Discussion about Self-Insert Characters in Fiction (Mary Sue/Gary Stu)

[Something Amyss]

That vs a severely injured opponent... sprinkle on some space magic and its easily plausible.

I mean, there's also the fact that Kylo is toying with both Finn and Rey. He dispatches Finn after he gets in a single, glancing blow, and before that he had been avoiding swings pretty handily. And while he may not have cared if Finn lived, he wanted Rey alive to train her, which not only gave her an opening but gave her the idea to use the Force. Up to that point, Rey was on the defensive the entire fight, retreating against someone who was not trying to kill her. Darth Cosplay specifically locked her up off-balance on the edge of a ravine. He could have killed her easily. He didn't because the Force works in mysterious ways he wanted an apprentice. Or another apprentice. I forget if the Knights of Ren are his students or not. TBH, I don't really care, either.

There's the argument that he should have known she was calling on the Force, but even if Force users can sense other Force users using the Force, I think it's well within not only his character but the choreography of the fight that he wouldn't expect it because he had her beat.

I'm not sure it even matters that he was injured except specifically to show how much of a badass he is. Dude took a bowcaster bolt and still had two of the main heroes on the ropes. His only real failing is his overconfidence, because while Rey may have been a threat on some level, I have no doubt he could have killed Finn with his first strike if he wanted to. The fight was desperate, but only for Finn and Rey. And that's part of what makes the scene so cool. The other part being the style of the fight overall. I also much preferred this style of fighting to the prequel fights.

Besides, space magic fixes everything...except when it doesn't.

 

[Agema]

That's the one I saw. I preferred it in terms of aesthetics as well... as opposed to the uselessly flipping and spinning wire-fu of the prequels. It was more like the broadsword stagefighting of epic fantasy rather than the twee twirling of the prequels that made pitched life and death battles look like nothing more than glow sticks at a kiddy rave. Plus, the established she was proficient with a melee weapon. Principle is the same, hold it by the handle... bonk them with the other end. That vs a severely injured opponent... sprinkle on some space magic and its easily plausible.

I've got to say, the worst for me was when Darth Maul handily takes on Obi-Wan and Qi-Gon Jinn at the same time, kills the latter and knocks the former down a pit. Then Obi Wan somehow force leaps out of the pit to somersault over Maul's head, pulling his lightsaber to him and nails Maul... and somehow this super-lethal Sith who can deflect laser bolts and outmatched two skilled Jedi effectively doesn't even react in the time it would take all that to happen. Sure! I know Hollywood loves its trope of the hero pulling it back from the brink of defeat, but sometimes it's taken to absurdity.

And oh, the irony of Obi-Wan telling Anakin he can't win the fight in the lava field because Obi-Wan has the terrain advantage, two films later.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Oh come on, nobody liked Anakin's stupid flight to destroy the power core that somehow single handedly won the war.

Yeah, but that's because they didn't like the kid, and it was a super convenient solution. I don't think anyone complained about him acing that pod race, which is equally ridiculous for a kid his age.


But let's say people's biggest problem was that he was too overpowered; What does Rey do that's equel to that that makes her a Mary Sue? She flies a spaceship adequately, knows how to fix machines, and is a somewhat capable fighter. And at the end she beats a bratty Darth Vader wannabee who got shot in the stomach in a lightsaber dual. Is that so much more crazy than Luke curving a missle into a tiny hole while going mach 20 through a trench while only being somewhat aware of his force powers?


Again, Star Wars protagonists are typically imbued with "heroic" talents, because it's necessary for the action adventure they're about experience. Similar to how in Lord of the Rings these little hobbits, who's only experience is farming, are somehow able to hold their own against vicious orcs twice their size. The only difference now being that this character is a girl, which apparently means there needs to be a better reason for her having these talents.

 

[Pseudonym]

Everyone can be called a Mary Sue when compared to Luke Skywalker, the least competent main hero character I know of. He only wins because an all-encompassing magical force really wants him to, and even then it requires a level of incompetence from his enemies that would make team rocket embarrassed. Even Yoda says so until he is killed of for pointing out that Luke doesn't work as a hero character at all and Luke is Retconned as knowing what he is doing in Return of the Jedi.

Honestly, I prefer my stories to acknowledge that the hero who is to solve it all is something of an exceptional person. It just comes off as sheer wish fulfillment when some random schmuck like Luke Skywalker gets to be the big hero.

 

[the December King]

Just go back to this very forum the month after TFA came out, and you will find numerous people defending Ani's skillset.

I'll take your word for it, though I remember more comparisons between Luke and Rey going on than with Anikin, in general.

Not as weird as when people try and pretend it was his skills or power level people hated, rather than the child actor in Episode 1 and the fact that he was constantly whining in 2 and 3. Because what people really hate about Ani was his skills, which is why they meme him jumping out of windows as a bad thing, and not jokes about sand and I HATE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

Speaking for myself, I disliked the overpowered nature of Anikin in the Prequels more than anything else about him, but yeah, the character's portrayal overall is tiresome. The fact that it hasn't really come up until now is likely because I never really considered this in light (or in contrast to) Rey's accomplishments - I also haven't really felt like I could comment on her character, as I haven't seen the new movies, and only know of her feats from these threads.

