Anyone else think the Thraw trilogy is just too damn complicated?

A lifelong Star Wars fan, I've never actually gotten around to reading the Thrawn Trilogy until now. I'mnot even a hundred pages into Dark Force Rising, and I'mg etting a headache from trying to keept rack of everythingthat is going on.

Thrawn is planning something called teh Tantiss operation, which he's launchingf rom Mount Tantiss on Wayland, using something called Spaarti Cylinders. He also plans on using the Ysilamari for something other than just controlling C'Boath. Meanwhile, he's caused unrest in the Republic by framing Admiral Ackbar for treason, and is also still trying to capture Luke and Leia. C'Boath is awaiting Luke to come to him on Jomark, but Luke is instead going off with Han to clear Ackbar's name, into another trap set by Thrawn, while Thrawn is sending a messaget o the Noghri planet to remind them of who they serve so that they can find Leia, but that's whereLeia's going, to make peace with them. And meanwhile, he's also using 'Delta Source' to monitor the path of the Falcon, which means that he's probably going to find out that Leia's going to that planet.

How the hell did y'all make senseo ut of this?!

Slimy!

 

I don't think its too complicated. Heir to the Empire will always hold a special place in my heart.

 

It's not too complicated, I think, but probably too contrived.

 

I think it started off very good and very Adult for Star Wars Literature.

Then it sorta got weird by Last Command.

 

Nope. It's so wonderful, watching the galactic chess game unfold time and time again...

 

I read TTT when I was 14 and had no problems at all.

 

My only objections were that Thrawn's reign ended so abruptly and Joruus' death seemed contrived.

Mara Jade kills a Jedi master AND a Skywalker clone?

 

Its not that complicated, is it? A lot of plots going on, but that's the norm for a trilogy. Thrawn's plotting lots of things, and C'boath wants Luke, Leia and Leia's unborn children so he can use them to take over the galaxy. Luke helps out Han with a few things, Leia talks to the Noghri and overall the New Republic is losing to Thrawn's genius. And then there's Kardde and Mara's subplot too, of course.

A nice, self-contained series of books. A bit complex, but with that many characters, its not that surprising. It led to other stuff, but on its own, its more than enough story.

A bit deriavative of the movies, but that can be a good thing, and this was one of the earliest EU works, so there wasn't that much more than the movies to work with anyway.

Things might make some more sense by the time you get to the third book in the trilogy, if that's any comfort.

 

Luke Skywalker blows up a Death Star AND defeats Vader?

The OT was Luke's heroic journey. TTT was Mara's.

 

I didn't think it was complicated but I do agree with Charles that the Last Command was sort of a let down.

Delta Source seemed like some really cool mystery. It wasn't.
I thought that C'Boath turning large groups of Imperials into Zombies was a bit excessive.
Thrawn's death was too abrupt and the final Luke/Mara vs Luuke/C'Boath showdown was a bit of a let down.

That said...that trilogy is awesome. Zahn's handling of the smugglers is extremely good.

 

No, I'm saying that with no Jedi training it wasn't believable and just made C'Boath's ending unsatisfying.

 

I can buy it. She had her training from her days as a Hand, and that quick refresher course with Luke and I'd say to me her victory was more because C'Boath was insane. If he'd stopped dropping rocks and just force pushed her back she wouldn't have gotten him. But he was so fixated on his vision that he just couldn't conceive of her landing a blow.

Of course if it'd been a prolonged duel and not a situation where his own arrogance cost him then I'd object to it but as it was written I don't personally have a problem with it.

And she killed the Luke clone which was pretty much a puppet while it was fighting Luke. Again I think it wasn't as effective as it would have been if it had been allowed any free will of it's own.

