The Rise of Skywalker Expanded Edition by Rae Carson: The "Tragedy of Vader" Edit (v2 NOW AVAILABLE) — Page 5

Alright, I put the following directly after the Knights of Ren scene I wrote from the previous chapter. I forgot about this scene, so when I saw it I knew it had to go back in, but it didn’t fit in the next chapter. I made a few modifications to it, namely to preserve the Chewie reveal, but I also threw in a reference to Vader dialog. If it’s too overt I’ll remove it:

General Armitage Hux and a handful of other executive officers strode down a hallway of the Steadfast. They approached their Supreme Leader with some good news. Hux had been intending on delivering it first, but he was beat to it.

“Sir,” Allegient General Pryde said. “The Knights of Ren have tracked down the scavenger.”

“To the capital of Kijimi,” Admiral Griss added quickly.

“They’re searching there now,” Pryde said.

Hux needed to insert himself before his peers had delivered all the good news. He asked, “Shall we destroy the city, Supreme-”

Ren stuck a long finger in Hux’s face, using the Force to freeze his vocal chords in place.

“Set a course for Kijimi,” he commanded everyone. “I want no capital disintegrations.”

His words dismissed them all, and Kylo Ren hurried off alone. Hux stood with his hands clasped behind his back and watched him go, wondering how he always managed to say the wrong thing.

Maybe he could say “no orbital disintegrations”. Since Hux is implying to destroy the city from orbit, like with a Dreadnought or something.

RogueLeader, back at it again. Thanks.

What I thought was strange about that scene is that I thought the film made it pretty clear that Kylo used the Force to shut Hux up. According to the original novelization, all he did was stick up a finger, which I don’t like as much.

Chapter 10 Changelog (was a big one):

• Plenty of streamlining (removing unneeded details), and making things more clear
• C-3PO cycles through his memory banks before he says that he’s saying goodbye to his friends. This is what prompts Poe to ask what he’s doing. It achieves the effect that he is also looking at Luke, Leia, and Han before he dies.
• Finn eyes Zorii and Poe exiting the workshop longingly
• Removed all romantic inclinations between Poe and Zorii. They are just old friends.
• Overhauled Poe being a Debby Downer about nobody helping the Resistance:

1. Zorii points out that Kijimi City is in a state of active rebellion, as are many other worlds. It isn’t just about the First Order instilling fear.
2. Poe witnesses a group of teenagers doing graffiti art of a man holding a glowing sword when she tells him this.
3. Poe admits that people are rebelling, but insists that everyone is out for themselves since nobody came to help them on Crait.

• As a result of the aforementioned change, I have removed a second reference to the retcon that the First Order was blocking their call to the galaxy
• Rey tells Finn that Ochi’s ship was used by her parents, not that they simply left in it (which implies that Ochi didn’t notice the screaming girl behind him).
• 3PO’s message refers to the Sanctuary Moon of Endor. Finn refers to it as where the second Death Star exploded, not where the last war ended.
• Chewie is not revealed to still be alive until Rey senses it. As a result, moved Kylo’s interrogation scene to directly after this.
• To see changes to the interrogation scene, see the bottom of the last page
• Moved Zorii’s scene from the next chapter to the end of this one
  Link:
  https://drive.google.com/file/d/15Tg1J8GT7T42bciRhcsFWJYUxdIpSN_w/view?usp=sharing

I’m having trouble writing this chapter with the idea that Rey’s parents were bad people. The problem is that I would have to heavily rely on the idea that her father has PTSD from Exegol. But obviously we don’t know that he was a clone experiment at this point in the novel, so there isn’t anything except spite towards Palpatine there that could explain why they don’t give up her location in the flashback. Thing is, that’s coming just after another flashback which demonstrates how inherently selfish people they are, so I don’t think spite is a good enough reason. They clearly only care about their own lives.

If anybody has any ideas to fix this, I’d definitely tinker with it some more. But I had other ideas regarding good parents that I’d like to try in the meantime (like that perhaps they actually paid Unkar to watch her, and that they only purchased drinks to cope with losing her).

