Solid ideas, RogueLeader. Regarding Rey and the “choice” Kylo gives her, I’d like to be able to emphasize that Kylo thinks the only way they’ll be strong enough to defeat Palpatine is if Rey goes to the Dark Side, just as he did. (“The Dark Side is more powerful!” and whatnot.) Subtextually, this would also be Kylo’s way of validating the choices he’s made this entire trilogy. (“If Rey joins me, and we defeat Palpatine, it will prove that I was right to go down this dark path.”)
So basically, you’d have Rey, who wants to kill Palpatine as a Jedi, but is constantly struggling to avoid slipping into the Dark Side throughout the film. You’d have Kylo, who also wants to defeat Palpatine, but wants to do it through the Dark Side. And you’d have Palpatine, who wants Rey to kill him using the Dark Side, so that she’ll be deep enough into the Dark Side that he can possess her and complete his resurrection.
The Quarters fight could be about Kylo saying “You need to accept it, Rey. This is the only way you’ll be strong enough to face Palpatine. Give in to the Dark Side.” “No!” (This would also, theoretically, come right after Rey’s Dark Side Dagger Vision, if that concept is still in the cards; so the whole scene would sort of revolve around this idea of Rey succumbing, rather than “This is the knife that killed your parents! Ain’t that kooky?”)
Structurally, Finn serves as the angel on Rey’s shoulder, trying to convince her of her goodness (“That doesn’t sound like you. Rey, I know you…”). Kylo is the devil, telling her that she has to submit in order to defeat Palpatine. But when he offers her his hand, she steps back, because she wants to believe that she can still save the day as a Jedi, and not as a Sith. (“I did want to take your hand. Ben’s hand.”) It’s not a clash of goals, but of means and ideologies.
When Kylo destroys the McGuffin in the Death Star, she’s not just mad because he’s made her whole quest pointless. She’s mad because the only way she can possibly get to Exegol now is by joining Kylo on the Dark Side. That doohickey was her only chance of finding Exegol on her own, as a Jedi. And Kylo’s destroyed that chance. You bastard, I’m gonna flippin’ murder you…
Kylo is also torn between the Light, represented by Leia, and the Dark, represented by Palpatine. Maybe Palpatine doesn’t want to possess Kylo because Leia’s influence is still too strong in him or something? (“I sense conflict in you still. You must prove yourself worthy of my Fleet.”)
Thus, Rey’s character arc in the film would supplement Kylo’s, and vice versa. They’d feed into each other and enhance each thematically.
I don’t know if any of this makes sense. My brain is kind of fried from working with the same few audio clips all night haha.
God, it’s frustrating how close this movie was to being good.
“It’s like rhymetry. They poem.” - Leorge Gucas
TROS Novelisation: The Faraday Edit, TLJ: Stoic Edition, ROTS: The Faraday Nudge, ROTS Ultracut: Order 66, Kenobi: Faraday Cut, Godzilla Vs Megalon, Godzilla Vs Gigan, Godzilla: Final Wars, The Light Rises, Faraday Jr.'s Star Wars
For reference, this is Palpatine’s plan in the original script pre-reshoots. According to the JediPaxis leaks.
After obtaining Vader’s device Kylo travels to the place specified by the wayfinder. It takes him to the Unknown Regions and a dead planet of flat, black rock. I previously reported that the planet where Kylo finds Vader’s wayfinder was called Exogol. Since then my understanding has evolved and I’ve been told that this planet actually bears that name. Kylo lands outside a giant cube, floating just above the ground and begins walking toward it. Kylo walks between the cube and the ground and once he reaches the center he discovers an elevator leading down below the planet’s surface. He follows the lift down and finds an old man, near death and lying in bed and being tended to by cloaked aids. My source believes these aids to be referred to as Sith Loyalists. The old man identifies himself as Darth Sideous. Kylo initially dismisses the old man, knowing that the Emperor had died over 30 years prior over the forest moon of Endor. Feeling that this must be a trick, Kylo claims that there must be some other explanation, such as this man being a clone. My sources specifically tell me that the Palpatine refutes the idea of him being a clone and affirms that he survived his fall. After his defeat at Endor, he left the known galaxy and traveled to the Unknown Regions to rebuild his Empire. Despite his skepticism, Palpatine begins to reel Kylo in and subsequently tells him of something known as a “Force Dyad”. The Force produces two incredibly strong users and when they unite together, both become stronger than either one could be on their own. Palpatine believes Kylo Ren and Rey to be the two halves of this dyad and shares this knowledge with Rey. (Note: I previously wrote that Palpatine wanted them to become “master and apprentice” since then this has been clarified to me as Palpatine seeking the two members of the Dyad) Palpatine claims that he seeks the Dyad because he is weak and dying and he wants the Dyad to rule together once he’s gone. Palpatine orders Kylo to bring Rey to him and turn her so that the Dyad will be a strong, unified force of darkness. Palpatine also reveals that he has been amassing an armada of Star Destroyers equipped with Death Star tech, each one capable of destroying a planet on its own. Generals Hux and Pryde are tasked with rounding up children in large numbers to train and staff his armada.
