ST Official Sequel Trilogy / Legends / Expanded Universe discussion thread

Yes. Yes, yes, yes.

When The Clone Wars was first announced, Dave Filoni often talked about being a big fan of the EU, and that they were going to try to stick to it as much as possible. They wanted to reassure fans as much as possible, even though in the end they often did take liberties with existing material. If Episode VII was going to do the same they would tell fans, if only to stop sales of the books from dropping off.

 

Because they pretty much haven't said anything about the films....

Say who's the director again? Oh right, JJ Abrams

Secrecy is his M.O.

And no. They said they were not adapting any of the stories. It's not adapting to utilize the EU as a treatment for the characters. An original story utilizing treated characters is an original story, not an adaptation.

 

There's secrecy, and there's business. The two are not always the same.

If they came out and said "Episode VII will pick up where the EU leaves off", then we still wouldn't know that much about the film. We wouldn't know the villain or the plot, or even which heroes would and wouldn't appear. All we could really say is things like "well, I guess Luke won't have a teenage daughter, he'll have Ben". And as Millionth Voice said, people who've never picked up an EU book before would dash out to find out who all these people are.

I mean, a lot of your argument hinges on the fact that the audience can follow an EU-compatible Sequel Trilogy. Why not tell them now so that they can do the necessary research? If they are going to follow the EU, what does it benefit Disney/Lucasfilm/Abrams in keeping this quiet?

You're right, that quote does not mean that the films won't be a continuation of the EU.

Common sense and past precedent do that.

 

Because a good movie doesn't rely on them knowing precedent. A good movie should be able to tell the audience the exact information they need to know. We didn't need to understand Obi-Wan's past to understand the movie. There was a treatment written for him that said exactly what he was about and they conveyed that information through visual media. It can be the exact same way with this. Treat the EU has a treatment which basically sets up their personalities etc. and then only tell the audience what they need to know for the movie.

 

Is anyone really hot on having Jacen Solo the annoying one and KatnissJaina in VII?

 

Boil it down to, I wanna see what the filmmakers think is in store after ROTJ, not what the books said was in store after ROTJ.

 

This is the crutch that every "EU-compliant Ep 7" argument rests on - "well, it won't be a problem if the movie is good enough. Good writing will make the story perfectly accessible to a new audience without contradicting any of the existing EU."

Want to know the problem with that? Making a good movie is hard. No director, producer or screenwriter sits down at the start of the process and thinks "I want to make a terrible movie". Sure, the guys who make Scary Movie probably have lower standards than the people churning out Oscar winners, but I'm sure when they start writing they're thinking that their film will be hilarious.

So, everyone wants to make good movies, and yet only some of them are good. The process is difficult, and comes down to millions of subtle little elements. One of the few ways to try and ensure a good film is to place as few restrictions as possible on the writers. That's why many of the best book adaptations (The Godfather, Jaws, Lord of the Rings) aren't afraid to take liberties with their source material.

Michael Ardnt and George Lucas already have the difficult task of writing a film that follows on from six other instalments, with all the expectations and baggage that come with that. No one is going to make their job harder by saying "oh yeah, it also needs to fit with these hundred novels". Why burden your creative team like that?

Because Obi-Wan was a new character. We didn't expect anything of him. This crazy guy in the desert says he's a Jedi? Sure. I don't even know what a Jedi is yet.

Imagine if the Star Wars films were made in chronological order, and when we saw Obi-Wan in ANH he had a daughter (but no wife), and was living on Corellia, and had his face scarred in an explosion caused by a race of savages who invaded the galaxy. Suddenly we're overloaded with questions and the plot is derailed. What's worse, the audience is left thinking "why couldn't we have seen that?".

No it didn't. It conveyed Obi-Wan's backstory by having him sit there and monologue about it. Which worked, because he could keep it short and interesting. Trying to do the same with the current EU would be exhausting.

What is that though?

"This is Allana, our granddaughter".
"So, she's Jaina's daughter?"
"No, actually, she's the daughter of our son, Jacen."
"Where's he?"
"He's dead."
"How did he die?"
"Well, he went to the dark side, became a Sith and Jaina had to kill him."
"He became a Sith?!?"
"Well, he'd been through a lot, what with the Yuuzhan Vong invasion and all."
"The what?"
"You didn't hear about that? Freaky aliens from outside the galaxy invaded, messed up a bunch of planets, killed out otehr son, dropped a moon on Chewbacca ..."

AUDIENCE: "What the hell? Why aren't they showing us this stuff?"

There is a major difference between introducing a new character with a backstory, and revisiting an old character who's been through massive life changes that we aren't privy to. George RR Martin found this with the Song of Ice and Fire books - he tried to have a time skip after the third book (A Storm of Swords), but found that too much had happened in the interim for him to just pass it by.

Most importantly, we're still left with the million dollar question: why wouldn't Lucasfilm/Disney go out of their way to reassure the EU was going to stay intact, unless they were going to override it?

