A Star Wars rant that’s five (six?) years too late but for some reason still feels like it needs to be brought up:
To some Star Wars fans, I got a question: does Rey changing her last name to Skywalker instead of Palpatine seriously still bother you? Like, actually?
Like I’m seeing people to this day say “She’s not a Skywalker, she’s a Palpatine.” “She’ll never be a Skywalker.” “She doesn’t deserve to be a Skywalker.” etc, etc. And I just think y’all need to grow up.
Like, y’all know we have multiple real life examples of this, right? Let’s list them.
1. Any of y’all have a mom? Does she have the same last name as your dad? Yeah, that’s not her actual last name. Are you gonna walk up to your mom and tell her she’s not a true Johnson or Davis or *insert your last name here*? No you’re not, because that’s stupid.
2. Adopted kids chose to take the name of the family that adopted them all the time. Are you gonna tell them they haven’t earned it? That they never be a true *insert last name*? That no matter what, they’ll always have *insert former family’s last name* blood in their veins? No, you wouldn’t (or I hope you wouldn’t) because that’s a cruel and kinda evil thing to say. This is essentially what happened with Rey, as it’s very obvious that Luke and Leia either gave permission or had no qualms with Rey choosing their name.
3. You can literally go and change your name right now. Legally. No one will stop you. You could go by any name you want. Your name is yours. It can be anything. YOU could go and become a Skywalker.
4. Lot of celebrities go by different names that aren’t the name they were born with. Like:
If you said Elton John, you’re wrong. His name is Reginald Dwight.
If you said Michael Caine, you’re wrong. His name is Maurice Micklewhite.
If you said Vin Diesel, you’re wrong. His name is Mark Sinclair.
If you said Martin Sheen, you’re wrong. His name is Ramón Gerard Antonio Estévez.
If you said Lady Gaga, you’re wrong. Her name is Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta.
Like y’all are still calling Eminem Eminem, 50 Cent 50 Cent, Ice Cube Ice Cube, The Rock The Rock, The Undertaker The Undertaker, etc, but when a fictional character changes their fictional name to another fictional name, you’re suddenly up in arms? Make it make sense.
Also, kind of a more serious point here but are y’all gonna go up to the descendants of Hitler and tell them that they aren’t allowed to change their name? That they’ll always be a Hitler? No, you wouldn’t because that’s insane. In Star Wars, Palpatine is just space Hitler, so it makes sense why she doesn’t want to go by that name. It’s a name that deserves to die out.
Basically, if you still have an issue with Rey choosing her last name to be Skywalker, I think you need to grow up and find some actual things in life to have issues with instead of letting a fictional character’s name take up so much space in your mind that you still feel the need to comment on it years later.
