#finn meta

and it’s not just bc of the cheating/puck/baby lie of it all, which would always be just. horrifically bad on its own, and if you’re finn i don’t know how you get past that—the lie more than anything. it could have affected the *rest of his life* - even if she didn’t keep the baby, if quinn kept the lie up( finn would likely always he wondering and thinking about the daughter he wasn’t ready to have but felt like abandoned/gave up on/left behind. he expresses this as a real fear in s1! and what if one day that baby grew up and decided she wanted to know her biological parents?

anyway. if you’re finn, i don’t know how you get past all of that.

but she also LITERALLY chose sam over him. she said, to finn’s face, “i choose sam”. and then sam dumped *her*! like? did she tell finn she changed her mind? or did he just accept he was second-choice? i don’t feel bad for finn in the context of the finn-quinn-sam love triangle, bc he it’s not like he was hapless in all that, he pretty actively pursued her. (after she kissed him, but still.)

Finn uses the force and finds out the atrocity that happened to the clones and that they were enslaved to Palpatines will just like he was enslaved to the First Order and finally stages his stormtrooper rebellion along with Jannah to avenge the clones and every stormtrooper indoctrinated by the Empire and First Order.

They could also bring in Kix in this story to avenge his brothers!! Sweet Kix who didn’t get to see the end of The Clone Wars and missed seeing any of his brothers free. Who was too late to save his brothers but can help free these troopers that remind him so much of them.

I've just been thinking about Finn lately and how his journey went and I just had this thought that I wanted to share.

Finn's entire identity starts with and revolves around Poe. Poe gave him a name. Poe gave him an identity. Poe gave him the freedom and the will to choose. Poe, to an extent, is his identity. Poe created Finn from FN-2187. Before Poe, Finn was just a number, worthless, unmemorable, and expendable.

And then Finn discovered that he did have the right to choose for himself, and he chose. He made choices because he suddenly could. He chose Rey for a while, and then he chose Rose, but eventually he came back to Poe because he has a deeper bond and connection with Poe than he does with anyone else. And we see this, in TROS, over and over, his choosing Poe. He chooses to become a General for Poe. He agrees to go with Poe, to serve with him, to stay with him, to be by his side. Finn chooses Poe because, years ago, back in TFA, Poe chose him, and for the first time ever, he had a purpose.

For Rey it’s always been about her family, coming to grips with what happened back when she was abandoned on Jakku and it doesn’t matter what exactly happened or who did it for this to be her center and character focus.

What’s more, she’s now stuck in a role she never wanted. She didn’t want to be a Jedi or hero, she wanted her family to care for her. But now she’s stuck with the legacy of Rey the Jedi, the possible savior of the galaxy the same way Luke was stuck with his legacy of Luke Skywalker.

Rey’s path in TRoS, whoever she turns out to be, will be about finding a different path than Luke took, coming to peace with the past and finding out who she really is and all comes to a head.

Finn on the other hand have always been about the larger struggle, about the one man who went against the system and about the Force. It wasn’t subtle in TFA and the trailer is even less subtle about it.

Like his lines are basically “The Force, hey did I mention the Force, I think the Force put us here”. He is also the only one of the new characters, including Rey and Kylo to talk about the Force and the Force’s importance. In a trilogy that began with “The Force Awakens”.

What’s more, his lines neatly becomes a frame for the trailer when taken together with Luke’s and Leia’s, “The Force will be with you. Always,” at the end.

I’ve seen some ppl throwing shade at John Boyega for being dissatisfied that his story arcs as Finn kept him away from Rey and Ben’s story. Whatever your feelings about the other recent dramas involving his comments and online activity, I don’t think it’s right to use this as a reason to be hateful towards him. (Shouldn’t be being hateful toward him at all, but. That’s not an argument I expect some people can comprehend enough nuance to understand.)

While I do love the last Jedi and think his arc in it is great and important, let’s be fair to Finn.

I DO think he should’ve been included more in Rey and Ben’s journey, ESPECIALLY since it’s now canon that Finn is force sensitive. I don’t understand why TROS would make the choice to give him those abilities and then treat him the way it did, but I don’t understand much of why that movie did anything.

And I will note that his story in TLJ could have worked with this if TROS had been brave enough and smart enough, as I was naive enough to hope, to work with it. But TROS failed to come through for Finn (as it did literally everyone else in the movie) the way it should’ve.

Remember how Finn’s journey (aka the entire plot of the sequel trilogy) starts with Ben-as-Kylo-Ren, the conflicted dark warrior, showing mercy to Finn-as-FN-2187, the stormtrooper who disobeyed orders? How TFA ends with Ben screaming “traitor!” and brutally slashing him in rage and pain because Finn used his weakness, the very mercy he knew he shouldn’t have given him, to escape the First Order and join forces against him?

That needed resolution.

Finn and Ben needed to come face to face again, not in combat, but in resolving their conflict and understanding eachother. Finn should’ve been able to show him that the weakness of mercy was actually incredible strength, and won’t always only be used to betray you. Ben should’ve learned from Finn what it means to fight for a cause because you believe in it instead of blindly following in someone else’s footsteps.