Peace is a lie
There is only passion…
I enjoy how the original plot makes Palpatine’s use of the dyad to rejuvenate himself in the finale actually a pay-off of his scheming, rather than a lucky coincidence. I can see how they felt it was important to give Kylo more agency though - it’d seem strange for him to go from TLJ Kylo to just being a lackey for Palps, and then from there to redemption.
Sherlock’s recent comment for reference:
Solid ideas, RogueLeader. Regarding Rey and the “choice” Kylo gives her, I’d like to be able to emphasize that Kylo thinks the only way they’ll be strong enough to defeat Palpatine is if Rey goes to the Dark Side, just as he did. (“The Dark Side is more powerful!” and whatnot.) Subtextually, this would also be Kylo’s way of validating the choices he’s made this entire trilogy. (“If Rey joins me, and we defeat Palpatine, it will prove that I was right to go down this dark path.”)
So basically, you’d have Rey, who wants to kill Palpatine as a Jedi, but is constantly struggling to avoid slipping into the Dark Side throughout the film. You’d have Kylo, who also wants to defeat Palpatine, but wants to do it through the Dark Side. And you’d have Palpatine, who wants Rey to kill him using the Dark Side, so that she’ll be deep enough into the Dark Side that he can possess her and complete his resurrection.
The Quarters fight could be about Kylo saying “You need to accept it, Rey. This is the only way you’ll be strong enough to face Palpatine. Give in to the Dark Side.” “No!” (This would also, theoretically, come right after Rey’s Dark Side Dagger Vision, if that concept is still in the cards; so the whole scene would sort of revolve around this idea of Rey succumbing, rather than “This is the knife that killed your parents! Ain’t that kooky?”)
Structurally, Finn serves as the angel on Rey’s shoulder, trying to convince her of her goodness (“That doesn’t sound like you. Rey, I know you…”). Kylo is the devil, telling her that she has to submit in order to defeat Palpatine. But when he offers her his hand, she steps back, because she wants to believe that she can still save the day as a Jedi, and not as a Sith. (“I did want to take your hand. Ben’s hand.”) It’s not a clash of goals, but of means and ideologies.
When Kylo destroys the McGuffin in the Death Star, she’s not just mad because he’s made her whole quest pointless. She’s mad because the only way she can possibly get to Exegol now is by joining Kylo on the Dark Side. That doohickey was her only chance of finding Exegol on her own, as a Jedi. And Kylo’s destroyed that chance. You bastard, I’m gonna flippin’ murder you…
Kylo is also torn between the Light, represented by Leia, and the Dark, represented by Palpatine. Maybe Palpatine doesn’t want to possess Kylo because Leia’s influence is still too strong in him or something? (“I sense conflict in you still. You must prove yourself worthy of my Fleet.”)
Thus, Rey’s character arc in the film would supplement Kylo’s, and vice versa. They’d feed into each other and enhance each thematically.
I don’t know if any of this makes sense. My brain is kind of fried from working with the same few audio clips all night haha.
This is actually funny, Sherlock, because I started typing all of this before I read your comment, but we clearly were on the same wavelength tonight!
With all of this in mind, this is what I’m thinking now for a Rey Nobody edit where her parents don’t factor into the story:
Palpatine “tells” Kylo to kill Rey, not because he foresaw Rey killing him, but to make Kylo prove his worthiness. Which works well, since the theatrical film doesn’t say that Palpatine wants Rey dead because she’ll kill him. Maybe he could give Kylo more reasons why he is offering this to him. Basically implying that he has been grooming Kylo his whole life to take over.
Possible lines to Kylo:
Long have I waited, for you to come home…
I don’t have long…
My spirit is weak…
You wouldn’t necessarily need to add any lines, and it would still be on the same level of the theatrical film’s level of explanation.
When Rey has her vision during training, she sees flashes of the battle, her friends in danger, and herself on the Sith throne. Maybe this isn’t necessary, but you could add a shot of Kylo somewhere there with her. (I think you could potentially edit that BTS shot of Kylo in his chambers and make it look like he is on Exegol. Or maybe a different shot of Kylo on Exegol could be used.)
