main
side
curve
  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Lit The 181st Imperial Discussion Group: Dark Apprentice!

Discussion in 'Literature' started by Grey1, Sep 1, 2013.

  1. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    We have unfinished business, and so has Exar Kun. So, no big introductions, since last month already told us what we'll do this month and the month after that.

    - I think this month is a pretty good time to talk about Qwi Xux, who we didn't really get around to last month.

    - Ackbar driving Miss Leia around in a modified B-Wing. Now that's a thought. There's something about this combination that's not uncommon for KJA, but also for a lot of EU. Is it fun to simply use the toys from the box in any way imaginable (and possibly even possible)? Has there been a time when this was more fun for you, but you don't appreciate it anymore?

    - The huge thing is, of course, the Jedi training aspect. KJA is the first to move Luke into this position of authority and strength. The training we see onscreen gets criticized a lot by "I, Jedi" man Corran. How does the actual book deal with this? Do we simply see some highlights that can be built around movie quotes, or is there reason to believe that Luke doesn't have a lot to teach? Based on the little training Luke receives onscreen in the movies, which seems to be more important? Commando-style physical training, theoretical training, or metaphysical training that has to do a lot with a kind of perception none of us really know about because it's entirely made up?

    - Have you ever been unhappy with the Yavin choice? Especially if there are any readers who saw the Coruscant temple first and only got around to the books after that? Boy am I old.

    - And no, I still can't let Wedge slide. Yes, he was set up as a military pilot for all the time depicted before the JAT. But all those times were times of great conflict. As much as Luke has to learn to stop being a soldier and start being Yoda, I think Wedge is a symbol for the evolution of the EU that was about to take place (but in the end didn't, or got reset again). He's leaving his military career behind to some degree. Now that's the same thing Lando and Han and Luke do, but Luke has something "more worthwhile", Lando easily slips back into the business stuff he did before he joined the rebellion, and Han... well, for most of the EU, Han is around anyway. Helping the Republic even when he acts as if he can't stand them (Tatooine Ghost). Wedge is the only guy who's having an attempt at stepping back from the war business, and he's also a symbol for the healing of a divided galaxy by falling in love with someone from the enemy's camp. With one of those myth level love affairs that has the guy who helped destroy the biggest weapon ever (twice) with the person who invented this. Soothed by the fact that she was naive and didn't realize she was building a weapon. In comparison, Wedge and Iella is a couple that makes more sense from a character-based or rather US-TV-colleague-couple-pairing perspective, but has no "deeper" meaning regarding factions or developments or anything.

    And no, I'm still not saying KJA is a great author. But I do not dismiss what he's done either.

    Further thoughts?
     
  2. Tim Battershell

    Tim Battershell Jedi Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 3, 2012
    Qui just naïve, or naïve and abused? What effect would seeing her people's cities being destroyed for their student's failure (and the constant threat of that happening to her own city, and her family) have had on her?
     
  3. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    Having her realize that she had to choose between inventing weapons threatening life in the galaxy and behaviour that would kill her people, that's a model case of cognitive dissonance, if you ask me.
     
  4. Jeff_Ferguson

    Jeff_Ferguson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 15, 2006
    Wedge's role in this book is the textbook example of KJA using Wedge for the sake of using Wedge. KJA basically admits as much in the first chapter:

    KJA doesn't put any more thought into it than that --- Wedge's role is literally built around the idea of "I got tired of doing that thing I was doing in the last book, so now here I am doing something that will cause me to appear in this book." He's still a New Republic General, yet he has the freedom to try out a new non-military job every week, while the rest of the NR Military is busy cleaning up from Operation: Shadow Hand.

    The hell?

    And here's what the same chapter has to say a few pages later:

    The New Republic is worried about a fleet of Imperial Star Destroyers, and so they assign their best Navy General to... be somebody's personal bodyguard. Riiiiiiiiight...

    His romance with Qwi is additionally awful. It's built around them going from planet to planet and looking at beautiful sunsets. There's no emotional connection and no reason for the reader to believe that they're falling for each other. It's a romance based on nothing more than KJA looking for something for Wedge to do.

    I'm glad we're talking about this book, since it's really the only one in the trilogy where anything happens. It's the only book where Luke's actually training his students, and it's the only book where Daala's campaign is raging across the galaxy. Those two storylines are both abruptly cut short at the end of Book 2 so that Book 3 can meander around aimlessly for 300 pages (more on that next month). The trilogy's pacing is just terrible.

