fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #4315 ]

[ SECRET POST #4315 ]

⌈ Secret Post #4315 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 49 secrets from Secret Submission Post #618.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I’m not fishnchips, but I’m afraid they might not be referring to quite the same trope as you, but more the generic “evil villain redeemed by twu lurve of beautiful girl” thing. And the closest things I can think of to your request are both cartoons—Megamind and Strange Magic, the latter of which, iirc, doesn’t involve an existential threat, just an asshole.

Oooh, thanks!

And you made a good point here--- I think the reason Reylo doesn't fall into the "her love redeems him" trope for me is that in Star Wars, and specifically with Ben's own grandfather's arc that we know has a lot of personal significance for him, I've always read the "work" of "the redemptive power of love" to be on the side of the person in need of redemption. Luke didn't "fix" his father by loving him, Vader (and the staging in ROTJ feels SO OBVIOUS ABOUT THIS, you can actually FEEL him making the decision in that moment) makes up his mind that his love for his son is more important to him than Palpatine and the Empire. His son's calling out to him and in that moment he makes the choice of where his loyalties lie. (FWIW, it's also expressly what I love in the redemption arc in A Christmas Carol, because it's about Scrooge having to do the work, albeit with assistance from someone who is expressly described as helping him as part of his own penance and making amends, to figure his own stuff out and then make amends and because it's a happy feelgood story the people in his life do let him, but he did the work and keeps doing it.)

Similarly, Rey shutting the door on Ben at the end of TLJ says something like that to me--- she is expressly DONE making an effort, and he will have to do the work and make the decision about his priorities himself, much as his grandfather did, and if he gets his act together then MAYBE she'll take his Force Skype calls again. (Though to quote from The American President, "I'm not sure, but groveling will be involved." LOL) (Come to think of it, American President is another one of the stories that expressly subverts the "love of a good woman" trope, but saying more would be spoilery for that movie.)

Oh this. Ben's whole character is built around fucking up attempts at reconciliation from people he cares about. If he's going to be something other than the scorpion in "The Scorpion and the Frog," he's going to have to do some work. And I'm not sure one more Disney film is going to have that much space.

AYRT

I'm thinking it's either a full Vader "death pays all debts" deal or something involving the fact that it's pretty clear Hux wants to get the same kind of promotion Ben engineered for himself and Ben switching sides somewhere in there. (In a franchise that did political nuance at all well, it would involve one or more people in and around the Resistance realizing that Ben is actually potentially the least worse option available, especially a Ben who is listening to Rey--- the others being Supreme Leader Hux or the full collapse of any sort of unified galactic government with the end result of a lot more people like Unkar Plutt, and for the matter Jabba the Hutt, running around, and trying to make that work, but this is Star Wars and I think I have learned my lesson about canonical political intrigue in Star Wars that is not written by Claudia Gray. ;) ) (Then again, I actually have an unfinished futurefic for my idea of Ep.IX that actually reads somewhat like some of the end of TLJ except with Ben expressly choosing to switch sides because Rey's made it harshly clear that she wants nothing to do with him while he's on the Dark side, so I'm not sure how good my Star Wars crystal ball is.)

My bet on Ep. IX is Hux gets an even bigger phallic gun, stabs Kylo in the back, and Kylo's "redemption" is bringing it crashing down on Hux's head.

AYRT

Yeah, I can see it, especially about Hux's penis-substitute feelings toward weaponry.

This is a great post!

AYRT

Thanks so much! (Seriously between the general state of the world and then seeing all the Reylo hate I was a little bummed, and this comment has made my week!)

"All the Reylo hate"? Look, you're in a thread about NOTPs, so maybe don't go looking in a subthread where someone states a ship you like as their NOTP for positivity for that particular ship.
I never said people shouldn't ship it - if anything, all the actual antis make me passively support Reylo shippers - it's just my NOTP that I wish would not become canon and that won't change anytime soon.

Let me rephrase: I meant to express that I was sorry at the number of people who mention my OTP on a NOTP thread, not that I expected to see nice things said about it on, as you say, a NOTP thread. Sorry if I didn't make that clear and I appreciate the passive support.

That's okay, I get it. The ship does get a lot of hate and considering the behaviour of antis, it's understandable that it gets frustrating.

AYRT—I don’t personally see the woman saying “I’m done with your shit, asshole,” or equivalent followed by his groveling as a subversion of the *her love redeems him* trope, and despite my love of Beauty and the Beast, including darker “problematic” variants, Reylo is one of my two NotPs in my 25 years in fandom.

I’m a big Megamind fan, but even my astronomically high cheese tolerance was strained by Strange Magic. I hope you find more fandoms that fit your synopsis there—if you do, please share because I’m a sucker for that story too; Reylo just doesn’t fit it for me.