Kylo tells Rey that if the Resistance goes to Exegol, they will all die. She will fail. Again, Palpatine could kill Rey and the Resistance on his own, using his fleet and followers. He just wants Kylo to prove that he has fully embraced the Sith path (or just the dark side) by killing Rey, his “light”.
The flashbacks during the Force bond duel would be replaced with “flashforwards”. Swap the first flashback with shots of the Resistance/Finn/Poe losing the battle, and the second flashback with Finn and Poe “dying”.
Then, the hangar revelation would be something like this.
Kylo: Rey, I know the rest of (y)our story.
Rey: Tell me.
Kylo: I saw what we will become. We won’t just have power. We’ll have his power. We will kill Palpatine, and take the throne. I feel the pull to the light, and you, the darkness. What Palpatine doesn’t know is that we’re a Dyad in the Force, Rey. Two that are one. Together, nothing will stand in our way. You know what you need to do. You know.
Just to point out, I don’t think Kylo sees this as him taking the Sith mantle. He sees it as taking their power away and using it for his own new order. In the end, though, his opinion that he is different than the Sith might just be misguided. But it is important for him to say that since we see Rey on the Throne in the vision.
So at this point in the film, these are our characters’ choices as they’ve been presented to them:
Rey can either join Kylo Ren and kill Palpatine, or face Palpatine as a Jedi and fail. Kylo can either kill Rey to earn the fleet, or find a way to defeat Palpatine with Rey by his side.
While Kylo’s choices are pretty similar, the crucial difference is Rey. We know this is an important distinction to Kylo. But for Rey, her choices are starkly contrasted. No new information is necessarily revealed to Rey, like in other versions I’ve suggested. Instead, Kylo’s theatrical argument for joining him is basically elaborated on (Which I think is a strength, since the Kylo/Rey dynamic is the strongest aspect of the Sequel Trilogy.) Kylo tells Rey that she won’t be strong enough to defeat Palpatine, and he’ll kill her friends. It isn’t until she confronts Palpatine does he present the third option: kill me and become the next Sith Lord. And this would be shocking to Rey, and the audience, because we weren’t expecting Palpatine to make Rey this offer. With the Rey Palpatine version, it seemed obvious.
And I think this editing plan will work well. I’m trying to think this through, but I think with this option, you don’t have to change any of the interactions with Palpatine (outside of the Rey Palpatine stuff). Palpatine knowing, or not knowing, about the Dyad works either way. So does either placement of the “my spirit will pass into you” line. I think this version of the film stays pretty faithful with the movie’s theatrical logic, outside of the Rey Palpatine stuff. The solution wasn’t to focus more on the Palpatine plot, it was focus LESS on the Palpatine plot!
So, this is what we replace the exposition about Rey’s parents with. Rey’s dark seed isn’t her dark origins, it’s her innate connection to Kylo Ren. They influence each other, both positively and negatively. They are each other’s Shadows. Can she be a Jedi if she shares a bond with the evil Supreme Leader? This is Rey’s inner conflict.
EDIT: I’m sure some people will tell me, “Instead of RogueLeader, you should call yourself ObviousLeader.” I know, I know. Maybe I have been overthinking this whole thing, but that just happens when you spend too much time thinking about this movie. At least now that I thought this through myself, I know what direction to take the Force Bond Duel and the Hangar Scene now.
I’ll be honest, I actually do think you can make some logical sense of the original film’s take, even if it’s pretty silly.
Palpatine from the start wants Rey to come to Exegol and take over his spirit. He basically lies to Kylo knowing that he’ll reveal to Rey her backstory which will just make her want to come to Exegol more. Meanwhile he figures that Kylo won’t actually kill her, and even if he does he can just take her place. “You have his power” seems to be more neutrally “you have a lot of power” or something. Even in Kylo’s mind, he doesn’t know about the essence transfer, so if Rey is destined to kill Palpatine then he doesn’t see why Palpatine wouldn’t want to stop it.
Things definitely get more complicated when we start changing things, since most of this logic you kind of have to figure out on your own, it’s not explicitly stated to begin with. I’m gonna have to think this through for sure in terms of where Kylo fits. Is he trying to stop her from killing Palpatine, or is he trying to get her to fulfill the vision. I will say in my version he still doesn’t know about the essence transfer. I kind of like the idea though that he might be trying to stop her regardless. Wonder if we could sneak in a line like “Palpatine is a distraction,” something that gets that point across. So his offer is really more about the dyad thing specifically. I wish we had that oracle scene, apparently it told him about the dyad. Tricky stuff here.
I’m not in love with my bad parents but still revenge solution, but personally I’ve yet to be convinced of a better solution. I don’t believe that Rey having bad parents would be enough to stop her from wanting revenge for their deaths. These are still people she’s been emotionally attached to for almost all of her life, and this is the dark side messing with her mind after all too.