I do believe her parents being good people has its fair share of issues. Not only does it really mess with Rey’s arc where she wants to prove herself because of her “abandonment”, but it’s also kinda stupid that her parents give her to Plutt of all people. I suppose the whole “proving herself” side of things could just swap from it being because of abandonment to being a Palpatine, but idk.

Sorry for the rant.

I did suggest the tweaked “Rey Palpatine” reveal in the Redux Ideas Thread.

Also, change the previous conversation with Rey and Kylo Ren so it isn’t about her parents being good people, maybe just something along the lines of, “I know the rest of your story,” as well as, “I know why your parents threw you away.”

I think the entire dyad fight would have to be overhauled for this idea to work properly. The reason for that is because Kylo is revealing information in the scene which makes no sense without the context that she is a Palpatine.

The only ways I can think of to solve that would be to completely eliminate the flashbacks and reveals for later in the novel (gutting the fight as a result), or to straight up reveal her true heritage in the fight. But then what’s the purpose of the hangar scene?

Ugh. I knew this might be an issue but I didn’t think it would be this hard.

The dyad fight can be about “I know the rest of your story, Rey, and why your parents threw you away.” Kylo Ren doesn’t reveal the rest of the information yet, similarly to in the film.

The hangar scene remains, but with the dialogue I suggested.

But if you watch the film he says/reveals a lot more information than what you said there. And as I said before, none of it would make much sense. Ex: “It was Palpatine who had your parents taken. He was looking for you. But they wouldn’t say where you were. So he gave the order.” That quote would come just after a flashback which I modified to show Rey’s dad lying to her that he would come back for her if she just kept quiet. That same person would almost certainly just reveal her location to save his life. That’s why I came up with the PTSD explanation, but that cannot be incorporated until it’s revealed he’s a clone of Palpy.

Don’t apologize for brainstorming on your own thread!

The big issue the writers ran into by introducing this concept in the last film is that you have to exposit so much backstory in order to explain it, and then it screws with the pacing of the story they’re trying to tell present-day. So trying to go into more detail sort of just exacerbates the issue.

And of course, one of the major storytelling rules is to show, not tell. You can kind of get away with it when it isn’t a lot, but the more that must be explained, the messier it gets. I thought the idea of having a chapter that just quickly flashes through what happened wouldn’t be a bad idea, and then you could get into her dad’s head as to why he wouldn’t give up her location.

Could it be possible Palpatine didn’t know about Rey until recently, and Ochi killed her parents before they had a chance to even mention her to Ochi? Like, they left her on Jakku in their own ship, then Ochi found them, snuck on their ship and killed them while they were in a drunken stupor?

But again, you can get away with this complicated backstory in the novelization, but even the little bit we get in the film is too much nonsense for my tastes. At least you’re trying to make some sense of it.

As for Palpatine not knowing about Rey, I see that to be a little convoluted. Clearly her parents have been in hiding for however old she is in years plus a couple extra years, so why would he wait all that time to track them down?

The sequence of events I’m thinking of is that Rey’s father escapes Exegol by hijacking the Bestoon Legacy, he flies to Jakku (which is right next to the Unknown Regions) where he meets Rey’s mom. They leave Rey there, flying off in the Legacy. Ochi is sent after them to find Rey, and also to retrieve his ship back.

Here is something I’m a little more proud of so far:

Rey entered a bright, white space with soaring ceilings and clean perfection. Kylo Ren’s private quarters.

She stepped forward slowly and carefully, drawn to the dagger. The room was beautiful and light-filled, but devoid of any warmth. Various artifacts were placed around the room upon pedestals. Rey thought his quarters resembled an art exhibit more than a place of rest.

On a prominent white pedestal lay a necklace. Not the one he had ripped from her neck on Pasaana - it was much simpler in design, and yet elegantly crafted. It was a pendant of some kind, an amulet, unfamiliar sigils carved in some sort of organic material, strung on a loop of leather. Rey thought the charm was beautiful. She couldn’t help but wonder what sort of significance it had to Kylo.

