OOTS #1176 - The Discussion Thread

[Goblin_Priest]

From Wikipedia:

A Mary Sue is an idealized and seemingly perfect fictional character. Typically, this character is recognized as an author insert or wish fulfillment.[1] They can usually perform better at tasks than should be possible given the amount of training or experience, and usually are able through some means to upstage the protagonist of an established fictional setting, such as by saving the hero.

This is the definition I believe most critics adhere by. Redefining the term, in order to give it a sexist definition, is nothing short of a strawman fallacy. There are certainly a lot of sexist critics of the sequel movies, but one needs not be sexist to consider the character of Rey a Mary Sue.

Rey is like previous protagonists, except better in every way, with no established reason for it. Perhaps the next movie will try to present something to explain it, though imo that'd still be two movies too late. Each installment should fit within the saga but also be good on its own. The Last Jedi, for example, is garbage because it fails miserably at both.

Rey is a largely uninteresting character. She's basically marketed simply as being a "woman" and being "strong", i.e. the "strong woman". Her depiction rather fails at displaying this, though. Honestly, I find her as boring and unappealing as Superman, another ridiculous character that can achieve just about anything, and then can't, as the plot demands. I wouldn't consider Superman quite a Mary Sue, because that character stems from a different universe which does provide reasons for his difference, though I could rail for a long time about how crappy those reasons are and how they fail to make him an interesting character. Gender has little to do with making all-powerful characters interesting or not for most people, I'd even think that there are more people who love the character simply because she is female than there are people who hate the character simply because she is female.

Strength is more than just whatever powers one gives to a character. When we look at "strength of character", we don't look at the powers said character has. Rey can pull off all kinds of tricks that clash with established lore, but other than that, she's really just going with the flow of events, without clear motivations or stakes. Sure she left a ****ty homeworld. So what, to what ends? She just tagged along with those that helped her escape, but doesn't express any personal stake in what's going on. She does things because the plot demands it. Luke had a ton of motivations clearly displayed. His naive curiosity, his boy-scout goodness, his loss of his uncle and his farm, living up to his father's legacy, and so on. We see him expose his motivations in believable ways, despite him being sucked into a plot that's largely bigger than him (at least at first). Despite the blatant plot hooks, it still looks like he's got agency, and makes choices that fit with who he is, unlike the sequels which feel like a terrible railroad.

I've not watched the films, so I cannot say if this Rey person is a Mary Sue by the old definition. But I can say that to many people on the Interwebs and the twitters, "Mary Sue" is defined as "female character taking on a role previously reserved to male heroes". I understand that by this new definition, she is indeed a Mary Sue.

Of course, the thing is that some then conflate the definitions. The Old Mary Sue definition is a black mark against a character - a short hand for a form of character (self-)insert in fannon all too common of starting writers that usually indicated poor quality of writing. The new definition is nothing of the sort.

(I'm a descriptivist, so I'm not about to judge which of the two terms is "better". Like Thor said, all words are made up. But I am damn well going to point out the sleigh of hand attempt at conflating two terms that have nothing in common).

Grey Wolf

This is a ridiculous strawman fallacy as mentioned above.

The definition of Mary Sue I’m most familiar with is the one from Wikipedia: “A Mary Sue is an idealized and seemingly perfect fictional character. Typically, this character is recognized as an author insert or wish fulfillment.”

Rey wasn’t written as fantasy wish fulfillment for the author. Rey might have been written as fantasy wish fulfillment for the reader, like Harry Potter. She’s not a great character. But she’s not (obviously) a Mary Sue.

You cut that quote short. If you want to focus on the "author part", it could (and has) been argued that it'd apply to Kathleen Kennedy. She's Kathleen's the idealized "strong woman" character, one without any distinctive flaws. The main critic everyone has with her is not that she's a woman, or that she's taking "male roles" (seriously, wtf?), but rather the very sentence that follows your cutoff: "They can usually perform better at tasks than should be possible given the amount of training or experience, and usually are able through some means to upstage the protagonist of an established fictional setting, such as by saving the hero."