Except the point of her arc in TLJ is that she doesn’t care for them anymore by the end because of everything they did to her, they threw her away like garbage and considered her to be absolutely, inherently worthless. Why would she avenge them after what they did?
This is an interesting idea. I’ll need to sit with it and think about how it factors in to the characters throughout the film.
I suppose since I’ve already cut the bit where Kylo tells Rey they’ll kill him and take the throne, this works. I guess if you think about it with the hangar line changes it’s kind of like Kylo is basically saying Palpatine doesn’t matter? I’ve suspected before that his line on the DS “the only way you’re getting to Exegol is with me” was a dub to remove an earlier version where Kylo doesn’t want Rey to go to Exegol at all. Hmm, how might that idea be accomplished?
Actually perhaps most important this change probably makes more sense in terms of my new version of Rey’s backstory.
These kind of logical questions speak to the frustration I’m having while trying to figure out how to make the Force bond duel scene (and the hangar scene) work in a logical way. Tbf, the original film has these problems too I think.
Okay, so Palpatine tells Kylo to kill Rey because he foresaw her killing him and taking the throne. Okay… so, how does Kylo factor into this? Palpatine tells Kylo that if he kills Rey, that he’ll give him the fleet and let him be the new Emperor. So, is he basically trying to tell Kylo that he wants him as his successor, but not Rey? And Kylo believes that?
Why do you think he eradicated the Jedi Order during the prequels? Because they’re a threat to his power, in the way Rey is, in this context. And he wants to possess Kylo Ren after he kills Rey to clear away his confliction - he has no use for Rey at this point since Kylo Ren’s this far into the dark side.
The movie makes you think Palpatine is telling Kylo he wants her dead because she’s a Jedi, but when Kylo says, “Because he saw what you would become. You don’t just have power. You have his power” that whole speech makes me think he is referring to this dark power inside her, that she will become evil like Palpatine.
Maybe it’s like this: Palpatine wants Kylo to think he wants Rey dead because she will destroy him and his Empire “as a Jedi”. But, Kylo doesn’t want to kill Rey. He wants to show Rey her power and her inner darkness in order to make her join him and destroy Palpatine together. But if Kylo fails to kill Rey and go full dark side, Palpatine wants Rey to actually be his new vessel (assuming if she kills Kylo instead).
There’s still less than two whole hours of the movie left. There’d probably be information yet to be revealed by the end (which, in fact, there is: Palpatine originally wanted to possess Rey, but her parents hid her and he turns Ben to the dark side and hopes to possess him, and wants him to kill Rey to clear away of his confliction, but Ben turns to the light and now Palps falls back to his original plan to possess Rey).
Also, isn’t weird that when Rey says that to Finn, Finn says that doesn’t sound like her? Like, isn’t finding Palpatine and destroying him the plan, though? I guess it was how she said it, since it is implying she wants revenge for him killing her parents? So weird. (This is a scene that I think would be improved in a “Rey killed her parents” scenario, because Rey could tell Finn she killed her parents, and Finn could say that doesn’t sound like her. Idk.)
Finn’s never seen Rey like this before.
RogueLeader, you always have excellent ideas for small tweaks to lines which totally change their meaning. I really like “I saw what we will become. We won’t just have power. We’ll have his power.” (maybe I’ll try to see if I can put it together). The ideas that you and others have been having recently to further separate Kylo from Palpatine are excellent, I think, and a good way to bring him a little closer to TLJ Kylo and also make his redemption better fit his overall plot in the movie.
I admit that I am personally biased against Testing’s (and I suppose the official) interpretation of Palps ever wanting to possess Ben in a Rey Palpatine edit, because if he could just possess anyone regardless of their genes, why’d he bother putting all that effort into growing force sensitive clones of himself, or strandcasts like Rey’s dad? I also don’t really like the idea he ever intended to possess Luke in ROTJ - the existence of Exegol and his clone bodies there already help justify his seeming willingness to die in ROTJ; we don’t need to make it weird. In a Rey Nobody edit, though, I suppose you have to suggest he could possess either of them since there’s no obvious distinction.
I admit that I am personally biased against Testing’s (and I suppose the official) interpretation of Palps ever wanting to possess Ben in a Rey Palpatine edit, because if he could just possess anyone regardless of their genes, why’d he bother putting all that effort into growing force sensitive clones of himself, or strandcasts like Rey’s dad? I also don’t really like the idea he ever intended to possess Luke in ROTJ - the existence of Exegol and his clone bodies there already help justify his seeming willingness to die in ROTJ; we don’t need to make it weird. In a Rey Nobody edit, though, I suppose you have to suggest he could possess either of them since there’s no obvious distinction.
