Ben Solo

"Forgive me. I feel it again&hellip; the call to the light. Supreme Leader senses it. Show me again, the power of the darkness, and I will let nothing stand in our way. Show me, grandfather, and I will finish what you started."

- Kylo Ren to Darth Vader's mask

Kylo Ren was a Force-sensitive human male who trained as a Jedi pupil under Jedi Master Luke Skywalker before turning to the dark side of the Force and joining the Knights of Ren. He was born with the name Ben to Princess Leia Organa and the smuggler Han Solo. In his youth, he displayed traits similar to that of his grandfather, Anakin Skywalker, who had turned to the dark side and became the Sith Lord Darth Vader. Ben, who was sent by Organa to be trained by his uncle, fell under the influence of Supreme Leader Snoke of the First Order and destroyed the new generation of Jedi that Luke Skywalker was training. Skywalker vanished, while Ben took the name Kylo Ren and served the First Order. His goal was to complete what Darth Vader once started and destroy the Jedi.

Years later, Ren sought the remaining fragment he needed to build a map that would lead to Skywalker's location, so the last Jedi could be destroyed. Ren hunted the astromech droid, BB-8, who carried the map and tracked the droid to Takodana after learning that the droid was in the possession of Han Solo. There, Ren also discovered Rey, a Force-sensitive who had seen the map and was helping BB-8 bring the map to the Resistance. Ren brought Rey to Starkiller Base, a First Order stronghold and superweapon, and attempted to probe her mind for the map information, but she resisted and escaped. The Resistance soon attacked the Starkiller weapon to destroy it, and Ren encountered Solo once again during the battle. He killed his father, hoping to eliminate the light that Ren struggled with inside himself, and tracked Rey and the fugitive stormtrooper Finn to a forest as the Starkiller was under siege. He engaged both in a lightsaber duel, besting Finn before being beaten and injured by Rey. As the Starkiller began to implode from the Resistance attack, Supreme Leader Snoke ordered General Hux, the base's commander, to bring Ren before him so his training could be completed.

Early life
"There's too much Vader in him."

- Han Solo, reflecting on the similarities between Kylo Ren and Darth Vader

The son of Leia Organa and Han Solo, Ben was sent to study alongside other Jedi students at a young age, being instructed and led by his uncle Jedi Master Luke Skywalker. While Ben showed great potential as a Force-user, he began to develop an unhealthy obsession with his grandfather Anakin Skywalker, being inspired by his exploits as the Sith Lord Darth Vader. Feeling that he must uphold the legacy of Vader, Ben betrayed and destroyed his former Jedi peers, preventing Skywalker from fully restoring the Jedi Order. Having fallen under the influence of the mysterious Force-user Snoke, Ben became his apprentice, joining Snoke's First Order and the Knights of Ren, taking on the name Kylo Ren. He built his own lightsaber, a dangerous and ragged design, using an unstable crystal, making the blade distorted and crackle unlike that of a typical lightsaber, and started wearing a metal helmet. Ren was at the forefront of the First Order's attempts to destroy the Resistance (an organization that opposed the First Order) and the Jedi, with his primary concern being the location and extermination of his former master Luke Skywalker, the only Jedi known to have escaped Ren's uprising.

Jakku
"There is no need for concern. Together we will destroy the Resistance—and the last Jedi."

- Kylo Ren

The Resistance was also looking for Skywalker and both sides were after a map that led to his location. The First Order had recovered most of it in the archives of the Empire, but one piece was missing, and the Resistance found it first. Their best pilot, Poe Dameron, was sent to the desert planet Jakku to recover the fragment from Lor San Tekka, but Ren and the First Order were close behind. As the stormtroopers attacked, Dameron hid the map in his droid BB-8, who fled into the desert. Ren had traveled to Jakku personally and laid siege to the small village, executing its leader and the surviving villagers and taking Dameron prisioner. He was taken to the First Order's Star Destroyer Finalizer, where Ren tortured and interrogated the young starfighter pilot for information, successfully learning about BB-8. The First Order offered a bounty to anyone capable of retrieving the droid and sent a group of troopers to search for it, but lost contact with the defeated group shortly after.

