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'Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker': Rey And Kylo Ren's Connection Runs Deeper Than We Thought

Star Wars Connection Between Kylo Ren and Rey
By Ethan Anderton

It's unofficially Star Wars Day on the internet today since Vanity Fair released their now-traditional cover story about the upcoming Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. While we already covered a slew of information that came from new details revealed in the magazine's extensive story and gorgeous photos by Annie Leibovitz, there were some more significant discussions to be had about the connection between Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) and Rey (Daisy Ridley).

In Star Wars: The Last Jedi, director Rian Johnson introduced a strong link between the Force-sensitive characters, one that allowed them to communicate across space with each other in such an intimate way that they nearly touched through the Force. Some fans took that to a romantic place, but if Kylo Ren's harsh stance against Luke Skywalker and everything the Jedi stood for remains intact, then that doesn't seem likely. However, it sounds like the connection between Kylo Ren and Rey runs much deeper than previously thought.

Both of the preceding Star Wars trilogies have had clear cut romances among the battles raging across the galaxy. Han and Leia had quite the contentious romance in the original trilogy, at first hating each other and then falling in love. Meanwhile, the prequel trilogy's romance is almost a mirror image of that romance as Anakin and Padme almost immediately have a connection with one another, but then come to hurt each other more deeply than any other had before. So where do Kylo Ren and Rey fall?

Previously, director J.J. Abrams has referred to Kylo Ren as a sort of prince. After all, he's basically a descendant of Star Wars royalty as the son of Princess (now General) Leia Organa and Han Solo. But that clearly hasn't worked in his favor up to this point. Adam Driver talked to Vanity Fair about how coming from two characters who were essentially career heroes is what ended up pushing him toward the dark side:

"If you were the product of those two people, two very strong personalities who seemed to be almost more committed to a cause than anything else, what's that like? How do you form friendships out of that? How do you understand the weight of that? . . . It can easily go awry."

Meanwhile, on the other end of the spectrum, you have Rey, who grew up with nothing, but didn't let it sour her perspective on the good in the galaxy. In fact, she might even resent Kylo Ren for making his turn to the dark side even more firm. Ridley said, "I think there's a part of Rey that's like, dude, you fucking had it all, you had it all. That was always a big question during filming: you had it all and you let it go."

But even if the two characters are at odds, that doesn't mean they're actually far apart from each other. Let's not forget that both essentially came into their formative years without their parents being a big part of their lives. That ended pushing them both on the path they find themselves today, and it continues to inform the decisions they make. Rey keeps trying to latch onto would-be parental figures like Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, and Leia Organa. Meanwhile, Kylo Ren keeps trying to distance himself from the past, killing it if he must. Because of this, both have lived lonely, isolated lives.

Perhaps this explains why the connection between these two characters in the Force is so strong. In fact, one source told Vanity Fair that "their Force-connection will turn out to run even deeper than we thought." Could that be what the recently released concept art is alluding to? Is their Force connection so strong that it allows them to fight each other through their connection? Or will this be the core of what might become a romance that ultimately redeems Ben Solo and makes Rey feel like she belongs? This could also mean that the two actually share some blood between them, even if that feels like a step backward after the events of The Last Jedi. We really don't know.

For what it's worth, the covers featuring these two characters contain some kind of hidden meaning:

The wind is blowing their clothes in opposite directions, but both of them seem to be slightly looking towards each other. Perhaps this is an allusion to everything that they know pushing them away from each other but neither of them can help but still be drawn to the other. That's some real star-crossed lover stuff there.

The question is whether or not there's even still a chance for something else to spark between these two. Is that connection still open for anything except confrontation? Driver won't say specifically, but he reminds us what just happened and teases what's to come, "The Last Jedi ends with the question in the air: is he going to pursue that relationship more or, when the door of her ship goes up, does that also close that camaraderie? This idea of being alone."

The best way to keep from being alone would be to take solace in a kindred spirit, someone who knows what you've gone through because they felt it themselves. Is that enough for Kylo Ren and Rey to get their own love story? No one is saying definitively, but at least at the beginning of the movie, Rey seems to have made up her mind about Kylo Ren. Ridley says, "Rey is less inclined to believe that Kylo potentially could redeem himself." But that doesn't mean the events in the film can't change her mind. After all, Darth Vader was once the most ruthless villain in the galaxy, but the faith and love of his son brought him back from the dark side.

Meanwhile, Driver says that this connection and their relationship can't be so simply described as a romance. The actor says, "I don't think it's any one thing. The strength in what Rian [Johnson] wrote and what J.J. [Abrams] wrote is it's never all one thing." We'll have to wait to find out what that means when Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker arrives on December 20, 2019.

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