ST Official Sequel Trilogy / Legends / Expanded Universe discussion thread

This thread, for me, has the whole "TL DR" thing going on, so I don't mean to bring up something that's been brought up.

With the EU officially getting the boot, do people still suspect the EU names and offspring like Jacen and Jaina to still be used, or even the "fact" that Han and Leia had twins? (like if ST's story had them have only one child, and with a different name) Or what if the simple stuff we guaranteed to still crossover from EU to ST will actually be wiped out too? What if the idea/character Nellith comes back in a different way to replace the EU offspring and to have a different focus of Lucas's original ST (brief) storyline?

Or are the specific offspring/twins of Jacen and Jaina still somehow in the forefront so much, that even though they're EU, that it would be weird for ST to completely wipe them out for the sake of starting the ST with a blank slate.

 

But that's the point. That was his movie. His movies are what he cares about.

 

How in the world could they have done that, short of going all Star Trek and creating parallel universes? Should they have pulled a Bob Newhart and we see Luke in bed at the very start of E7, wake up, and discover it was all just a dream?

Lucas, by his own admission, did not follow the EU terribly closely, and he completely disregarded it when making the prequels.

 

Should have not ended the Big 3 with Crucible, End the Lost Tribe threat, Get rid of Daala, Jag as Emperor, Imperial Knights formed etc. Give us a satisfactory end that sets up Legacy. That stuff did not happen.

 

I think that "solution" would only create 100 times as many problems as it solved. They really had to get rid of the whole darn thing. It would have been ridiculously confusing to pick and choose.

 

I'm talking about a coherent ending to the Legacy book era of the EU on its own term separate from the ST. Give us that sense of closure so we can move on to the ST universe.

 

There's just no financial incentive to commission another book in a dead continuity--it doesn't fit with their overall current marketing strategy.

 

Yeah, I think that's exactly what will happen. Probably nothing between Episode VI and VII until after VII is released.

 

They do it for comics.

 

The current focus is on revitalising the SW brand with content relevant to the next slate of films. It's a very tightly focused strategy: get people thinking about Luke, the Rebellion, the Empire, etc. This is because, for the last 15 years SW has been associated with the PT--the general public need to be reminded of old-school SW which get the pump primed for Ep7. Anything "off message" will seriously dilute the marketing push.

 

Yes, I am emotionally invested. I've been reading and collecting the EU for over 20 years. Do you expect me to not be? And yes, I think we all expected some changes to the continuity, but there's a big difference between "We're keeping X and ditching Y" and "We're ditching everything." So yes, I have always taken an objective view when it comes to relationship between the films and the Expanded Universe but I assumed that at least some of it would be preserved.

Considering that KW Jeter had to get George's assent to bring back Boba Fett in The Bounty Hunter Wars Trilogy, Alan Dean Foster was explicitly told that he could not write about Boba Fett's origins, or the Clone Wars when he wrote Splinter of the Mind's Eye and and considering that he told the NJO authors that they could not kill Luke but they could kill Chewie, I think calling the novels rogue frankly, is inaccurate. He may not read them, but yes, I think he knows the broad strokes.

No, what I said that overall the EU hangs together well, which it does, because of the Holocron, but that's not the point. The point can be summed up in one word. Respect. Respect for the existing content, respect for the creators of the content and most importantly respect for the fans. You should go over to the Del Ray Star Wars Facebook page. There are some really unhappy people over there because 30 years of continuity have been junked and they haven't given the authors the opportunity to wrap up the existing plot lines, never mind the fact that the fans haven't had the opportunity to say goodbye. I'm sure that more than a few fans will walk away from Star Wars because of this. They think they're ending the canon wars, but they're not. They're just going to get worse now because they are going to be lots of bitter EU fans who are going to want to defend the current interation of the Expanded Universe to the death. I have no issue with bringing in new blood and new ideas, but I am taking issue with is how certain elements of that transition are being handled.

 

Also a lot of us that are old enough to remember when the OT was all we had, the new generation all they know is the PT now. Unless they are big enough fans to watch the originals, are going ro be asking "what happened to the clones, Vader, Jar Jar etc.

 

Not exatly true. Most little kids I've met who like SW seem to focus more on the OT.

 

OK I apologize for misunderstanding.

I have to admit, I really haven't been following the EU terribly closely in some time, so I am not really familiar with the loose end we will never see tied up..... however, I still think what Disney did was the wisest course of action given the fact we are roughly 20 months away from a new movie.

