Rey is a Mary Sue.

The big difference between Maz and Obi-Wan is that Maz is a cantina owner and Obi is a Jedi Knight.

What difference does that make?

An experienced martial arts master tells me to exhale every time I throw a strike.

A bar owner says to me: I'm no martial artist, but I know how to fight. You should breath out every time you throw a punch or kick.

It's the same result when I give it a shot.

Obi Wan could have been a fake Jedi and crazy old man... its what he says to Luke that's important, not his own rank.

And Luke is able to audibly hear Obi talking to him.

Yes, and we hear everything he said to Luke. He reminded him to use The Force instead of the computer. Had Luke been more confident (or simply didn't have the targeting computer and had no other alternative), he wouldn't have needed Obi Wan in his ear. Just because Luke is fairly sceptical of The Force's abilities (even up to mid-Empire) doesn't mean every other character would or should be.

But what is not mysterious is Anakins and Lukes first movie, there is exposition to explain their skills and why they have them.

Really? I don't seem to remember any exposition explaining Anakin's amazing tech skills. He's a 9 year old who's able to build his own protocol droid to perfect professional manufacturers standard. Where is it explained how he has such skills?

I don't remember any exposition explaining why Luke, a farmboy, was able to hold his own and come out without so much as a scratch in a few fire fights with Stormtroopers, who's aim was referred to as 'precise' earlier in the same film.

Putting some other beloved films under that same lens, it's been a while since I've seen it, but was there any explanation in Raiders as to why Indiana Jones is so good with a whip? I didn't think so but correct me if I'm wrong.

There's no explanation as to how Bruce Wayne learned to fight before joining the league in Batman Begins.

There's no explanation on how he learned to fight at all in Batman 89.

There's no explanation as to why Kyle Reece from Terminator is handy with a shotgun when we see he comes from a time where soldiers have plasma rifles.

Rey is just another protagonist in an action film that has a few different skills. She says she can fly a ship. She's a loner, so which character needs to step in randomly and say to Finn 'Rey is quite a pilot y'know' in order to believe she's not lying? I've never seen a movie where a character is mentioned to be a pretty good driver right before a car chase scene, so should I question its credibility if the driver attempts some unconventional driving and manages to pull it off? In an action movie?

This is what Lucas does best. He provides exposition as to why Luke is able to accomplish his task.

Yet doesn't explain just how Luke is able to make such shots as a hobby, yet skilled and experienced fighter pilots deem it impossible.

There is absolutely nothing in TFA that explains all of Reys skills, besides the Force awakening.

Because in all honesty, most of them don't need to be, just like Luke's amazing runins with Stormtroopers, him coming out with a few kills but not a scratch on him. It's an action movie.


Her piloting skills need not be explained because in all honesty, the last two trilogies have explained it for us. Extremely Force sensitive people have 'Jedi reflexes'. She says she's a pilot herself and has flown ships but has never left the planet.

She's a scavenger on a planet that looks as though there's nothing to do and she was seemingly given or sold to Unkar Plutt, who upgraded the Falcon. She is more likely to know about these upgrades and how they work more so than Han Solo, who hasn't been in the ship for 30 years.

When people say its silly that she knew more about the Falcon than Han, a) They haven't taken that into consideration b) They obviously forget that even when the Falcon was in his possession he barely knew how to handle its maintenance then. He couldn't fix it on his own and even 3PO had a better understanding of it than he did.

Her shooting skills, same as Luke I suppose. Everytime a hero in the Star Wars universe goes up against the 'precise' aiming Stormtroopers, they suddenly turn into ameteurs and the heroes, sharp shooters. That's an action film cliché that's in everything, so why Rey is the only one put under analysis, I'm not so sure.

Her melee skills are shown. It's shown that she can take care of herself earlier in the film. This is shown instead of told. How she got skilled is unknown and irrelevant, same as Luke's piloting. We're told he's a good pilot, not told how he became one.

