What was the point of Captain Phasma?

[clearspira]

No, this is not another Star Wars hate thread. I am now quite burned out from that for the time being. My question relates to one of curiosity: what is the point of this character? What does she do that ultimately a random Stormtrooper could not have done instead? Was does she do that Hux could not have done instead?

Let me see if I remember correctly: She suspects Finn has had a breakdown, gives over the codes to help destroy him the Mega Death Star, and then nearly manages to decapitate Rose and Finn. That's largely it. MAYBE this character will still be alive come 9, but having survived both the destruction of Mega Death Star and the end of TLJ, it is stretching it somewhat.

And to just show how I am not all hate, I thought the concept of a Stormtrooper in cool armour and with some actual personality was not a bad idea. She could have been a real rival for Finn. But as it is, she is probably the most underused of all Star Wars characters in terms of build-up to payoff.

[Mecha82]

Sure they build her better in comic books and novels than they did in movies. In those she is shown to be sociopath from Mad Max style planet who only cates about herself. She was put to charge of First Order's Stormtroopers by older Hux before she alligned with younger Hux and they had older Hux assassinated. It was pretty much explained that she shut down Starkiller base's shield generator because she only cares about her own will being. Which is why she wiped out all evidence that she did it. Oh and her armor is made from material from Emperor's personal ship so it's most valuable Stormtrooper armor there is.

[Deledrius]

I kept waiting for her to be important. I suspect she was meant to be, as much as anything JJ Abrams does which looks cool is ever meant to serve a secondary purpose to that. But as the second movie's purpose was to take every plot point served to it and bury them, she got caught up in that. It's a shame, really. In the end she gets a worse utilization than Boba Fett originally did. I sorta hope she returns in Ep IX, but it would have to be part of the running gag of "how does she die this time?"

More seriously, I think this trilogy is struggling with having a lot of villain characters, at least one of which is a main character. It causes them to crowd each other for screentime, and when you have a Stormtrooper as a main character as well (Finn) it really makes her mostly redundant except in how she relates to him, which turned out to be "not much".

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

EU bait, according to mecha.

[Winter]

Okay, I was actually Just Writing about this on my Dark Force Rising vs. The Last Jedi Act III Comparison and one thing that bugs me is that if you want to know Anything about Phasma you Have to read her tie-in material and if you didn't read up on them you're out of luck because the films do not bother to cover anything else about her.

Contrast this with Jango Fett in Attack of the Clones. In AOTC all we get about Jango is that's he's Bounty Hunter who is letting the people on Kamino use his DNA to create a clone army and who's combat skills were trained for said Clone Army for the upcoming Clone War and that he wanted an unaltered clone for himself. That's all we get but frankly that's more then what we got for Phasma. We're told that he's a Bounty Hunter and if you never read his comics or play his game than that's really all you need to know about his motivation, he's doing this because he's getting paid. Why does he want an unaltered clone for himself, he wanted a kid because even criminals want a family.

If you check out the Supplementary Material it further elaborates on his motives and background but none of that is required to understand him in AOTC as the film gives all we really need. But we DID need to know how Phasma survived the events of The Force Awakens and how she avoided getting blamed for lowering Starkiller Bases Shield.

Say what you will about the Prequels but speaking as someone who didn't check out the tie-in comics and games (did see the Clone Wars 2D Series though) I was able to follow what was going on just fine and never felt like I needed to do homework on anything before getting the story started. The one exception to this was that I didn't know what Sith meant before The Phantom Menace and thought it referred to Maul's Race and it wasn't until later, when I re-watched From Star Wars to Jedi: The Making of a Saga, that I realized it was the name of the Evil Force Users like Vader and the Emperor.

[Fianna]

I assumed she was there so they'd have another cool looking outfit to sell toys and costumes of.

[Admiral X]

She is an attempt at a Boba Fett for the sequels.

[hammerofglass]

I suspect she was written as a random political officer and then the marketing latched on to her because the actress was suddenly popular.

[McAvoy]

Actress was already popular by the time of the shooting for Star Wars.

Brienne showed up I believe in 2013.

Bit you wouldn't know it was her as Phasma unless you recognized her voice.

It is possible she was cast due to her size and being female.

The importance of why she was in the movies I suspected was just something shiny to look at. Nothing more.

Look shiny!

[Mecha82]

I suspect she was written as a random political officer and then the marketing latched on to her because the actress was suddenly popular.

I am sure she was always meant to be leader of First Order's Stormtroopers. Besides her actress was already popular back then so she was clear choice for role because of her size. I am sure they could had been able to tell Phasma's role in First Order with not very words if they had wanted instead of leaving everything for additional material that casual movie goers don't bother with.