 

[Asita]

And, perplexingly enough, in the fight with Kylo Ren he makes sport of her while she employs mobility and her environment in ways that fit her skillset, but she turns the fight around when she abandons that skillset in favor of the more conventional fighting style he'd specialized in.

Some times I wonder if people have seen the same lightsaber fight in TFA that I have. The one that starts with Kylo Ren wounded by a direct hit from a weapon that routinely throws Stormtroopers across the room from sheer kinetic impact. The one where Kylo is bleeding and continually beating his wound to build up adrenaline and pain to draw upon the dark side. The one where he handily dispatches Finn, who tries to go toe to toe with him, and then chases Rey, who has no idea how to properly handle a lightsaber. The one where he has Rey at the ropes, but instead of killing her reminds her about the force, which lets her wield her lightsaber with some degree of proficiency (as previously established in EU materials, where lightsaber use is based on letting the force guide you). With the force she manages to turn the fight against Kylo, who at this point has fought for a good several minutes with an untended wound from a weapon that routinely flings people across the room when it hits. So she catches a wounded and tired opponent who doesn't want to kill her off-guard and manages to drive him back before he can get his bearings back.

I mean, it isn't the best lightsaber fight in Star Wars, but the power of the Bowcaster has been foreshadowed several times, Kylo's wound is repeatedly shown, as is his ritual of beating it to pump himself up. We get a clear shot of Rey tapping into the force and her fighting style obviously changes when she uses the force to wield a lightsaber instead of her scavenger skill set. We've also been shown previously that Snoke wants Rey alive and Kylo even stops to tell her that he doesn't want to kill her but wants her to join him. The scene itself gives us all the building blocks we need to see why Rey, who is clearly outmatched by Kylo Ren even when he's injured, can pull an unexpected victory from their confrontation and none of it is very Mary-Sueish. Kylo is impaired by his wounds, holds back and doesn't expect Rey to come at him with such ferocity.

In the larger design of things, her ability to resist Kylo's mind probe and then using the mind trick on JB-007 is more glaring. But it isn't that much more glaring then Luke somehow having figured out how to use the force to pull his lightsaber to himself in Episode V, despite apparently lacking an actual mentor to teach him the force and all his force training pretty much amounting to letting the force guide him.

Well to answer snark with snark, sometimes I wonder if people actually read what I wrote.

Snark aside, I'm legitimately confused as to your takeaway from my post and how "Kylo Ren was injured" is supposed to be a modifier I overlooked. Consider that example in the context of the rest of my post. My overall point was the tendency for Rey's big moments to occur when she was outside her niche. Kylo being injured doesn't factor into this, as my point wasn't that she won the fight, but rather the oddity (and I'd argue narrative failing) of how her skillset played into that fight. She fared poorly when playing to her skillset but did well when she dropped that skillset and instead used an unfamiliar one. More than that, my point was that the oddity of that was not isolated to the fight, but part of a larger pattern with her in TFA; ie, the poor execution I've been alluding to.


As an aside however:

In the larger design of things, her ability to resist Kylo's mind probe and then using the mind trick on JB-007 is more glaring. But it isn't that much more glaring then Luke somehow having figured out how to use the force to pull his lightsaber to himself in Episode V, despite apparently lacking an actual mentor to teach him the force and all his force training pretty much amounting to letting the force guide him.

This equivalence ends up annoying me to no end. Not quite as much as "he made the missile turn at a right angle with the Force" malarkey[footnote]It's not a missile launch, it's a bombing run that draws heavily from the Dam Busters (based on Operation Chastise in WWII)[/footnote], but still... Anyways, Empire Strikes Back takes place three years after the end of A New Hope. There's a rather severe difference between figuring something out in the course of minutes and figuring something out in the course of years.

Narratively, Luke pulling on his Lightsaber is there both to indicate growth in that period and to set up the idea that while he has powers he needs training to really come into his own with regards to his abilities. It's also a bit of a refresher for the audience that Star Wars is a universe where rare individuals have special powers. Luke's entrance in Return of the Jedi served a similar role, only this time the effortlessness with which he uses his abilities suggests that over the time skip he gained greater confidence and proficiency and is closer to mastering them.

 

[Trunkage]

Oh come on, nobody liked Anakin's stupid flight to destroy the power core that somehow single handedly won the war.

Yeah, but that's because they didn't like the kid, and it was a super convenient solution. I don't think anyone complained about him acing that pod race, which is equally ridiculous for a kid his age.

Plus that Nintendo Pod Racer game was good, so I was biased on him doing this. I was blinded by an actual good game

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

And, perplexingly enough, in the fight with Kylo Ren he makes sport of her while she employs mobility and her environment in ways that fit her skillset, but she turns the fight around when she abandons that skillset in favor of the more conventional fighting style he'd specialized in.

