LogFAQs > #881210310

Also he's pretty much using a cracked khyber crystal.

Lightsabers are hard enough to move as it is (while the blade technically has no weight, it's resistant to motion, so you actually do need a measure of strength to move it) and behave more like chainsaws of plasma energy than frozen light. His cracked crystal makes the energy unstable and the blade's the size of a frigging claymore.

Meanwhile, Rey's been fighting with a cool stick and fights with a lightsaber in the same way you'd expect a quarterstaff specialist to fight if you suddenly gave them a sword.

All in all, the odds were pretty much stacked in her favor. Faster weapon, has probably been lowkey using the force her entire life without realizing it (Luke was a bit more coddled growing up in that regard, though he could shoot wampa rats with startling accuracy, so there's that), Kylo Ren is wounded, and he has to capture her alive. Not that Kylo Ren is a slouch - he's using tried and true lightsaber forms and is drawing upon the dark side, taking advantage of a disadvantage (pain fuels the dark side, hence why you see him pounding the blaster bolt wound).

Like all in all, Kylo Ren is a whiny fanboy who wants so badly to be Darth Vader and doesn't measure up to him - and that's precisely what makes him a fairly dangerous villain, because this is the universe where angst is literally power, and unlike Darth Vader, he doesn't have the grace and experience to control his anger and so his tantrums are just as devastating to his side as they are to the enemy's.

Like, he's pretty much what you'd get if you took a deconstruction and then proceeded to play it completely straight, without playing off of the fact that it's a deconstruction. It's low-key brilliant. Or perhaps I'm just over analyzing it.
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