She can do everything Luke could, except better, and without training. She's not stealing any "male roles" because the franchise has no male equivalent for being able to do everything without any training whatsoever. Even Anakin, whose force sensitivity was off the charts, was trained since childhood. Sure, Lucasfilm could, in the third sequel, say "yea, but her midi-chlorian counts are TEN TIMES as high as Anakin's!" to explain that, but that's the equivalent of just making a bigger death star, and a bigger capital ship. Neither of which were female, both of which were equally lame and uninteresting. The reflex to always want to "one-up" whatever was done in a prequel is simply bad writing. Starkiller base doesn't up the ante compared to the first Death Star. Making Rey able to use all kinds of jedi tricks with zero training doesn't add anything to the movies either. If the sequels had been published in a vacuum, then it would have been a lesser deal, albeit still uninteresting (see: superman comments above). But it wasn't done in a vacuum. In fact, TFA was largely a pale imitation of ANH. So comparing Rey with Luke is only natural, and I don't think SW would have had its success if Luke had simply been a male Rey.

[Peelee]

Rey is like previous protagonists, except better in every way, with no established reason for it.

She's not better in every way, and they established various ways that she is capable of her feats.

She's Kathleen's the idealized "strong woman" character

Source?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I'm more surprised Loki has followers. What part of serving the God of Screwing People Over sounds reasonnable?

Evidence suggests that he is particularly attractive to people who consider murder a reasonable response to polite offers of foot massages, and whose life philosophy is "I win as long as the other guy suffers more than I do".

Grey Wolf

[Schroeswald]

People who want the power she's willing to give away. She used to have a lot of that thanks to her portfolio.

Side-note: I'm more surprised Loki has followers. What part of serving the God of Screwing People Over sounds reasonnable?

Well based on our two personalitied clerics of Loki, Hilgya has very known reasons, and Cleric of Loki lived in Greysky city, who else would you follow, as for others, well if you like stealing and pranks, who else would support you?

[Fyraltari]

Let me tell you about Lolth....

Am listening.

Evidence suggests that he is particularly attractive to people who consider murder a reasonable response to polite offers of foot massages, and whose life philosophy is "I win as long as the other guy suffers more than I do".

Grey Wolf

Sounds like a great fit for "I will torn this world to shreds before I allow anyone to gain a strategic advantage over us", "I'd rather continue this cycle for alleternity rather than give an inch to that damn goblin" Tyr to me.

Well based on our two personalitied clerics of Loki, Hilgya has very known reasons, and Cleric of Loki lived in Greysky city, who else would you follow, as for others, well if you like stealing and pranks, who else would support you?

Freyr? Iounn? Bragi? Fenrir? I'm sure Fenrir's people (would) love Greysky City.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Am listening.

Sounds like a great fit for "I will torn this world to shreds before I allow anyone to gain a strategic advantage over us", "I'd rather continue this cycle for alleternity rather than give an inch to that damn goblin" Tyr to me.

Freyr? Iounn? Bragi? Fenrir? I'm sure Fenrir's people (would) love Greysky City.

And yet evidence shows they were snagged by Loki. So there's your answer.

Grey Wolf

[Peelee]

Am listening.

Short version, kinda like Loki but actively screws over her worshippers. Also, has an entire race that worships her.

[The MunchKING]

Side-note: I'm more surprised Loki has followers. What part of serving the God of Screwing People Over sounds reasonnable?

Ideally, I think you are learning/wanting to be the Screwee rather than the Screwed.

[Jasdoif]

Side-note: I'm more surprised Loki has followers. What part of serving the God of Screwing People Over sounds reasonnable?

Ideally, I think you are learning/wanting to be the Screwee rather than the Screwed.

And/Or, you believe you're getting to get screwed over no matter what you do, so you may as well try to get an endorsement by facing the inevitability on your own terms.

[factotum]

She's not better in every way, and they established various ways that she is capable of her feats.

Source?

Care to actually spell out these "various ways"? Because I sure as heck don't remember them. I mean, even if you go with "Well, we saw Rey fighting with her staff in Episode VII, so that proves she was already a good fighter!", that doesn't (a) explain how she picks up the very different fighting style of a lightsaber--lot easier to handle a weapon that you can't chop bits of yourself off with, after all--and (b) even if she was the most spectacular fighter in the universe, how she was able to actually beat a trained Jedi/Sith in a lightsaber duel. I mean, even Luke, who'd had a lot of training by that point, wasn't able to beat Darth Vader in a straight-up fight in Ep6 until he started channeling the Dark Side.