Palpatine is very clearly shitty at making clones. It’s why his post-RotJ body is rotting to the point where it needs a life support machine, and why he can’t just make an army of Snokes.
I have to admit I agree with Testing here. The reason Palp’s goes with clones is because their free will can easily be manipulated. He might even be able to will his spirit into them without any killing involved since they’re just a copy of his body. Also, I’m not even sure that there were many powerful Force users left in the galaxy. He resorted to clones as a failsafe in case he dies somehow when Luke denies his request.
I have to admit I agree with Testing here. The reason Palp’s goes with clones is because their free will can easily be manipulated. He might even be able to will his spirit into them without any killing involved since they’re just a copy of his body. Also, I’m not even sure that there were many powerful Force users left in the galaxy. He resorted to clones as a failsafe in case he dies somehow when Luke denies his request.
I feel as though I disagree with this one. Judging by inferences from the actual movie, Sith essence transfer only works if another Force-sensitive kills him (whereas Darth Vader threw him into the shaft, Rey reflected his lightning at his face - he essentially committed suicide).
When Rey has her vision during training, she sees flashes of the battle, her friends in danger, and herself on the Sith throne. Maybe this isn’t necessary, but you could add a shot of Kylo somewhere there with her. (I think you could potentially edit that BTS shot of Kylo in his chambers and make it look like he is on Exegol. Or maybe a different shot of Kylo on Exegol could be used.)
Kylo tells Rey that if the Resistance goes to Exegol, they will all die. She will fail. Again, Palpatine could kill Rey and the Resistance on his own, using his fleet and followers. He just wants Kylo to prove that he has fully embraced the Sith path (or just the dark side) by killing Rey, his “light”.
The flashbacks during the Force bond duel would be replaced with “flashforwards”. Swap the first flashback with shots of the Resistance/Finn/Poe losing the battle, and the second flashback with Finn and Poe “dying”.
Then, the hangar revelation would be something like this.
Kylo: Rey, I know the rest of (y)our story.
Rey: Tell me.
Kylo: I saw what we will become. We won’t just have power. We’ll have his power. We will kill Palpatine, and take the throne. I feel the pull to the light, and you, the darkness. What Palpatine doesn’t know is that we’re a Dyad in the Force, Rey. Two that are one. Together, nothing will stand in our way. You know what you need to do. You know.
Just to point out, I don’t think Kylo sees this as him taking the Sith mantle. He sees it as taking their power away and using it for his own new order. In the end, though, his opinion that he is different than the Sith might just be misguided. But it is important for him to say that since we see Rey on the Throne in the vision.
The one thing here though is - why would Kylo want “his power”? Why would he want to take the Sith Throne, when his mission statement at the end of TLJ was to let the past die, including the Jedi and the Sith? I almost feel like he should be an anti-hero - wanting to stop Palpatine in order to destroy the Sith, so that he can take control and make something new. (Ha, “I will finish what you started”…by destroying Palpatine.)
In my mind, I think the conversation should go something like this:
Kylo: Rey, I know the rest of our story.
Rey: Tell me.
Kylo: I feel the pull to the light, and you, the darkness. I saw what we will become - a Dyad in the Force. Two that are one. Embrace the Dark Side, Rey. Join me. Together, we can stop Palpatine. Nothing will stand in our way. You know what you need to do. You know.
I also kind of like this, because it helps to explain the Dyad stuff a little more. They didn’t just become a Dyad off screen, they need to unite in order for it to happen, and then they can level up. Kylo thinks they need to be on the Dark Side to be a Dyad. But in reality, it will happen when they stand together against Palpatine on the Light Side, culminating that arc. That then explains why Palpatine didn’t have any clue about it until the end, and didn’t factor it into his plans.
As for the Quarter scene, do we even need flashbacks or flashforwards? Would it be possible to edit it in such a way that it focuses on just Rey and Kylo? Don’t get me wrong, I think “If you try to defeat him on your own as a Jedi, you won’t be strong enough, and everyone you care about will die” is a really good way to take the story. (And it sets up for Palpatine’s later temptation, rather than throwing that into the climax out of nowhere.) I’m just having trouble picturing how to convey it effectively. Like, if you want to show Poe dying, you could have a shot of him being rattled around in his X-Wing, and then cut to Greg Grunberg crashing into the Star Destroyer; but that sort of manipulation would be obvious when watching the final battle itself.
God, my brain hurts. This is what happens when the original cut tries to implement 18 different contradictory story concepts all at once, and we’re left trying to filter through them.
The Rise of Skywalker: Untold - A “Rey Nobody” edit of Ep. IX | Looking for voices and VFX - Please reach out if interested!
