Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker saw Rey continuing her Jedi training now with Leia as her master, but it was still a boring part of her story, which was a repeated mistake in the Star Wars saga. The Star Wars universe began in 1977 with the movie now known as Star Wars: A New Hope, which along with the sequels Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back and Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, forms what’s known as the “original trilogy”. These movies introduced the audience to heroes Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa, and Han Solo, as well as to villains Darth Vader and Darth Sidious, whose presence would linger in the saga.
The Star Wars universe expanded between 1999 and 2005 with a prequel trilogy, focused on the backstory of Anakin Skywalker, from his days as a young slave in Tatooine to his rise as Sith lord Darth Vader. Following the acquisition of Lucasfilm by Disney in 2012, the studio started working on a third trilogy, with the purpose of closing the Skywalker saga and introducing a new generation of heroes and villains. The main focus of the sequel trilogy were the stories of Rey, a young scavenger with a dark family backstory, and Kylo Ren, Leia and Han’s son and Luke’s apprentice who turned to the dark side. Rey was eventually trained as a Jedi, and while that was an important part of her arc, it ended up being a very boring part of it as well.
The training of each Jedi apprentice varies depending on their master, but it includes the specialized study of subjects like military history, diplomacy, science, investigation, and medical science, along with training in resistance towards mind probes and interrogation. Of course, Jedi apprentices also train in lightsaber combat and different Force techniques. Jedi training as it is isn’t boring, but how the Star Wars saga approached it was. Luke was introduced as a young man who knew nothing and not long after learning who Ben Kenobi really was, he began training with the former Jedi master. Following Kenobi’s death, Luke was trained by Yoda, but the audience only got to see bits of Yoda’s peculiar ways of training his new apprentice. The Star Wars saga then jumped to a fully skilled Luke Skywalker, and the same pattern was repeated in the prequel and sequel trilogies.
Anakin’s training was very similar, going from a nine-year-old kid with no knowledge to a mildly adept trainee to an advanced apprentice. Rey’s training was no different, with Star Wars: The Force Awakens introducing her as a skilled young woman with no proper training (she was just that good), to being trained for a couple of days by Luke Skywalker in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, to the final days of her training with Leia, which instead of being a full arc was just a quick way to wrap that part of her story up before the rest of the events of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker happened. The movies failed to show the intermediate stages and trials that go between those phases in Jedi training, and with that, it left many questions about the training, while also making this part of the stories of the characters (particularly Rey’s) quite boring.
While some of it has been addressed in other Star Wars media (canon and non-canon), and it will surely be a big focus of the Obi-Wan Kenobi TV show on Disney+, the Star Was saga focused on the same stages of Jedi training and completely missed the chance to show more of it. Although that doesn’t mean the Star Wars universe can’t make up for it, it won’t change the fact that Rey’s training could have been a lot more interesting had the writers left the old ways behind.
