love that movie civil war for the way it Nails the clash between people’s external reads on tony vs The Truth
– backstage MIT people ready to kiss tony’s ass like he wants a fanfare and parades in his honor when really he’s looking for random excuses to ditch the adulation and leave through the back door
– mrs spencer thinking tony won’t give a shit about her son when in reality her struggle becomes a key factor pushing him to the accords
– steve assuming pepper was pregnant, like this guy heads off into the horizon and people assume happiness and then tony’s pretty much like “actually no i am Miserable” in not so many words
– “you alright?” “always,” tony answers, fucking literally clutching his own chest after almost non-successfully talking ross out of approaching steve with a killing squad
– scott lang like “this is your conscience, we don’t talk a lot these days” when in the beginning of the movie tony literally has an “it helps ease my conscience” line i’m just fuckinG
– natasha like “are you incapable of letting go of your ego for one god damn second” literally 1 milisecond before pointing out herself that ross & co practically have tony on a leash and he literally spent the entire movie begging
– tony being like “i was wrong” and sam, who presumably barely ever talked to tony responding like “that’s a first” when he clearly doesn’t hold steve to the same “openly admitting i’m wrong” requirements and like lmao tony was actually The First to say “i was wrong” in the movie and like literally his first scene has him standing in front of an audience like “have a live sneak peak of a MOMENT I REGRET”
bonus points for doing that without compromising the characterization of the IM1 guy who came out of the cave ready to make OPEN HONEST AND PUBLIC AMENDS the guy whose first “back from captivity” press conference speech starts with an honest and personal comment about his incomplete relationship with his father, and moves on to an admission of guilt. the guy who went up in front of journalists and said he wasn’t the hero type because of all his character defects, this guy, My Guy, the guy who has a deleted (WHY) line about how reputations stick with you and he was never entirely comfortable with his, My Guy, My Tony Stark, is finally Back, complete with the tragic Struggles of a reputation he can’t free himself from even though he will Fucking tell you In Person, with minimal prompting, that his conscience is Heavy
just a reminder that that is daniel craig rey just used the force on james bond
Fun fact: While filming Spectre, Craig would go over to TFA lots and just hang out. Until one day JJ asked if he wanted to be a stormtrooper in one of the scenes. This is the result.
Anakin Skywalker was born a slave. He was a slave for the first nine years of his life. At which point, he was taken away from his mother, and tossed into a environment that he was ill prepared for, with a master who lacked sufficient training to properly guide a Padawan who differed so far from the standard model, and for more than a decade, nearly constantly gas lighted by one of the most evil and manipulative men in the entire galaxy, while looked down on with suspicion and distrust by the head of the order he’d given up everything to join.
Despite all that, before Anakin had his final mental breakdown and decided murdering children was a dandy way to spend an afternoon, he still managed too…
Successfully complete more than a decade of Jedi training.
Help win the first battle of Geonosis.
Become an incredibly successful general.
Train an amazingly competent Padawan.
Be a semi-functional husband (though the health of his marriage is a whole other topic).
Become one of the best pilots in the galaxy.
Shape the course of the entire war.
Anakin’s mental breakdown was a result of more than a decade of neglect by, and in some cases active hostility from, members of the Jedi order, combined with repeated emotional traumas, and an active, vicious campaign to deliberately destroy his mental and emotional well being by Palpatine.
Anakin didn’t fall to the dark side, so much as he was shoved over the edge.
Now, let’s talk about Kylo Ren.
Kylo Ren grew up with parents who loved him. They may have made mistakes, they may not have been perfect, but anyone who watched the same movie I did and says that Han and Leia didn’t love Ben are full of shit.
He had a master who would have loved him like a son, because this is Luke, and this is Han and Leia’s kid. Luke, say whatever else you want about him, is all about family.
Now, I don’t know what lies Snoke told Ben. I don’t know what he whispered in Ben’s ear. But I know this.
