Star Wars: The Force Awakens – Who is Rey?
History was made on December 17th, 2015 when the first live-action Star Wars movie in eleven years, The Force Awakens, was released into theaters. This was something that many Star Wars fans never thought would happen. Not only did it break box office records worldwide and surpass James Cameron’s Avatar, it introduced us to new, intriguing characters, such as Rey (Daisy Ridley), Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac).
The character that I, as well as many other Star Wars fans, are most interested in is the scavenger from Jakku, Rey.
Disclaimer: there will be spoilers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens beyond this point. This post will be about who I think Rey is, based on what I’ve seen in the movie.
Where do I even begin with Rey? We don’t know much about her- we know that she’s been living on the desert planet of Jakku since she was about five years old, and that she’s a scavenger. We know that she’s lonely due to the way she’s been forced to grow up, but also that she has some kind of piloting skills, as is shown when she flies the Falcon off of Jakku and ends up finding Han Solo and Chewbacca. Through the Force vision she has when she touches Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber, we know that she has a fair amount of Force sensitivity. This is proven even more when, during a battle with Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), Rey is able to use the Force to call Luke’s lightsaber to her, which is very reminiscent of the scene in Empire Strikes Back when Luke uses the Force to do the same thing.
Rey is feisty. She’s independent, she knows how to take care of herself, and she doesn’t need to be rescued by anyone, as she tells Han Solo.
Rey: The Jedi were real?
Han Solo: I used to wonder that myself. Thought it was a bunch of mumbo-jumbo-magical power holding together good, evil, the dark side and the light. Crazy thing is, it’s true. The Force, the Jedi, all of it. It’s all true.
Even after Han tells Rey that the Jedi once existed, she still finds it hard to believe. This is perhaps because she is still very much clueless about what her own Force abilities, which she discovers after she’s captured by Kylo Ren, are and what they mean for her future. When she discovers Luke’s lightsaber, which was lost at Cloud City and somehow found again, and has her Force vision, it frightens her and makes her resistant to what she’s probably known deep down for a long time.
Between the music and the parallels that were practically being smacked over the heads of the audience, this scene pretty much sealed the deal for me and who I believe Rey is. The parallels between this scene and the scene in Empire Strikes Back when Luke uses the Force to call his lightsaber to him are so strong, there’s almost no doubt in my mind.
The other scene that helps to confirm who I believe Rey is is the very end of the movie:
Who do I think Rey is?
I think she’s Luke’s daughter.
There are a number of other examples in The Force Awakens that makes me believe that this is the case that I won’t get into for the moment. The look that Luke gives Rey is one that is not only extremely sad but it’s also almost prideful. He doesn’t say a single word to her, but the words his eyes are conveying are perhaps those of a father looking upon a daughter that he might have believed to be dead, or that he hasn’t seen since she was five years old.
There are many other theories that fans have. Some people think that she’s the reincarnated version of Anakin Skywalker (to which, I say, those people need to not only re-watch The Force Awakens, but also re-watch the original trilogy); some think that she’s the granddaughter of Obi-Wan Kenobi (considering he’s basically the equivalent of a celibate monk, this is very unlikely). Some even still hold out hope that she’s Han and Leia’s daughter, despite the fact that both Han and Leia spent the entire movie only ever talking about their son and never even mentioned having a daughter. Surely they would have acknowledged and said as much if Rey had been their daughter.
Some might ask “how could she be Luke’s daughter? Jedi aren’t allowed to have children.” This isn’t entirely true. The old Jedi Order was completely wiped out, save for Yoda and Obi-Wan; their traditions basically died with them, save for what little they were able to pass on to Luke through his training. How else would Luke be able to train more generations of Jedi if he forbade every Force sensitive seeking training from being able to form attachments and have children? They surely wouldn’t follow in his grandmother’s footsteps and lead to a bunch of Chosen One, fatherless, babies, so he had to have abolished the rule of not forming attachments when he started his Academy. Many Star Wars fans also know that this is actually what did happen in the expanded universe novels that Disney chose to no longer make canon.
There are over six-hundred days left before we find out the truth and see which fan theory is correct.
May the Force be with you until then.
Written by Allison Kelly of PixelByPixelDesigns
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