One of my favorite scenes in tfa is when the’re at Maz’s bar and while Maz is being all cryptic and stuff, Rey eats the food on the table. And everytime the camera’s on her she has something else to eat. First I thought oay maybe they used different shots of Rey in this scene but then I thought, maybe Rey is just eating really fast because she wants to try all this new, food. I bet the poor baby has never eaten fruit in her entire life, no wonder she’d try al the new stuff Maz has
According to the book this is exactly what she’s doing.
Finn is eating plenty too, because Stormtroopers are fed pretty shitty, tasteless food, so this is all new and interesting to him as well. But he keeps looking at Rey who’s just scarfing down everything she’s given, then looking around for more.
Actually, now I really start thinking about this scene I’m getting a lump in my throat. Rey who’s never had enough to eat, who has always lived in borderline – and sometimes likely outright – starvation, is given to eat anything she wants. Maz is really, really nice to both Finn and Rey in the book, even nicer than she is in the movie. First thing she says to them is “sorry about this” and when Finn asks what she’s apologising for she answers “whatever it is Han dragged you into”. She definitely would be giving Rey whatever she wanted to eat.
re: rey and food, one of the saddest things in ‘before the awakening’ (where her story was the saddest for me) is that rey has repeatedly gone so hungry it made her weak to the point where she had trouble moving. there’s a scene in the book where she gets stuck indoors for several days and forced to skip meals because of a storm and when she finally goes out she’s feeling dizzy and faint but she goes to work anyway. rey constantly thinks about the value of things in terms of how many portions she could trade them for. in another scene she finds the remains of a ship and digs up some sealed instant food thing from the wreckage that’s still good to eat and some of those things are sweets and she loves then and that BROKE ME.
i’m saying, sure, finn was fed shitty bland food all his life, he’s going to have a ball discovering new things. but if anyone in this trio has deep food-related anxieties, it’s definitely not finn.
If anybody’s read Rey’s Survival Guide (which is the loveliest little book, FYI), you’ll see the “salvage = food” thing is huge in her thinking.
There’s a whole section on a downed X-Wing she found, and what she was able to take from it. I can’t attach a photo in this type of post, annoyingly, but beside the little sketch of what she got and where (in case the reader needs to do the same, which is the point of the book– writing a guide for anyone stuck on Jakku), she’s written in block capitals “TOTAL SALVAGE FROM SHIP 37 PORTIONS THANK YOU YELLOW-4!!!” and a smiley face.
Yellow-4 is the name of the ship/pilot.
There’s also a part explaining about how she found a downed TIE fighter, took his gear (because he didn’t need it), and then buried him in his uniform.
Rey is honestly one of the sweetest and saddest characters to have ever have graced fiction. I may be all about the Kylux, but my god, that girl would break your heart.
Stardust and Sinew 