This is my first Steemit post. I had planned on doing an intro post, but I have been lazy. As a quick intro, I am a Christian; I like sports and strategy games; I enjoy reading history, fantasy, and science fiction; and I like Star Wars. I really disliked The Last Jedi, but I won't get into any of that here.

Some friends and I were talking about Rey and Kylo Ren and his offer to her to join him. I think that she should have taken the offer, and that it would be pretty reasonable for her to have done so with relatively little change in the script as it is. This is pretty long, so I have included the TLDRy conclusion here:

To recap, within about a week, Rey discovers she has Force powers, discovers that the legends about Luke are real, finds a father figure in Han who is killed by Kylo Ren, finds that Luke is not who she thought he was, and finds that her parents will not be a part of her life. She has made friends in the Resistance, which is a group that she idolized. She wants to stop the First Order. After her time with Luke, she comes to believe that Kylo Ren is the only one who can stop the First Order. She goes to him, and he kills Snoke. Then he offers to work with her in making a new galactic order. Had she agreed, that would have switfly crippled the First Order as it then stood - either through changing the Order into something better for the galaxy (end alien discrimination, end child soldiers, and end whatever unethical military practices they had), or it could have ended by engulfing the First Order in a civil war, in which she and Kylo help destroy the worst parts of the First Order ("a house divided against itself cannot stand").

The only real part that would need to be changed to help make Rey's joining smoother would be to have the Rebels (her friends) not in immediate danger when the question was asked. There are a number of ways to do this. The one with the least change to the story may be to have the Rebel ships land on the planet before the offer is made. This would change the timing of Holdo's sacrifice (it seems logical that she jump towards the First Order ships instead of just run out of fuel, even if the others have made it to the surface), but that is about all.

Declaration of Love, by Vladimir Makovsky, 1891, wikiart.org

REY JOINS REN

Introduction

Okay, so the plan here is to change as little as possible in The Last Jedi to make Rey's acceptance of Kylo Ren's offer believable. I am not including any information from the books, only the movies. I feel that the main movies should be able to stand by themselves without needing to read books.

The Force Awakens

First, let's take a look at The Force Awakens and what we know about the Republic, First Order, and the Resistance.

Episode VII
THE FORCE AWAKENS

Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister FIRST ORDER has risen from the ashes of the Empire and will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed.

With the support of the REPUBLIC, General Leia Organa leads a brave RESISTANCE. She is desperate to find her brother Luke and gain his help in restoring peace and justice to the galaxy.

Leia has sent her most daring pilot on a secret mission to Jakku, where an old ally has discovered a clue to Luke’s whereabouts….

So, the Republic cannot or will not openly stand against a growing threat and is instead fighting through a proxy. Luke Skywalker is deemed important by both sides. During the movie, the Republic is destroyed, so the small group of Resistance fighters is all that is left (though they were the only ones doing the fighting anyway, it seems). The Resistance does complete the map to Luke, and it sends Rey, Chewie, and R2 to get him.

Rey is portrayed as a decent person - she protectrs BB-8 and then will not sell him, even for a lot of rations. She is obsessed about her family and seems to see Han Solo as a father figure in their brief time together. Rey was born roughly 10 years after the fall of the Empire. She believes that the Jedi and the Force are legends. She lives on a planet that has remains of that conflict. It seems like she idolized the Rebellion/Resistance (given her reaction to Finn "being part of the Resistance").

Kylo Ren is pulled to the light but is trying to be dark to finish what Vader started (setting up a galactic empire?). He is willing to kill his father to do this. He offers to teach Rey about the force - he does not want to kill her.

The Last Jedi

Episode VIII
THE LAST JEDI

The FIRST ORDER reigns. Having decimated the peaceful Republic, Supreme Leader Snoke now deploys his merciless legions to seize military control of the galaxy.

Only General Leia Organa’s band of RESISTANCE fighters stand against the rising tyranny, certain that Jedi Master Luke Skywalker will return and restore a spark of hope to the fight.

But the Resistance has been exposed. As the First Order speeds toward the rebel base, the brave heroes mount a desperate escape....

General Situation

This opening crawl makes it seem as if some time has passed since The Force Awakens, but the way the cuts are done in the movie makes it seem, to me, that the events of episode 8 follow on the heels of episode 7. (For example, we see the tracking bracelet during a few of the cuts, making it seem like the events with the Resistance are happening at the same time as the events with Rey.)

So, after the fall of the Empire, the Republic arose, but they were weak enough to be defeated by the First Order without giving them too much of a fight. (The Resistance is about 400 members, though they did lose about 2 squadrons at the end of The Force Awakens. Given their one cruiser, two dozen transports, four squadrons of fighters and one squadron of bombers, I feel that their capabilities were more for harrassment and sabotage on a small scale - nothing that could really slow the First Order down.)

We will go along with what the movies say and agree that the First Order is totally evil and must be stopped. The question is, what can be done to stop them now? The Last Jedi makes it seem like the 400 Resistance fighters are the only ones in the galaxy brave enough to stand (even with the message from Leia after the destruction of many, many material assets of the First Order - The Last Jedi is a huge tactical win for the Resistance - still no one comes to help them).

