The Last Jedi finally answered the question of Rey's origins, hinting at a mundane heritage rather than anything otherworldly. In the early stages of developing his script, writer/director Rian Johnson toyed with countless ideas surrounding Rey's parents, from the extraordinary to the absurd. Johnson recently admitted that he even included Rey being a robot or a clone to the exhaustive list of potential origins.

“I honestly listed everything I could think of, even awful possibilities where I said, ‘This is not what we’re going to do.’ I mean the less silly one was, ‘Is she a clone?’ Anything that’s a theory on Reddit now I guarantee was listed on that document," Johnson told The /Filmcast. "The silliest one was, ‘Is she a robot?’ Okay, we’ve seen a biomechanical realistic flesh hand on Luke, could the technology have advanced significantly in the 30 years, and then I just started laughing. Look forward to the ‘Rey was almost a robot headlines.'”

Some audiences were left unsatisfied with Rey having a boring origin story, yet it's hard to tell how audiences would have reacted to the character being a clone or, even more bizarre, a robot. Despite some fans' disappointment, the filmmaker knew that the most fascinating decision and the best way to push the series forward was to give Rey a boring background.

"The easiest thing for her to hear would be, 'Yes, you are so and so's daughter.' Or 'Yes, here's where you fit into this. Here's the answer,'" Johnson pointed out to The Hollywood Reporter. "The tougher thing to hear is, 'You're going to have to stand on your own two feet, you're going to have to figure out what you're worth in this world yourself. Your place in this story is not going to be handed to you. You are going to have to find it.' That to me was the most interesting and toughest thing for Rey."

The question about parentage was presented in The Force Awakens, which Johnson took into account when crafting his story.

"It was hinted at in [Episode] VII when Maz [Lupita Nyong'o] says the answers lay ahead, not behind, but it was something that was obviously still on Rey's mind and the audience's mind," Johnson shared. "It felt like a powerful thing that she was still holding onto this notion of the past defining her. And I guess I was entirely looking at it from a perspective of...what would be the thing that would be the most difficult for her to hear?"

You can see The Last Jedi in theaters now.

[H/T The /Filmcast]