Some times I wonder if people have seen the same lightsaber fight in TFA that I have. The one that starts with Kylo Ren wounded by a direct hit from a weapon that routinely throws Stormtroopers across the room from sheer kinetic impact. The one where Kylo is bleeding and continually beating his wound to build up adrenaline and pain to draw upon the dark side. The one where he handily dispatches Finn, who tries to go toe to toe with him, and then chases Rey, who has no idea how to properly handle a lightsaber. The one where he has Rey at the ropes, but instead of killing her reminds her about the force, which lets her wield her lightsaber with some degree of proficiency (as previously established in EU materials, where lightsaber use is based on letting the force guide you). With the force she manages to turn the fight against Kylo, who at this point has fought for a good several minutes with an untended wound from a weapon that routinely flings people across the room when it hits. So she catches a wounded and tired opponent who doesn't want to kill her off-guard and manages to drive him back before he can get his bearings back.

I mean, it isn't the best lightsaber fight in Star Wars, but the power of the Bowcaster has been foreshadowed several times, Kylo's wound is repeatedly shown, as is his ritual of beating it to pump himself up. We get a clear shot of Rey tapping into the force and her fighting style obviously changes when she uses the force to wield a lightsaber instead of her scavenger skill set. We've also been shown previously that Snoke wants Rey alive and Kylo even stops to tell her that he doesn't want to kill her but wants her to join him. The scene itself gives us all the building blocks we need to see why Rey, who is clearly outmatched by Kylo Ren even when he's injured, can pull an unexpected victory from their confrontation and none of it is very Mary-Sueish. Kylo is impaired by his wounds, holds back and doesn't expect Rey to come at him with such ferocity.

In the larger design of things, her ability to resist Kylo's mind probe and then using the mind trick on JB-007 is more glaring. But it isn't that much more glaring then Luke somehow having figured out how to use the force to pull his lightsaber to himself in Episode V, despite apparently lacking an actual mentor to teach him the force and all his force training pretty much amounting to letting the force guide him.

Well to answer snark with snark, sometimes I wonder if people actually read what I wrote.

Snark aside, I'm legitimately confused as to your takeaway from my post and how "Kylo Ren was injured" is supposed to be a modifier I overlooked. Consider that example in the context of the rest of my post. My overall point was the tendency for Rey's big moments to occur when she was outside her niche. Kylo being injured doesn't factor into this, as my point wasn't that she won the fight, but rather the oddity (and I'd argue narrative failing) of how her skillset played into that fight. She fared poorly when playing to her skillset but did well when she dropped that skillset and instead used an unfamiliar one. More than that, my point was that the oddity of that was not isolated to the fight, but part of a larger pattern with her in TFA; ie, the poor execution I've been alluding to.

I dunno, letting the force guide your actions is pretty much end level Jedi philosophy. That she'd start winning when she did so makes sense. Or at least, makes as much sense as Luke translating his planetary speeder experience into military grade star fighter performance.

The different ways Kylo use their power is also something I think a lot of folks overlook. Like, despite people talking up him using his pain and rage as an appropriately Sith way to get power...he sucks at it. Anytime he's mad or in pain or lashing out with those good ol' Sith emotions, he's objectively weaker than when he's calm and composed. Angry Kylo couldn't have taken out Snoke.

He self-sabotages by trying to be the Sith he thinks his Granddad was.

 

[twistedmic]

Anytime he's mad or in pain or lashing out with those good ol' Sith emotions, he's objectively weaker than when he's calm and composed. Angry Kylo couldn't have taken out Snoke.

He self-sabotages by trying to be the Sith he thinks his Granddad was.

Never thought of it that way. Calm and composed Kylo can freeze a blaster bolt in mid air, angry/upset Kylo can get gut-shot by a wookie's bowcaster. Calm Kylo can trick and kill Snoke, angry Kylo can get force *****-slapped by Snoke.

 

[Saint of M]

Anytime he's mad or in pain or lashing out with those good ol' Sith emotions, he's objectively weaker than when he's calm and composed. Angry Kylo couldn't have taken out Snoke.

He self-sabotages by trying to be the Sith he thinks his Granddad was.

Never thought of it that way. Calm and composed Kylo can freeze a blaster bolt in mid air, angry/upset Kylo can get gut-shot by a wookie's bowcaster. Calm Kylo can trick and kill Snoke, angry Kylo can get force *****-slapped by Snoke.

Might be a self controle issue. Remember, the Bowcaster was shown to hit like a grenade launcher in that movie. Then he is survives having that go through him at least a Kidney if not a large number of other internal organs and only groan as if it was just a pulled musle, ven hitting it in an attempt to drive it back to place.

By the time he and Rey face off against not palpetine, he is the one calm and collected and Rey is the one letter her emotions take controle (something shown to be exploited by Darth Maul's fight with Obiwan after he killed Qui-Go).

 

[Asita]

I dunno, letting the force guide your actions is pretty much end level Jedi philosophy. That she'd start winning when she did so makes sense. Or at least, makes as much sense as Luke translating his planetary speeder experience into military grade star fighter performance.

