There is a lengthy comment on Film Crit Hulk’s TFA essay (http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2016/06/28/star-wars-the-force-alluded-to) from soletsgettothepoint that I think is worth summarizing and expounding on. They claim that TFA works as a meta-analysis of Star Wars, and the problems of bringing this property back to the big screen after a decade of near-dormancy. For this analysis, Finn can be seen as the symbol for Disney, Rey is Abrams as well as exemplifying the Good side of the Star Wars fan, Kylo exemplifies the dark side of the Star Wars fan, and Han represents George Lucas.
In summary:
The commenter makes the point that Finn wonders why everyone wants to go back to Jakku (read: Tatooine), as if Disney wants to branch out from the same places in the Star Wars universe and make the most of an entire galaxy. Rey still holds out hope that her family (read: George Lucas) will still return for her, though she certainly knows better. She is delusional, but understandably so. It amuses me that Rey is a scavenger of other people’s property and her efforts lead to ever diminishing returns (‘last week it was a half-portion each’). The Falcon represents the original spirit of Star Wars, which ‘hasn’t flown in years’. It is off to a shaky start, and is put through more abuse in this film than in all of the other films combined, but it proves quite resilient. The commenter pointed out that since Han is George Lucas, the Rathtar sequence takes on a whole new meaning. From the commenter: ‘There was a specific reason that there were THREE very dangerous rathtars trying to kill everyone on board. They called the one famous rathtar attack before that a “tragedy.”’ I’d also note that Rey, the ‘good’ star wars fan, is blissfully unaware of the tragic Rathtar attack. I wonder now if making the Rathtars look obviously CG was intentional.
Further thoughts:
I wonder if Rey had an absurd number of magical competencies because she is the epitome of the Star Wars fan, someone who believes that they can do magical things if they simply believe in themselves enough. Rey isn’t realistic, but then again, neither are Star Wars fans. They are naively hoping for a Star Wars that cannot realistically exist, but they keep believing regardless. Kylo is the opposite of Rey, in that nothing is ever good enough for him. He is the offspring of George Lucas, but his greatness is the result of George’s wife, Marcia, though he never mentions her. So who/what does Snoke represent? What about Hux? Where does Poe fit in all of this? It’s a fun theory, so what do you think?