Books Aftermath: Empire's End (book 3) by Chuck Wendig

“I asked Rian Johnson about Snoke—Who/what is he?—and Rian was fairly up front in saying that Snoke is not a character he particularly gets into in TLJ. Hmmm.” http://screenrant.com/star-wars-8-snoke-role-rian-johnson/

Maybe we will see some clues about Snoke in TLJ and his backstory just in IX

 

Not surprising. Ep. VIII will likely be focused mainly on Luke and Rey while Snoke will get a little more screen time in IX. It would be a little too much to answer both the question of Rey's past as well as who Snoke is in one movie.

Unfortunately that probably means we likely aren't going to learn a whole lot more about the First Order either.

 

Which, as much as I love Zahn, should be another group than the Imp's characterization.

The Separatists? Sure.

The FO? Sure.

The Empire? No, they are a nation of puppy kickers.

 

Maybe we'll get some follow up on Empire's End and the fate of Rae Sloane in the Phasma book ?

 

Empire's End explicitly pointed out the tall blonde girl so there's a leaning that it may be Phasma and remember, Rax gave lil'Hux complete control of all of these killer kids so maybe if the tall blonde girl is Phasma then she would have basically risen up the ranks along with Hux in the origins of the First Order.

 

We might see parts of that in the upcoming Phasma novel.

 

Yeah I would imagine they would make the characters age the same age as the actress or at least very close to it. TFA takes place 29 years after Empire's End so the character in Empire's End would have to be about 9 if they indeed are going to make them the same age. Have only read EE once so can't remember exactly how old they said the kids were or if they gave any type of age description for them at all.

 

They never nail it down but they describe them as "children" but some of them are pretty big (and they can take out stormtroopers) so I would say, at most, they would be early teens.

 

I wanted to jump in here because I've been up all night and it has afforded me a lot of time to think about a great many things. One of the many thoughts that popped into my brain was how simultaneously good and not so good Empire's End was as the final book of this trilogy. It's good because it wrapped things up pretty nicely, it was fascinating to read about the Contingency and the end of the Empire, and we got to see some interesting new concepts (Niima the Hutt, the Observatory).

But ultimately, as much as I had fun reading the novel and as much as it was competently written and storied, I can't help but feel like it's way too depressing for its own good. Pretty much everything is at its darkest moment here--the characters are all separated and suffering in their own little ways--the mental health of Sloane and Norra is deteriorating, Sinjir is still an unhappy bastard, Jas is still struggling with paying her debts and mutilates herself on Jakku to create a means of escape, Temmin is suffering from worry over his mom, and poor Jom. Poor, poor Jom.

Hardly any of these characters escape without suffering grievous consequences, it seems. And to me that is depressing. War has consequences, yes, but Star Wars always at least made you feel good after it was all said and done because good had triumphed over evil. In this book the troubles of the New Republic and the deterioration of the collective sanity of the Imperial Navy and Stormtrooper corps on Jakku add a whole other layer to just how bleak everything seems despite the New Republic being on the brink of defeating the Empire and ushering in 29 years of relative peace.

Knowing the shake up that happens in TFA, I personally would've liked this book to have a more hopeful disposition. For one, it would help reading this book not be such a dreary experience. And secondly, it would serve as juxtaposition for that hope eventually dying in TFA. As it stands now the plucky heroes of the Rebellion transitioning from warriors to world-warn diplomats in just a year doesn't capture the feel good feelings that the OT had.

Having said that, Empire's End is still a fitting end for the Aftermath trilogy, and it might be an unpopular opinion but I'm happy that this was our first post-ROTJ big time trilogy. It was a great look at the crumbling and eventual defeat of the Empire through the eyes of some new and interesting characters, and Gallius Rax is a formidable villain to be put up there with the likes of Thrawn and Xizor.

 

This is a dark book but I'd say it's a pretty dark trilogy, actually. Aside from the character's quipping, there is a lot of messiness in the books. And it's kind of in the title, it's the Empire's End and the end was Sidious' Contingency which was carried out by a bloodthirsty madman who deliberately killed the Empire and drove it's soldiers mad. So people die. A lot. Which also makes sense that they were gone a year after Endor, they were literally hardwired to self destruct.

Jom's death was just mean, though. But it was certainly the most emotional death of the series. Mister Bones has a back up drive (that we see in Poe Dameron) and Temmin's dad was kind of dead years ago when he was taken away. Kind of like how the Empire dies at Endor. He was a dead man walking ever since they woke him up from the prison ship. This is just the fallout.

