Daisy Ridley starred in the new Star Wars movie trilogy, and while plenty of people enjoyed the series, a lot of people had many negative things to say.
Ridley reflected on the backlash in an interview with Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast recently. She said the response is “still upsetting,” even years later. 2015’s The Force Awakens was more universally enjoyed than its sequels The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker, which some Star Wars fans had issues with.
“You don’t want people to feel like you’ve not served the thing they’re a fan of,” she said (via Variety). “But [The Last Jedi] was so divisive…it felt like the first one everyone was responsive in the same way. The second, super divisive. The last one, super divisive. It didn’t change how I felt about it.”
Among other things, Star Wars fans criticized the decision for The Last Jedi to reveal that Rey was an orphan with no famous lineage, only to have that change in The Rise of Skywalker when she’s revealed to be Emperor Palpatine’s granddaughter. People also didn’t enjoy the “Reylo” storyline between Rey and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) that culminated in the two kissing.
Ridley, however, believes the kiss was earned and served its purpose as a storytelling device.
“I felt like we all…it felt earned,” Ridley said of the kiss. “What was interesting again is intentionality. My feeling in that moment was that it was a goodbye, and that felt earned. You can call a kiss a thousand things, but I felt it was a goodbye. That whole scene felt emotional and I felt I was saying goodbye to the job, too.”
Ridley is coming back to play Rey again in a new Star Wars film from Oscar-winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy. Ridley recently told Variety that the story for this movie is “cool as shit.”
“No spoilers, but [Obaid-Chinoy] gave me a rundown of the entire story. If it weren’t amazing, I would have been like, ‘OK, call me in five years.’ But it’s worthwhile,” she said.
Other Star Wars movies in the works include a film from The Mandalorian’s Dave Filoni and a “dawn of the Jedi” movie from Indiana Jones director James Mangold.
