God did I feel the same way. I totally ugly cried when she was able to fight back competently. I broke out it goosebumps and get teary just thinking about how there are going to be so many little girls out there who are going to want to grow up to be Rey. And that is the best thing in the world as far as I’m concerned!

I am a middle aged (sigh) white dude, and I felt exactly the same way about it. Well, maybe not the included part. But I did love it. It is honestly just so fucking cool to have a no apologies, no bullshit female protagonist. None of this “Oh, but it’s *really* Furiosa’s story, we just had to call it Mad Max” crap.…

Ray is the character I made up so I could play Star Wars with my brother and his friends because my friend always played Leia.

He’s a fully fleshed CHARACTER and they hired a great ACTOR to portray him. I think a smart thing they did was allow him to take the helmet off at pivotal moments so you could really empathize with both actors in the scene.

Yaaaaaas. After watching Natalie Portman crumble like a sad cookie in the prequels, it was nice to see some lady-competence in this one, esp when said competence gave way to her mastering everyone’s domain.

Agreed - and I think it extends to the stormtroopers. Just hearing a woman’s voice coming through the helmet was IMPORTANT.

During the pivotal scene where *******BIGGEST SPOILER OF THE MOVIE******** I just thought to myself, “holy shit Adam Driver is a good actor.” So impressed, dare I say I think he holds more villain potential than Darth Vader (ok please don’t internet punch me).

This may be me nerd-ing into the film a bit too much, but this feeling he was able to re-create is “Home”. JJ and the performances took us home. The prequels felt foreign, stoic, unwieldy, and were definitely not home. Also, that concept of establishing or finding “home” was articulated repeatedly in the movie: “Bring…

Mr.Tank, my husband, is a huge fan of Star Wars. HUGE. I’m a far more casual fan of the series, but omg I loved this movie! When we saw it, I could not contain my excitement over Rey. She’s so strong and so completely awesome. Also, I may have fist pumped during the opening when it mentioned General Leia Organa.

There’s nothing wrong with a talented man abandoning the work force to support his wife’s career, or prioritizing hers over his own. Unless he too is a Jedi, her job is, in this series, more important than his.

Yes! I teared up when I saw her in the trailer. I’ve loved Star Wars since I was a toddler (my parents were geeks) and seeing someone like ME as the main character was just profound.

I FaceTimed with my 5 year old nephew after he saw the movie, and he said “I want to have the Force and fight like Rey!!” Seeing him idolize a female character in a sci-fi action movie literally melted my heart into 100 tiny feminist pieces.

I think Daisy Ridley is gonna be huge. She was just SOOOO good. And did anyone else tear up when Chewie went insane with grief?

Exactly, she was a strong female character without having her gender be something ever even raise in context of her being strong.

As a little girl I had to play Leia when we played Star Wars. Now, she’s a kick ass character, but I still had to wait by the elm tree until I was saved from the Death Star and I still didn’t get a light saber. After that I had to make do with background Jedi and 4-comic runs of Shaak Ti. So...when Rey caught the…

It also helps that she is just so damn good in the film. Daisy Ridley pulls off the typical Star Wars angsty struggle with the Force without coming off as whiny, something never accomplished in the prequels.

Joseph Campbell bears a large portion of responsibility for the lack of female characters in Star Wars. His feminine heroes are defined by providing inspiration and guidance to the male hero - not exactly action figure material.

He’s the Peeta. He can be her supportive rock while she saves the universe.

I didn’t think having a lady-lead would make that much of a difference to me (I didn’t think I’d feel so included) but it legitimately did in the best way possible.

like, its not even a question. he’s really fucking working that beard...