    Yavin IV is a pretty cool choice for the Jedi Academy (not Coruscant, the NJO temple should never be on Coruscant, why did Karen Traviss build a Jedi Temple on Coruscant that was identical to the OJO's one), although at the same time, it's KJA using a movie location. Ooooh, shocking, big surprise.
     
    fett 4, JackG and Havac like this.
  5. Parnesius

    Parnesius Jedi Knight star 1

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2012
    Dark Apprentice was, I think, my first introduction to a bunch of EU bits and bobs - not the Yavin Praxeum or Tionne (I'd already read at least the first few Young Jedi Knights books) but most everything else introduced in the Jedi Academy Trilogy, as well as Winter, Mara, Mon Calamari, the idea that Palpatine genuinely returned from the dead...and Wedge Antilles. I'm fairly certain I didn't realise at the time that he was anyone special from the films...but then, I didn't realise Wedge was anything special (or continuous) during the films until the Battle of Endor when I thought "this extra's unusally chummy with Lando".

    Anyway, I really don't feel it's that remarkable that General Antilles might receive a quiet posting overseeing Coruscant's reconstruction - or that he might take the opportunity every other day to beetle around to the sub-department of such-and-such and there potter around and ask questions and fail to put eveyone at their ease and have a go with the forty-story construction droid and come this close to breaking something important and generally terrify his subordinates who just wish the General would go back to his office to get on with his job and let them get on with theirs.

    I saw the Coruscant Temple, then the Yavin Praxeum in Shadow Academy. I thought it an odd and inferior choice in-universe, and ridiculously movie-centric out- (I'd have been ten or possibly even nine years old when I reached that judgement which, looking back, strikes me as a little worrying). Reading about its Sith origins (and lingering presence) in Dark Apprentice and Champions of the Force, as well as that Force nexus beam in Jedi Outcast, made Luke's decision more reasonable. And I suppose it's not the most movie-ish choice - he could have set up on Dagobah - all students begin the day with a four mile run, then it's the daily Cave of Fear spelunking before levitating rocks until supper, which is terrible, with nary a peep lest Luke and the three ghosts launch into their Four Yorkshiremen bit.
     
    Grey1 likes this.
  6. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    Best take I've ever read on the topic. And I'm pretty sure it also lines up with Stackpole's Wedge.


    And good thought about Dagobah being the "more logical" choice if you look for forced movie Force locations.
     
  7. RC-1991

    RC-1991 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Dec 2, 2009
    My first thought (and I need to reread the book) is that Ackbar the overqualified chauffeur is completely in line with his depiction in the Jedi Prince novels :p
     
    Dr. Steve Brule likes this.
  8. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Feb 17, 2004
    I think the Yavin temple makes more sense than the Coruscant temple. I did read these books long before the prequels, but the Coruscant temple seemed to be more a symptom of the problems the Jedi were having with regard to becoming integrated into Republic bureaucracy and emphasizing that role over service to the Force. In the greater Expanded Universe, most other examples of Jedi temples or praxeums are on isolated planets in a manner reminiscent of of real life monasteries, and I think it just makes sense.

    As for selecting Yavin over Dagobah -- it was clearly a matter of being conducive toward the plot, plus from an in-universe perspective I think it is logical in the sense that there already exists the infrastructure of not only the Massassi temples but the remnants of the Rebel base. Luke would know about this, it would fit the need of a monastery type environment, and it makes sense to me -- and even if it is a movie callback, I think it makes sense from a narrative perspective to use that since it wasn't really explored all that much in the films anyway but readers would be familiar with it, vis-a-vis Luke saying "oh hey I went to this planet no one ever heard of during the Galactic Civil War that would make a great location for the praxeum!"

    Something I've been wondering, and I dunno if anyone besides KJA knows, but is there some sort of etymology for the word "praxeum," or is it a word KJA made up with a letter jumble because it looked cool?
     
  9. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    Overqualified? He crashes the thing! Not much qualification there, if you ask me.

    As far as I remember his daughter came up with the expression, and while I wouldn't know how old she was at that time, I suspect it's a case of kids making up cool new words.
     
  10. Lugija

    Lugija Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 3, 2009
    Ackbar is the best thing in this book. Reposting an old post from another thread:
    Wackbar is also cute.
     
  11. Tim Battershell

    Tim Battershell Jedi Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 3, 2012
    Praxis = use, practice, discipline (College English Dictionary).
     