A few more steps brought her to another prominent pedestal, deep black in contrast with its surroundings, jutting from the shiny white floor. Displayed atop this pedestal was a warped black mask, its eyeholes and vocoder still gaping but melted like heated wax, smeared into a display of perpetual agony.

She stared at it for a long time - too long - unable to look away. She’d seen this mask in Ren’s thoughts, when he’d tried to pull Luke’s map from her mind on Starkiller Base. It had also appeared in her visions on Ajan Kloss. It had belonged to his grandfather. Was this whole place dedicated in his honor?

But that horrible mask was not what she’d come for, and she wanted nothing to do with it. She glanced around… there! On another white pedestal lay Ochi’s dagger. On a table next to it were Chewie’s things - his bowcaster and satchel.

It’s quite similar to something you’d expect Thrawn to have (art gallery), but I thought it would be fitting for the japor snippet. And by the way, the snippet was not buried with Padme according to canon, so Kylo did not have to do any grave digging on his grandma. It was left in a glass display case on Naboo outside her tomb.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

As for Palpatine not knowing about Rey, I see that to be a little convoluted. Clearly her parents have been in hiding for however old she is in years plus a couple extra years, so why would he wait all that time to track them down?

The sequence of events I’m thinking of is that Rey’s father escapes Exegol by hijacking the Bestoon Legacy, he flies to Jakku (which is right next to the Unknown Regions) where he meets Rey’s mom. They leave Rey there, flying off in the Legacy. Ochi is sent after them to find Rey, and also to retrieve his ship back.

So why did Palpatine wait until she was six to go after her, and how did he even find out about her? This all just brings up a lot of questions.

Also, like the japor snippet addition!

You act as though Palpatine knew where his son was all along.

I was going to mention that in the hangar scene. He receives a vision about her, and regrets letting her dad escape Exegol. Rey was born on Jakku, so he doesn’t know about her until the vision.

How about Palpatine SENSES that he has a Force-sensitive granddaughter?

Isn’t that the same thing as a vision? I mean I’m willing to go either way on it but I’m just curious why you would prefer it that way specifically.

I think I’m going to work on 2 versions for these next 2 chapters. The first one will be with good parents, and the second will be with bad ones. Depending on which is worse (by my own opinion and others), I’ll go with the opposite.

If you do change the hangar conversation to be like my suggestion, how do you plan on retaining the idea that Palps saw what Rey would become?

That’s a great question that I don’t know how to answer because I haven’t gotten there yet.

What I can tell you is that in this version (no matter which way I go regarding her parents), Kylo never mentions that he wanted to kill her as a little girl, only take her. You can’t do that in the movie because of how difficult it would be to change those lines, and as a result the idea that he always wanted her dead works best for the movie. But this is a different circumstance.

You can’t do that in the movie

From a re-editing perspective, or a script re-writing perspective?

Re-editing. It could have worked but for some reason they wanted to save the reveal that Palps wanted her alive for when Finn and Poe discuss D-O. But since at the beginning of my novelization Kylo already realizes that Palps might want to possess her (if he dies in the fight against her) that is unnecessary and muddies things up.

These are with good parents in case the other way doesn’t make sense
Chapter 11 Changelog:

• The usual treatment (streamlining, QOL, correcting oddities, etc.)
• Finn is upset that Poe decided to blast the stormtroopers the second they get on board
• Expanded on why with the next stormtroopers. He realizes that all of these troopers could be just like him, and doesn’t want to kill anymore unless necessary. This is what prompts Rey to use the mind trick (because she is seemingly reading his thoughts).
• Instead of having Rey run off for the dagger for absolutely no reason, she cites the inscription “Only this blade tells.” This convinces Poe that it’s worth grabbing.
• Removed the Zorri Bliss scene where she goes back to the Spice Runner’s den. It serves 0 purpose after the previous scene with her already explains what she was going to do.
• Finn is okay with shooting stormtroopers once they start shooting at him. Also, he reacts much more emotionally to Poe getting shot.
• See previous post on what I’ve done to Kylo’s quarters. The japor snippet is one of the items there.
• In Rey’s first vision, modified the following:

