The modern Star Wars movies have produced a number of popular “ships” which each have their own devoted supporters online. One that’s really grown in popularity since The Last Jedi though is “Reylo,” with swathes of fans hoping for Daisy Ridley’s Rey and Adam Driver’s Kylo Ren to get together in future films.
Even if you don’t subscribe to the idea yourself, you can probably understand why some can see a romantic connection between the pair. As The Last Jedi made clear, the duo have a lot in common and their shared scenes in Episode VIII got very intense. Not least the infamous “Shirtless Kylo” moment. But nothing in the film itself outright stated that Rey and Ren are attracted to each other.
The novelization of The Last Jedi, on the other hand, allegedly does. Some fans have been lucky enough to get their hands on advanced copies of the book and have pointed out a passage that pretty conclusively hints that at least Ben Solo has feelings for Rey.
The scene described occurs in the movie when Kylo asks Rey to join him so they can usurp Snoke as rulers of the First Order together. The novelization heavily suggests Ren has some other kind of partnership on his mind as well, with the key phrase here being: “Rey realizes Kylo’s churning emotions are not only about himself, but also about her.”
In effect, then, a romantic connection between Ren and Rey has now been made canon. This novelization is being promoted as very closely tied with the film, with it even being called an “Expanded Edition.” Writer/director Rian Johnson worked together with author Jason Fry to insert scenes into the book that never made it into the pic and given his close oversight of the project, we could infer that it was Johnson’s own intention to hint at this romance on the big screen.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi‘s novelization is set to release on March 6th (pre-order here), while the film itself arrives on Digital HD on March 13th, with the Blu-Ray/DVD following on March 27th.