    DigitalMessiah likes this.
  12. Vialco

    Vialco Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Mar 6, 2007
    There's a line in Dark Apprentice that Ackbar is so concerned about traitors and assassination attempts, that he insists on driving Leia around personally. Say what you will about KJA but he gives more depth to some of the secondary characters from the films.

    Mon Mothma and Admiral Ackbar receive quite a bit of development in the JAT. I actually like the JAT more than the Thrawn trilogy, it feels more fantastic and adventurous than Zahn`s hard sci-fi. Star Wars isn`t hard sci-fi, it`s space opera, and KJA gets that.
     
  13. Jedi Ben

    Jedi Ben Chosen One star 9

    Registered:
    Jul 19, 1999
    I DEMAND someone makes this happen!

    Think you're a Jedi? In my day we had to do 4hrs meditation before breakfast.
    Pah? 72 hours training in my day there was - easy you had it.
     
  14. Havac

    Havac Former Moderator star 7 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 29, 2005
    Qwi Xux is an awful character. She's kind of one of those examples of KJA having a thought and saying, "Oh, cool," and throwing that idea right into the mix without any examination or consideration of what it actually means. KJA's books always kind of give the sense of being written in one draft, where he just starts rambling and has it all transcribed and that's that. I'm sure he's not actually narrating them over the course of one afternoon, but that's the sense of lack of consideration they give.

    But the problem is that he's got this idea of "What if one of the people who designed these superweapons didn't realize they were superweapons?" Which, yeah, interesting. But KJA can't do moral or psychological complexity. He doesn't really consider that anyone trained by a vicious maniac who blows up cities during her training, who is then locked up in an isolated lab and told to come up with really powerful destructive devices cannot plausibly retreat to the excuse of, "I thought it was for science!" It doesn't necessarily mean that she has to be a wicked or cynical person, but any attempt to deploy that excuse has to reflect, at the least, deep psychological trauma in someone who's taking a refuge from reality in a falsehood they know is untrue but feel the need to believe. Qwi, if not a figure who cynically hid behind a convenient lie she refused to question while knowing in her heart what she was doing, then has to be a deeply traumatized person in need of serious counseling. Or else she genuinely does believe it and never considered otherwise, which is kind of what KJA seems to suggest . . . but to be that stupid, that incredibly naive, after Tarkin was blowing up cities to train her . . . she has to basically have the mind of a child. She's an idiot savant.

    And of course, KJA's course of action with this character, who either has the mind of a child or is deeply psychologically troubled . . . is to have her tour the galaxy with a (stupidly random, as Jeff points out) bodyguard. Who falls in love with her child mind/mental trauma and starts romancing her. Basically, Wedge takes sexual advantage of a woman who is either mentally immature or mentally ill and who has been entrusted to his care.

    [face_plain] [face_plain] [face_plain] [face_plain] [face_plain]

    And then, of course, she has her mind erased so that she's even more childlike and Wedge is like, "Oh, hi, you're in love with me by the way. Your sweet childlike idiot naivete really turns me on and makes me want to protect you so hard. Anyway, you definitely need to remember that I've been your boyfriend for the past two days, so you're in love with me and we're a couple."

    NO WEDGE NO.

    There is nothing about the entire relationship, the entire conception of the character and her direction, that isn't dodgy as all hell. And KJA blithely ignores it.

    I remarked in WHTTATWJS that between this and YJK, KJA is the person who has written the most material ostensibly about Jedi training, without writing practically anything actually about Jedi training at all. There are maybe two scenes in the entire trilogy of actual Jedi training. KJA makes no real effort to examine a Jedi's relationship with the Force, or what it's like to learn to wield that power, or how they might be trained to use it or conceptualize it or anything. He's far, far too superficial a writer to get into anything metaphysical or philosophical. He just gets one or two setpieces where maybe they meditate vaguely and then oh no bubbles and some people "use the Force" and that's it. It's so incredibly shallow. He's so wrong an author to tackle this kind of material. Even Stackpole, whom you wouldn't pick as a big metaphysical/spiritual experience guy, was a billion times better at actually going through some of the process of communing with the Force and giving you an idea of what becoming a Jedi is like. KJA just can't hit any kind of depth at all. As an author, he's like a parrot that's trained to "talk." Pretty good at repeating the surface experience of the movies he sees, but without any understanding at all of what it actually means and no intent of conveying anything by it.

    I love it. Yeah, it's movie-centric, but to be fair, the Jedi were always going to end up somewhere recognizable. Luke's unlikely to just pick a spot on a map and say, "There!" But the only way it could be better is if Luke had built a SKY ACADEMY on Bespin.

