Of all the characters that we're excited to see again in Star Wars: Episode VIII it's possible none is as intriguing as the villain, Kylo Ren. Now the actor that plays him says that the new film will allow them to delve a bit deeper into the character and allow the audience to see a bit more about who he is. Adam Driver says that there is one aspect of the character we didn't see in The Force Awakens that he will get to show in Episode VIII.
"I think --- maybe this is such a general answer but you know --- humanity. Even though it's very much a blockbuster movie, there was no taking that for granted, and that we were forced to be general. There was a lot of plot points that we knew were operating in the first one, that we get to explain more in the second one, to make both of them make sense."
While we saw more emotion from Kylo Ren then we were used to seeing from your average Sith Lord, the character in Star Wars: The Force Awakens was, as Adam Driver says to Larry King, pretty general. Kylo Ren was the villain and as such he had a part to play within the larger story. While many have been critical of the fact that The Force Awakens seemed to be following a "How to make a Star Wars movie" instruction manual, Driver seems to imply that, for the purposes of the first film, that's what they had to do. Everybody knew that the first movie back had a job to do as a blockbuster and so that was their goal.
However, now that the setup has been done, the sequel gets to drill a little deeper and get to know the characters a bit more. It appears this will be the case for Ben Solo, aka Kylo Ren. This likely means that we will get to know more about who Ben Solo was before he became Kylo Ren. Some of this information was probably part of the backstory of Star Wars: The Force Awakens that the actors were aware of, even if the audience was not. This is likely what Adam Driver is referring to as far as plot points the new movie will get to explain. We'll likely understand the how and why regarding the young Solo's turn to the Dark Side, which may give some more depth to some of the things we saw in the first movie as well.
We certainly can't wait to see where Star Wars: Episode VIII goes with the story. We can't wait to see anything at all. We're now less than a year out and the movie doesn't even have a title, never mind a trailer, to show us at least a little bit about what we're going to get the film hits screens in December.