AYRT

I think I misled you as to what I'm talking about with the throwaway American President reference (especially since what actually happens is the opposite of "girl dumps guy, guy begs, girl takes him back" And does involve larger self-reflection and behavioral change on the guy's part, not just related to the woman but to other aspects of his life and specifically the extent to which he's failed to live up to his own standards for himself and their breakup is only a piece of it. Again, I'm trying to avoid spoilers but probably shouldn't have thrown a niche reference into the mix without being able to explain). (And possibly being more cautious about spoilers than I need to be, because I'm actually someone who usually wants a lot more in the way that kind of background information on new media so I'm always afraid I'll overshare.)

The thing I find if not necessarily subversive but certainly distinct from the "her love redeems him" trope in Star Wars specifically is that it's always the person in need of redemption who's responsible for their choices--- it's "his love is the impetus for him to redeem himself" and in fact Anakin's own arc explicitly pushes back on the whole "male redemption through female love" idea--- Padme loving him wasn't enough to save him if he wasn't willing to do the work, but him loving Luke is; in fact, ROTJ seems to go at least a little out of the way to make it clear that Luke loving his father wasn't enough by itself, with all the back and forth between Luke and Anakin before Anakin turns.

So I'm waaaaay more sanguine about it in Star Wars than I would be in other properties, especially the "sci-fi/Disney/popcorn" variety) (and if Rian Johnson were still directing/writing I'd be downright confident given how pleased I was with all the handling of relationships and moral/ethical learning curves in TLJ).

Ironically, Ben's parents also have a little of "it's the guy's love for the woman that makes him make better choices and actually the woman is over here doing her own thing"--- in the first two movies especially, Han shows signs of having mainly stuck with the rebellion over his feelings for Leia (and Luke), whereas Han and Leia's arguments in ESB are expressly about the fact that she is focused on the larger picture of the Rebellion. ("We need you? What about I need you?") So there is, to my mind, a lot of room in this story for "dude rethinks his dubious life choices out of loyalty to one or more loved ones". (Actually, if Ben ever finds out how his maternal grandmother died, and more to the point the version of it that Palpatine was pushing and that Anakin may have believed until his own death, "It seems in your anger you killed her", that might be enough right there--- "oh, shit, I am on track to repeat exactly my grandfather's failures," in a manner that's an almost exact parallel of the moment in ROTJ when Luke cuts off Vader's prosthetic hand and looks down at his own, in the way that the sequels seem to like doing callbacks to the OT.)

Thanks for the tips relative to the other recommendations, and if I find any more canons that fit the type, man, I will be shouting happily about them from the rooftops! :)

AYRT—hmm. Your reference to American President didn’t mislead me, so much as I don’t necessarily see the next film involving a lot of self-reflection or attempts at self-improvement on Kylo’s part. The narrative could go there in the last film, but unless he dies like Vader in the midst of saving Leia—and possibly Rey but mostly Leia—I don’t see the point in redeeming him to pair him up with Rey. There’d need to be a whole ‘nother trilogy of build up for me to not cringe at Reylo.

Kylo just doesn’t seem to have much depth to him. He has, so far as we see onscreen, no sense of humor or hobbies. His only moment of human feeling that doesn’t involve being pissed at Rey is brief reluctance to kill his mother. If he had a similar backstory to Anakin Skywalker I could possibly see redemption via love if Rey were the equivalent of Padme being found alive somewhere.

Kylo Ren had a pair of loving, if possibly awkward and estranged, parents. He was not a child when he killed his fellow jedi-in-training (did they ever call them padawans in the new films?) I’ve heard the novelization expands on his mind-bond with Snoke starting when he was a child, but that’s not made clear in the films. He doesn’t fix droids in his spare time, or practice interstellar languages, or play electric guitar. He broods about exceeding his grandfather’s genocidal legacy.

If Vader had stopped exhorting Luke to rule the galaxy with him and instead offered to go to a space arcade and play Intergalactic Invaders for a day, I would’ve been okay with an ending where Vader didn’t die. But that offer of co-dominion to Luke is the best Vader can do. Kylo should’ve been able to do better if the narrative is gonna end differently this time.

I hope that any possible redemption for Kylo Ren has nothing to do with Rey except possibly as reflects her part in the Resistance, and would prefer (sorry!) that he die rather than get together with her. It’s not that I ship opposing ships—I don’t—but none of the other possibilities except crack like Reyux creep me out so much.

I actually ship a few “her/his love redeems him/her” couples, although I prefer to write and read fanfic where the villain does just as much work as the hero(ine), as in your wishes for Reylo. The difference is those villains are shown onscreen (or page) to have more going on and more to offer the hero(ine) than the realization that mass-murder’s not enough to build a relationship. They have goals in common or differ on method, or family/friends in common and reconcile for their sake, or hobbies/interests in common.

I dunno, I find Kylo Ren really attractive but can’t get over what he’s done when it took him 2 movies into a trilogy to realize destroying entire planets is a stupid way to get girls.

Yep, that's the one. Because should Reylo become canon, there's no way it wouldn't fit that trope to a T.

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