1. True, if this is peoples' first movie then they have no idea what the backstory is and just enjoy it. Unfortunately there are die hard fans who have picked this movie apart.

And diehard fans that have argued those points. I can only speak from my own experience and what I've seen on these boards, but the common (though not absolute) theme seems to be that those who like the prequels and what they brought to Star Wars don't like it and pick it apart and those who hated the prequels and ignore what they brought to Star Wars love it.

Of course there's plenty of fans that don't fall under this, but its been noted several times that it seems to be the general result.

. True, but what they don't know is that it is a ripoff of ANH and hence why it succeeded so well.

It shares many similarities with ANH intentionally trying to recapture the flavour of pre-prequel Star Wars, which many OT fans seem to agree is a good thing.

Jakku is a desert planet (seeing as every planet in the SW universe only has 1 climate, how many really different types of planets are we expecting to see? It stands to reason many would be the same or similar. Complaining about this is like complaining about films constantly taking place in the city.)

They use a droid to hold onto important information (though a completely different kind of information). Why not? Disk drives don't travel so... droids seem to be the best bet.

There's a powerful space station that wipes out entire systems. This is the start of a new generation of characters. The stakes aren't personal yet, so there needs to be a real threat. So, if your bad guys have a space station that can blow up planets in your first movie, they're not really going to create a less powerful weapon, now are they?

Someone actually said they blew up Starkiller base the same way they destroyed The Death Star in ANH. I seem to remember Rey, the Force sensitive protagonist, had nothing to do with the destruction of Starkiller Base. In fact she needed to be rescued in order to survive its destruction. The base was destroyed by a group effort from fighter pilots and men on the ground planting bombs to reveal the weak spots.

The mentor figure was killed, never mind the context was completely different.

That's about it I think.



At the same time, one of the most common complaints that those who hate this movie like to voice is that Rey isn't having the same limits and journey with The Force that Luke did.

The movie is certainly different enough imo.

3. You might not see a problem with it but for many others it is a big deal.

Obviously. Just seems strange that we never see this kind of complaint with other characters as mentioned earlier.

4. Anakin was naturally gifted as well. But being tech savvy doesn't explain all of Reys amazing skills.

Melee combat is shown early in the film.

Piloting isn't particularly amazing except for one unconventional manoeuvre in a desperate situation, again, not unlike car chases.

Force stuff is Force stuff, its mysterious and will likely be explained in further instalments, if not, well as mentioned, Luke nor Anakin are not the templates as they were even different from each other.

What other amazing skills?

5. There is nothing in the movie to explain this.

There's nothing in the film to explain Luke's piloting skills either. We're told they're good. We're never told how they got good. There's no need for it.

6. How did Rey have the skills of a Top Gun pilot? She was able to escape 2 trained Tie Fighters by flipping it upside down and turning the engines off mid dive. If that is not deemed difficult even by the most experienced pilots then Luke blowing up the Death Star could be seen as the same thing.

It's essentially a car chase. 2 trained Tie Fighter pilots (lets not forget an army of trained Stormtroopers stood no chance against farmboy Luke and co in previous movies) have to hit them. An erratic pilot is difficult to hit, doesn't make her a great pilot. She turned off the engine mid dive, causing the ship to go upside down, in which it is Finn who has to correctly time the shot. Turning the engine off to tip the ship isn't so much a skill as it is a brilliant idea. It doesn't particularly take honed reflexes. Not like a shot that skilled fighter pilots deem impossible.

So back to square one, this is why most people think Rey is a Mary Sue. Well that and a lot of other reasons.

Back to square one on a silly problem that doesn't need explaining. Its an action movie. Like other action movies, including Star Wars movies (not to mention, in real life), some people have skills that aren't explained in detail. Some of Rey's are shown and not told, but there's a ridiculous constant comparison to Luke's limits, as though he is the template... why still crying that the movie is too similar to ANH.

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