Just one thing, Kylo doesn’t literally feel the pull to the light.
In TFA, Kylo Ren is established as a character who has a desire to be the bad guy for the hell of it, he wants to be on the dark side and be evil… but deep down, he acknowledges that what he is doing… is wrong; he wants to get rid of these goody-goody feelings forever, and it is for this reason he attempts to communicate with the charred helmet of Darth Vader…
…and why he murders Han Solo — he believes he can further himself into the dark side and permanently erase these goody-goody feelings; it is for this reason he is literally thanking his father, for his murder seeming to be permanently erasing his goody-goody feelings and ensuring he remains on the dark side for as long as he lives. When he does commit the deed, it does not work — in fact, he literally regrets it! He acknowledged how wrong it was for him to murder his own father, and this leads him down to the path of his failure.
Kylo Ren only used “the pull to the light” in TFA as a figurative way of saying that, deep down, he has these feelings that what he is doing is wrong — he never meant it literally.
Testing, I’m confused man. I don’t think anyone here is arguing his “pull to the light” is literal.
And Sherlock, I guess it depends on how you want to represent Kylo. I see the throne as representative of having the power of the Sith fleet. To control the fleet, he must take the throne. That doesn’t mean he wants to be Sith. I think he sees it as taking the Sith’s power and creating something new with it, whether that is misguided or not. Kylo ends up being wrong, either way. And I think Kylo believes he can get both things he wants, which is the fleet and Rey. Plus, with this interpretation, I think it might work better if Rey’s vision of her on the throne is associated with her choice of joining Kylo, since this seems to be what the theatrical film implies anyway when Rey says she had a vision of both her and Kylo on the throne.
And I guess you don’t need the flashforwards. I just figured you could just swap out the stuff with her parents in her vision with glimpses of the battle. And maybe you could just throw in shots from the battle when things are looking dire, rather than cutting it to make it look like Finn and Poe actually die. I guess you wouldn’t have to show it, though. Kylo could just say she’ll fail and they’ll lose. But I think Rey seeing it in a vision would add to her feelings of doubt in herself. So it isn’t just Kylo taunting her, but it has been foreseen, and it gives Rey a reason to hate Palpatine.
I have to admit I agree with Testing here. The reason Palp’s goes with clones is because their free will can easily be manipulated. He might even be able to will his spirit into them without any killing involved since they’re just a copy of his body. Also, I’m not even sure that there were many powerful Force users left in the galaxy. He resorted to clones as a failsafe in case he dies somehow when Luke denies his request.
I feel as though I disagree with this one. Judging by inferences from the actual movie, Sith essence transfer only works if another Force-sensitive kills him (whereas Darth Vader threw him into the shaft, Rey reflected his lightning at his face - he essentially committed suicide).
Wouldn’t Vader have been possessed then? Just sayin’, I’ve meticulously thought through all of these things and I’ve come to the most reasonable conclusions. In fact, the unaltered novelization makes it a point that Palpatine expelled his spirit before he even died from the fall. Which means there definitely wasn’t any killing involved. It was something more premeditated, which he can activate with his own will at any point. Which in my own novelization I made it be a secret he learned from Plagueis.
Palpatine chose not to possess Vader because his cybernetics have been damaged by his Force lightning and he was going to die because of this.
Okay… but from what we know about regular essence transfer it’s made quite clear that there are only 2 options:
That is why I’ll always advocate for the Plagueis theory. That he learned a secret that allows him to premeditatedly prepare to expel his own spirit at any point. Again, I have to mention that the novelization makes it clear he somehow possessed a clone before his original body was even killed.
From the films one can infer that Sith essence transfer works in the sense that your spirit/essence inherently leaves your original body that is killed by specifically another Force sensitive and your spirit/essence goes to, for example, Palpatine’s clone body or Rey’s or Ben’s body 'cause you will it to, Palps knows where those are specifically.
I’ll be honest, I actually do think you can make some logical sense of the original film’s take, even if it’s pretty silly.
Palpatine from the start wants Rey to come to Exegol and take over his spirit. He basically lies to Kylo knowing that he’ll reveal to Rey her backstory which will just make her want to come to Exegol more. Meanwhile he figures that Kylo won’t actually kill her, and even if he does he can just take her place. “You have his power” seems to be more neutrally “you have a lot of power” or something. Even in Kylo’s mind, he doesn’t know about the essence transfer, so if Rey is destined to kill Palpatine then he doesn’t see why Palpatine wouldn’t want to stop it.