"End level" is a pretty significant modifier when you're talking about a neophyte with no experience and little to no guidance. I'm assuming you're talking about Oneness, and Rey pulling that off in the first movie would make things so much worse. That's an achievement comparable to Enlightenment in Buddhism or Mushin in martial arts (or if you want to go completely over the top, Ultra Instinct in Dragon Ball Super). Which is to say that it's "legends among legends" material. It's the kind of thing you invoke when you're ready to end a character's story, not when you're just starting it.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

I dunno, letting the force guide your actions is pretty much end level Jedi philosophy. That she'd start winning when she did so makes sense. Or at least, makes as much sense as Luke translating his planetary speeder experience into military grade star fighter performance.

"End level" is a pretty significant modifier when you're talking about a neophyte with no experience and little to no guidance. I'm assuming you're talking about Oneness, and Rey pulling that off in the first movie would make things so much worse. That's an achievement comparable to Enlightenment in Buddhism or Mushin in martial arts (or if you want to go completely over the top, Ultra Instinct in Dragon Ball Super). Which is to say that it's "legends among legends" material. It's the kind of thing you invoke when you're ready to end a character's story, not when you're just starting it.

It takes a lot of faith to give up control of your own actions and go with the flow. Faith is something Rey has a lot of.

An over abundance, considering the mistakes she makes in TLJ.

(And, as I'm always gonna point out, this "letting the force control her actions" thing managed to let her temporarily beat a heavily wounded, emotionally compromised opponent who wasn't trying to kill her back. Meanwhile, Kylo managed to get wounded by Finn, the only person in history to lose a lightsaber fight with a Stormtrooper)

 

[Asita]

I dunno, letting the force guide your actions is pretty much end level Jedi philosophy. That she'd start winning when she did so makes sense. Or at least, makes as much sense as Luke translating his planetary speeder experience into military grade star fighter performance.

"End level" is a pretty significant modifier when you're talking about a neophyte with no experience and little to no guidance. I'm assuming you're talking about Oneness, and Rey pulling that off in the first movie would make things so much worse. That's an achievement comparable to Enlightenment in Buddhism or Mushin in martial arts (or if you want to go completely over the top, Ultra Instinct in Dragon Ball Super). Which is to say that it's "legends among legends" material. It's the kind of thing you invoke when you're ready to end a character's story, not when you're just starting it.

It takes a lot of faith to give up control of your own actions and go with the flow. Faith is something Rey has a lot of.

An over abundance, considering the mistakes she makes in TLJ.

...Alt? I do not think you grasp the implications of your suggestion. You are not suggesting that she centered herself and found her second wind. What you are suggesting is something that in terms of narrative is more of a mistake than the post-hoc explanation on wookiepedia that she "accessed memories of Ren's training which, in turn, served as her own training in the ways of the Force", or the fan-theory that she's tapping memories and skills from a past life. You are suggesting that in her first fight, minutes to hours after learning that she could use the Force, she was able to turn the tables because her opponent mentioning the Force made her figure out how to enter a state that most masters do not achieve. Yoda never reached that state.

Edit: As the post apparently was expanded while I was typing:

(And, as I'm always gonna point out, this "letting the force control her actions" thing managed to let her temporarily beat a heavily wounded, emotionally compromised opponent who wasn't trying to kill her back. Meanwhile, Kylo managed to get wounded by Finn, the only person in history to lose a lightsaber fight with a Stormtrooper)

I explained this in the very post you were responding to, Alt:

"My overall point was the tendency for Rey's big moments to occur when she was outside her niche. Kylo being injured doesn't factor into this, as my point wasn't that she won the fight, but rather the oddity (and I'd argue narrative failing) of how her skillset played into that fight."

I have not been talking about whether Rey or Ren should have won the fight. I have been talking about how established and unestablished skills played into Rey's achievements.

 

[Something Amyss]

Speaking for myself, I disliked the overpowered nature of Anikin in the Prequels more than anything else about him, but yeah, the character's portrayal overall is tiresome. The fact that it hasn't really come up until now is likely because I never really considered this in light (or in contrast to) Rey's accomplishments - I also haven't really felt like I could comment on her character, as I haven't seen the new movies, and only know of her feats from these threads.

Jedi implies Vader was always strong in the Force, hence the notion that any progeny would also be, so it never really bothered me that he was good. Especially since his piloting skills come down to nascent precognitive abilities which we see grow within the movies. I also wasn't all that bothered because the overall power level of the Jedi was higher and he never came off as that much more powerful to me. Granted, I've seen each of the OT movies exactly once, because they had a lot of other problems, so I might be misremembering things. But the worst I can really recall is that he was slightly better at the flippy stuff than Obi-Wan, which mostly showed itself off in two scenes in the entire trilogy. And even then, experience wins the day in the end (even if emotion leaves Vader alive to fight another day).

My biggest complaint about the prequels is that Ani is supposed to be a tragic figure. We're supposed to watch his rise and fall, but he's only slightly more sympathetic than Young Voldemort, and I don't care as a result.

Yeah, but that's because they didn't like the kid, and it was a super convenient solution. I don't think anyone complained about him acing that pod race, which is equally ridiculous for a kid his age.