Realizing that he needed help, Ren returned to Starkiller Base, where he sought council with his mentor and leader of the First Order, Supreme Leader Snoke. It was at this time that Snoke told Ren of an awakening he had felt in the Force. The Supreme Leader also foresaw that Ren would eventually confront Han Solo, and in order for him to overcome the light side of the Force, he would need to kill his father. Ren stated that Solo meant nothing to him, and that his journey to the Dark Side would soon be completed.

News of BB-8's whereabouts soon reached the First Order. This time it had been spotted in a cantina on Takodana.

Capturing Rey
"You still want to kill me.''" "''That happens when you're being hunted by a creature in a mask."

- Kylo Ren and Rey

After arriving on Takodana, the First Order attacked Maz Kanata's castle hoping to find BB-8. Ren searched for the droid in the nearby woods. But instead of finding the last key to Skywalker, he found Rey, a scavenger from Jakku who had helped BB-8 and the former stormtrooper Finn escape the planet. After a brief confrontation, Ren probed her mind and discovered that she had already seen the last part of the map to Skywalker. After rendering Rey unconcious he called back his troops and returned to his shuttle to interrogate her at Starkiller Base.

Ren's interrogation proved to be useless, as Rey was not only able to resist his powers, but she was able to turn his power against him and see visions of what he feared most: that Ren would never be as powerful as Darth Vader. A distressed Ren returned to Snoke, informing his mentor of Rey who ordered his apprentice to bring the girl before him, but she had escaped while they talked.

Confrontation with Solo
"I'm being torn apart. I want to be free of this pain. I know what I have to do but I don't know if I have the strength to do it. Will you help me?''" "''Yes. Anything."

- Kylo Ren and Han Solo

While searching for Rey at Starkiller Base, Ren was confronted by his father, Han Solo, who was attempting to destroy the thermal oscillator using explosives with Chewbacca, Finn and Rey. Solo pleaded with Ren to turn his back on the dark side and redeem himself for the choices he had made, offering anything he wanted if he would come back with him. Ren held out his lightsaber, seemingly offering it, but then, in an attempt to overcome the light side of the Force completely, he ignited the lightsaber, plunging it into his father's heart. As the dying Solo looked down in shock, Ren thanked him for giving him what he had wanted. An enraged Chewbacca severely wounded Ren by shooting him in the side with his bowcaster, allowing Finn and Rey to escape. Ren chased the two down into the woods and dueled with Finn, who used the blue lightsaber that had once belonged to Ren's grandfather Anakin Skywalker. Ren defeated and gravely wounded the former Stormtrooper, but not without receiving a wound to the shoulder. With Finn incapacitated, he then turned his attention to Rey, attempting to use the Force to bring the Skywalker lightsaber to him to strike her down.

Rey intercepted the lightsaber and engaged in her own fight with Ren. Though being the only one formally trained in lightsaber combat of the two, Ren received significant wounds during their battle and was eventually overpowered by Rey's use of the Force. She knocked him down with the lightsaber, leaving a gruesome facial scar. Yet, before she could kill him, the Starkiller base's destruction split the land between them. Rey then fled, eventually being rescued by Chewbacca from the ensuing planetary collapse in the Millennium Falcon. Ren was saved from the base's catastrophic explosion by General Hux, the base commander, on orders from Snoke to bring his fallen apprentice to him.

Personality and traits
"I am immune to the light."

- Kylo Ren

Kylo Ren was a male human. Before he adopted the name of Kylo Ren, he was known as Ben. As Kylo Ren, he wore a black hood and cloak, a dark mask, and wielded a dangerous and crudely-built lightsaber he assembled himself. Ren wore a mask and helmet that altered his voice much like Darth Vader, his idol. However, unlike Vader, who needed a mask to keep him alive and hide a severely burned physique, Ren did not need a mask. It can be argued that he adopted a mask to be more like his grandfather, furthering the symbolism that the dark side acts as a tomb. His lightsaber, based on an ancient design dating back to the Great Scourge of Malachor, relied upon a cracked kyber crystal that could barely contain the power of the weapon, necessitating the lateral plasma vents that produced its signature crossguard quillons. The fractured crystal was also responsible for the unstable, serrated appearance of the weapon's red plasma blades. The crossguard exhaust ports were also useful in combat, such as when Kylo and Finn were pushing their lightsabers against one another, and Kylo was able to injure Finn's shoulder with his crossguard.