[Fyraltari]

And yet evidence shows they were snagged by Loki. So there's your answer.

Grey Wolf

I never said they didn't I'm just confused as to why they would.

Short version, kinda like Loki but actively screws over her worshippers. Also, has an entire race that worships her.

Are they dumb or enjoying being used?

Ideally, I think you are learning/wanting to be the Screwee rather than the Screwed.

Wait. Is Loki's entire church a meta-pyramid scheme?! Oh my god, that's brilliant!

[Schroeswald]

Am listening.

Sounds like a great fit for "I will torn this world to shreds before I allow anyone to gain a strategic advantage over us", "I'd rather continue this cycle for alleternity rather than give an inch to that damn goblin" Tyr to me.

Freyr? Iounn? Bragi? Fenrir? I'm sure Fenrir's people (would) love Greysky City.

First off, Tyr is Lawful Good (at least in D&D according to Google), so the last choice for Chaotic Evil. I’m going to look at Fenrir for Greysky, Greysky is a place for thieves, Fenrir seems more murder-friendly, I imagine he has more clerics than many others there but he’d speak more to tribes like the ogre one on the island, and people whose philosophy is “murder everyone! Piss on their graves!” than people who’d work for Bozzok or around Ian.

[hroþila]

Care to actually spell out these "various ways"? Because I sure as heck don't remember them. I mean, even if you go with "Well, we saw Rey fighting with her staff in Episode VII, so that proves she was already a good fighter!", that doesn't (a) explain how she picks up the very different fighting style of a lightsaber--lot easier to handle a weapon that you can't chop bits of yourself off with, after all--and (b) even if she was the most spectacular fighter in the universe, how she was able to actually beat a trained Jedi/Sith in a lightsaber duel. I mean, even Luke, who'd had a lot of training by that point, wasn't able to beat Darth Vader in a straight-up fight in Ep6 until he started channeling the Dark Side.

She is already proficient with a melee weapon. Sure, lightsabers are different, but many of the relevant skills overlap: speed, coordination, footwork, distance, etc.
She learns quickly because of the force. Finn didn't have that advantage and he still did fine.
She beat a seriously wounded Sith.

When you compare that to e.g. Anakin in Ep I, it's pretty mild.

[Fyraltari]

First off, Tyr is Lawful Good (at least in D&D according to Google), so the last choice for Chaotic Evil.

I dunno, both of his lines boil down to "I'm okay with suffering as long as the other guy sufers more than I do" with no consideration for third parties which sound textbook Evil to me. It's very-much in line with Hilgya's day-to-day appraoch to interpersonnal relationships at least.

I’m going to look at Fenrir for Greysky, Greysky is a place for thieves, Fenrir seems more murder-friendly.

You don't think Greysky City is murder-friendly?

Not to mention that Bozzok employed frigging Crystal, so yeah wanton murderers fit nicely inside Greysky City and his Thieves' Guild.

[Peelee]

Care to actually spell out these "various ways"? Because I sure as heck don't remember them. I mean, even if you go with "Well, we saw Rey fighting with her staff in Episode VII, so that proves she was already a good fighter!", that doesn't (a) explain how she picks up the very different fighting style of a lightsaber--lot easier to handle a weapon that you can't chop bits of yourself off with, after all--and (b) even if she was the most spectacular fighter in the universe, how she was able to actually beat a trained Jedi/Sith in a lightsaber duel. I mean, even Luke, who'd had a lot of training by that point, wasn't able to beat Darth Vader in a straight-up fight in Ep6 until he started channeling the Dark Side.

Sure!

Are they dumb or enjoying being used?

Oh, what they do to worshippers is nothing compared to what she does to people who try to bring other religions in or betray her!

[Morty]

As someone who does the same (and indeed, apply it to "Deus Ex Machina" too), I can't blame you.

Grey Wolf

This is honestly just common sense when it comes to internet criticism, IMO.

Oh, yes. "Deus Ex Machina" doesn't have the same gender connotations, but it's no less overused. And both tend to lead to long and increasingly meaningless discussions about what the term even means. And for Mary Sue, apparently also Star Wars discussions. Go figure.