 

Mara doing both was a bit much, but its not like she's some random kid that picked up a lightsaber, she had been trained by the best under the Emperor. And her killing C'boath was after a long fight and despite C'boath's attempts at mind-control, controlling the Luuke clone and fighting all of them simultaneously was probably taxing. Not to mention I love how C'botah's "vision" came true. This is why one shouldn't try to force visions, it won't end well. Although Luke probaly should've been more than a match for his clone, but the clone was possibly just an extension of C'boath by that point, and Luke had had the Force resonance of fighting his own clone slowing him down. Not to mention that Mara killed the Luuke clone after Luke had tricked it into blowing up a monitor in its face. And Luke had at times managed to disarm the clone, but C'boath kept Luke from grabbing his original lightsaber back, so the duel continued.

 

I think a more satisfying ending would have been Mara killing Luke clone and Luke killing C'Boath or the Jedi Master blowing up with Mount Tantiss.

I confess, Zahn did a good scene where the prophecy about her kneeling came true.

 

I think TTT trilogy was the only EU (bar comics) I read prior to Karen doing the RC novels and I'm sure I read them back in high school as well and I had not problems. I think my next attempt was to read THE MANDALORIAN ARMOR and I just couldn't get into it and eventually forgot about getting back to the SW tie-ins.

Hrmmm...now I'm curious, because I'm sure it must have been post-release of the EGtC because it was Mara Jade's description that made me pick the books up.

I really do need to reread TTT, but in terms of plot and such I thought it was fairly densely plotted, but that was a good thing, as I felt like I was plunged right back into the universe. It's not as light of a read as some of the SW EU, but I remmeber it as being pretty straight-forward.

 

I think Mara regained some abilities on the trek but I doubt she was anywhere near alleigence level Mara.

To me Mara won more because of C'Boath than because of Mara.

I don't think Mara could have repeated her feat again without much more training from Luke. The circumstances came together in a way that favored her. If C'Boath wasn't completely round the twist he'd have never let her get close. He'd have made sure she couldn't interfere in his test of Skywalker but even with his improved focus from Thrawn using him he still over looked things and like alot of darksiders was extremely over confident.

 

She isn't really battling C'Baoth. Whenever she tried to use the force against him she failed. She was at the right spot at the right time and managed to kill him when he had a moment of weakness, not something you need to be incredible powerful or trained for.

Vader couldn't beat Palpatine in a fight either, yet he managed to kill him. The difference between Palpatine and Vader is definately much smaller than the one between Mara and C'Baoth, but power was irrelevant at that point because it wasn't a batlle, it was a surprise attack.


I wish there would be another series like TTT. To me it always felt like the closest thing to a real Star Wars story (for a lack of better words). All the other stories were either much shorter and thus less grand on scale or felt completely different.

 

I'm going to remember some of these comments when Jaina fights Jacen

 

I read it when I was 12 and had no problems

 

I too had no problems. I think there are two reasons why it seems complicated. First off, we get to see the New Republic Council doing their meetings and so forth. In other words - we get to see people play politics. Especially that Bothan. Unless you're a politician or a political sciences major, trying to understand and swallow politics, whether in real life or in fantasy, tend to leave you with a headache and an upset stomach, respectively.

The second reason is you have to consider whom the primary antagonists were. First, we have an insane clone of an obsessive Jedi Master, and both the clone and the original had turned to the dark side. Trying to understand what makes an insane person tick is difficult at times. Then we have Thrawn, the personification of military brilliance. And I think something Mara said in Vision of the Future summed him up in one expression - "While Palpatine always thought one step ahead of everyone else, Thrawn always thought two steps ahead."

 

Actually, she did "forget" to use the Force. Her Force powers seemed to atrophy after Palpatine's death - which is why Mara Jade being trained by Kyle Katarn isn't as ridiculous as people were making it out to be.

 

TTT is amazing. it has all the thought and effort that many of the books / series since have lacked. there have been good books, but there have been more half-hearted than well thought through ones.

enjoy TTT. it's the jewel of the EU.

 

TTT has one of the simplest plots of any trilogy in Star Wars. Heir to the Empire has the simplest plot of any one novel in SW.

 

You know, Thrawn basically launches the New Clone War that lasts a very short time. In some sense, you could say GL took alot of ideas out of Zahn's bag of tricks here. Politics being important, a dark Force-user playing puppet master, Coruscant, etc.