The 25 most influential Star Wars characters

13. Rey

From the very beginning, many fans have embraced Rey. She’s not a flawless character, but she’s someone that young girls can look up to and grow up with, much as others did with Leia. And with Rey being at the center of the sequel trilogy, it’s only right that she’s on the list for how much of her story influenced the end of the Skywalker saga.

Rey began the sequel trilogy as a “nobody,” growing up on a desert planet awaiting the day that her parents would come back to rescue her. But as she got mixed into an operation between the Resistance and the First Order upon meeting Finn, her life and the Star Wars universe as a whole would never be the same. Rey discovered that what it truly meant to be Force-sensitive and even trained under Luke Skywalker to become a Jedi.

While trying to take down the First Order, Rey eventually learned the dark truth about her heritage: that she was Rey Palpatine. Not only did this confirm Palpatine lived, but he had a lineage as well. Still, even with Sith blood in her, she did not let Palpatine sway her over to the Dark Side. After surviving, Rey built her own identity, heading to Tatooine to declare herself a Skywalker and continuing that family lineage that would have died with Ben Solo.