Does it count if you think the whole podrace was stupid because the fate of the galaxy hinged upon it? I wasn't bothered so much by Anmi's win, but the whole plate.

...Alt? I do not think you grasp the implications of your suggestion. You are not suggesting that she centered herself and found her second wind. What you are suggesting is something that in terms of narrative is more of a mistake than the post-hoc explanation on wookiepedia that she "accessed memories of Ren's training which, in turn, served as her own training in the ways of the Force", or the fan-theory that she's tapping memories and skills from a past life. You are suggesting that in her first fight, minutes to hours after learning that she could use the Force, she accomplished something that most masters do not achieve. Yoda never reached that state.

To the contrary, it sounds like he's suggesting she achieved a state Luke achieved in Episode IV with only a few words of advice from a crazy old hermit when he hadn't even heard of the Force a day before. Except likely augmented by the way the galaxy knows about the Force again (which is sort of a dumb contrivance of the whole saga, that people could forget in a couple of decades and then re-learn in a couple of decades).

It's also not that insane when you consider that the explanation TLJ gives about why Rey is so powerful--the canon explanation--is not that she accesses Milo Stimpy's training, but that the Force will create a balance, lading to a great light to match the great dark. It's not hard to buy that giving herself over to the Force would then allow a deeper connection. There's already an extant fan theory that goes along these lines: most or all of Rey's greatest feats are when she is letting the Force act through her, as opposed to controlling it. Star Wars Explained covered it at one point, and there is at the very least a level of consistency to it.

Granted, Luke had "one bornevery minute" levels of gullibility in Ep IV and all he did was block a training droid shot and bend a torpedo....

 

[Asita]

To the contrary, it sounds like he's suggesting she achieved a state Luke achieved in Episode IV with only a few words of advice from a crazy old hermit when he hadn't even heard of the Force a day before. Except likely augmented by the way the galaxy knows about the Force again (which is sort of a dumb contrivance of the whole saga, that people could forget in a couple of decades and then re-learn in a couple of decades).

It's also not that insane when you consider that the explanation TLJ gives about why Rey is so powerful--the canon explanation--is not that she accesses Milo Stimpy's training, but that the Force will create a balance, lading to a great light to match the great dark. It's not hard to buy that giving herself over to the Force would then allow a deeper connection. There's already an extant fan theory that goes along these lines: most or all of Rey's greatest feats are when she is letting the Force act through her, as opposed to controlling it. Star Wars Explained covered it at one point, and there is at the very least a level of consistency to it.

Granted, Luke had "one bornevery minute" levels of gullibility in Ep IV and all he did was block a training droid shot and bend a torpedo....

I disagree with that characterization. The idea hammered into Luke and the audience in Episode IV is that he needed to trust his instincts. The moment they used to set up the trench run was Luke's training on the Falcon, wherein the key takeaway was to trust your instincts over your eyes and that the Force would augment a person's senses and allow them to react more accurately.

And while I grant that I'd still be a bit leery of that considering that Rey didn't even get that paltry guidance, that's a far more reasonable explanation than saying she "let the Force act through her, as opposed to controlling it". The former's a basic Force ability that would inevitably form the foundation of her training, so while I'd still say that would be bad writing (or at least bad direction) for her to grasp it so suddenly in the heat of a duel with even less guidance than Luke got, it's at least plausible. The latter, however, is Oneness. Sticking with Luke for ease of example, he entered that state once, and that was during the climax of the Yuuzhan Vong War. Rey doing that so soon wouldn't just be skipping the basic training, that would be pole-vaulting straight into the realm of legends.


And an aside: He did not bend a torpedo. It's a bombing run, not a missile launch. If it required magically bending the flight path of missile, the mission would have been dismissed as literally impossible, not just requiring improbable accuracy. Furthermore, it's worth noting that the Trench Run is based heavily off of Dam Busters, itself based on the WWII "Operation Chastise" and its "bouncing bombs".

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

So, to me, Rey from the new Star Wars isnt a great character. Even if you like her, you'd probably recognize that she gets called a Mary-Sue.

She's called that because that's what the character is. She's completely perfect in every way. Despite establishing that she grew up penniless on a desert, she's an unbeatable fighter, speaks every language, an expert pilot, kind, generous and loyal, she beats a trained Dark Jedi the first time she picks up a lightsaber, is a master of the force with no training, beats a jedi master and so on. She exists because that's what Disney execs and Kathleen Kennedy want to portray in their world. It's social justice dialled up to 11.

But the problem isn't just Rey, the movies she's in are awful, have essentially spat on and burned all previous films and canon, and ruined a franchise for many (millions of) fans. Most characters in the movies are awful, but Rey and Rose are particularly awful...and Benicio Del Torro's stupid character too. Rose, ostensibly put in to appeal to "the Chinese market", was so bad I would say she was by far the worst thing in Episode VIII, and that's with a purple haired Laura Dern making every effort possible to make us hate her.

So my question is... why is it not okay for female characters to not work? For many, Rey doesn't work and then she's seen as some affront to culture.