Characters

Rey goes to Luke to ask for help and also for training, but she is rejected. Due to her Force powers, she now is a part of the legends that she grew up with. However, she is disappointed with her hero. During her time on the island, she does not resist the pull of the Dark Side, she fights with Luke and draws a lightsaber on him, and then she leaves believing that Kylo Ren will turn and that he is the only hope for the Resistance to stop the First Order. Rey wants to stop the First Order.

Kylo Ren is still conflicted, despite killing his father, and maybe even more conflicted because he killed his father (per what Snoke says). Kylo seems focused on increasing his power though, and he tells Rey that he needed to kill his father in order to be able to grow into what he could become - his attachment was holding him back.

So, Rey jumps into the system and delivers herself to Kylo Ren in the hope that he will turn to the light and destroy the First Order. Kylo Ren kills Supreme Leader Snoke. At this point, the guards attack. Kylo and Rey kill them all, the Kylo asks Rey to join him.

The Request

The movie sets this up as an honest request from Kylo Ren. He says that he is willing to forget the past, the First Order, etc., if Rey will join him in ruling the galaxy. Now, it seems to me that Kylo Ren must use the First Order to get the power that he wants, but that he is willing to change the focus of the First Order. He wants to make a new order with Rey.

Rey, for her part, talks about how her parents were nobodies. (This conversation seems more for the audience than for Kylo and Rey - I don't think Rey ought to care that her parents were nobodies. I think she just wanted to know her family. Kylo Ren's statement about how they sold her for drink money would hurt though.) Rey was abandoned by her parents, she was abandoned by Luke, she cares about Finn and Leia and about stopping the First Order.

Why does Rey not accept his offer of leadership? Surely Rey will be a leader in the Resistance (of 40 people), and if the Resistance is successful, then Rey will be a leader in the government that is set up. She is given the chance here to work with Kylo Ren to change the First Order, and she could probably change it into something that did not need to be destroyed. The First Order consists mainly of programmed troops willing to follow orders. Kylo Ren is able to get Hux to follow him easily. He could have just told Hux that he killed Snoke because Snoke was weak, and that Kylo will fulfill his vision for the galaxy. Hux was shown to be a huge pushover, and if Kylo has Hux, he has the whole First Order (seemingly).

Potential Plot Difficulty

Now, Rey's friends are being killed at that moment in the movie, and she would want it to stop immediately. Kylo Ren may not be able to make that happen in a believable manner, so that part of the movie may need to be changed (or the Resistance would be wiped out). The Rebels will need to have found a way to safety while Rey is in the throne room. Then Rey can join Kylo and they can start to shape things differently.

Irresistibly Persuasive Arguments

Given Rey's belief that Kylo will turn, given Kylo's statement that he is not tied to the ideology of the First Order, it seems that the quickest and best path to saving the galaxy would be to take control and shape the future for good at the head of the largest military power instead of less than 4 dozen people. There could be a civil war within the First Order over this, but that would still be to Rey's benefit, since she wants the First Order stopped.

Rey is willing to think that Kylo can be changed in a short encounter (which is why she leaves Luke), but she is unwilling to stay by his side and try to change him over the course of time? That seems odd. He just killed Snoke and offered to leave the old ways behind. Rey has no hope in Luke, she cannot really have much hope that those few remaining could stand against the First Order, and I don't think she has much of a conception about the Resistance being the spark that lights the galaxy aflame.

If Rey is not willing to try to change the institution and individuals of the First Order, then what is to become of all of those people and the starships if the Resistance wins? Will the remaining people be imprisoned or executed? Will the ships be scuttled? As Abraham Lincoln said, "Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?" Rey is given an opportunity to do that.

Conclusion

To recap, within about a week, Rey discovers she has Force powers, discovers that the legends about Luke are real, finds a father figure in Han who is killed by Kylo Ren, finds that Luke is not who she thought he was, and finds that her parents will not be a part of her life. She has made friends in the Resistance, which is a group that she idolized. She wants to stop the First Order. After her time with Luke, she comes to believe that Kylo Ren is the only one who can stop the First Order. She goes to him, and he kills Snoke. Then he offers to work with her in making a new galactic order. Had she agreed, that would have switfly crippled the First Order as it then stood - either through changing the Order into something better for the galaxy (end alien discrimination, end child soldiers, and end whatever unethical military practices they had), or it could have ended by engulfing the First Order in a civil war, in which she and Kylo help destroy the worst parts of the First Order ("a house divided against itself cannot stand").

The only real part that would need to be changed to help make Rey's joining smoother would be to have the Rebels (her friends) not in immediate danger when the question was asked. There are a number of ways to do this. The one with the least change to the story may be to have the Rebel ships land on the planet before the offer is made. This would change the timing of Holdo's sacrifice (it seems logical that she jump towards the First Order ships instead of just run out of fuel, even if the others have made it to the surface), but that is about all.

So, what do you think? What have I missed?