Lit Disney Wars: Episode 7 and the EU (Disney Purchasing Lucasfilm, intends to release Ep 7 in 2015)

Preserving the integrity of Star Wars, obviously.

It's about how Episodes VII, VIII, and IX will affect the EU.

Ok. Just checking.

Now thinking about it, another plot device that could really throw a wrench into the EU would be if Obi-Wan, Yoda and/or Anakin show up in the sequels as Force ghosts to give Luke or other Jedi guidance.

Not really. The movies have always been clear that they'd always be around to guide Luke. As for why they haven't been involved that much in the post-ROTJ era, it could simply be that Luke didn't need their advice as much, but the threat in the ST is big enough that they feel like they should directly talk to Luke again. And we did have Anakin Skywalker trying to tell Jacen Solo to "stand firm" in the light side in the NJO (which has even more meaning after LOTF).

As I barely recall, in The Truce at Bakura or HttE, Obi-Wan's ghost says something to the effect that he can't appear anymore to Luke and he's fading into the Force...or something like that.

I believe it was just that he needed to "rejoin" the Force.

Heir to the Empire- he says he can "no longer postpone his journey to that which lies beyond"

After everything we've learned about Obi-Wan......... I'm calling that a classic Kenobi cop-out.

I won't be surprised to see him (as Ewan) back in the next film. Where he'll no doubt prove similarly useless by spouting words of wisdom that can only be understood after a few beers from a certain point of view.

I can see that. Only it would be more like "no you should do this or that our way"

If they put Ewan in the sequels, does that mean they'll release yet another special special special edition of the OT digitally replacing Alec Guiness with Ewan as Force ghost?

It will probably be Ewan made to look like 60-something Alec Guiness.

Although I don't recommend it, with modern technology they could probably make a digital Alec Guiness. Perhaps something like Clu in Tron: Legacy, although to me it looked fake not not quite like the young Jeff Bridges.

I honestly hope they can progress the story without dragging long-dead characters back from the grave. Let Luke play the role of wise mentor and keep the past as a valuable history lesson. It'd probably also help continuity if they avoided the recent events of the galaxy (read: the last two decades) by keeping them irrelevant to the immediate issue and maybe dropping hints and references to those years as little in-jokes for the EU fans.

yeah that was stupid

i wish Zahn hadn't have written that in hindsight

I agree with this so much and would go even further and say not just the PT but the OT charachters as well. Apart from maybe a small part by Luke as the old wise Jedi, I really can't see the point of having them all back except for the sole purpose of the audience going ooohh look thats Leia and Lando etc.

They could have Ewan looking like he did around ROTS, and it would be fine. He, Anakin and Yoda are mystical ghost things right now, so who says they can't change their appearance to their younger selves, especially since that is how Anakin appears in the latest version of ROTJ. Not that they should necessarily appear at all.

I still want to smack Hayden for that. He looks so damn out of place. Like some ugly chair shoved into the livingroom to accommodate that one relative that no one really likes and now, in order to get to the bathroom, everyone needs to walk around this chair and relative because they're in the way. Oh, and they keep making stupid comments about the program that everyone is watching and have absolutely nothing of value to contribute to the conversation. That's what Force Ghost Hayden is like.

I liked it, honestly. An effective way to take away Luke's mentor, to really hammer in the fact that Luke is on his own, that reviving the Jedi is his responsibility, and his alone. I also like the implication that death for a Jedi is something that can be postponed, but not defied. Obi-Wan served his purpose in staying behind to help Luke, but not it's time for him to move on.

Well to be fair, when that was filmed, Lucas just told Hayden to pose for a photoshoot to test the cameras. He didn't even know he was added to ROTJ until the DVD was released.

Thanks for pointing to the responsible party, then! Now I know who to truly blame for that.

i liked it at the time as well, and as a function of that book in itself.

But when taken as part of the whole EU, and what we now know of the whills and force ghosts etc, it just seems a bit silly in hindsight

I think other characters have been able to stick around longer than Obi-Wan did as Force ghosts, so his claim here doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Well, that was a really, really long time ago, and I liked it, as a way to remove Obi-wan as an easy fallback option for authors to use. The most important thing was for Luke to defeat Vader and the Emperor... and while it didn't turn out the way anybody expected, Luke won and that's it. Other pre-Thrawn trilogy books have had Ben cameos, but he's not needed, and while it might be possible for Force ghosts to stick around longer, by that point Luke was probably established enough to handle things on his own, so time for Obi-wan to rest, at last. Anyway, as usual the prequels messed up the normal "rules" as we understood since Qui-gon's body didn't disappear into the Force, but he hung around for a while, but wasn't actually able to do anything for years.

Personally I just think of it as a Jedi Force ghost shouldn't hang around for too long, unless really absolutely necessary, and the biggest problem, the Emperor, was solved, so Obi-wan could rest at last. Well, there was stuff like Dark Empire after that, but Luke and Leia solved that on their own. And while Alec Guinness is long gone, an Ewan McGregor cameo is still possibility, if only they have old Luke joke about the sudden makeover and Obi-wan cite Anakin's final appearance.

And I didn't think that the actors had that much influence on some of the changes. Well, they have some input of course, but a lot of the... odder things over the last few years have typically come from one person. Well, not quite everything, but a lot, which is why Lucas not overseeing the ST might be good news, but he's still consulting, and if he says something, they might probably still follow it, so I'm still worried. You know the tinkering never ends, with the Blu-ray editions being one of the most recent prominent examples.

I just hope we don't end up with a ST version of a certain TCW character who is really overpowered for her age and position and gets to dual wield different color lightsabers and all that. TCW has a lot of examples of how Lucasfilm treats the EU, so I really hope the ST won't be like that, but I'm not optimistic.

Merry Christmas, everyone!