Ben. She deserved to not be left alone at the end of TROS, just as she had started in TFA.

I’m going to go work on my WIP Reylo fic now and try to forget TROS entirely.

#ben solo #reylo #reyben #tros #tros spoilers #rey #star wars #i am in pain #i am....so heartbroken

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