Ben didn’t hold his mother in his arms after she died from weeks of torture. Ben didn’t spend years in the meet grinder of The Clone Wars watching his friends die around him. Ben didn’t watch the order turn on the Padawan he trained and loved like family and cast her out. Ben didn’t spend years of his life enduring the dismissive suspicion of Mace “never to be sufficiently damned” Windu. Ben wasn’t having nightmares of his wife and child dying in childbirth, and losing everything he loved *again*.
Ben fell to the dark side because he was having some emo fit about his mom sending him to boarding school.
He slaughtered his fell Padawans because he was having a snit fit.
He destroyed his parents relationship because of a temper tantrum.
He murdered his parents friends, entire villages… He murdered worlds, because his parents disappointed him.
Then, he looked into his father’s eyes. The eyes of a man who loved him, who forgave him, who offered to do anything to help him, and he stabbed him through the heart.
Do not compare Anakin Skywalker to Kylo Ren. Anakin Skywalker was a human disaster, but when the moment came, when he stood on his bridge, Anakin chose his family. He chose to try one last time to be the man Qui-Gon, Obi Wan and Padme believed he was. He chose to be the man his son believed he was. Given the choice, Anakin chose to be a father to his children, even if it was just for a moment.
Anakin Skywalker was a human disaster, but Kylo Ren is garbage.
also fun fact: if you replace bb-8 with a puppy, the force awakens instantly becomes a rom-com about a tiny concerned dog going on a quest to find a date for its charming but lonely owner, and comes back with two excellent prospects in tow.
You are moping on your island of self-imposed exile, and then this girl shows up.
She’s flying your best friend’s ship. The ship that Han thought he lost for ever. The ship that was stolen and passed through so many hands that he was sure he’d never see it again. The same ship that took you away from home for the first time.
She’s accompanied by your personal droid. The droid you left behind and abandoned. The droid that C-3PO was sure would never be the same again.
She holds out her hand and she’s holding your father’s light saber. The sword you were sure was lost forever. The light saber that you dropped down a bottomless air shaft on a gas giant thirty years ago. The light saber you knew you would never see again.
You look up and you see her eyes. Maz Kanata says that if you live long enough, you see the same eyes looking out of different faces. The girl’s face is different, but those eyes are the same. You know those eyes. They’re the eyes you thought you’d never see again.
And that’s when you know it.
You’re screwed.
They say sometimes the Force works in mysterious ways. Sometimes, the Force will send you little signs. Subtle clues.
Other times, the Force will just beat you repeatedly over the head with a gigantic neon sign that says: “You can’t run away from your past anymore, Luke. I won’t let you. Look, here is your past come back to haunt you. Now deal with it.”
Ok I love all the Kylo Ren jokes (human trashbag, complete monster, Emo Teen) but like
According to the novel Ben was ten years old when he left home to train with Luke, and fifteen when he destroyed Luke’s Jedi temple
So that means Snoke tempting him to the Dark Side would have involved a lot less offering untold cosmic power; and a lot more child-grooming, and subsequently absconding with a preteen boy
Idk about you but that skeeves me out
Oh noooooo
for bonus:
He had trouble believing what he was hearing. “So Snoke was watching our son.”
“Always,” she told him. “From the shadows, in the beginning, even before I realized what was happening, he was manipulating everything, pulling our son toward the dark side.”
We don’t know the details for sure, but if the movies go with this, Snoke was definitely grooming Ben from … infancy, pretty much.
There’s also that scene where Snoke tells Ben that he’s trained other people, but nobody like Ben because he’s special. D: D: D:
On a completely serious note, it actually 100% explains the tantrums. When you’re groomed from a really young age (and are hurt at a young age), your maturity in dealing with stressors can be developmentally delayed, and your ability to deal (in general) becomes extremely… fragile. You don’t develop proper coping mechanisms at a critical stage in your development, and even if you’re removed from the stressor your inability cope with them can affect you all throughout your adulthood. A lot of people lash out in anger, because lashing out in anger is what children do. They never really developed past that (mentally), which is kind of why Kylo/Ben acts like he’s 16 when he’s closer to 30. Honestly its pretty tragic.
eirenical17 