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In the new Star Wars Movie,

Rey is searching for Luke Skywalker to give him his lightsaber.

But as you can see in Episode VI, Luke built his new green one with another handle. Didn't she just know that he already got another one?

CHEESE
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DieKomode
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    "You don't need it, so 'finders keepers'" would have been a bit rude? – Quentin Feb 16 '16 at 13:47
  • Related - Does Luke still have his green lightsaber? – TheIronCheek Feb 16 '16 at 13:48
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    Why do you think Rey knows that Luke had a green lightsaber? Luke appears to have quasi-legendary status to her -- she's not sure he exists until she meets Han Solo -- and I'm not sure she'd know details like the colour of his lightsaber. – alexwlchan Feb 16 '16 at 13:53
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    It’s been leaked that the new movie starts with Luke saying “Oh, no that’s okay, I built a replacement.” And Rey goes “Oh. Cool. Sorry.” And then leaves the planet. They’re going for more of a low-key Juno vibe with this one. – Paul D. Waite Feb 16 '16 at 14:41
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    In line with other questions regarding The Force Awakens, this title is too spoiler-ish and need to be rewritten. – ThePopMachine Feb 16 '16 at 16:49
  • @ThePopMachine We are starting to remove Episode VII spoilers, and in any case your edit doesn't hide much since the character tags give away which characters you were attempting to hide in the title. I've rolled it back. – Null Feb 16 '16 at 19:04
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    @Null, okay, sure. But I don't think the argument about the character tags is germane because a lot of the arguments for non-spoiler title revolve around HNQ, for example. – ThePopMachine Feb 16 '16 at 21:37
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    I'm more concerned about how she held it out /blade first/. Simple knife safety, there. If that lightsaber had activated it would have made Han's death look tame. An extending blade right through his face! – AJFaraday Feb 16 '16 at 23:00
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    @AJFaraday, isn't that basically what Ren did to his father? Maybe SW:VIII starts with Rey impaling Luke with his own lightsaber. How's that for echoing the previous movies? – ThePopMachine Feb 17 '16 at 19:13
  • I'm not sure she is searching for Luke to give him back his lightsaber, she's trying to find him to bring him back to fight for the light side. – mattumotu Feb 18 '16 at 16:03
  • The title should say, "Why did Rey hand Luke his Fathers* blue lightsaber even though he had a green one after Episode V?"* –  Feb 18 '16 at 17:11

5 Answers5

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She was reaching out to a man who had shut himself away from the galaxy...

...by giving him something that he has a personal connection to — his long-lost lightsaber.

Even if she was aware of a fine detail such as his newer green lightsaber (and there's no reason she would know something like that when it's clearly established in The Force Awakens that the Jedi are more or less legend and myth by that point), giving him a lightsaber so that he can have a lightsaber is not the point.

Giving him something to sway him after shutting himself away for years as a hermit is the point:

...Rey reached into her pack and removed his lightsaber. Taking several steps forward, she held it out to him. A plea. The galaxy's only hope.

(Official novelization, Chapter XVIII)

Praxis
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    I might also point out that she is asking him to come to the aid of the rebellion, fight for the future of the galaxy, and possibly restore balance to the force. Holding out the lightsabre and asking him to take it signifies a call to arms. Presumably Luke (being a powerful Jedi) is aware of the events taking place in the galaxy. – superluminary Feb 18 '16 at 12:41
61

First of all, Rey offering Luke her weapon shows that she means no harm. But there is much more significance to offering that particular weapon.

The lightsaber belonged to Luke's father before him. It is the only memento he ever had of Anakin Skywalker. It is an object of deep personal significance, and (so far as we know) he thought it was lost forever in Cloud City after his father cut off his hand. He will at the very least be interested to see it again.

Furthermore, while Rey could have stumbled across the lightsaber by blind luck, Luke is likely to believe that she was guided to it by the Force. The fact that Rey has the lightsaber is an indication of her importance and great destiny, which is another reason for her to show it to him.

Rey knows at least some of the lightsaber's history (having been told it on screen by Maz Kanata). She might also know that Luke has a new green lightsaber; Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3P0 are all aware of it and could have told her off camera. But Luke's new lightsaber is irrelevant to her reasons for offering him the old one.

Finally, Rey would have been searching for Luke whether she had his lightsaber or not; she wants to be trained as a Jedi, and it is strongly hinted that Luke knows something about her past and family background.