    What makes it work so well is that the Jedi don't belong on Coruscant. Not really. They should have some kind of station there, yeah, because they've got to liaise with the government. But the one thing that KJA gets, it seems, is that the Jedi aren't a political order. They're a mystical order of monk-knights. They're not the Avengers. They don't need a tower in New York City. They, like Obi-Wan and Yoda, belong as hermits, in a remote setting where they can concentrate on just themselves and the Force, removed from the bustle of the galaxy. The jungle setting, in nature, communing with the Force in ancient temples, is perfect for the Jedi. The Jedi, as an Order, belong in their own place, in a sort of spiritual retreat, a beautiful ancient place in touch with nature, learning their mystical arts and meditating and deliberating before striking off into the galaxy. KOTOR got this concept too, perfectly, with the Jedi Academy out of time on the beautiful, serene plains of Dantooine. Jedi Outcast also did a good job of capturing how right Yavin is -- the spiritual feeling of exploring those sun-drenched, jungle-encroached ruins as you reconnect with the Force is something you just can't get in the middle of metal-and-glass Coruscant.

    Even if you look at the other choices from the films, Yavin 4 is the best. Hoth is too inhospitable, too cold and dead. Tatooine is better, but would be far too derivative and ultimately too harsh. Dagobah would also be derivative, and too inhospitable. Bespin would be beautiful, but by nature isolated and insufficiently in touch with nature. Endor is the second-best option, but it's got the Ewoks as neighbors, which would be a distraction, and it doesn't have what Yavin does. Yavin's advantage is those temples. They just look right, and the idea of the Jedi reclaiming ancient ruins feels right. The lush jungle and ruins just creates a perfect setting for the Jedi. There's also the advantage of the Rebel history there, which I, Jedi does such a good job of tapping. It's where the Empire first started to topple, and now it's where the Jedi are reborn. It's where Luke first started to really act as a Jedi, and here is where he'll train others. It's an abandoned place that one, for one brief, glorious moment, housed the hope of the galaxy, and now will again. The symbolism is absolutely perfect.

    It's the best decision KJA ever made, and the only loss from the NJO that I really regret is that the Jedi lost the Praxeum and moved on from Yavin 4. Now, arguably, Zonama Sekot would have been an even more perfect new home for the Jedi, but that didn't happen because it got given to the Vong instead, which is fair enough.
     
  15. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Feb 17, 2004
    Zonama Sekot could have had a Jedi temple or praxeum despite the Yuuzhan Vong living on it. The Ferroans were already living there anyway, and I always thought the Yuuzhan Vong would become Jedi ancillaries.
     
  16. Tim Battershell

    Tim Battershell Jedi Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 3, 2012
    We shouldn't forget that at the time of JAT the Coruscant Temple had been built over and lost. It wasn't rediscovered until the NJO (Enemy Lines duology and Traitor - IIRC).
     
  17. Revanfan1

    Revanfan1 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Jun 3, 2013
    Anything except going back to Coruscant. That was when they started going downhill.
     
    Force Smuggler likes this.
  18. Havac

    Havac Former Moderator star 7 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 29, 2005
    It could have, but designating Zonama Sekot as "the new Yuuzhan Vong homeworld" where they're supposed to reconnect with their past would blur any narrative role as "the Jedi planet," and in turn having it be the Jedi planet would blur its role as the redemptive Vong homeworld, and potentially impinge on Vong society. I would have liked a satellite Jedi facility there -- more than just three or so Jedi roaming around an entire planet packed with Yuuzhan Vong -- but narratively, putting one on the planet kind of precludes the ability to put the other there, not without significantly changing the implications.
     
  19. Nobody145

    Nobody145 Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Feb 9, 2007
    Not to mention Zonoma Sekot's remote location and mobile nature. While it would be nice for some Jedi to stay on Zonoma long-term and just help out and talk with the planetary consciousness, it would be a long-term mission. Danni might have moved there, but she's just another dropped character by now, and Tahiri was there I think, but she was dragged back into the post-NJO mess.

    I loved Yavin as the location of the Jedi Praxeum as a nice place for a monastery but also the site of a pivotal battle in galactic history. Its also just a nice setting- jungle moon, plenty of ruins, but also at least some leftover equipment from the Rebel base. Its also still dangerous enough that the trainees won't be coddled too much, and while remote, isn't in the Unknown Regions or anything like that so the Jedi could still come and go while they went about their business. Its somewhat followed up on later, in the Lightsabers book in the YJK series, when the Young Jedi are looking for crystals to build lightsabers, they find quite a few crystals scattered about here and there.

