Today I asked followers on my Instagram account about favourite characters from the sequel trilogy and someone mentioned that they felt Finn was their favourite but only in The Force Awakens. They elaborated to say that the other movies following The Force Awakens were bad because they didn’t do anything with the great story-telling in the first film which left Finn hanging in the wind.
While I’ve mentioned several times why Finn wasn’t really considered an important character for me, what this person had to say about Finn rings true. I also felt that there was so much wasted potential there. J J Abrams did one good thing in bringing the character of Finn to the forefront and into our minds. He was nothing more than just another Stormtrooper in a war that didn’t make sense. But Finn having a back story that did make sense and was just as important as anyone else’s was a stroke of pure genius. I mean who cares about Stormtroopers in the bigger picture? The answer is nobody. Nobody cared about Stormtroopers until Finn came along. And suddenly, Finn was someone to watch with interest.
But of course, his character was pushed by the wayside in TLJ for obvious reasons; Rian Johnson had other plans for the direction of the film and Finn wasn’t really factored into that. To me, it seemed like Kylo Ren and Rey’s development was a lot more important to Rian which is perfectly fine. They were the main characters of the trilogy after all.
So while some fans like to take sides and throw mud at the directors and writers for their poor choices, I prefer to blame Disney somewhat for the mess that was the sequel trilogy. Bringing on board two very different creative people into one trilogy that really needed synergy and cohesion to work was the silliest decision ever made for this franchise.
Finn had a back story that could have worked really well had Rian carried on from where J J left off. And in the final film, J J Abrams tried to recover from what Rian had created in The Last Jedi and it just came out messy and nonsensical leaving Finn nowhere.
So for the very first time, I have stopped focusing on Kylo Ren and Rey (mostly Kylo) and I’ve stopped to think about Finn and how his character was diminished until he barely existed at all. And now I understand what the actor John Boyega was probably feeling about it knowing full well that his character had been overlooked entirely in the second and third films.
Don’t even get me started on Rose Tico. That’s another debate waiting to be addressed in another post.
What do you think or feel about Finn’s development as a character? Do you agree with me that his story was diminished to make way for Rey and Kylo Ren’s development? Or do you think what Rian did was the best thing for the franchise?
Let me know in the comments friends, I am eager to discuss this with you. And as always, stay safe out there and I’ll catch you in the comments!
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