Royal Canadian Bandit
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  • Han, Leia, C-3P0, maybe. Chewbacca? I mean, he might be aware of it, but does she even understand Wookieese? – Darrel Hoffman Feb 17 '16 at 14:16
  • What a parallel then. With the spoiled yuppie running around worshipping Vader's helmet, she willingly gives up something (a very powerful something) that was his before his fall. – corsiKa Feb 17 '16 at 15:26
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    @DarrelHoffman Citation needed I confess, but isn't there a scene where Chewie hrurrfs something which Rey replies to, and Finn says something like "You understood that??". – Eight-Bit Guru Feb 17 '16 at 16:43
  • @Eight-Bit Guru: Yes, that's the scene I was thinking of. :-) – Royal Canadian Bandit Feb 17 '16 at 17:23
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    I always got the impression that most of what Chewie says is basically indistinct emotional outbursts, nothing nearly as complex as "Hey, did you know Luke Skywalker built himself a new lightsabre after losing his father's?" I'll admit that he does possess enough engineering skills to conduct repairs on the Falcon, though that tends to mostly involve just hitting things really hard. – Darrel Hoffman Feb 17 '16 at 17:52
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    @DarrelHoffman: Chewie's dialogue with Han in Jabba's dungeon would suggest otherwise. "What's that you say, Chewie? Luke's a Jedi Knight now?" – Royal Canadian Bandit Feb 17 '16 at 22:09
  • @RoyalCanadianBandit I agree with this answer completly. One more thought I'd like to put out there with this: Luke's blue lightsaber may have some sentimental signifigance. It was also his father's before him and may be the last remaining memorial of his father left in the galaxy. – Ashwin Gupta Feb 18 '16 at 00:44
  • @RoyalCanadianBandit Plus Chewie was on the skiff with Luke and Han when Luke ignited the green lightsaber. – Michael Itzoe Feb 18 '16 at 15:10
  • Isn't there also something about all apprentices handing over "their" lightsaber to a new master for inspection? Vader even takes an inspect's Luke's one to note what modifications he has made shortly before he tries to make him an apprentice. I wondered if this was a reflection of that and a hint that Rey could be considered for training. It didn't matter that Luke found a sabre to start with, it shouldn't matter that Rey did either. (OK both were given it by a meddling 3rd party encouraging things along for their own ends, so found is not the best word). – TafT Feb 19 '16 at 07:51
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Rey gave Luke the lightsaber, but she was not:

searching for Luke Skywalker to give him his lightsaber

She had it, and she was looking for him, and it was his, but they don't flow in the order you're suggesting. She was looking for him for training; having the light saber was incidental.

Didn't she just know that he already got another one?

In the scene with Rey and Han on the Millennium Falcon, it's made quite clear that she's aware of the legend of Luke Skywalker, but it's also just that - a legend. His place in history was before Rey was even born.

The viewing audience may be aware of small details like that, but these are stories carried by word of mouth over thousands of parsec by (potentially) hundreds of thousands of people. The telephone effect makes it far more likely that any information she has is wrong and/or incomplete.

T.J.L.
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    I don't believe it is clear that she was looking for training. Perhaps that is something in the book? Do you have a reference? – amalgamate Feb 16 '16 at 17:00
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    I should downvote, because a parsec is clearly a measure of speed, according to physicist Dr Solo at least. – Accio_Answer Feb 17 '16 at 09:26
  • Ou universe the Parsec is in fact a measure of distance – jean Feb 17 '16 at 09:50
  • @Accio_Answer: I seem to remember some post-movie justification of the Kessel run being a race between two moving objects, the measure of success being how many parsecs there were between the two when you finished the race. Can't remember when I heard that or why it was used as a justification, but there you go! – Joe Bloggs Feb 18 '16 at 10:40
  • @JoeBloggs In that case, a larger parsec would be a more impressive result. Yet in Episode VII, Han corrects Rey to a lower number, seemingly with disgust that she got it wrong (because the actual number is better). – nhgrif Feb 18 '16 at 13:26
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    The retcon was that the Kessel Run involved navigating between black holes, the closer you could round them, the shorter the total distance... but that really has nothing to do with this question or answer. – T.J.L. Feb 18 '16 at 13:28
  • @T.J.L.: You're right. My tongue-in-cheek joke was not meant to be the springboard for a discussion. – Accio_Answer Feb 18 '16 at 16:38
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Because it belongs to him.

