Last Jedi's Comic Adaptation Reveals Luke's Biggest Regret About Rey

SPOILER WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Last Jedi Adaptation #4 by Gary Whitta, Michael Walsh, Mike Spicer and Travis Lanham, on sale now.

One of the biggest changes to the Star Wars film mythos, and quite a divisive topic, was how director Rian Johnson reshaped Luke Skywalker as a Jedi who fell from grace. In The Last Jedi, he was depicted as a recluse, an old hermit wasting his life away on the oceanic planet, Ahch-To, while the Rebellion suffered at the hands of the First Order.

Perhaps even more contentious was Luke's handling of Rey and the manner in which he passed the baton to her. His mentorship of her was very brief and fans were left wondering if he had truly done enough to put her on the path to rebuild the Jedi Order, something she's clearly intent on doing after stealing the religion's sacred texts.

While the debate continues to rage on, Marvel's comic book adaptation of the highly polarizing movie continues to provide "deleted" scenes for readers, with Issue #4 now addressing Luke's biggest regret about his latest student head-on.

Rey's powers are so strong, even Luke is afraid of her. Sure, he sees her as a new hope, but her potential reminds him of Ben Solo, whom he failed and helped push to the Dark Side as Kylo Ren. This issue mostly sticks to the exact scenes playing out on screen, as it goes deep into the failures of Luke with his family and academy, Rey's connection to Kylo via the Force, and her intentions to redeem him.

Of course, after learning Luke tried to kill Ben -- the breaking point for his nephew -- Rey acknowledges Kylo still has some good in him and jets off in the Millennium Falcon to save him, no matter what Luke thinks. If this sounds familiar, well, this rash behavior was very reminiscent of Luke in his younger days, and the failure to break this behavior out of Rey is what the Jedi regrets the most with her. Readers see this in Luke's inner-monologue, something he never admits in the film, as he watches her leave Ahch-To, reminded of himself. As she departs he laments how badly he wanted to get her to stop being like him, but couldn't.

He sees someone heading off into battle gung-ho, overly ambitious, headstrong and well, a bit too hard-headed for what's to come. Rey ignoring his warnings (which he tells her is a trap Kylo and his master, Supreme Leader Snoke, have laid) throws Luke's mind back to when he ignored Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back and in similar fashion, abandoned training to go face Darth Vader. He of all people would know one shouldn't disobey their masters, especially as that fight didn't go as planned, with Luke losing an arm and finding out Vader was actually his father, Anakin Skywalker.

Luke is grieving on the inside as he senses what's to come, knowing the price that will be payed for such heroic aspirations. In fact, it's also quite similar to Return of the Jedi when, against everyone's recommendations, he went to go save Vader's soul from Palpatine. This, however, worked out in his favor as he killed the Emperor and managed to bring his father back to the Light Side, but by then he was a seasoned Jedi (having finished his training with Yoda).

Rey, on the other hand, barely spent time honing her craft with him, and eventually, she almost died at Snoke's hand. Nonetheless, with both her and Kylo on a collision course once more, hopefully the texts help teach her what Luke couldn't, because following his death on Crait, the only assistance he can offer her is as a Force Ghost in the chapter to come.

CBR

Marvel's Last Jedi Adaptation Reveals Luke's Biggest Regret About Rey