Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker's Force dyad was one of the most George Lucas-inspired concepts in the sequel trilogy. Resembling the Star Wars creator's original vision for the Force and where he wanted to take the sequels before Disney purchased Lucasfilm, the idea of a powerful bond in the Force seen between Rey and Kylo Ren would have fit right in. However, the concept was largely wasted on-screen in the established Star Wars canon.
As seen in The Rise of Skywalker, Rey and Kylo Ren learn that they exist as a dyad, a powerful bond between Force wielders who complement each other with their respective uses of the light and dark. Unseen for generations in the Star Wars canon, Rey and Kylo's bond explained their ability to interact with each other regardless of the physical space. It also made them an incredibly potent duo, with the resurrected Palpatine using their shared power to restore himself. However, there's more to a Force dyad than was revealed in The Rise of Skywalker, and it would have fit very well with how Lucas views the Force.
George Lucas Believed The Force Was All About Symbiosis
The Force and its dual aspects are typically depicted with the yin and yang concepts of interconnected opposites. However, "balance in the Force" meant something even deeper for Lucas, which he likely would have delved into further with his original vision for the sequels. For example, Lucas planned to flesh out the important relationship between Midi-chlorians and the Whills. Midi-chlorians are microscopic organisms that generate the Force and exist in all living things, and the single-celled intelligent life forms known as the Whills feed off their power, offering destinies to Force-sensitives such as Anakin Skywalker (essentially serving as the will of the Force).
According to Lucas in Paul Duncan's The Star Wars Archives: Episodes I-III 1999-2005, Midi-chlorians and the Whills existed in a co-dependent bond of symbiosis in order for the Force to exist and be tapped into, as well for life to persist in the galaxy. Additionally, this key relationship of symbiotic reliance is something that would have been built upon further in Lucas' sequels, with audiences getting to see the microscopic world of the Whills. As such, it's evident that Lucas saw balance in the Force as being something far more than just the opposition of light and dark, the way in which the Force is most often depicted.
On a much larger scale beyond the microscopic, The Clone Wars animated series featured an arc that saw Anakin Skywalker facing his destiny as the Chosen One following his arrival in the supernatural realm known as Mortis alongside his master Obi-Wan Kenobi and apprentice Ahsoka Tano. There they met the beings known as the Father, Son, and Daughter, with each one connected to the Force's core aspects. The Son represented the dark, while the Daughter was the light. The Father kept them both in balance, and their family dynamic served as a direct fulcrum for the Force's power across the entire galaxy.
Just like with the Midi-chlorians and Whills or the natural cycles of life and death, Lucas' idea of symbiotic balance is seen in action after the Son murders the Daughter in The Clone Wars. This results in the balance on Mortis being broken, as they had needed each other to survive despite their conflict (symbiosis). Unfortunately, the deaths of all three beings was the only way in which balance could be restored.
Rey & Kylo Ren's Force Dyad Is A Form Of Symbiosis
In a similar vein, the Force dyad of Kylo Ren and Rey is also a symbiotic relationship in the sequel trilogy of Star Wars films, seeing as how they needed each other to defeat Emperor Palpatine. By relying on Rey, Kylo Ren was able to achieve his ultimate redemption as Ben Solo prior to his death, while Rey was able to reconcile her own journey as a Jedi with Kylo's help, regardless of her origins as the granddaughter of Palpatine himself. Their relationship was far more complex than a simple black-and-white conflict.
Rey and Kylo's bond as a Force dyad is representative of the symbiosis Lucas is talking about in of balance. Kylo predominantly came from the dark, while Rey was largely within the light. However, their bond meant that neither of them fully belonged to either side of the Force, instead coming together as one existing in both. While there was an ancient Sith prophecy about Rey and Kylo's Force dyad, which might have inspired Darth Bane's Rule of Two, Palpatine's Sith Eternal was never able to orchestrate its own powerful dyad, as the bond required more than just the dark side of the Force.
The Star Wars Sequel Trilogy Wasted Its Most Lucas Idea
There's so much of Rey and Kylo Ren's Force dyad that could have been explored in The Rise of Skywalker and the sequel trilogy at large, though their bond and what it meant in the grander scale of the galaxy is hardly touched on. Sadly, the concept was largely wasted in the established canon under Disney, when it would have likely thrived if Lucas had gone through with his original vision for the future of the Star Wars galaxy after the original trilogy. As it stands, the idea of symbiotic balance in the Force is not something that comes across in the films (when it easily could have been).
Ultimately, the Force dyad concept is very good and gives dynamic depth to both Rey and Kylo Ren as the sequel's biggest characters. However, it was largely unexplained and underutilized in The Rise of Skywalker, a common criticism of many elements seen in the sequel trilogy (such as Palpatine's resurrection). While new additions to the canon with shows, books, and comics have helped somewhat, there's a lot about the Force dyad that should have been better defined in the movies themselves. At any rate, it's evident that the Force dyad is one of the best canon ideas to share DNA with George Lucas' original vision for Star Wars' sequels.