1. Rey’s mother doesn’t call her by name and explains that a “bad man” is after them.
2. Rey’s dad exchanges money with Unkar (not clarified which person is getting paid).
3. Rey’s dad says the line from the TFA novelization that Rey keeps hearing: “Stay here. I’ll come back for you, sweetheart. I promise.”

• Kylo clarifies that he was was wrong: they paid to have her looked after. They didn’t sell her. The drinks were to cope with losing her.
• In Rey’s second vision, Ochi declares “This is for stealing my ship” before killing her father. Also, Rey’s mother no longer mentions Jakku.
• Kylo never says that the Emperor wanted Rey dead as a child. Instead, he was simply looking for her.
• The fact that Rey wasn’t abandoned makes her feel immensely better about herself. But this will change for the worse after the next chapter.
• New scene with Kylo Ren on Kijimi. Explains why the homing beacon didn’t make Kylo realize she was on the Star Destroyer. Kylo also wants Vader’s mask brought back to his quarters.
• Poe asks Finn about what he was trying to tell him before they were about to die last time, but Finn doesn’t want to say it in front of all the stormtroopers.
• After Finn says there’s no way Poe knew Hux was the spy, Poe jokingly clarifies that he knew it because “It’s General Hugs”. This is a callback to TLJ. He hugs Finn after this.

Chapter 12 Changelog:

• Same treatment as previous chapter
• Used Captain Faraday’s version as a base for the first two scenes here. I made my own modifications to it, but Threepio has a better line with the trooper, Rey doesn’t kill the trooper (knocks him out), and there is a new scene where Threepio kills stormtroopers with Chewie’s bowcaster.
• Hux’s motivations are clarified better: he wanted to usurp Kylo Ren
• Rey asks why Palpy wanted to take a child, not why he wanted her dead
• Kylo clarifies that it was a vision that made him aware of her existence. He sensed what she could become.
• Rey is referred to as Palpatine’s daughter instead of granddaughter. This works because Kylo refers to her father as a clone of Palpatine.
• Kylo doesn’t want to kill Palpatine (since they would just get possessed). Rather, he alludes that that there is a way to seal his spirit away in a tomb. Furthermore, he doesn’t want the throne, just the fleet.
• Kylo says that if she joins him then no more families will be torn apart (reference to Rey’s family and also how the Jedi would take children), and theirs will make things right. That’s right, he proposes to her.
• Rey starts approaching him, but when the Falcon arrives she remembers that the Resistance is her family.
• A brief description of Rey’s mental state at the end. She thought she was worthless because her parents abandoned her. But since that isn’t true anymore, she still thinks she is worthless because of how much evil her bloodline has caused. This means she thinks she has to prove herself all the more.
• Believe it or not, most of the romantic undertones were already present in the final scene with Kylo in this chapter. I just expanded on it with a few extra words here and there.
• Kylo decides to bring the japor snippet with him for when he sees her next time. He believes that it will be her symbol when she joins his dynasty.

Link:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1iwPLrEgOj3PiAGu-EGEVkk2ZE3Tas_ZQ/view?usp=sharing

A brief description of Rey’s mental state at the end. She thought she was worthless because her parents abandoned her. But since that isn’t true anymore, she still thinks she is worthless because of how much evil her bloodline has caused. This means she thinks she has to prove herself all the more.

So this is a reference to the interpretation of Rey’s core belief?

Also, when can I expect for you to post the version of Rey’s parents being bad people who thought she was worthless?

Also I skimmed to the passage in question. I think you should keep in mind that Rey overcomes her core belief WHEN the Jedi of the past encourage her to defeat Palpatine regardless of how weak she is in comparison to him after her life force was drained. Because Luke convinces her that she’s still valuable and can still do the right thing regardless of her heritage.

