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Thoughts on Mary Sue characters.

AlinaX said:
See, if this discussion went, "Rey is a character with a lot of potential that the films failed to explore," I wouldn't have a problem with it, but dismissing her as a Mary Sue and arguing irrational worship (as opposed to superhero worship?) just feels aggressive.

I could write a story about Rey growing up and honing her instincts, but I'd be surprised if a dozen people haven't already done so.

Tired of this.
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Rey WAS a character with a lot of potential. Unfortunately, that isn't the character we got. We got a a Mary Sue.
Why is it "aggressive" to argue irrational worship, but not "aggressive" to argue for irrational hatred ("YoU dOn'T LiKe hEr bEcAuSe ShE's A GIRL!!!").
 
Kelliezgirl said:
Rey WAS a character with a lot of potential. Unfortunately, that isn't the character we got. We got a a Mary Sue.
Why is it "aggressive" to argue irrational worship, but not "aggressive" to argue for irrational hatred ("YoU dOn'T LiKe hEr bEcAuSe ShE's A GIRL!!!").
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I'm confused now. Are you literally saying that's why you don't like her?
 
So you thought you'd get the accusation in first, just to eliminate any possible doubt?
 
AlinaX said:
So you thought you'd get the accusation in first, just to eliminate any possible doubt?
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No, I'm asking a question.
Why is it "aggressive" to accuse one side of "irrational worship"
But not aggressive to accuse the other side of sexism?
 
I'm more curious about your perverse need to advertise your own prejudices. I don't mean to kink-shame, but it seems almost masochistic.
 
All worship is irrational, so the term "irrational worship" is a pleonasm, in my opinion. Just wanted to point that out.

Also, there is a long line of Mary Sues who are waiting for their turn, but this Rey character has totally clogged the line đź‘»
 
AlinaX said:
I'm more curious about your perverse need to advertise your own prejudices. I don't mean to kink-shame, but it seems almost masochistic.
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And since you want to troll and not discuss the topic, I'll just move on.
Enjoy your irrational worship of a fictional character.
 
Bramblethorn said:
But the only reason I'm able to tell you that Rey grew up on her own on Jakku, scavenging wrecked spaceships and surviving as a child on a rough planet, is because the writing literally did establish that information. Did the audience really need to be led by the nose to "maybe she learned some relevant skills in all that time"?

Is it really any lazier than "the controls are similar"? [For two very different vehicle operating in different environments with different weapons systems]

Don't get me wrong though. I thought Episode VII had some of the worst writing in the franchise overall. So much of the plot, including some of the Rey bits, depends on recycling material from Episode IV.

Resistance hero captured by stormtroopers, led by a fallen Jedi? Cute lil' droid escapes with crucial information on a desert planet, and gets found by a Force-sensitive orphan of mysterious origins? Millennium Falcon? (Everybody loves Han and Chewie.) Another Death Star, with another single-point vulnerability? Fallen Jedi kills father-figure? (This time around, literally his father). Fighter squadron storms the Death Star, flying through canyons to evade anti-aircraft fire, and manage to hit its weak spot and blow the whole thing up? New Jedi begins training with the guy who used to be the mentor to the fallen Jedi? (Though this time at a later point in the sequence.)

All that is lazy, and worse, timid writing. It feels like the writers were so cowed by reactions to stuff like "midichlorians" that they chose to play it safe with a Greatest Hits mixtape. Reprising Episode IV's Jedi 101 with Rey would only have exacerbated that problem.

Anybody who spends much time around Star Wars fan discussions will know that fans are happy to devote incredible amounts of energy to rationalising plot holes in the original trilogy, rather than just say "it's a movie, don't overthink it", even when they know the real answer is "because George Lucas was making it up as he went". Why didn't Obi-Wan say "hey before you two kiss, something you ought to know"? Why did Obi-Wan decide that the best way to hide Anakin Skywalker's son Luke Skywalker was by putting him with Anakin's stepbrother, under the name "Luke Skywalker", on the planet where Anakin spent his early years and where he first took a major fall towards the Dark Side? (That thread came up with a solid answer for the surname, only to then have it torpedoed by non-film canon.) I don't know if the responses have been preserved, but I saw a bunch of SW fans go to war with the laws of thermodynamics when a physicist mentioned that the physics of Coruscant don't work.