Err what? She's not an affront, she's just a badly written, badly thought out Mary Sue character.

While bad male characters aren't given that scrutiny.

They certainly are. It could be that Rey gets more attention on account of ruining Star Wars, which if you haven't noticed is, or at least was, a massively popular franchise until Disney (and EA) took a flamethrower to it. Bad male characters are criticised wholesale wherever they appear, it's just that you don't get called a sexist when you criticise a male character, so there's no controversy for SJWs to jump on.

Terminator: Genysis? Both John Connor and Kyle Reese were absolutely awful. I watched "The Nun" last month, the French-Canadian guy was the worst thing in it, and it was a really bad movie. I'm not a huge fan of Hayden Christensenn's Anakin, all Nick Cage roles except Con Air...I can name loads of awful male characters.

I've already plenty of people being against Ms Marvel movie next year and how she's be ruining comics for a while. Why is it not okay for her to 'ruin comics' just like plenty of male characters 'ruined comics'

Okay, this is a different thing. The short version...essentially Marvel Comics caught a bad case of "social justice". They went on a rampage and anything "white" and "male" was out. Thor, woman. Tony Stark? Gone. Iron Man, 15 y/o black girl. Captain America, Nazi. I'm not joking, an actual, literal Nazi. Role then filled by...black guy. They pushed Captain Marvel so hard to be the headlining hero in the comics. They relaunched her title give times (five issue 1s!) in very little time because they never catch on. I believe the head honcho has now been fired for driving the comic part of the business into the ground.

In short, Captain Marvel kinda did ruin the comic books because they kept trying to push her as the flagship hero and no one was buying it. Sales figures were falling, fans were alienated. I believe they're now trying to undo the damage done and bring back the original heroes, but I don't know details. But for years, particularly since the success of the MCU, people could watch Cap, Iron Man and Thor on screen, but were completely unable to buy their comic books because they were gender/race flipped in the name of "diversity".

(As an aside, I dont think Luke as much of a character. He's had little training and little personality. He's a cardboard cutout running around on adventures. He's ruined Star Wars before Daisy Ridley was even born.)

Luke was a better character than Rey by far. He had personality and flaws. In Empire, he thought he knew better, ignored Yoda's warnings, failed his training, left anyway to go to Bespin where he failed to save his friend and lost his hand. In RotJ, he almost gave in to the Dark Side when his father taunted him and was poised to kill his own father, only at the last minute holding back.

Rey is perfect and flawless. She should've had her butt whooped by Kylo Ren in that fight, gone to find Luke and come back stronger. But nope, she's a girl so she's better than everyone all the time, from the start, no training, can't lose, has to be portrayed as "strong".

The issue isn't Rey per se, it's the "strong female character". I loathe the SFC utterly, and this lady explains why SFCs suck so much. Ellen Ripley was an amazing female character. She was flawed, terrified, we could identify with her. We were terrified in Alien because she was, because we cared about her, because she was human and the xenomorph had already killed everyone else. She persevered in spite of her terror, used her engineering skills and knowledge of the ship. Ripley was a great character. Not a great "female" character. A great character, no qualification needed.

Sarah Connor in T1 was terrified, helpless, chased by an implacable enemy. She ran, she clawed desperately for life and in the end, one of the best movie endings. In T2, she was a nut-job, half crazy and violent. Watching her claim be vindicated when the T1000 walked into the psyche ward, when the arsehat shrink's pen fell from his mouth, was so satisfying. Because we knew she was right and cared about her struggle. Cersei Lannister is now wearing the crown of the Seven Kingdoms in Game of Thrones...you know how she got it? It wasn't with kung fu. She's a liar, cunning, smart and ruthless. Rey will never lose a fight, is never afraid, never needs help from anyone, is more powerful than everyone, she has no human qualities at all.

---------------

Overall, I think the issue is that in the current zeitgeist, no one will write believable female characters. "All princesses know kung-fu now". All female characters are now "strong". That's it, that's their only quality. They all know kung fu, need no help (certainly not from no man!), have few flaws if any. Where are the weak women? Where are the evil women? Where are the helpless, scared, rude, contemptible, dishonest, wise, funny, cunning women? Rey is one-dimensional, flawless and boring.

People love the original SW trilogy because it said something more about the human condition...every woman I know much prefers Luke over Rey, by miles, because he was relatable. People relate to characters they can identify with, but the issue now is that the social justice identitarians believe that no one can identify with characters that don't match the viewers race, sex or sexual preference. They're wrong, that's why Episodes 7-8 turned out as they did.

 

[Abomination]

Every other Jedi, before Rey, has required some sort of mentor or to at least have partaken in some kind of practice.

For some reason Rey is so special that she did not need to do this.

How much of Luke's story involved conversations where he was being trained?
Anakin was the same, he showed skill in two fields and then spent, what, 8 years training with the Jedi?

Rey spent perhaps a year at most near Luke, and how much of that was actually spent training compared to how much time was required to even convince him to train her?

Even the piloting thing is absurd for Rey. She's upset that she's stuck on a planet but apparently is capable of not only piloting a ship with faster than light capability but knows how to repair one.