 

Sure ending the EU is probably the better way to go but ending it with a cliffhanger is not the way to go. Read Crucible. That is not the way to end it. The Unifying Force was the way to end it with no cliff-hanging plots. A large remaining Sith army? Jedi split from the GA? Jag not Emperor? No Imperial Knights?

Get Stover, Luceno or Zahn to end it perfectly in a trilogy or Duology. Want people to accept the ST continuity? Wrap up the EU successfully, not have Han get the stuffing beat out of him in his finale and don't leave things hanging. Give us some form of respect that way.

 

Agreed. It doesn't have to be the New Jedi Order all over again, but give us a three to five book arc and wrap up the dangling plot threads. Then reboot the universe.

 

If the filmmakers want to steal from the EU, I highly encourage them to do so and the press release / video did imply that will continue to happen. There's too much EU stuff entrenched in the Star Wars universe fabric to entirely lay waste to everything (Example: Ewok names! Lots of 'em!). But I do think saying the novels are non-canon is the best decision to take because it means they aren't constrained and forced by the EU to set up their world. But steal the hell outta huge chunks or ignore other ones. It's their call. Although, to be honest, I would have just gone with "Post-Ewok party = non canon!" But I can see the reason why keeping the pre-ROTJ EU as canon could also conflict with any sort of far-reaching plans they had.

All that being said, I don't see how self-contained books like "Shatterpoint", or "Han Solo at Star's End" or "Shadows of the Empire" is actively contradicted by Disney's Star Wars grand plans going forward. It may not have the "official" canon stamp but how can be it disproved to have not happened to the fictional people in their fictional universe? (Well, okay, if Lucasfilm puts out yet another ESB to ROTJ multimedia product, then, yes, "Shadows" would not fit, but right now, it still does).

 

It would be great to take "elements" from the EU from the new films, Like a Chiss imperial that's not exactly Thrawn or another imperial mastermind that isn't thrawn (or a Chiss)

 

How are we supposed to be happy otherwise that the EU is ending?
I mean look at Dune. Yes Frank Herbert died a year after Chapterhouse: Dune but his plotline wasn't answered until Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson picked it up 20 years later. That is not cool to leave things dangling.

 

the way I see it now Star Wars has Alternate Universes just like other Scifi Space Operas you can have as many as you want I have several for some of my fav franchises you can have whatever you want in yours that helps me when something happens I don't like it didn't happen in my personal AU

 

That sounds interesting if they cobble characters together from various sources. But I do think if they wanna have the blue space alien super-smart admiral in the white uniform in any sort of Star Wars product down the line, might as well make him "Thrawn" as long as the broad strokes are there. But that doesn't automatically mean that the novel he appeared in is canon. For example, if they used Thrawn at any point in the ST. That doesn't canonize The Thrawn Trilogy, heck, it would actively contradict it. But it's still Thrawn in the movie doing Thrawn stuff. If not the whole extended PT to Heir to the Empire novel history. but, y'know, broad strokes.

 

Yeah, Think like how Marvel movies pull things out of thei rvast comic universe. Disney could do this with SW by pulling things out of the Legends continuity.

 

Exactly. As I said earlier, one of the things that I really liked about JJ Abrams' first Star Trek movie was that it actually respected the existing universe and respected me as a fan. Disney isn't doing that at all with Star Wars.

 

EU should be like what the Marvel Comics are to Marvel Cinematic Universe. there's a bunch of stuff there, take bits, make original things, but use the materiel (or, y'know, don't). It is something I've been saying since, like, I first heard about Disney buying it. It's like, "Oh! They're gonna treat the EU like the Marvel comics, neat!" Because, big picture, Disney wants to work Lucasfilm like how they work Marvel, and they're gonna need a source of inspiration to take from.

As for the nitty gritty canon-ness of the whole thing, there are a lot of intrinsic details to the Star Wars universe that come from the EU, it's the lifeblood that makes the Star Wars world breathe. The names of the planets, aliens, etc, will probably remain unchanged, mostly. the Marvel comic analogy is fairly apt, they look to the source for what it is.

As for every single novel ever published not canon, like I said, it'd be hard to actively disprove every fictional event having not happened. These are imaginary people, they lead really busy lives.

I would love an in-universe continuity time-travel crisis reboot but I'm in the minority, apparently. Bill and Ted meet Nero and the Doctor and reset the EU to just TCW and the movies! In a pop up book! or something really crazy. Jaxon's time travelling revenge scheme! Stuff like that.

 

Do toylines count? Because Hasbro named these currently unnamed characters.