here comes a special boy! here comes a special boy! here comes a special boy! here comes a special boy! here comes a special boy! here comes a special boy!
also this is even more amazing when you go into extended canon
not only did rey grow up orphaned and isolated, but also dirt poor, working a thankless job for despotic boss in order to feed herself and sometimes not managing even that. if you read ‘before the awakening’ rey’s story is utterly fucking heartbreaking because it’s outright said that she has, on multiple occasions, gone so hungry she had trouble standing. despite this she loves building things so much that she’d rather keep the best stuff she’s scavenging for herself than exchange it for food. she built her speeder already several years before we meet her, so like, in her mid-teens and she’s very proud of it. she has a workbench in her home and she’s always tinkering with things. rey would literally go hungry to follow her passion.
finn is basically caught in the equivalent of an abusive educational system that’s forcing him in little boxes and teaches skills (which incidentally involve murdering civilians) at the expense of his humanity. not only that but finn is also the overachiever who’s constantly doubting himself. it’s fucked up but before he escapes the first order so much of finn’s thought process is ‘i’m always at the top of the class and they’re saying i have so much potential, so why do i feel like such a failure?’ finn rebels against the order by bringing out his humanity full force and holding it up to them. he’s such a giant fuck you to the system it’s incredible. if anyone is a rebel in this story, it’s definitely finn.
poe is so interesting because at 32 he would actually still be in the millennial age gap. he’s older, and by all accounts should be that disillusioned guy who understood long ago that notions of galactic peace and what have you are useless in real life. he should be that dude who embraced his cynicism and is maybe sort of patronizing towards these idealistic wide-eyed kids. instead he’s the opposite of all that, but that’s not really the point. poe, whose family fought to establish the new republic, wants nothing more than to do his part in rebuilding it. but at some point in the process he runs head-first into a wall of corrupt politics and shady business deals that would profit from a war. but instead of giving up and keeping his head down once he realizes what he’s up against, poe goes and becomes a leader figure in the resistance.
so basically you have three young people: one who works incredibly hard and is often unable to cover her most basic needs, but doesn’t give up on her passion; one who should have been broken by an abusive educational system, but instead broke the system by affirming his humanity at every point in the story; and one who didn’t succumb to cynicism and chose to act once he understood politics is always self-interested.
and the second they meet they do nothing but praise and encourage and lift eachother up, loudly and enthusiastically.
space millennials. my heart is so full of love for this story.
‘Yes,’ said Dorfl. He reached down and picked up the vampire in one hand. ‘I Could Kill You,’ he said. ‘This Is An Option Available To Me As A Free-Thinking Individual But I Will Not Do So Because I Own Myself And I Have Made A Moral Choice.’
‘Oh, gods,’ murmured Vimes under his breath.
‘That’s BLASPHEMY,’ said the vampire.
He gasped as Vimes shot him a glance like sunlight. ‘That’s what people say when the voiceless speak. Take him away, Dorfl. Put him in the palace dungeons.’
