The term "Mary Sue" needs to die.

[Antiboyscout]

I was mostly thinking about the bounty hunter that took 3 jedi to break his mind. I seem to recall Anakin's padiwan having difficulties as well.

[Karha of Honor]

I didn't say they aren't real fans. I just said they're a laughing stock.

So if you think they are wrong they are laughable people. Maybe someone needs to call the FBI to put these lower life form weirdos on a watchlist. All Hal Mithra!!!!!!!!!

[FakeGeekGirl]

*deliberately ignores gatekeeping discussion even though gatekeeping is one of my fandom pet peeves*

Check out the "Creator's Pet" on tvtropes. This is essentially their listing of Mary Sues even though a creator's pet isn't necessarily a Sue or vice versa. See how many entries are female, and have very scant justification. Notice how many blatant male creator's pets are conspicuously not there, and if they are have more justification.

I had a personal fight with the admins trying to add a male character I felt qualified, and finally decided it wasn't the hill I wanted to die on and let it go. At the same time I initially added this guy, I added a female character from the same work, with minimal justification, and this was never, ever questioned. Maybe that's a bad example, maybe in this case there really was more abundant evidence the female character was a creator's pet than the guy, but it seems to me that this can be thrown at a female character for just about any reason, but almost never at male characters unless it is terribly blatant.

Probably the most cringey one is hearing Mary Sue accusations being thrown at Katniss, even though a major point in the books is that she's NOT special to the extent that the world should crumble around her, the Revolution just picks her out and makes her one because it was convenient for them, and she constantly struggles to live up to the expectations created by this. It's almost a deconstruction of the trope but people just see a powerful and beautiful female character and assume the worst.

As for Rey ... I went into it having heard some people complain about Rey being a Mary Sue and I really didn't want her to be so I was fighting that. I made it through the scenes with the Millenium Falcon. I even made it through the Jedi mind trick even though ... let's set aside how difficult it is or isn't to perform, had Rey ever seen or heard of it being performed, ever? Anyway, I made it through all that. And then the lightsaber scene. Just ... no. Swordfighting takes years to learn, I have to believe that even with the Force guiding you, it would take some time and skill and practice to learn. But Rey beats the guy who's been being trained in the Jedi way since he was a kid and then presumably got Sith training when he switched over to the dark side? No. I mean ... Kylo was wounded, sure, but that was weaksauce. I wish they could have come up with a different way to handle it, so that she would still look competent overall but it was a more believable victory for a novice - maybe something as simple as making Kylo seem more impaired by his injury. I think part of it is people being petrified of having a female character that's less than perfect lest they be accused of being sexist - frustratingly, also see Katniss for that. But the thing is that this is a problem that can only be solved by moving forward - if we have more female characters, eventually people will stop being terrified of giving them flaws. Or you know, putting more than one in a work so you're not desperately trying to cram enough competence and representation for the entire female gender into one character.

[MithrandirOlorin]

The movie established early on Rey had experience with Male Weapons. And Pay attention to how she fights Kylo, it clearly like what she did with her Staff and not real sword fighting.

Again, the main character cna never be a Mary Sue, a Mary Sue is by definition someone who shouldn't be the main character taking over the story.

[GandALF]

I was mostly thinking about the bounty hunter that took 3 jedi to break his mind. I seem to recall Anakin's padiwan having difficulties as well.

Yes, "Sphere of Influence": Ahsoka uses a mind trick on a guard to get herself and senator Chuchi past him, but she has to do it twice because the guard only lets her through the first time. So its similar to Rey but there's the caveat that Ahsoka had been trained since infancy and was still making mistakes whereas Rey got it right after two tries because she had just sort of heard about it?

Also George Lucas was directly involved in making the The Clone Wars, so its as canon as canon can be. Thats why it was able to overwrite parts of the EU

[Karha of Honor]

The movie established early on Rey had experience with Male Weapons. And Pay attention to how she fights Kylo, it clearly like what she did with her Staff and not real sword fighting.

Not the same.

[TGLS]

Again, the main character cna never be a Mary Sue, a Mary Sue is by definition someone who shouldn't be the main character taking over the story.

But that doesn't work. The original Mary Sue was the main character (albeit a goofy one who had Kirk, Spock and Bones as supporting cast), and that definition stops her from being a Mary Sue, so it must be wrong.

[MithrandirOlorin]

The fanfic that coined the name was itself written to parody the concept. But regardless it's like an episode of Star Trek focused on a guest character.

[GandALF]

Maybe there should be a distinction between a mary sue and just an overpowered character depending on the type of story. So superman is just OP because the story is about a man being super. Whereas Rey is more of a mary sue because SW is ultimately about the heroes journey and all that and her exceptionalism breaks the rules to a degree.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Again, the main character cna never be a Mary Sue, a Mary Sue is by definition someone who shouldn't be the main character taking over the story.

But that doesn't work. The original Mary Sue was the main character (albeit a goofy one who had Kirk, Spock and Bones as supporting cast), and that definition stops her from being a Mary Sue, so it must be wrong.

No, she was the main character of the fanfic, but not of the source material. A Mary Sue is somebody who steps in from outside and makes the regular cast utterly redundant.