His father built it; he inherited it. Despite Kylo Ren's insistence that it belongs to him as some sort of heir to Vader's legacy, (which the light saber itself refuted by responding to Rey rather than to him when they both reached out with the Force to take it) that light saber belonged to Anakin Skywalker. Vader's light saber was red, like other Sith light sabers.

In returning his property to him, Rey is showing him respect, which is an absolute requirement if she is to become his padawan. He may well lend one of his light sabers (whether one of the two we know of, or some other he or one of his students has since constructed) back to her to use during her training, and may even at some point convey ownership to her outright, but that must follow her acknowledgement of his clear title to his father's light saber.

Besides, her training will not be complete until she builds her own, which will be hers in a way no transfer of ownership can ever truly convey.

Monty Harder
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    If they make hers pink or some such nonsense, I'm going to freakin lose it. – coblr Feb 16 '16 at 23:37
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    @fractalspawn It's okay, Lucas is no longer in charge :) – Jane S Feb 17 '16 at 01:58
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    Attachment is forbidden... – T.J.L. Feb 17 '16 at 16:02
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    @JaneS - Perhaps, but J.J. isn't either. The new writer/director, doesn't have a huge oeuvre, and I'm not that familiar with it, but it certainly doesn't look like he has an impressive track record of reasonable depictions of women to point to. – T.E.D. Feb 17 '16 at 19:18
  • What is inherently wrong with a pink lightsaber? I would expect that a 'saber of such blade color would be wielded by someone like the Hello Kitty Darth Vader (search Google Images if you dare), but that still doesn't make it wrong. – Codes with Hammer Feb 17 '16 at 19:44
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    @CodeswithHammer - Well, red sabers are generally for Dark Side users, so I'd expect a pink one to be wielded by the Delores Umbrage of the Star Wars universe. – T.E.D. Feb 17 '16 at 22:50
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    I'm quite sure Luke will give her his green saber, mark my words... – Juha Untinen Feb 18 '16 at 10:11
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    She is clearly gonna build a double-bladed lightsaber, as you can tell from the movie posters with the lightsaber and the staff lined up side-by-side, and she can already fight with a staff. Maybe it will be purple to make up for the fact that the only main character they gave a purple lightsaber to so far was THE BLACK GUY. – JackArbiter Feb 18 '16 at 17:00
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    @JackArbiter - They didn't "give" it to him. SLJ specifically insisited on purple. His justification seems to have been that his character was especially "badass". :-) – T.E.D. Feb 19 '16 at 23:16
  • @T.E.D. - Ha, I thought about it after I commented - he wears a lot of purple in person, so I thought "well maybe he asked for it," but then it was too late to edit. I didn't actually intend to invoke the race card other than to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek. Thank you for the info :) – JackArbiter Feb 19 '16 at 23:33
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    @JackArbiter The first cinematic Jedi to use a double-bladed saber... now that would be awesome! – TylerH May 06 '16 at 16:02
  • @T.E.D. and Jack - Samuel L Jackson has a purple item in every movie. It's something he does. In Star Wars he couldn't have purple clothing or jewelry because the Jedi are largely a monastic order, but he could have a purple lightsaber blade. – TylerH May 06 '16 at 16:03
  • @TylerH - That's true. He even had a purple snake in Snakes on a Plane. http://cbsnews1.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2006/08/11/d463d4e3-a642-11e2-a3f0-029118418759/thumbnail/620x350/ccdfcf275b3be38027a0ff2613772ef5/image1886146x.jpg – T.E.D. May 06 '16 at 16:22
  • @T.E.D. http://movies.stackexchange.com/questions/646/what-purple-items-have-samuel-jacksons-characters-had More, if you're interested – TylerH May 06 '16 at 16:47
  • @TylerH - Edited that answer to add the snake. Its in the review queue, if someone wants to approve it. :-) – T.E.D. May 06 '16 at 18:10
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Assuming a tool or weapon is given to do something with it, there are two obvious uses of this lightsaber now:

  • Fight the First Order.
  • Train a Jedi (likely Ray).

The latter would match his own teacher, Joda. Joda trained Luke but never returned to fight himself, probably assuming he is already too old.

h22
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