One scene in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker secretly confirmed the scale of Rey and Kylo Ren’s combined powers. The mysterious bond between Rey and Kylo Ren was finally explained in The Rise of Skywalker, which revealed that they were a Force Dyad. According to Palpatine, the power of this bond was so great the Sith had sought it for generations.

Since then, Star Wars has gradually revealed the true nature of the Force Dyad. Rae Carson’s novelization of The Rise of Skywalker subtly hints it requires both light and dark acting in unison (an idea confirmed in, of all places, Star Wars LEGO: Rebuild the Galaxy – Pieces of the Past).

We never really got to see the full potential of the Force Dyad. Rey and Kylo Ren only learned a few unique tricks, notably a form of teleportation. But one early scene in The Rise of Skywalker subtly hinted at the Force Dyad’s true power…

Rey’s Training Scene Hints At The Force Dyad’s True Power

The Rise of Skywalker opens with Rey training in the forests of Ajan Kloss, a major Resistance base. It doesn’t go well, in part because she is far from centered in the Force; vulnerable to the dark side, she unwittingly triggers the bond with Kylo Ren, who’s meditating at the time. The two experience a vision.

This Force vision is actually quite unique. Watch it closely; it includes flashes of both past and future, even of the possible future in which Rey falls to the dark side and becomes a Palpatine. We’ve seen previous visions explore the past, and the Jedi of old sought to perceive the future; but this is both.

This fits well with Secrets of the Sith, an in-universe book supposedly written by Palpatine himself. There, the Dark Lord of the Sith notes that the Force Dyad has a power greater than time itself.

There’s Only One Parallel With Rise Of Skywalker’s Visions

There’s only really one vision we’ve seen that fits with this; Rey’s mysterious Forceback in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. When she touched Anakin Skywalker’s old lightsaber, her mind was cast adrift through time. This culminated in a moment when she saw Kylo Ren, who seemed to sense her presence in his own time.

This interpretation was recently confirmed in Charles Soule and Stefano Raffaele’s Legacy of Vader #8. There, the Knights of Ren remembered the moment Rey had seen; and, surprisingly, they remembered Kylo Ren reaching out to someone they could not see. Rey wasn’t just experiencing a vision… her mind was truly present in the past.

Yes, Star Wars has time travel. The Force Dyad seems to unlock this ability, allowing a person’s mind to literally experience the past and future. It’s similar to the Force power at psychometry, where a Jedi touches an object to perceive its past; indeed, physical touch is part of both The Force Awakens and The Rise of Skywalker.

Is this really what’s going on in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker? The subtle parallels suggest this is indeed the case; that the power of the Force Dyad has unmoored the minds of both Rey and Kylo Ren, sending them spinning through both past and future(s). It’s a thrilling idea, and it’s a shame the movies didn’t develop it further.