#rei damsel in distress is like my fav kind of rei

[ureithral]

AU where kaoru is a vampire and rei is a human damsel in distress who’s in love with a certain vampire

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[emperorren]

1- I know I shouldn't but I kind of feel guilty because I'd love for Ben to save Rey through his love. I love KOTOR and RevanxBastila is one of my fav ship ever and I'm still moved to tears by how Revan just refuse to battle her, riking his life (and the Universe, btw) and saves her throuth the declaration of his undying love. I think it's beautiful, not sexist. I don't mind Rey being a "damsell in distress" (wathever it means), I don't mind her crying or being fragile. I don't but

I feel guilty. I understand people might not like what I do, that their fantasies could be the opposite of mine. At the same time I'm afraid of being labeled as anti-women and, I don't know... I can't avoid to think that it is hypocritical to want Ben to be the one being saved (and, I want to be really clear, I absolutely don't think it's wrong in any way, everybody might fantasize about whatever they want) an to be labelled as problematic if I want the opposite. To me it's just reallyromantic and heart-wrenching... Is it wrong? I don't think so.

Anon, both fantasies are valid and there’s nothing wrong to be attracted by the idea of being saved. However, it’s important to not relegate Rey to a passive role in the canon story, either. She needs to retain her agency---which doesn’t mean that she can’t be saved by Ben, but that her actions and choices need to remain relevant and be crucial in determining the outcome of the story.

I'm still moved to tears by how Revan just refuse to battle her, risking his life (and the Universe, btw) and saves her through the declaration of his undying love. I think it's beautiful, not sexist

I don’t think such a scenario applied to Reylo would even require Rey being a /damsel in distress/? the power of saving a “monster” through love is typically feminine---it's what the heroine usually does in batb-adjacent fairytales. It’s the opposite of the standard action hero rescuing the damsel all guns ablazing trope. So Ben being the one to save Rey from darkness would actually be a nice gender subversion.

But to do that, he’d have to have already resolved the darkness within himself. I don’t think you can build up the question of “can Kylo Ren be redeemed” for 2 movies and then sidestep it completely by making his redemption coincide with someone else’s redemption---someone who we didn’t even know needed redemption until the last film. Well, actually, you CAN, but it’s complicated.

So I think it’s possible that Ben will go through his own hero’s journey in TROS and will travel into the underworld to save Rey just like Rey traveled into the underworld to save him in TLJ. If dark!Rey happens, it will be her love for Ben to keep her from losing herself (like Ben’s love for Rey was what made him worthy of claiming the legacy saber) and they’ll end Palpatine together like they ended Snoke together. There won’t be a clear cut hero/damsel binary in their dynamic, but both of them will be both things simultaneously, and they’ll save each other / be saved by each other / save themselves.