Lit Did The Last Jedi change your view of the new SW canon?

I’m so utterly deflated. I hate what they did with Luke and don’t buy for a second that he’d give up for years like that. So I kind of got interested in maybe starting the Legends stuff, but then it’s like... ****, the whole damn universe is abandoned. And then apparently some stupid uncharacteristic stuff happens later in the post-Thrawn-trilogy. But then you have all these cool side stories with minor characters and- ****, those are just invalidated. Dead. I wish we could get some new material under the Legends banner. That would keep me interested. As of now, I’m going to seek the help of you guys to find the essential, golden EU material, close the book, and consider Star Wars a completed story outside of side things that don’t affect the Skywalker saga and could fit into either canon.

 

Yes, it did ruin it. It's clear now that there is absolutely no cohesive vision, and likely never was one before. They've spent the time and money on things like Phasma books and comics for absolutely no reason. It's a shame to see them toss away such well developed characters for no reason, especially considering that they could have done so many more interesting things with that character.

It's becoming more and more evident that the books are being developed to plug the holes in the scripting process. The visual dictionaries in particular seem to just exist to give the information the films didn't bother to. Star Wars is being run like a disposable movie machine, with the details people like me care about being relegated to the background, subject to immediate retcon. Something I thought the story group was in place to prevent. It didn't even take two years for things to become obsolete. The visual dictionary for TFA that says Luke left the map to his destination for Lor San Tekka? Wrong. Even though it was written by a story group member. While TLJ was in pre-production. They couldn't even keep their story straight. I expected continuity to get fuzzy in time, because obviously you can only tell stories for so long before things get muddled. These guys couldn't even finish a trilogy before changing course.

 

I think it’s because in the case of the above you had better stories replacing them. In the New EU case you are replacing the better stories with lesser ones.

Zahn has Thrawn in The Thrawn novel follow the Thrawn character of the old EU rather than Rebels, as they seem like completely different characters.

As for the I’m out statement. It depends on the movie.
Speaking only for myself, Iv no interest in the Solo Movie, even before all the backstage cluster stuff came out, I had no interest in seeing a non Harrison Ford person play him and it was not a movie I was particularly interested in seeing anyway. In ANH he’s a drug runner who owes money to his gang boss. He’s a mercenary whose only in it for the money. That’s fine, we need nothing else.

For 9 , no I won’t be. Iv no interest in watching more Rebellion v Empire mk2 and no interest in seeing Rey Sue or being reminded that the last Skywalker in the Skywalker saga is a crazy emo while JJ coming back was the icing on that cake.

For the Obi Wan Movie - Assuming they get Ewan back and have a good script (essentially by turning the Kenobi book into a movie) then I will be back and be interested in it.

Same goes for a Vader movie assuming we have conflicted Vader trapped in his own hell etc.

Yoda and Fett movies - no not at all.

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/ne...s-not-my-luke-skywalker/ar-BBH9JU6?li=BBnb2gh

Mark seemed to have had issues with the version of Luke they chose upon, but it was out've his hands.

 

Where's it been tweeted that this book is wrong? Luke's behaviour is a little inconsistent with leaving the map with Tekka - but maybe he did so and then changed his mind about wanting people to come after him?

 

Even for a fan fix, that's pushing it.

 

Given that Tekka's in the Poe Dameron comics - if he made it clear in those that he had to hunt down the map - he didn't just get it given to him - that would qualify as "retconning the splatbook" at least.

It wouldn't be the first time newcanon splatbook data got retconned, after all.

But to say something has been retconned, generally requires some strong evidence of it.

 

Pablo Hidalgo's clarified the map on Twitter.

"The map isn't specifically to Luke. It's not something he left behind. It's to where Luke is believed to be. It's a map to the first Jedi temple. Lor San Tekka helped with the research."

Which... sounds to contradict the TFA Visual Dictionary.

 

If Tekka helped Luke with the "find the first Jedi Temple" research, and then Luke gave Tekka a copy of the product of all their research before setting off - then it matches the Visual Dictionary fairly neatly.

 

Luke seemed at peace with the temple he had with his new Jedi Order until things fell apart - due to his own Dark Side weakness or impulses that truly created Kylo. Wouldnt it make more sense that Tekka helped Luke find that specific Jedi temple and not the one on Ahch-To. Also with Ahch-To he was going there to destroy the last remaining history of the Jedi Order and to die of old age or light himself on fire who knows . He was no longer a Jedi. Also as far as I am aware Luke's destroyed Jedi temple was never given a location oddly enough even in the second film.

One of the issues am curious as to why Luke even needed someone like Tekka in the first place, in film that character was another red-herring thrown at the audience, he was there basically to act the place of a Ben Kenobi. The whole map thing seemed just thrown in there to give Ford an Indiana Jones-like moment and at the same time be a call back to Kenobi having trouble finding Kamino in the Jedi archive galactic map.

In Battlefront we also learn the Force called him[Luke] to Pillio to locate one specific item in Sidious's personal collection which happened to be the special compass . In the film its just a prop, as are the sacred texts lol.

In TLJ we learn Luke did not want to be found, and he spent apparently all these years rejecting the Force and thus cutting himself off from it, he seemed corrupted by the Dark Side with by his own fear and lack of getting over or accepting failure, and hoarding objects which we was not strong enough to let go of - Yoda lifted that burden and was the one that destroying them. I've seen Luke officially described as a Colonel Kurtz, which before was applied to Maul. Luke is confirmed to be wearing a Sith kyber crystal attached to a Jedi Crusader pendant which is odd for any Jedi Master let alone one that has cut himself off from the Force and gave up. So far we had Savage's Talisman and Maul's holocron shard that acted as compasses . Luke seems to be using similar means to those Dark Siders. The symbolism found on Ahch-To seems kinda like a Mortis, the light and the dark is present even in its symbolism.