She's a SCAVENGER, not a mechanic. She takes things apart, that doesn't mean she knows how to put them back together.

 

[Cicada 5]

She's called that because that's what the character is. She's completely perfect in every way. Despite establishing that she grew up penniless on a desert, she's an unbeatable fighter, speaks every language, an expert pilot, kind, generous and loyal, she beats a trained Dark Jedi the first time she picks up a lightsaber, is a master of the force with no training, beats a jedi master and so on. She exists because that's what Disney execs and Kathleen Kennedy want to portray in their world. It's social justice dialled up to 11.

She is not an invincible fighter. Her defeat of Kylo Ren was due to his injuries and impulsiveness. And kind? She sure doesn?t act that way to Finn and BB-8. The only thing that is true here is expert pilot and that applies to every Star Wars film protagonist.

But the problem isn't just Rey, the movies she's in are awful, have essentially spat on and burned all previous films and canon, and ruined a franchise for many (millions of) fans. Most characters in the movies are awful, but Rey and Rose are particularly awful...and Benicio Del Torro's stupid character too. Rose, ostensibly put in to appeal to "the Chinese market", was so bad I would say she was by far the worst thing in Episode VIII, and that's with a purple haired Laura Dern making every effort possible to make us hate her.

Where the hell does this idea that Rose (a character played by a Vietnamese-American actress was put in to appeal to the Chinese market come from?

Err what? She's not an affront, she's just a badly written, badly thought out Mary Sue character.

For a character not seen as an affront, she sure rustles the jimmies of a huge number of online fanboys who go as far as harassing her actress.

They certainly are. It could be that Rey gets more attention on account of ruining Star Wars, which if you haven't noticed is, or at least was, a massively popular franchise until Disney (and EA) took a flamethrower to it. Bad male characters are criticised wholesale wherever they appear, it's just that you don't get called a sexist when you criticise a male character, so there's no controversy for SJWs to jump on.

Bad male characters rarely, if ever, get this level of backlash and accusations of SJW agenda (unless they?re non-white). And as for ruining Star Wars, I thought the prequels did that?
As for the accusations of sexism, when you?ve got Rey getting crapped on for stuff other male characters have done and the actress herself being harassed, what conclusion is anyone to make about why Rey is getting singled out?

Terminator: Genysis? Both John Connor and Kyle Reese were absolutely awful. I watched "The Nun" last month, the French-Canadian guy was the worst thing in it, and it was a really bad movie. I'm not a huge fan of Hayden Christensenn's Anakin, all Nick Cage roles except Con Air...I can name loads of awful male characters.

See my above posts. The backlash was nowhere near this ridiculous (not to mention based on different things) and which of these actors got harassed for their roles?

Okay, this is a different thing. The short version...essentially Marvel Comics caught a bad case of "social justice".

Marvel?s had a ?bad case of social justice? since Stan and Jack put out a comic showing Steve Rogers punching Hitler on the cover. A move which got them death threats and I can only imagine what would happen had such a thing been done today. The Marvel you?re seeing now is the one Stan and Jack wanted.

They went on a rampage and anything "white" and "male" was out. Thor, woman.

Thor has been everything from a frog to a horse-faced alien. This is not the weirdest thing to happen in Marvel.

Tony Stark? Gone. Iron Man, 15 y/o black girl.

Riri Williams wasn?t going by Iron Man. She was calling herself Iron Heart. Dr Doom was the one calling himself Iron Man. You?d think a villain assuming a hero?s identity would be far more offensive, especially in light of Superior Spider-Man but people were more pissed at the black girl who wasn?t even calling herself Iron Man.

Captain America, Nazi. I'm not joking, an actual, literal Nazi.

Not the first time it had happened. Kirby himself did this in the 70s.

Role then filled by...black guy.

Said black guy had been a Captain America supporting character for decades. It wasn?t anymore out of place than Dick Grayson becoming Batman. Twice.

They pushed Captain Marvel so hard to be the headlining hero in the comics. They relaunched her title give times (five issue 1s!) in very little time because they never catch on. I believe the head honcho has now been fired for driving the comic part of the business into the ground.In short, Captain Marvel kinda did ruin the comic books because they kept trying to push her as the flagship hero and no one was buying it. Sales figures were falling, fans were alienated.

DC and Marvel push characters all the time regardless of sales. In the case of Carol, she had an upcoming movie and was a character whose film rights they had access to. How the hell were they not going to push her?
The reason for collapsing sales was Marvel?s idiotic business practices. Namely, oversaturation of events, increased prices, poor distribution and over reliance on the direct market. Not to mention that the comic industry has been failing for decades due to competition from other media.

I believe they're now trying to undo the damage done and bring back the original heroes, but I don't know details. But for years, particularly since the success of the MCU, people could watch Cap, Iron Man and Thor on screen, but were completely unable to buy their comic books because they were gender/race flipped in the name of "diversity".

So despite being able to see Thor, Iron Man and Cap in the movies (not to mention the games, t.v. shows and other media) them being temporarily replaced in the comics (one of the oldest traditions in the superhero genre) was too unbearable?