The only thing that I find disappointing about the final book is that Luke doesn't show up at Jakku. Well, at least in the book, he could have still been there somewhere. But I think having Luke show up would have added a bit of much needed light in the darkness.

 

I hated reading the Aftermath trilogy....from a writing/reading perspective. Too many silly phrases used, the over-use of triple words (bang! bang! bang!), all the characters talk unrealistically and too long, and too similarly to each other, with that Solo-like quipping, as well as the disjointed story-telling by the author; jumping from scene to scene too many times, especially when he has sometimes 5 or more different scenes going on, then by the time he comes back to a scene, you forget what was going on. Especially in context too with tension created for each scene....he might leave scene #1 with danger and action, then write at length about scene #2 which is filled with a lot of light talk between characters, then jumps to scene #3 which is pages of setting up the environment and scene, etc....so that when you do go back to the cliffhanger of scene #1, 50 pages later, the tension has been sucked out of it.

As a writing of novels, it would've been better (imo) if he stuck to a more linear narrative, where a scene takes on and absorbs into it the NEXT scene, and then that takes on the next scene, etc. So like a progression of escalating matters, with new characters joining into the story as the plot progresses. Rather than jumping back and forth trying to first establish 5 different scenes, and 20 different characters, and then jumping between them the rest of the way.

I also think something is a little fishy. I've read Bloodline and now Aftermath (and soon to read all the other new canon books), but have already noticed that two very different writers overuse the same words, overuse the same expressions, etc. Like, the REAL writer is the head Editor at LucasFilms Book branch. Like the authors submit their final work, and then this hypothetical chief Editor makes sweeping revisions, adds references to movie characters, places, etc, keeps continuity to the entire new canon, so you see a lot of similarity of exact language, phrases, words, expressions, etc between different SW books.

Just a theory

 

Hi Ezra Snoke,

that Wendig did jump too much in his trilogy is an allegation put up quite often and I agree with that. Such a heavy jumping works when the characters are already well established during the progressing of the novel or when they are already known. But to throw so many new characters like in this trilogy into the cold of abrupt scene changing like this is a mutilation of the story. Every other Star Wars novel I know starts with a heavy part of introduction of one or two characters - even when they are already known to the audience. Only then a change in scene can be made without the danger of leaving feelings interrupted and the readers torn into confusion what the "new" protagonists did last summer. I just red "Sith Lords" by Paul S. Kemp and I think he managed that scene-jumping very nicely.

 

Rae Sloane Is Black...

 

Yah, I was talking about the tall blonde child solider who was told to follow Hux's orders and was freaking out Sloane (as all of them were)

 

Unlike the theory that your username is derived from, this one has some merit.

 

I hate to burst the bubble on that theory, but it isn't correct.

 

Yeah there are a lot of words required in order to write 350-400+ page novel. Authors using similar phrases from time to one another likely isn't that uncommon.

 

I'm fine with it as long as someone "chuckles darkly" from time to time.

 

The part I thought had some merit was the canon locations and technology part. Hard to believe that all authors are as meticulous as James Luceno.

 

Oh I could see that!

 

I mean, considering we've had various authors come on the board and talk about what they included or did not include certain things, I find it pretty doubtful that there's just a guy at LFL straight combing through books and inserting references/rewriting stuff.

 

Who? Aside from Jason Fry, I mean.

 

Further on my theory...

Look at how many major events, moments, scenes, locations etc occur in the Aftermath trilogy, especially that tie in with TFA era. There is no way Disney and LF are allowing some freelance writer to establish so much important content without them first writing it for him -- the essential plot points of the story, and just giving him freedom to create new characters and name them and such things. Then going over it with a fine-tooth comb to ok it.

Consider Rebels. The staff of writers for the show are like novel authors, but everything has to pass thru Dave Filoni. And he's a very high up entrenched identity in Star Wars. And even he has to get the ok of LF and Disney for any major aspects that affect the greater universe and tie in with the movies and TFA era.


Chuck Wendig has never written a Star Wars book before. Not entrenched. No way they're entrusting so much to him. Imo, he would've been given a synopsis of a book, the major events and plot points to occur, especially that tie in with TFA era. Locations, characters from existing canon who interact with his new characters, places they went, things they did together or not, certain planets featured, what revelations to avoid, not allowed to decide the back story for characters like Rey and Snoke.

 

Every Star Wars novelist starts off as a new, unentrenched writer. If they weren't going to trust him, they wouldn't have hired him.

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