 

Well when Star Wars originally came out people thought it went too fast with little exposition on why and how things were, we were dropped into a new universe. TPM was released 22 years later and it had IMHO too much heavy exposition on the how and why in some cases. At that time we were dropped into the same universe at a much earlier time (did we know how much earlier at the time?) Now in less than two years we'll be sitting in a movie theater and get dropped into the same universe at an unspecified time period with things that we won't know how or why things have changed since RotJ.

 

If the galaxy has been ravaged by extragalactic force-immune aliens, it doesn't make any sense to make a later film about something that is in fact a lesser deal. And compared to that just about everything is a lesser deal. (Just using the YV as an example here)
It's like making a gangster movie set in a New York where a completely incidental alien spacecraft has landed in Central Park, but in the film it's not even talked about, it's only shown in some establishing shots.

Logically, if in Ep7 the huge events of the EU are not explicitly mentioned or referred to, they cannot have taken place, because the films tell us all the most important bits.
The only way that they can keep the EU as backstory is by incorporating the Vong, Darth Caedus, etc as important plot points in the ST, like the PT events are to the OT. If they dont, they can't simply mention it because mentioning irrelevant stuff is confusing and pointless, and if they don't mention it logically it hasn't happened, since if it would have happened it's important enough to have been the focus of the film.
There is absolutely no way the EU events are only 'interesting backstory for those who want to know more'. They are game-changers or they didn't happen.

 

I'd get a kick out of a reference to the "Vong war" regardless of what direction Disney takes for their version of the universe.

 

Your hypothesis is false. Restrictions can often be a good thing in the creative process. Most successful movies have restrictions, because most successful movies these days take place in already established universes. Take a look at the highest grossing films of this year so far, for example.

I don't think the ST will include any EU stuff, but your argument is misplaced.

 

There are already enough restrictions in place without having to follow the EU. Some restrictions can be a good thing but too many of them make the job more difficult.

 

A difficult job may be in order if it enables them to not throw out all the back catalog from bookstores. I'm 99% sure if the EU becomes non-cannon that it will no longer be on a bookshelf near you which is a big $$$ decision.

 

What is worse for Disney? The loss of the old EU continuity or that the movie underperforms? Making the job harder than it already is - and it is damn hard after the storyline in ROTJ practically ended - is a recipe for failure. Arndt and Abrams don't need any extra hurdles. They are already tasked with the impossible.

 

"Restrictions can often be a good thing in the creative process" is just a truism.
Restrictions inspire when they inspire and obstruct when they obstruct.
It's not a simple thing to write a new and interesting story around the EU just because you want it to be.

 

Sure, some restrictions can be good. There are plenty of stories about disasters in films that inadvertently made them better (eg the monsters looking fake in Alien and Jaws prompted the directors to show less of them, making them more mysterious).

But that doesn't mean all restrictions are good, or that more restrictions are better. That's why TV Tropes has a page for Executive Meddling - the more conditions you impose on a piece of art, the harder it is for real creativity to flourish.

Three points:

1. Are those movies the most successful because they're the best written, or are they the most successful because people will go and see their favourite franchises regardless of the quality of the film? Are they the most successful because Hollywood doesn't like taking risks, and so put all their financial backing behind the big name films?

2. Box office profits for these franchise blockbusters are dropping off sharply.

3. Finally, and most importantly, all of these big-budget franchise films are happy to play fast and loose with the source material. Sure, comic books movies are big, but DC and Marvel have never aimed for continuity with the comics, and will change characters and events around to suit whatever purpose they like. Star Trek and James are going strong, having rebooted their series. And the likes of Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter will happily alter the details of the books to fit the cinematic medium. Bottom line: even with an established property, studios want their freedom to do their own thing.

The only $$$ decision made will be Disney executives looking at Star Wars publishing figures and saying "Star Wars books make money. Let's make sure we print more of them."

 

The ROTJ storyline is over, no question about that. They now have a blank canvas to move forward with a new storyline. That is how good writers prefer to work, without being tied into a pre-established story arc that they only get a small piece of. This new trilogy has to be a million times more exciting to write than the prequels which had to be told a certain way to end up where we were in the Original trilogy.

The EU as it sits after Crucible is about 95% a blank slate, other than obvious "opening crawl" things that anyone with a brain knows is coming in terms of re-established Jedi and empire defeated. To not do those two things would spit on the Original Trilogy. Everything else in the EU is just details that get us a few characters while also leaving open plenty of room for new characters. Most importantly it's already set up the Big 3 to not be actively involved in the missions anymore. Just remember, in the original trilogy the Clone Wars were a brief aside by Obi-wan. We didn't have to know about them to go forward, just like the EU can stand but the audience wouldn't have to know about it to move forward.

My prediction is we keep the EU and don't even mention Jacen, Anakin, Chewie or anyone else that's come or gone during that era. It's important background information, but not important to tell or show in the movies.

 

That's a really interesting figure
How did you calculate its blank slate-ness? The Vroum-Dehipp sequence? Dhin-Aire regression?