EDIT: Oh, yeah… Rey still feels worthless UNTIL after her scene with the Jedi of the past, even after Luke convinces her to face her fear and that she’s still valuable and can still do the right thing regardless of her heritage.

Below is my interpretation of Rey’s TRoS arc, for you to reference, similarly to when I showed you my interpretation of her TLJ arc a while back.

Her character arc in The Rise of Skywalker starts off with her receiving a vision of herself as a Sith, ruling on the Sith throne — she begins to fear the mere idea of her turning to the dark side, convinced that no one is going to give her approval if she were to turn to the dark side; hence why she begins to feel unworthy of being a Jedi and using a lightsaber, convinced she would become a Sith if she remains a Jedi and continues using a lightsaber.

Of course, Rey learns of a truth even worse than that of her parents throwing her away like garbage… she is Palpatine’s granddaughter — she begins to fear of what the wider galaxy would think of her if they find out who she is, since her grandfather is the Sith lord who not only destroyed the Jedi Order but also made the galaxy suffer under the rule of the Galactic Empire and was also responsible for the destruction of Alderaan.

Upon injuring Kylo Ren during their duel, she becomes convinced that her heritage is the thing that is causing her to continually give into the dark side — since this is the first time she had given into the dark side after she learned the truth of her heritage. Because of this, she exiles herself, convinced she is meant to end up just like her grandfather, still held back by her belief that no one is going to give her approval if she were to become a Sith.

Luke Skywalker, aware of her heritage, shows up to her and dismisses what she believes, explaining to her that her value is determined by her heart and not her heritage — proven to be true by Leia deciding to train her, despite how she has acknowledged who Rey truly was — and that said heritage does not define who she is and how her future is going to turn out, urging her to face her fear, confront Palpatine and save the galaxy; this convinces her that she is able to do the right thing, regardless of her heritage.

Right at this point is the first time Rey truly acknowledges the existence of her core belief of self-worthlessness and how it has been holding her back her entire life — when Luke informed her that, “Confronting fear is the destiny of a Jedi,” she applied this to her fear, that being her feelings of self-worthlessness.

Of course, she goes to confront Palpatine on Exegol; he urges her to perform the Sith ritual; she must kill him, and by doing so this would allow his spirit to possess her body — she would become the Empress of the Sith. At first she refuses, but Palpatine warns her that the Resistance is in danger of annihilation by his forces, convincing her that, by becoming the Empress of the Sith, only she can prevent this from happening.

Convinced that the Resistance is going to be giving her validation for as long as she exists, ruling as the Empress of the Sith, she accepts his request — representing herself giving into her core belief of self-worthlessness as well as her lie that only others determine her value; Ben Solo, however, returns for her — proving to her that she is valuable, regardless of whether she becomes the Empress of the Sith or not; this allows her to refuse the ritual and stand aside Ben against Palpatine.

Palpatine, however, drains them of most of their life force to rejuvenate and strengthen himself, afterwards literally throwing Ben Solo into the chasm  — Rey is left weakened and alone.

Feeling unable to defeat Palpatine on her own, she turns to the Jedi of the past for support; in response, they encourage her to try her best to defeat Palpatine, regardless of how puny she is in comparison to him — now, she has enough strength to not only refuse the lie she had believed her entire life, that she is worthless, that she is only worth something if other people think she is, but also rise and stand against Palpatine.

He dismisses her as nothing, no match for the “power in [him];” instead of succumbing to his remarks, she ignores them and responds back with her own, self-made sense of self-worth and self-esteem… that “she… is all the Jedi,” and the icing on the cake is that she has pulled in the Skywalker lightsaber, the weapon she has felt unworthy of using for so long — she finally feels worthy.

No longer held back by her irrational, toxic core belief that she is worthless, having come to terms with the truth that worth and acceptance comes from within and not from other people, Rey destroys Palpatine — the embodiment of this belief — once and for all.