Why Kylo Ren’s Followers Suddenly Call the Force ‘The Shine’ in New Star Wars Lore

A new Star Wars comic has revealed that the Knights of Ren do not talk about the Force the way Jedi and Sith do. Instead of the familiar light side and dark side labels, Kylo Ren’s followers use a different set of terms that hints at their own beliefs and traditions.

A new vocabulary for the same power

Marvel’s Star Wars: The Fall of Kylo Ren adds a small but notable piece of lore to the sequel era. In the comic, the Knights of Ren refer to the light side of the Force as “The Shine.” Their term for the dark side is “The Shadow,” a name that had already appeared in earlier work centered on the group, so the newer material completes the pair rather than introducing both at once.

The series is written by Charles Soule and follows Kylo Ren and the Knights in the stretch between Star Wars: Episode VIII. The Last Jedi and Star Wars: Episode IX. The Rise of Skywalker, a part of the timeline the films left mostly unexplored. One issue, The Fall of Kylo Ren #3, adds another term to the group’s lexicon by describing someone as “Radiant,” which appears to be their word for a Force-sensitive person.

That may sound like a minor wording change, but it gives the Knights of Ren more identity than they had on screen. In the sequel trilogy, they were mostly seen as ominous figures around Ben Solo before he killed them on Exegol. The comic suggests they were not simply borrowing Jedi or Sith ideas. They had their own way of naming what they experienced, which points to a culture outside both traditions.

Why these terms matter more than they seem to

The interesting part is not that Star Wars has replaced the Force with new official branding across the franchise. It has not. What the comic shows is that different groups inside this galaxy can understand the same power through their own language.

That idea has shown up elsewhere in canon. The Acolyte introduced a coven of Force witches on Brendok led by Mother Aniseya. They referred to the Force as “the Thread,” rejecting the usual division between light and dark. In their view, it was something that could be pulled, woven and shared by connected people. The Jedi shown in that series did not simply dismiss that belief. They treated it as another tradition examining the same power from a different perspective.

The comparison matters because The Acolyte became a flashpoint for arguments about Star Wars lore. Some critics said the show was changing established ideas, and the Thread became part of a broader list of complaints that also included the coven’s apparent ability to create life through the Force and the series’ depiction of the Jedi. The debate continued, and Lucasfilm confirmed in August 2024 that the show would not return for a second season, leaving its final cliffhangers unresolved.

There is another link between the two stories as well. It was later confirmed after the show’s cancellation that Qimir was essentially the first Knight of Ren. That makes the comic’s new terminology feel less like an isolated bit of flavor and more like another example of Star Wars exploring Force traditions beyond the standard Jedi and Sith framework.

What this could mean for Star Wars next

The arrival of “The Shine,” “The Shadow” and “Radiant” also lands at a moment when Lucasfilm appears increasingly interested in bigger questions about the Force itself. Ahsoka Season 2 is expected to examine that territory through the mythology of the Mortis Gods, the Father, the Son and the Daughter, who were first introduced in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Dave Filoni, now Lucasfilm’s President and Chief Creative Officer, has indicated that the series will explore that mythology.

There is also James Mangold’s announced film set at the dawn of the Jedi, roughly 25,000 years before the Skywalker Saga. Lucasfilm unveiled the project at Star Wars Celebration London in April 2023. It would tell the story of how the Force was first discovered. The film remains on the slate, but there is no production start, no cast and no release date, and it has seemingly been placed on indefinite pause.

If that movie ever moves forward, it could become the Star Wars project best positioned to address where ideas like “light side” and “dark side” came from in the first place. Until then, The Fall of Kylo Ren offers something more contained but still intriguing. It gives one of the sequel trilogy’s least developed factions a worldview of its own, and it does so with just a few carefully chosen words.

For fans who want to see how these terms fit into Kylo Ren’s story, The Fall of Kylo Ren is available now through comic book shops and digital retailers. The larger answers about the Force may still be waiting in future screen projects, but this comic has already opened a new window onto how different people in Star Wars choose to name the same mystery.