Seriously, the post- ROTJ events in the EU are gamechanging, and not something you just brush aside.

Also, publishers make more money from publishing new books than from keeping old ones in circulation.

 

Really? 95% a blank slate?

• Chewbacca is dead
• Luke Skywalker has one son and a dead wife (who was specifically a Force-sensitive Imperial assassin turned Jedi)
• Han and Leia have one daughter (a Jedi Master who's at least in her 30s) and a granddaughter, the father of whom is a dead Sith Lord
• The Jedi Order numbers in the hundreds and has a council again, with specific Jedi characters serving on it
• There have been two massive wars in the last 20 years
• One of these wars was with bizarre aliens from outside the galaxy, and changed the actual physical nature of many planets, including Coruscant
• There's a godlike Force being out there that the Jedi are supposed to be finding a way to deal with
• The government is the Galactic Alliance, not the New Republic
• The Empire is still around and has a new Emperor. Who just happens to be the husband of Han and Leia's daughter.
• There are loads of Sith hanging around, and they have played a major role in recent galactic events
• Etc etc

That's a lot of specifics for a 95% blank slate.

The key difference is that we were just be introduced to the Star Wars universe. We can accept the Clone Wars as a brief mention because, as far as we know, what's happening now is more important.

Contrast that with the ST, where we are familiar with the characters and the events, and anything significant that's been skipped will stick out like a sore thumb.

Think of it like this: you meet a new person. They have a spouse and kids. Totally normal. You wouldn't question it.

Now imagine you meet an old friend. Last time you saw them they were unattached. Now they're married and have a kid. Don't you want to know the details?

Prepare to be disappointed.

I mean that seriously. There's, like, a 5% chance that the ST will follow the EU. Prepare yourself to be disappointed now, then in the future, if Episode VII is totally compatible with the EU, you can be pleasantly surprised.

 

When they decided to keep the original actors for Luke Leia and Han, they locked themselves into "95%" of this stuff. We have to jump past the Empire still existing and the Jedi being reborn phase because it would be unbelievable to still be stuck in the same spot 32 years later with the same actors.

Chewie is the 5% issue in my opinion. Not sure what happens there.

 

Has anybody thought about the long-term consequences(like years down the line) about restarting/rebooting/discarding the post-ROTJ EU in favor of this EU 2.0? Well I'll offer my thoughts on what I feel might happen. At first it would be great some of us might enjoy this new take on things, plus the weird story-lines like Palpatine Reborn can get the boot(at the cost of also booting cool parts of the current EU even stuff which is still going to be printing like Star Wars: Legacy Vol.2 etc which is a little unfair) and it allows new fans to not immerse themselves in years of continuity just to learn what happens(which is ok). However Marvel Comics did something similar to this by creating the "Ultimate universe" a while back, sure it offered new readers a continuity-free, fresh take & origins & stories on familiar characters but 10+ years later, it's now just as confusing, big and too complex as the 616 Universe(the main Marvel Universe for people who don't know). I feel that is a very likely path that could realistically happen and then we'll pretty much be where we started. Is this something we REALLY want for future generations?

What do you guys think?

 

Reboot happen all the time in other franchises and often enough they are successful. Aside from that they can keep most of the stuff aside from the horrible post-ROTJ-EU anyways.

Complexity creep is inevitable too.

I disagree. It is not a blank slate. And why? Because the whole shebang is titled Episode VII. The expectation is that this will be a continuation of the old story.
But because the old plot has found its end, a new plot must be created and at the same time it must feel like a continuation. This is a very difficult balancing act and getting the characters right will be even more difficult (If you screw up the Big 3 you better move to Iceland because otherwise the ****storm is gonna hit you badly). I don't envy Arndt. Tbh I wouldn't have called the thing Episode VII to begin with precisely because it creates the wrong expectations.

And Jedi Comedian already aptly pointed out why post Crucible is in no way a blank slate.

 

ScorpionJedi: I think you might be right. But going forward there will be movies and spin-off movies and TV-series, so I think the important stories will be told on-screen anyway. The literature being a bit messy probably won't matter to the franchise as a whole.

 

Yeah but how long will it be until someone says "Oh you need to watch episode X from *insert name of Star Wars TV Show* " to understand this reference? It seems pointless. I don't see any reason why we can't keep at least some vestiges just to keep purists quiet like the Thrawn saga which took place just under a decade after ROTJ whereas VII would take place years after that where characters have moved forward since.

 

they can always make tv series, special dvd releases, and the like to fill in the missing years. Pablo's story team, will have members from
the different content developers collaborate, to make sure their is strory consistency, someone.

Kinberg is consulting on both the ST, and rebels, he's writing the pilot for Rebels, and one of the spinoff movies.
Jennifer Heddle for the comics, and books,
the person who handles the license with EA, to make sure the games fit in the narrative, with Leland Chee, making sure everything fits in the new Holocron.

Pabl Hidalgo, has aid, that he has talked to kathleen Kennedy, so you know, that it has her approval.