[Fish]

Because I sure as heck don't remember them. I mean, even if you go with "Well, we saw Rey fighting with her staff in Episode VII, so that proves she was already a good fighter!", that doesn't (a) explain how she picks up the very different fighting style of a lightsaber--

Luke Skywalker is able to deflect multiple laser blasts blindfolded on his first day of training, but yes, yes, this is unreasonable — an experienced fighter with her eyes open and he Force on her side should be worse than a guy who can’t fight off a single Tusken raider, and whose only training is “put on this hat, and try anyway, it’s no big deal if you screw up with your lightsaber considering we’re in space and all.”

It’s things like this that make the anti-marysue camp say, “It must be sexism that causes them to attack a female character for being good at things, even when male characters are demonstrably better.”

[Fyraltari]

Oh, what they do to worshippers is nothing compared to what she does to people who try to bring other religions in or betray her!

That doesn't sound like a viable system.

[mjasghar]

Er, I should clarify. I meant there's nothing stopping a mortal from converting (eg, a human born in Azure City could, if they were so inclined, become a worshiper of Odin or Ereshkigal).

This has been debated before
Specifically with regards to dwarves getting out of the system by worshipping another pantheon and moving there
The fact that Durkon got a Hel spirit instead of a nergal one suggests otherwise

[weasel_airlift]

Perhaps Hel is the goddess you would pray to for assistance in smiting a powerful enemy. . Since she's also the goddess of disease, she's also the one you would ask to smite the annoying halfling bard with venereal disease. And to worship her, you simply have to assassinate a certain number of dwarves to curry her favor, and thus convince her to help you

Assassinating the dwarves is important, since they have to not see it coming, and thus die dishonorably.

THAT is the sort of message her cleric needs to be spreading. Thus, she gets worship. Belief, she already has in spades I imagine. Dedication is still a rough one. That would however, assist with the influx of Soul Food.

[Peelee]

That doesn't sound like a viable system.

I think you've managed to grasp the core concept of the Drow, yes.

Think of them like Hutts, but with some Sithy bits in there.

[mjasghar]

Wait, D&D has time travel spells? How do you even manage that as a GM?

Have we had any indication that Marduk is evil? And why "not coincidentally"?

Red eyes and Marduk in some d and d is portrayed as evil
There’s little doubt that outside of the elven area the western continent tends to evil (granted Tarquin et al have had some influence there)

[mjasghar]

So The Giant's quote about Hel's lack of worshipers:

I take this to mean that it is completely impossible for any living being to do so, not simply some issues with not having clerics to tell her side of the story and grant boons to worshipers. If it were possible, there would certainly be some weirdos who would worshiper her, even if she couldn't do anything for them in this world (and probably wouldn't do anything for them in the afterlife). I think something more powerful than "she can't have clerics among the living" must be baked into the world, if The Giant's comment is right (and he would know).

That said she's clearly suffering from the lack of worship (which she complains about specifically). Beyond that she's presumably getting plenty of belief since she's an important part of other god's stories, and should be getting dedication and souls, though Thor telling the dwarves about the bet is likely causing her to get less than she expected. I'm not sure all that is enough to destroy her between worlds though, Odin clearly didn't get much worship in the previous world, but he made it mostly intact.

Worship likely needs rituals ie she needs clerics
Otherwise it’s just whatever she gets from curses and general belief in the pantheon

[Jasdoif]

That doesn't sound like a viable system.

It's a classic self-sustaining insular system: Kill outsiders quickly, mitigating outside influences; kill deserters gruesomely, harshly encouraging silence of dissent; maintain long enough for a generation that's been surrounded by outward agreement to the system their entire lives to come into power...and then almost anything can be rationalized as "better than the alternative". And then continue now that deserters dissenters are easier to identify.

[Dion]

one needs not be sexist to consider the character of Rey a Mary Sue.

Sure. But many people calling Rey a Mary Sue are sexist.

That’s one of the dangers of public dialog. Less common jargon like “Mary Sue” has a real risk of becoming an in-group slang term used by people you don’t want to be associated with.

If you want to describe why Rey is a bad character, describe why Rey is a bad character.

Don’t use a jargon phrase that has lost its traditional meaning and has grown to be identified with the less desirable parts of the network, unless you also want to be identified with the less desirable parts of the j termed.

[Fyraltari]

I think you've managed to grasp the core concept of the Drow, yes.

Drows are D&D dark elves, right? Because yeah, that sounds about right.

Think of them like Hutts, but with some Sithy bits in there.