    And with TotJ, it also ties into ancient Jedi/Sith history, which is nice too. Ossus has sort of been a stand-in for Yavin recently, especially after the Vong-forming, but I still miss Yavin. When the Yavin Temple is almost literally eaten during the Vong War (or digested or melted down or something biological), I hated that moment. It was almost like ha, they're running over stuff the Bantam books set up, and another "burst the bubble" moment in terms of permanently destroying that place from the movies. Especially in more recent times, I really miss the image of Jedi as monks, sages, whatever, sitting around on a remote, peaceful natural planet. The prequel Jedi Temple isn't exactly humble (though its also part security bunker, especially by the Clone Wars) and of course during the NJO the Jedi were too busy surviving to do much spiritual stuff, and post-NJO hasn't bothered to do anything but rip off ideas from the prequels. And act like special operations commandoes. in this book, Luke is still working out the whole Jedi Master and student things, but at least it seemed like an interesting experiment. By now, its just so... impersonal. Not quite assembly line, but compared to this book, where we had Kam with his history and Streen with his isolationist nature, Gantoris' troublesome nature, Kyp's issues and Tionne as the historian/musician, it was only the first class, but a good deal of variety was packed in there. I appreciated that Luke had to go far to find so many candidates, who the Empire missed, and its easier to set up a sort of interesting first class, but I liked that version of the Jedi. Too bad that image of the Jedi as wandering helpful monks has mostly been abandoned.
     
  20. Jeff_Ferguson

    Jeff_Ferguson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 15, 2006
    I always find myself disagreeing with statements that begin with "Star Wars is" and "Star Wars isn't." The films were space opera, sure, but the EU is a whole different ball game. It has room for hard sci-fi, horror, space westerns, philosophical inquiries, capers, whodunnits, etc, etc. It's the perfect avenue for experimentation because it doesn't always follow the film's space fantasy example. If every EU book focused on mythological themes at the expense of starfighter maneuvers, naval formations, and an occasional dose of scientific details, then the EU would be a very dull place. There would be no world-building. Everything would be vague and begging for expansion. I'm not saying that Curtis Saxton should write a novel, but a happy medium is desirable, and I think that Zahn was very close to that happy medium (if a little on the technical side). Zahn's hard sci-fi is what makes things like the New Republic Defense Fleet and Rogue Squadron interesting.

    You can do so much more in a 400-page book than you can in a two-hour film --- Zahn's hard sci-fi did wonders to actually expand the universe. He wrote about naval tactics; territorial losses and gains; and something called a crystal gravfield trap that was going to make a huge difference in the war, and that take on the universe painted a vivid and fascinating picture of an Empire struggling to gain the upper hand in a war it was now losing, and of a New Republic experiencing growing pains and realizing that this whole peace thing is harder than they thought. Its attention to detail painted a picture that a straight space fantasy never could, and it didn't do it at the expense of mythological themes, either.

    The EU is all about balance. Nobody wants to read the same themes in every book --- we want a hard sci-fi trilogy full of space battles followed by a book about a mythological hero followed by a heist novel followed by a M*A*S*H homage, ad nauseum. And one of the Jedi Academy Trilogy's biggest weaknesses is that it clings too strongly to the films instead of evolving and doing its own thing. Even though it's supposed to be a landmark trilogy about the next generation of Jedi, it misses its chance to actually expand the universe.
     
    Havac , Iron_lord and RC-1991 like this.
  21. Loopy777

    Loopy777 Jedi Master star 1

    Registered:
    Apr 8, 2013
    Agreed on how Yavin as the choice for the Jedi Praxeum was really stellar, but I, Jedi killed a lot my ability to enjoy when it pointed out how silly Luke was for staying there when he realized that the temples were really Sith Temples and they were all completely haunted. Yeah, Exar Kun is dealt with in the next book, but the first arc in the Junior Jedi Knights books reveal that there are more wacky Sithy things going on in the other temples that Luke has never bothered to investigate.

    (I never really liked the Jedi Academy Trilogy, even when I was twelve, but I, Jedi devastated so much of its logic that I kind of came to enjoy JAT as an unintentional comedy.)

    I would have liked to see something like Master Thon did with Ambria, claiming the planet back for the balanced Force, but if Luke did anything like that, it happened off page and no cared enough to mention it. And then the Yuuzham Vong ate the planet, or maybe the prequel movies did, I'm not sure which.
     