Things definitely get more complicated when we start changing things, since most of this logic you kind of have to figure out on your own, it’s not explicitly stated to begin with. I’m gonna have to think this through for sure in terms of where Kylo fits. Is he trying to stop her from killing Palpatine, or is he trying to get her to fulfill the vision. I will say in my version he still doesn’t know about the essence transfer. I kind of like the idea though that he might be trying to stop her regardless. Wonder if we could sneak in a line like “Palpatine is a distraction,” something that gets that point across. So his offer is really more about the dyad thing specifically. I wish we had that oracle scene, apparently it told him about the dyad. Tricky stuff here.
I’m not in love with my bad parents but still revenge solution, but personally I’ve yet to be convinced of a better solution. I don’t believe that Rey having bad parents would be enough to stop her from wanting revenge for their deaths. These are still people she’s been emotionally attached to for almost all of her life, and this is the dark side messing with her mind after all too.
Except the point of her arc in TLJ is that she doesn’t care for them anymore by the end because of everything they did to her, they threw her away like garbage and considered her to be absolutely, inherently worthless. Why would she avenge them after what they did?
Don’t you think TROS is a masterpiece or whatever? Take it up with that movie, not me. I’m just working with what I got.
From the films one can infer that Sith essence transfer works in the sense that your spirit/essence inherently leaves your original body that is killed by specifically another Force sensitive and your spirit/essence goes to, for example, Palpatine’s clone body or Rey’s or Ben’s body 'cause you will it to, Palps knows where those are specifically.
I disagree with the inference, but whatever. Palps says, “Kill me and my spirit will pass into you.” Not “my spirit will pass into my clone”.
God, this movie really had to overcomplicate things didn’t it? It was already dumb that they were bringing Palpatine back for TROS. They should’ve just went with the dumbest, most straightforward answer to how he was able to come back in universe.
"Yeah, Palpatine died but some space mosquito sucked his blood and got stuck in space amber and we were able to use that to clone him back to life. ¯_(ツ)_/¯ "
GAH!
Don’t you think TROS is a masterpiece or whatever? Take it up with that movie, not me. I’m just working with what I got.
I mean, I think we already established that he’s actually JJ.
😄
From the films one can infer that Sith essence transfer works in the sense that your spirit/essence inherently leaves your original body that is killed by specifically another Force sensitive and your spirit/essence goes to, for example, Palpatine’s clone body or Rey’s or Ben’s body 'cause you will it to, Palps knows where those are specifically.
I disagree with the inference, but whatever. Palps says, “Kill me and my spirit will pass into you.” Not “my spirit will pass into my clone”.
It’s not like Palps had any more clones.
I’ll be honest, I actually do think you can make some logical sense of the original film’s take, even if it’s pretty silly.
Palpatine from the start wants Rey to come to Exegol and take over his spirit. He basically lies to Kylo knowing that he’ll reveal to Rey her backstory which will just make her want to come to Exegol more. Meanwhile he figures that Kylo won’t actually kill her, and even if he does he can just take her place. “You have his power” seems to be more neutrally “you have a lot of power” or something. Even in Kylo’s mind, he doesn’t know about the essence transfer, so if Rey is destined to kill Palpatine then he doesn’t see why Palpatine wouldn’t want to stop it.
Things definitely get more complicated when we start changing things, since most of this logic you kind of have to figure out on your own, it’s not explicitly stated to begin with. I’m gonna have to think this through for sure in terms of where Kylo fits. Is he trying to stop her from killing Palpatine, or is he trying to get her to fulfill the vision. I will say in my version he still doesn’t know about the essence transfer. I kind of like the idea though that he might be trying to stop her regardless. Wonder if we could sneak in a line like “Palpatine is a distraction,” something that gets that point across. So his offer is really more about the dyad thing specifically. I wish we had that oracle scene, apparently it told him about the dyad. Tricky stuff here.
I’m not in love with my bad parents but still revenge solution, but personally I’ve yet to be convinced of a better solution. I don’t believe that Rey having bad parents would be enough to stop her from wanting revenge for their deaths. These are still people she’s been emotionally attached to for almost all of her life, and this is the dark side messing with her mind after all too.
Except the point of her arc in TLJ is that she doesn’t care for them anymore by the end because of everything they did to her, they threw her away like garbage and considered her to be absolutely, inherently worthless. Why would she avenge them after what they did?
Don’t you think TROS is a masterpiece or whatever? Take it up with that movie, not me. I’m just working with what I got.
I never said TRoS was a super-duper flawless God-tier masterpiece. I do like the movie alongside TLJ, RotS and ESB, but do I think it is 100% flawless? No. It’s just that, alongside TFA, TLJ and all three prequels (yes, we exist!), there’s a lot of invalid criticisms towards the movie that can easily be refuted using inferences and explicitly shown/mentioned pieces of information from the movie.