When the fandom goes to such immense efforts to rationalise accepting the things that they want to accept, but can't come up with a headcanon to accept something as straightforward as "Force-sensitive woman is unexpectedly good at a couple of things", one ends up wondering if maybe they just didn't want a reason to accept it.
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Still maintain that street urchin does not equate to advanced force skills. I’ll have to rewatch but I’m pretty sure the first reference we get to her even being force sensitive is when she touches Luke’s light Sabre. Luke’s relative experiences have nothing to do with her being too OP too fast without documentation or explaination of how she got that way. Sorry, screams Mary Sue to me.
 
 
 
MrHereWriting said:
Luke's failures

Episode 4
Knocked out by a Tusken Raider, saved by Obi-Wan.
Get's picked on in the cantina, saved by Obi-Wan.
Gets shot by that little laser ball trainer the first time we see him practice with a lightsaber, then Obi-Wan gets him to "use the force."
Han Solo gives him shit instead of worshipping him.
Watches Obi-Wan die, the last known Jedi at the time.
Wins a space fight in the Falcon, but misses a million shots, told not to get cocky instead of being celebrated.
Scores a HUGE victory in the X-wing, but by that time he needs a victory, so it feels a little bit earned and the audience really wants to see him win. The audience needs him to win. We also hear Ben guide him with "Use the force, Luke." Remember, we don't know what the Force is capable of yet. He wins with help.
He also had something else going for him that Rey didn't: The audience didn't understand the Force. What they did for Rey was abuse the Force.

Episode 5
Luke is knocked out by the Abominable Snowman, saved by Han Solo, we see Luke recover.
Kisses his Princess sister (maybe that's the most Mary Sue thing he did, lol.)
Goes to Yoda and dismisses the most revered Jedi of his time due to his size and behavior, fails the first lesson.
Can't pull the X-wing out of the swamp, fails another lesson.
Defies Yoda, goes to save his friends, gets his ass kicked by Vader, gets his hand cutoff, and has to commit to a near suicidal jump and has to be saved by his friends instead of doing the saving.

Episode 6
He's now in black. He feels older. He looks older. The movie has come out 3 years after The Empire Strikes Back and his new powers and abilities feel appropriate.
His Jedi mind trick doesn't work on Jaba, he panics, goes for a gun, gets dropped into the Rancor pit and after a "are you fucking kidding me" look on his face, beats the Rancor by dropping a door on his head. Nothing fancy about that. It comes across as desperate and not a part of his original plan to save Han.
Beats Jaba, but with his friends, and in a strategically better location than Jaba's lair.
Goes back to his Jedi training, but Yoda dies right away. His training is incomplete. He's not a Jedi and the audience knows this, and Yoda tells him this.
Goes to help his friends bring down the Death Star's shield, but has to surrender to Vader since he is compromising the mission.
Won't fight Vader, can't turn him back to the Light, has to spend the majority of this battle running, hiding, and controlling his anger.
Loses control, as the Emperor wanted, and fights his father, almost killing him.
Gets his ass kicked by the Emperor, saved by his father, has to watch his father die.

Luke is far from the Mary Sue Rey was. The character of Rey took the shortest route to greatness possible after the fans had already watched 6 Star Wars movies. Whoever stepped into that role had to earn it without appearing to be greater than Luke from the get-go, and they screwed that up. Disney, the producers, and the writers dropped the ball and the fans let them know it.

Luke was far from a Mary Sue, but the bottom line is this: If your Mary Sue is likable, they get a pass. If they aren't, they don't.
Click to expand...

Thanks for typing this up. I was going to do a pretty much identical post but didn't have the energy to type it all up.

Is this a good place in the conversation to repost that clip of Rey destroying three Tie Fighters with one laser bolt from page one?
 
TheRedChamber said:
Thanks for typing this up. I was going to do a pretty much identical post but didn't have the energy to type it all up.

Is this a good place in the conversation to repost that clip of Rey destroying three Tie Fighters with one laser bolt from page one?
Click to expand...

It's the PERFECT place for that. I hear that being a street urchin is directly relevant to that kind of thing.
 
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