*Burp*

Red eyes and Marduk in some d and d is portrayed as evil
There’s little doubt that outside of the elven area the western continent tends to evil (granted Tarquin et al have had some influence there)

[citation needed]

It's a classic self-sustaining insular system: Kill outsiders quickly, mitigating outside influences; kill deserters gruesomely, harshly encouraging silence of dissent; maintain long enough for a generation that's been surrounded by outward agreement to the system their entire lives to come into power...and then almost anything can be rationalized as "better than the alternative". And then continue now that deserters dissenters are easier to identify.

Thing is, these kind of systems at least pretend that being a good insider will net you rewards of some kind. If the goddess is open in her screwing her own people over, then ruling by fear isn't sustainable. It can't all be stick, you need some carrot in there.

[Peelee]

Thing is, these kind of systems at least pretend that being a good insider will net you rewards of some kind. If the goddess is open in her screwing her own people over, then ruling by fear isn't sustainable. It can't all be stick, you need some carrot in there.

That depends on the size of the stick.

Anyway, the carrot is her doing even worse things to your enemies.

[Goblin_Priest]

She's not better in every way, and they established various ways that she is capable of her feats.


Source?

Please share with us what she does less well than Luke did, since he's pretty much the benchmark for "strong force-sensitive main character that starts with no knowledge of the force and ends up mastering it".

Being a junk trader doesn't explain being a martial artist proficient with all forms of weapons. I don't think my county's garbage collectors would do all to good with a sword, laser or otherwise. Being a street rat either. Fleeing tends to be the main strategy for those who live in lawless places, dirty tricks would come next. Ability to use basic weapons that lie around would come well after, but proficiency with one weapon is not fully transferable to others. Setting aside the idiocy of the choreographies in TLJ, with folks jumping around pointlessly and swinging at nothingness, not to mention blades being removed post-production, these remain complex and suggestive of great levels of training. I'm sure there are videos online of folks at LARPing with rubber swords. It's not super elegant. It's been argued that it's actually probably an optimal way to fight with a lightsaber, but it remains that the basic instinct would just be to try to tag the other guy (which is really totally legit when your sword is made of a laser). More trained people would tend to fight more like what we see in the original trilogy, while the fancy acrobatics would be reserved for people who specifically trained to do fancy acrobatics. Not really something a junk trader on a desert planet would have any reason to spend any time on.

Previous characters have tried, and tried, and failed. Luke lost to Darth Vader when he first fought him. And before that there are a number of scenes with him trying, and failing, be it deflecting shots from that training orb or lifting objects on Daggobah. Anakin lost to Dookoo (and a bunch of others I think?) when they dueled. Both lost their hand in their defeats. Rey doesn't lose. She actually wins against Kylo in TFA, which a convenient geography change to drift them apart (also lame and cheap). She even leaves HIM with a scar across his face (at least she didn't chop his hand off... wouldn't have even been surprising by that point).

As for Rey's depiction, I mean, just look anywhere. Kennedy promised she'd deliver "really strong women". Look for keyword "strong" in anything sequel related, and you'll get a bunch of pings about Rey, from Kennedy and her subordinates. It's by far the most used keyword to describe Rey/Daisy by anyone on the payroll.

To be honest, Rey is far from the greatest sin of the sequels. She's uninteresting, but she's not "delete a weapon on the bad guy in post-prod, between cuts, because otherwise he'd just kill Rey and we are far too lazy to reshoot or do a less stupid choreography (unless they didn't notice until much later, which honestly isn't any better)". Nor as bad as "let's have a chase scene, where anyone can hyperspace out and back, except no one will do it save for a few good guys for the sake of a totally irrelevant side-quest" or "let's make every single bombing run senseless by destroying an entire fleet with a single ship". If only someone had thought of that back for the first Death Star... Nah, unlike many other aspects of the sequels, Rey isn't outright franchise sabotage, but that doesn't make her "good" or "interesting" either.

[Fyraltari]

That depends on the size of the stick.

No it really doesn't.

Anyway, the carrot is her doing even worse things to your enemies.

That doesn't sound like a viable mindset. What's the average drowish life expectancy? 14?

[Schroeswald]

No it really doesn't.


That doesn't sound like a viable mindset. What's the average drowish life expectancy? 14?

Well the average lifespan for a dwarf is like 200 years, so Hel would be very effective at least.