Its also not clear why didnt Sidious use the compass. Did he just hoard items because he was a nut on the subject of the occult, ok fine but unlike Indiana Jones' Hitler, Palpatine was a Sith Lord. We also learn that the Empire had atleast part of the map from the Imperial archives, so the Sith/Empire had to have been close to locating the temple at some point. Moreover supposedly Sidious was always being drawn further out in space and in search of some Dark Side source.

 

Very well put. We were sold this idea that they were building this incredible universe and there would be a lot of cohesion between the books and movies. It's a big reason why I was ok with the old EU being scrapped (parts of it).

We are just an afterthought. The money they make off the movies and products make the book/comic fans look like a dot in space. As long as people are content enough to keep going to the theaters and buy their endless supply of memorabilia then Disney will be happy. I know there are dedicated people at Disney who would disagree but I doubt they have any sort of big say in the direction of the franchise.

I haven't read the Phasma comics or book yet and I feel like I'm going to be introduced to an absolutely awesome character and incredible warrior only to have that image completely ruined by the joke she is in Episode VII and her getting beaten by

Spoiler

the janitor

in Episode VIII.

 

Spoiler

I'm really tired of people referring to Finn as "the janitor." The TFA Visual Dictionary confirms that Finn worked sanitation on rotation, and this was not uncommon for stormtroopers to do. Finn's not a janitor–but janitorial duties are part of stormtroopers' duties and thus, Finn would've done that, too. He was also a highly-trained soldier, and that's the guy that defeated Phasma.

 

You will have a harder time trying to stay awake for like half of the book. I recommend letting it all go, it feels very liberating. Right now the new canon is the equivalent of an apple beautiful on the outside but rotten on the inside.

 

I feel you and agree with you. I do wish that they would take more care to make the universe feel more connected. But at the same time, I also feel like they are slowly getting to that point, but it might be a bit of a slow burn for right now. As it stands, like you pointed out, most people are more inclined to watch the movies and don't care about the extra lore behind everything, yet complain when they skimp on the lore. Right now I'm reading a new book that just came out with the hopes that it makes me feel more attached to Rose.

Catalyst is a good example of what they should be doing with the new canon, make a book that directly ties in with a new movie, but make it so that fans can still enjoy the movie without having read the book. Heck, what they did with Jyn in my mind was a good idea because it makes reading both Catalyst and Rebel Rising valid because both those books (along with Rebels) help to paint a bigger picture with Rogue One. I'm hoping that this trend will continue and that the only reason it looks like we aren't at that stage yet is that the books and movies are being released essentially out of order to try and avoid certain plot twists for the more casual fans.

 

That’s because you shouldn’t need to read a book to explain a movies plot or character motivation.

To be fair the ST isn’t the only ones to do that.That for me was one of the big issues of the PT, what’s a Sith and why do they want revenge. That’s never explained in the movies.

Compare both of the above to OT where we as an audience are told that the Jedi were the Guardians of peace and justice who were overthrown and killed by the Empire and Darth Vader was originally a Jedi himself.

Or as a character motivation , comparison, to use (again) Han Solo - a drug runner who owes money to his Gangster Boss, hell he even spells it out for the audience with Leia as the audience surrogate “I expect to be well paid, Im only in this the money”

You don’t need a book to explain any of that, it’s all there in the movie but with the PT and dialled up 1000 the ST you do

 

Except the Rogue One example shows what can be done with a rough plan - film here, book here, add the two together if you want but not required.

If they had a plan for the ST, they would have had a far better idea of what books / comics to issue ahead of the film in order to craft a meaningful connection. You can just watch R1, but watch it having read Catalyst and the opening scenes play very differently.

Now TLJ made things harder by supposedly continuing immediately after the end of TFA, which is why we got the books they did. But if there was a plan and they knew what is in ep 9, they could have been preparing 'TLJ aftermath / Ep 9 prologue' material. As it is? They don't know what is in ep 9, TLJ has blown up the idea of there being any kind of coherency or consistency from film to film, so I doubt there'll be anything significant until Autumn 2019, which is a massive shame and missed opportunity.

 

Well yeah, as it's Abrams and we know his tendency towards secrecy.

 

And his use of the rehash ...insert Khan Gif ...

 

I'm now at the sifting through the charred remains and possibly rebuilding stage.

 

So, Ruined Forever?

I kid, but overall I like the new direction the series is going in. And while I don't agree with every last decision, there's enough good, and what characters needed a good send off got one, to be hopeful about the future.

 

Phasmsa is the new Boba Fett. And Fett got beaten by a blind man...

 

Again, I don't remember coming out of Revenge of the Sith and hearing people say, "Ugh, Durge and Asaj Ventress weren't even mentioned. What a complete lack of cohesion, we are just an afterthought".

Spoiler

It seems to me that the death of Phasma, despite a comic and a novel dedicated to her, is what's brought about all this "the EU doesn't really matter, we're all doomed!" sentiment. But is it really that different from how Boba Fett, Darth Maul, Greivous, and others were only cool looking bad guys in the films, and had to have the real meat of their characterization filled in by the EU?

I feel like people are ignoring that this is nothing new, and that somehow, despite Star Wars being "Ruined Forever" we survived. And I feel like this is just round two of the aftermath of "Journey to The Force Awakens" when people complained because for some reason they expected it to give away major plot points of the movie.