You’ve Already Seen Rey’s Father…

…and it’s not who you think it is.

Some spoilers follow. For the three people who have yet to see this movie, anyway.

The Force Awakens revealed the answers to some questions about the shape of the Star Wars universe since Return of the Jedi, but it also left some pretty major ones unanswered. Namely, who exactly is Rey? It’s hinted at pretty heavily that her parentage is important, but we still don’t even have a last name.

This is all by design, by the way. It generates interest in the characters. It gets people talking. It generates lengthy blog posts like this one. The marketing machine we saw leading up to December 18 (and beyond) is how you generate new interest in a franchise. Creating mystery and intrigue is how you keep the interest alive going forward.

So some common theories have sprung forward. Many are theorizing that Rey is a direct descendant of one (or more) main characters. I’m not buying into that anymore. And here’s why…

Luke Is Too Obvious (Among Other Things)

I’ll preface this by saying I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this one ends up being true. Rey’s situation and innate Force sensitivity clearly echoes previous Skywalkers. So it makes sense, but maybe it makes too much sense. It’s too neat, too easy to pick out, too cute, even. I can’t shake the feeling that there has to be something more to Rey’s backstory than that she is Luke’s daughter.

The other issue is that for Luke to be the father, you almost need to have an equal character for the mother. And who would that be? It’s possible that this character hasn’t been revealed yet, but there would have to be a lot of build-up for a new character to carry this type of weight. And it would have to happen quickly. I don’t think creating a new character to be Luke’s love interest and subsequently Rey’s mother is the way to go, and there are no other main characters for Luke to hook up with.

And then there are story driven issues. Rey clearly thinks Luke is a myth, so she would have needed to live with another family from birth that then drops her off on Jakku (why?) or she would have had to have been mind-wiped somehow (again…why?). It’s impossible that Luke was the one to leave her on Jakku, because she was clearly old enough to have memory of him at that point. Unless Luke doesn’t know about her, there’s no reason for him to hide her away somewhere. At that point, Ben Solo hasn’t turned to the dark side because he would have been roughly Rey’s age. And if she is indeed Luke’s daughter and he’s training a new generation of Jedi, why would he want to hide her somewhere? Wouldn’t he want her with him to train, and if she’s that powerful a Jedi wouldn’t she be the most obvious one to train? There’s too many holes here, and I don’t think any of them have an answer that’s good enough to keep me satisfied.

Finally, Maz Kanata’s counsel to Rey doesn’t fit very well if Luke is her father. Han tells Maz who the girl is off camera, so she knows Rey’s story by the time they talk in the palace basement after Rey’s Force vision. She tells Rey that the people she waits for on Jakku are never coming back, and that her belonging lies ahead of her. If Maz knows Luke is her father, this dialogue doesn’t make much sense. Or at least it’s a very poor way for Maz to break the news, and she’s pretty much a jerk. It basically makes her think her parents are dead, without giving her the hope that at least her real father is still alive. I think the correct way to read this dialogue is that her parents are indeed dead, but she needs to find Luke and become a Jedi to find her true belonging.

Han and Leia Don’t Act Right

One of my initial theories was that Kylo Ren and Rey were twins and that Han and Leia were the parents. I suppose that theory isn’t totally dead, but I think there’s only one or two more nails to drive into that coffin. At least I got half of it right.

But somehow the theory that Rey is the daughter of one or both of these characters lives on. I’ve seen The Force Awakens four times now, and I absolutely do not get the feeling that Han and/or Leia are Rey’s parents. They simply don’t act right. They both seem to look on her with pity. Han’s even willing to drop her off on the first inhabited planet when they initially meet. In either case, not the way you’d expect your parents to react when they see you for the first time in like 10 years.

They know who she is. In fact, I think all of the original series characters know who she is. And I think there’s a reason Han and Leia seem to be remorseful when they see her. But more on that soon.

The Oddball Obi-Wan Theory

Unlike the Luke theory, I would be surprised if this one ended up being true. I have a hard time believing that Rey is a Kenobi, and an even harder time believing she’s a direct descendant of Obi-Wan. It was included in previous continuity that Obi-Wan had a brother, Owen Lars (AKA “Uncle” Owen). I suppose that this idea could be brought back to life again, and that Rey could be a niece of Kenobi.