  22. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Feb 17, 2004
    Shared universes are fun when the authors snipe at each other.
     
  23. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    It can sometimes be very hard to have a story if you don't wave things like that through. And I'm pretty sure it would kill all the fun in Corran's character if someone wrote a book from a new perspective that showed how self-absorbed Rogue Nine always was, feeling himself all-important because his father in law was a huge smuggler and he had a Jedi heritage and he had CorSec training, can you believe it. The thing is, why would you do that? Why would you spoil one portion of fandom's fun just so that the cynics can pat themselves on their backs?

    Nail on the head with this one. While a lot of the stuff KJA does seems like a perfect match for Lucas - inventing fun stuff and fun scenes, making the entire experience problematic by bad dialogue and half-baked plot developments - he doesn't build the background Lucas creates. You can always see that Lucas is busy with making up backstories, with making up how something works that will never be explained onscreen and that things like the EU will explain in a different way before he even thinks about lifting the veil on that particular background. And more importantly, Lucas has ideas about mythical experiences, about story telling in itself. Yoda's training is really questioning the classic idea of the action hero. KJA doesn't delve into the topic, he has no idea what all of this means - there's a basic journey to these books, but it's too much too quickly, as Luke's not only learning to be a teacher, but his pupils also essentially grow up and become "champions" by solving one crisis.

    But then again, even if some ideas were had during Bantam's EU run (like Stackpole having ideas about Corran enhancing his roster of force powers), nobody really delved deep into the Force and all that. Callista losing her connection after some magic essence transfer is just as much a magic Force property as Waru giving headaches: it's some metaphysical mojo that's happening. So whether KJA is hiding a Sith spirit in a temple, Zahn invents an animal that's made of kryptonite and has fast clones go mad because of the force, or much later Denning makes up flow-walking, it's always the same: not using the Force as an amalgam of all thelogical and philosophical schools on this planet, but as magic.


    Funnily enough, I think some stuff like the pulpy bad dialogue that Lucas gets criticised for comes from a basic idea that audiences don't get. While there's mythological grounding and cutting-edge visuals, it's still a pulp serial. And he doesn't want to improve it, like Tarantino "imrpoves" exploitation cinema by having the characters regurgitate tirades about his own musical knowledge. The same for Indiana Jones - it's a thirties or fifties B-movie thing. It's not just adventure movies like Tomb Raider or that Nic Cage vehicle; it's adventure movies with that historical component, or maybe weakness for history. KJA somehow got that part right in his adaptation of the wonderful Sky Captain; somehow, I'm not so sure that he was all that aware about this concept when he wrote (or dictated) the Jedi Academy trilogy.
     
    DigitalMessiah likes this.
  24. fett 4

    fett 4 Chosen One star 5

    Registered:
    Jan 2, 2000
    For the first bit, I thought it was just a case of the cool authors (Stackpole and Zahn) in Bantams run, just slagging off the bad authors (everyone else) nothing more and simply not being aware that the same could be done to their works too.

    For the 2nd part. Yes you are correct and KJA is terrible, but a lot of the books where pretty much the same and essentialy Walker Texas Ranger in space. Stackpoles books had Corran blast TIE fighters (and actually destory any tension and ignore the films) away by the hundred before geting super duper kewwl new Jedi powers. Did he learn anything or go through any of the hero trials on the journey. Nope just a super cool person get more super cool. Zahn then tried to up the anti with Mara (who at least had a hero journey in TTT) in HoT.

    None of the books (besdies TTT which seems more to be lightning in a bottle) really got it in jmo.
     
  25. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Feb 17, 2004
    The Jedi and the Force never really got serious treatment in the EU until the NJO series. What followed the NJO is the equivalent of the Bantam take on the Jedi, but with knowledge of how the Jedi are depicted in the prequels. But I think that just made it worse.

    Although, prior to the NJO, I guess Tom Veitch maybe?

    I will say, for KJA and Dark Apprentice, that I think Kyp's fall is better depicted than most... he's motivated by his own desires and he keeps his eyes on the prize. He wants to strike back at the Empire for what it did to him. He doesn't join the Empire because dark side. Whereas Jacen specifically chose to train under Lumiya because "Jacen cut Luke down. Luke died." He didn't keep his eyes on the prize! Kyp is suitably Jungian, and acting out of understandable motivation when he does what he does, which is kill a lot of people by blowing up their star. But I'm jumping ahead!
     
    Grey1 likes this.