Ren was obsessed with the fallen Sith Lord Darth Vader, his maternal grandfather and a powerful figure of the First Galactic Empire, and was believed to have modeled his appearance and behavior after him, and vows to finish what the Sith Lord started. One of the motivations for his obsession was the duty he feels to Vader. When questioned by Rey on board the Starkiller Base, Rey affirmed Ren's true fear--that he would never be as strong as Darth Vader&mdash;much to the frustration of Ren. The dark warrior was also known for his fiery temper, but compared to Vader, Ren seems less able to control his own anger. Met with adversity, he would throw dramatic tantrums where he might lash out with his lightsaber at anything within sight, devastating equipment simply to express his frustration. If they could, stormtroopers seemed to prefer to stay far away from the mentally unstable Kylo Ren when he was in that mood.

Despite his loyalty to the First Order and his devotion to Vader's legacy, Ren demonstrated deep conflict within himself. In spite of his commitment to Snoke and the dark side, he constantly felt the pull of the light and his family, and struggled to keep himself disconnected from his former life. In those regards, he was quite similar to his grandfather. Snoke believed Ren to be an ideal embodiment of the Force: a focal point of both the dark and light side.

Powers and abilities
"You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force."

- Kylo to Rey

Like his grandfather, uncle, and mother, Kylo Ren possessed a powerful connection to the Force. He was skilled in the use of telekinesis, able to use it to immobilize Poe Dameron and Rey in place, stop a blaster bolt in midair for an extended period of time after focusing, and send Rey flying with a Force push. Kylo Ren was also able to telepathically torture individuals like he did with Poe Dameron, and use the power of a mind probe to telepathically extract information from his victims. Ren was also able to sense disturbances in the Force such as when he felt an awakening in the Force and the presence of Han Solo in Starkiller Base. His skill with a lightsaber was somewhat lacking in comparison, as he was beaten by the untrained Rey in lightsaber combat. However, this was likely due to the fact that he had been injured by Chewbacca prior to their fight. He also possessed a strong tolerance to pain, able to continue fighting despite being shot by Chewbacca and wounded by both Finn and Rey.

Behind the scenes
"I’ve written four ‘Star Wars’ movies now, and there’s never been a character quite like the one that Adam plays."

- Lawrence Kasdan

Kylo Ren was first revealed in the first teaser trailer for Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens on November 28, 2014. Ren's name was revealed by Entertainment Weekly in an exclusive trading card. He also appeared in the second teaser trailer, and will appear on all The Force Awakens merchandise. On May 4, 2015, it was confirmed by video footage released by Vanity Fair that Kylo Ren is portrayed by Adam Driver.

J.J. Abrams wanted The Force Awakens to depict an evolving villain as well as a hero's journey, and tapped into parental fears of a child gone wrong in creating Kylo Ren. He felt they needed to be bold with Kylo Ren. "The only reason why Kylo Ren has any hope of being a worthy successor [to Darth Vader] is because we lose one of the most beloved characters," he said.

A similar character, Jacen Solo, appeared in the continuity of Star Wars Legends. Like Kylo Ren, Jacen was the son of Han Solo and Leia Organa who was trained as a Jedi by Luke Skywalker, only to turn to the dark side and take a new name, Darth Caedus. A villainous character named Kybo Ren appeared in the 1985 Star Wars: Droids animated series. Michael Arndt stated Kylo Ren's backstory came about from needing a rationale for the original trilogy's main characters to have separated after Return of the Jedi.

Appearances

 * Before the Awakening
 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens
 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens novelization
 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens junior novelization
 * The Force Awakens storybook
 * Lightsaber Rescue

Non-canon appearances

 * Disney Infinity 3.0
 * Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes