“Star Wars” having a canon story about a lightsaber that is also a bomb may be a little hard to swallow for some fans, and that’s not just because it muddies the waters even further on the science behind lightsabers. Per Obi-Wan Kenobi’s (Alec Guinness) famous line in the original “Star Wars,” there’s a certain refined quality to lightsabers, regardless of the morality of their users. Equipping such a weapon with a kill switch feature feels a bit contradictory to the whole point of using a lightsaber in the first place, even if it might be considered fitting for Ren as a character.
Then, there’s a pretty major inconsistency to deal with in terms of this particular lightsaber’s significance. The first issue of “Star Wars: The Rise of Kylo Ren” reveals that Ren’s lightsaber is called the Ren. If that isn’t confusing enough, it’s also established that he and his fellow knights worship this lightsaber. If it’s such an important fixture of their belief system, Ren presumably equipping it with an explosion feature feels a little off.
Perhaps the strangest thing about the Ren, however, is how it kind of just fizzles out in terms of importance. When Ben Solo eventually kills Ren and officially embraces his status as both Kylo Ren and the new leader of the Knights of Ren, he actually turns his own lightsaber red rather than use Ren’s legendary saber. With that, the exploding lightsaber never again pops up in “Star Wars” canon, fading into a weird memory.