Finn should’ve learned from Ben that even those still ensconced in the dark are worthy of compassion too. Ben should’ve taught Finn to open himself up to the force and the power he possesses, and shown him what the dark offers.

They should’ve learned from eachother that where you come from, the choices you’ve made, don’t define who you have to be for the rest of your life.

Further, the cutting Finn out of Rey’s relationship with Ben is what truly sidelines him as a character, because as her first real friend, as the first person who came back for her and cared intensely about her wellbeing, that he isn’t privy to this massively important aspect of her life at all suggests that Rey doesn’t value or trust him on anywhere near the same level that he does her. That is deeply sad. Ben is literally her soulmate. And Finn doesn’t, and may never, know this vital piece of who Rey is.

She’s incredibly important to both of them and she should’ve been able to have a open and unconflicted relationship with two of the most important people in her life. Instead she hides the truth about her real relationship with Ben from Finn, and never tries to introduce Ben to even the idea of who her friends are as people and why they’re important to her.

Finn and Ben should understand eachother on a very deep and fundamental level and I’m deeply sad that not only are they both deprived of this incredible relationship, but Finn ALSO never gets to learn about the powers he’s given.

He gets to have “a feeling” whenever the plot needs him to figure something out, “a feeling” that takes credit for things that should be attributed to his moral character and bravery. He doesn’t learn to fight with or connect to the energy that binds the universe; he’s left out of the rooms where the force users (Ben and Rey, Rey and Leia) interact and share their fears and their knowledge about the power that is rightfully his, too.

This is my drabble fic for both the @gleepotluckbigbang Drabble December and the 2019 @klaineadvent.  The GPBB story is about Carole Hudson-Hummel and the KA story is (mostly) about Kurt.  Mostly canon compliant but the world needs more Carole so here it is.  :)

GPBB Drabble December prompt: Memories

Klaine Advent prompt: Lecture

I did a Five Times fic for Carole so just ignore how this installment messes with the timeline.  We are still in S3.

The second Christmas without Christopher was the hardest.  People reached out to her on the first one, they brought meals and toys for baby Finn.  She felt cared for and supported.  But the second one... well, by then most people had moved on.  She and Finn had a rhythm and people did not see her as needing help.  She had always tried not to show it.  While little Finn toddled around tearing up the leftover wrapping paper and climbing inside the one big box, she remembers looking at their shoebox apartment, sparsely decorated with only a string of lights, and worrying that this was all it would ever be.

The first Christmas as the Hudson-Hummels was just she hoped it could be.  She and Burt were your typical newlyweds, making every excuse to scar their sons with strategically placed mistleoe.  When Kurt was finally home on break from Dalton, he was a busy bee making the house festive.  She came home to scented candles and fresh baked cookies nearly every day.  The house was alive with songs and holiday cheer.

A year later, she thought the house might burst from all the people.  Maybe a little too much holiday cheer — certainly a few too many songs.  With Finn and Rachel, Kurt and Blaine, and a their new live-in son Sam it was already lot.  When half of the glee club is under one roof, the others are usually not far off.  It was a big, bustling mess of people and joy.  The house was pregnant with promise.

Last Christmas had been hard.  When she promised her sister to finally come visit over the holiday, she had planned on having Burt by her side.  He got along well enough with the rest of the family so it made all the micro-conflicts her sister tried to start feel less important.  They could get in and get out in a couple days.  But then Burt had gotten the news from the doctor and wanted to tell Kurt in person.  So he flew one direction and she and Finn drove another.  The two halves were split, but at least it gave her time to catch up with Finn.  He was starting to get over the bruise of losing the club.  Moving forward had been hard for him the last year or so.  She hoped next year would be a fresh start.

This year she can’t escape the memories.  All the years with him picking out the tree, opening gifts, and stringing lights rattled around in her brain.  He was gone but always with her.  Sometimes the haunt of him was too strong.  There was a box in the attic she couldn’t bring herself to open, not willing to risk coming across his stocking.  There was so much he had never done.  Never completed the path he was on at school.  Never came back home with a baby of his own to toddle around in the gift wrap.  Everything was simply cut short.  He was nowhere and everywhere all the time.

------------------------

This was worse than the pamphlets.  So much worse.  Kurt squirmed in his spot at the dining room table.  Blaine tried to reach out and take his hand but Kurt flinched and shooed him away.  Not now, dummy!

He watched his dad stand up, then sit down, then stand again, then readjust his hat, then sit down again and look him square in the eye.  Where was a good sinkhole when you needed one?

“I get it, I was young once, too...” Burt started.  Kurt did his best to not listen and focus on the incredibly interesting wall opposite him.  In his peripheral vision, he could see Blaine furiously and earnestly nodding his head in assent as his dad continued on with his lecture.

“...so as long as you can respect those rules, we won’t have a problem.”

Upon first viewing of TFA with no prior knowledge of the movie, most thought that when Snoke and Kylo were discussing an Awakening in the Force, that they were referring to Finn, but post TFA, various people arrived at the conclusion that it must have been Rey. Certain fans even claimed that Finn’s role in TFA, and thus the trilogy, was a red herring created to keep Rey’s force abilities a secret. I’m here to tell you, that’s a load of kriffing barnacles!