Don’t you think TROS is a masterpiece or whatever? Take it up with that movie, not me. I’m just working with what I got.
I mean, I think we already established that
he’s actually JJ.anyone who defends TLJ or refutes criticisms towards the movie is actually Rian.😄
Testing, I’m confused man. I don’t think anyone here is arguing his “pull to the light” is literal.
And Sherlock, I guess it depends on how you want to represent Kylo. I see the throne as representative of having the power of the Sith fleet. To control the fleet, he must take the throne. That doesn’t mean he wants to be Sith. I think he sees it as taking the Sith’s power and creating something new with it, whether that is misguided or not. Kylo ends up being wrong, either way. And I think Kylo believes he can get both things he wants, which is the fleet and Rey. Plus, with this interpretation, I think it might work better if Rey’s vision of her on the throne is associated with her choice of joining Kylo, since this seems to be what the theatrical film implies anyway when Rey says she had a vision of both her and Kylo on the throne.
Ah, but you changed that line so they’re not both on the throne, right?
I see what you’re going for, I’m just worried that the audience won’t necessarily correlate “Take the Sith Throne” with “Control the Fleet.” I know I never did in theatres; I saw it as him wanting to rule the Sith Empire. Like, it sounds like he’s trying to work inside established Sith-y systems, rather than trying to burn them down and build anew.
I think we’re both pursuing the same angle for Kylo, it’s just a question of the clearest/easiest way of conveying that.
And I guess you don’t need the flashforwards. I just figured you could just swap out the stuff with her parents in her vision with glimpses of the battle. And maybe you could just throw in shots from the battle when things are looking dire, rather than cutting it to make it look like Finn and Poe actually die. I guess you wouldn’t have to show it, though. Kylo could just say she’ll fail and they’ll lose. But I think Rey seeing it in a vision would add to her feelings of doubt in herself. So it isn’t just Kylo taunting her, but it has been foreseen, and it gives Rey a reason to hate Palpatine.
Same thing - good idea in concept, we’ll just have to see how it works in practice. I trust you, man! Can’t wait to see what you come up with!
The Rise of Skywalker: Untold - A “Rey Nobody” edit of Ep. IX | Looking for voices and VFX - Please reach out if interested!
Ah, but you changed that line so they’re not both on the throne, right?
Actually, I think for this version of the story it could go either way. To be fair, even if we were to do a version where Kylo wants to take the throne with Rey, it doesn’t make sense for Rey to say that Kylo AND her were on it. I’m sure she was being figurative, but clearly only one little body can actually sit on the throne. But like I said, I think it could work both ways, but it might work better if that vision’s connection to Kylo isn’t revealed until later. When she shares what she saw with Finn, she is still is trying to figure out what it means. She doesn’t understand the context. So, when Kylo later provides that context (in this case, that they will kill Palpatine and take the throne from him), Rey’s shocked reaction feels warranted. She putting the pieces together, and the fact Kylo saw it too makes it feel scary and inevitable.
I see what you’re going for, I’m just worried that the audience won’t necessarily correlate “Take the Sith Throne” with “Control the Fleet.” I know I never did in theatres; I saw it as him wanting to rule the Sith Empire. Like, it sounds like he’s trying to work inside established Sith-y systems, rather than trying to burn them down and build anew.
I think we’re both pursuing the same angle for Kylo, it’s just a question of the clearest/easiest way of conveying that.
To be fair, Kylo says he wants to build a new system, but he operates within the trappings of what came before him. Red lightsaber, black clothes, a new identity, being committed to the dark side. He even regresses to using his old helmet again. Regardless, I personally don’t think it would be hard for most viewers to see it as “whoever controls the throne, controls the fleet”. Exegol is Palpatine’s little kingdom, the fleet is his army. If Kylo takes the throne, he takes the kingdom, and its army. But maybe some new bit of dialogue from Kylo or Palpatine can be made to make that connection clearer.
Even ignoring all of that, since there is already a lot of dialogue and visuals reiterating Rey’s vision of herself on the throne, and her fear of that vision, then I think you have to correlate that with her joining Kylo, if that is being presented to Rey as the only option to stop Palpatine and save her friends. Also, while I like the reasoning of Kylo saying they will stop Palpatine instead of kill him (because of the spirit transfer nonsense), I don’t know if “stop Palpatine” has the same impact factor as “kill Palpatine”. Maybe, “We will destroy Palpatine” would work better, but maybe this version of the film should keep Kylo not knowing about the spirit transfer.
Same thing - good idea in concept, we’ll just have to see how it works in practice. I trust you, man! Can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Right! We’ll just have to play around with it and see what works. I was trying to keep pacing as similar to the theatrical as possible, but maybe we could get away with trimming more.