Luke was a better character than Rey by far. He had personality and flaws. In Empire, he thought he knew better, ignored Yoda's warnings, failed his training, left anyway to go to Bespin where he failed to save his friend and lost his hand. In RotJ, he almost gave in to the Dark Side when his father taunted him and was poised to kill his own father, only at the last minute holding back.

Rey is perfect and flawless. She should've had her butt whooped by Kylo Ren in that fight, gone to find Luke and come back stronger. But nope, she's a girl so she's better than everyone all the time, from the start, no training, can't lose, has to be portrayed as "strong".

In TFA, Rey is headstrong and stubborn and an ass to Finn and BB-8 for a long time. In TLJ, her desperation to be someone special and to find her parents in preyed upon by Ren. And again, her victory against Ren was due to his injuries and impulsiveness.

The issue isn't Rey per se, it's the "strong female character". I loathe the SFC utterly, and this lady explains why SFCs suck so much.

Literally none of these issues apply to Rey. In both of the films she has appeared in, Rey is shown to have faults and insecurities which the villains take advantage of. At one point we even see her running in fear.

Overall, I think the issue is that in the current zeitgeist, no one will write believable female characters. "All princesses know kung-fu now". All female characters are now "strong". That's it, that's their only quality. They all know kung fu, need no help (certainly not from no man!), have few flaws if any. Where are the weak women? Where are the evil women? Where are the helpless, scared, rude, contemptible, dishonest, wise, funny, cunning women? Rey is one-dimensional, flawless and boring.

Try watching Killing Eve, Moana, Frozen, Jessica Jones, Insecure, She?s Gotta Have It, Dear White People etc. if anything, there?s more diversity among female leads than there?s ever been before.

People love the original SW trilogy because it said something more about the human condition...every woman I know much prefers Luke over Rey, by miles, because he was relatable. People relate to characters they can identify with, but the issue now is that the social justice identitarians believe that no one can identify with characters that don't match the viewers race, sex or sexual preference. They're wrong, that's why Episodes 7-8 turned out as they did.

Here?s the thing about relatability; it depends on the person. Some people will relate to Luke more than Rey and others will relate to Rey more than Luke. Because everyone?s experiences are different in amny ways. Just because Rey isn?t like Luke doesn?t mean she isn?t relatable and plenty of women like Rey just fine. Some even like both her and Luke. Shocking I know.

 

[Casual Shinji]

She's a SCAVENGER, not a mechanic. She takes things apart, that doesn't mean she knows how to put them back together.

How old is Rey in the movies, like 20? And she's been on that planet since like the age 5? I would assume 15 years of taking machinery apart, something I would guess needs to be done delicately so as not to destroy the components, would give one a very good sense on how machinery fits together. Hence why she would also probably know how to put them back together.

 

[Something Amyss]

The latter, however, is Oneness.

You mean the one where Luke asks if it controls your actions, and Obi-Wan says partially, but it also obeys your commands? The exact thing I was referencing? Yes, I'm familiar with the scene. It's sort of like the idea of lketing go has been baked into Star Wars since the seventies or something.

Every other Jedi, before Rey, has required some sort of mentor or to at least have partaken in some kind of practice.

Prior to Episode IV, all the Force was used for was mind tricks on the weak minded.
Prior to Episode VI, no Force user had ever had a lightning power. Also, this is the first mention of the Force being hereditary.
Prior to the prequels, Jedi didn't flip around like monkeys.
In the prequels, Ani was already a Force user by the time he found a mentor.

For some reason Rey is so special that she did not need to do this.

The stable by was able to Accio his Firebolt without training, so I think you're cherry-picking to make it seem like Rey is somehow treated differently, when it's the Force which is treated differently. It's not a broken rule, either way, it's just showing something that traditionally hadn't been. And there was a time when the Doctor had always had blue eyes, which doesn't make blue eyes canon.

By episode VI, the greatest Space Wizard in the Galaxy was a guy who could barely move objects, barely deflect blaster bolts for more than a shot or two, and maybe do a jump. This was the dude who took down Dark Helmet, the tragic fallen Cheddar Monk. By Episode I, all these feats looked ridiculously weak compared to Jedi. Now duct tape face can freeze blaster bolts in midair. Weird how people spend so little time on this, but...

She's a SCAVENGER, not a mechanic. She takes things apart, that doesn't mean she knows how to put them back together.

This is the absurd part. Even though scavengers in the Star Wars Galaxy have traditionally been good with fixing things.

But of course, what utility would there be in scavengers fixing things?

Here?s the thing about relatability; it depends on the person. Some people will relate to Luke more than Rey and others will relate to Rey more than Luke. Because everyone?s experiences are different in amny ways. Just because Rey isn?t like Luke doesn?t mean she isn?t relatable and plenty of women like Rey just fine. Some even like both her and Luke. Shocking I know.

Some will look at Kylo Ren, a whiny and entitled fanboy cosplaying as his hero and throwing temper tantrums, see themselves, and not understand why this is a bad thing.