The truth is that we have no idea what Obi-Wan has been up to in between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. It’s plausible that he found a romantic interest while on Tatooine. It was established in The Clone Wars that he was not above those emotions, and after the fall of the Jedi Order there would no longer be a reason to keep them in check. But you do get the feeling that when Luke, Artoo, and Threepio come rolling along he has continued to live by a certain code. Plus, I simply don’t see this trilogy as a continuation of the Kenobi legacy.

Some of this theory stands on the fact that the chest containing Anakin and Luke’s lightsaber is similar, or the same even, to Obi-Wan’s chest in A New Hope containing the very same lightsaber. But Maz is clearly a collector of certain artifacts, so it’s conceivable that she would have something like that. It also seems to stem from the fact that Obi-Wan speaks to Rey at the end of her vision, telling her that she has taken her first steps. But Yoda is also heard, and he obviously has nothing to do with her heritage. I think the fact that Yoda and Obi-Wan are both heard are just products of them being of the few who have learned how to preserve their being in the Force after death. Oh, and don’t worry. I feel Anakin’s time is coming for him to make an appearance as well.

So Where Does She Come From?

I think this scene has more to do with our story than anyone has mentioned yet. It’s during her Force vision/flashback scene experienced at Maz’s palace. I think it’s part of the vision because it’s important, and I think it’s important because her parents are lying dead in this very scene.

Also, pay close attention to the character stabbed through the chest by Kylo Ren in the scene before. He’s trying to fight back, and he reaches for a staff as he dies. In fact, it appears you see this staff again held by one of the Knights of Ren (the next to last on the right, above). I don’t necessarily think this is Rey’s staff, but maybe it’s a “like father, like daughter” sort of thing. I believe you saw Rey’s father killed by Kylo Ren in that scene, and that the reason Maz says the parents Rey is waiting for will never come back is because they were killed at the hands of Kylo Ren and his knights. It offers a whole new dynamic in the Rey versus Kylo Ren struggle introduced in the final act of The Force Awakens. At some point, Rey will learn that the man who killed the “father she never had” in Han Solo also killed her real parents. Imagine her battle to control her anger and aggression then. Imagine her struggle to choose between killing Kylo Ren, or bringing back a redeemed Ben Solo because of her new-found friendship with his family.

And speaking of the Solo family, they know her. Even Kylo Ren appears to be wary of a certain girl, judging from some of his dialogue about and with Rey. Han and Leia, as I mentioned before, seem to look on Rey with a certain amount of pity. There’s clearly a connection between them all. You could argue that they pity her because of what she’s been through during her time on-screen, but I believe they feel pity (perhaps guilt?) because their son killed her parents. Effectively, they feel partially to blame for her current situation.

And how did she end up alone on Jakku? She comes from two Force sensitive parents, both of which leave to train with Luke in order to possibly better their lot in life so that they can come back for Rey and relocate to a more suitable living situation. They tell her to wait, and that they will return for her. She’s left with Unkar Plutt, perhaps under a promise that he will feed and care for her since he seems to be able to provide for pretty much all the scavengers around the Goazon Badlands. You can argue he is caring for the girl. Take, for instance, the fact that he gives her a much higher price for similar parts one week as opposed to the next. Maybe this is him being unfair, but maybe it’s a way for him to give her more than he should.

As Luke is setting up a new Jedi Order, I believe he moves away from the idea of taking children away from their parents at a young age like the previous Order did. After all, it’s pretty much his call now, and training at a later age worked for him. I think maybe he has an age limit that Rey did not meet at the time, forcing her parents to make the choice to temporarily leave her behind. She stays on Jakku, waiting for parents that promised to come back for her, but it would never happen because of an unforeseen turn of events with a certain Ben Solo.

There you have it. Rey’s story. One that is separate from the Skywalkers, yet through certain events one that will be forever affected by them.

This trilogy is a pretty clear passing of the torch. While Star Wars is a story of family strife, it doesn’t always have to be the Skywalker family strife. Besides, we have that part of the story with Kylo Ren. This part of the story will be about Rey, and about her connection to the galaxy as a whole.