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Lit From Endor to Exegol - The State of the Galaxy Discussion Thread (Tagged Victory's Price Spoilers)

Discussion in 'Literature' started by AdmiralNick22 , Sep 6, 2015.

  1. Chris0013

    Chris0013 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    May 21, 2014
    I know...it is a little tricky...but they could give us something that lays out the 30 years and where we are at up to the opening crawl. With regards to the academy they don't have to go into all the detail...just Luke founded it, $#!& happened, Luke went into hiding.
     
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  2. MandaloreRex2015

    MandaloreRex2015 Jedi Knight star 1

    Registered:
    Jan 3, 2015
    Yeah. Something that pretty much says "here's just enough info for you to understand the current state of the galaxy at the beginning of Episode VII."
     
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  3. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2002
    Something that explains, for example, that Luke Skywalker has vanished and, in his absence, the sinister First Order has risen from the ashes of the Empire? And that, with the support of the Republic, General Leia Organa leads a brave resistance?
     
    Last edited: Feb 6, 2018
  4. The Raddinator

    The Raddinator Jedi Knight star 2

    Registered:
    Dec 18, 2017
    FWIW I think they could have handled exposition like this a bit more artfully just by doing it within the movie itself with only tiny changes. I blame the second paragraph of the crawl mostly, because it's meant to explain but leaves things pretty unclear - why are the Republic and the Resistance different things? What's going on here? Tweaking that paragraph could both give more clarity up front and avoid some of the most jarring dialogue later in the movie - (Really thinking here of Hux's clumsy "The government that supports the Resistance, the Republic!")

    Something like 'With the peaceful REPUBLIC oblivious to the rising threat, General Leia Organa has formed a brave RESISTANCE. She is desperate to find her brother Luke and to expose the First Order before it is too late' would be substantively very similar but make the basic political situation clearer, at least IMO.
     
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  5. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2002
    Rewritten:

    Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister FIRST ORDER has risen from the ashes of the Empire to challenge the peaceful and prosperous NEW REPUBLIC. They will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed.

    Unable to convince the Republic of the threat, General Leia Organa leads a brave, hardscrabble RESISTANCE on First Order worlds. She is desperate to find her brother Luke and gain his help in restoring peace and justice to the galaxy.

    Leia has sent her most daring pilot on a secret mission to Jakku, where an old ally has discovered a clue to Luke’s whereabouts . . .
     
  6. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    Honestly, I don't get it when fans complain they didn't get enough "background" or "context".

    Seriously folks, what did was know about the Old Republic, based on ANH? Or the Senate? The answer is next to nothing, but that didn't hamper the story they were telling. I think a lot of people are unfairly harsh on the Sequel Trilogy for this. This is a staple of Star Wars storytelling, we always get the details after the movies.

    --Adm. Nick
     
  7. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2002
    I do think people were more confused about what the Resistance was and its role in relationship to the Republic than I ever would have been seeing ANH.
     
  8. Chris0013

    Chris0013 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    May 21, 2014
    Yeah...but I was a little kid then and only cared about lightsabers and hot rod freighters. Now I care a little more about back story.
     
  9. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    Not everyone was a little kid when they first saw them. ;)

    --Adm. Nick
     
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  10. sidv88

    sidv88 Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Aug 22, 2005
    Some things still glare from ANH though. After over 40 years of media, the audience still has very little attachment to Alderaan I think, or know much about the planet. The closest may be the new canon Leia books. My own personal attachment came from playing the Old Republic.
     
  11. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

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    Aug 19, 2002
    And not everyone watching the sequels now is a grown up.
     
  12. reagan64

    reagan64 Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Feb 26, 2006
    ANH actually did a really amazing job in setting up the Empire-Rebellion conflict. The scene on the Tantive IV is a masterpiece of fluid exposition. From just a few lines of dialogue we know:
    -There is an Empire with a Senate, which is sufficiently influential that military officers are reluctant to go against it
    -Many in that Senate are sympathetic to a rebellion against the Empire
    -One of those sympathizers (Leia) has been regularly abusing her diplomatic immunity to assist the Rebellion.

    This is all in the first few minutes and none of it feels the slightest bit clunky. The conference room scene is similarly well-crafted. TFA didn't have scenes like that to set up the conflict.
     
  13. Vialco

    Vialco Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Mar 6, 2007
    [​IMG]
     
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  14. MandaloreRex2015

    MandaloreRex2015 Jedi Knight star 1

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    Jan 3, 2015
    Yes! I love this! This would have gone a long way to explaining the conflict in the ST.
     
  15. SpecForce Trooper

    SpecForce Trooper Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 19, 2016
    Not exactly comparable. The OT started the whole shebang. There wasn't a need to go in depth about whatever happened before the films. The audience knows nothing. With the Force Awakens we know the universe. We know what happened in the OT. So it's important to explain how we got from the OT to the ST. We don't need to know what happened between the Clone Wars and ANH because we know next to nothing about the Clone Wars.
    ANH is the first film.
    TFA is a sequel.
    We don't need to know what happened before ANH.
    TFA has 6 films preceding it. We need to know what happens in-between.
    Why should we care what Palpatine was doing in the Clone Wars? We've never even seen the Clone Wars.
    We need to know what Snoke was doing during the OT. There must be a reason we haven't seen him in any of the other movies.
    In ANH the past is expository dialogue. In TFA the past is the films we the audience have seen!
     
  16. Ghost

    Ghost Chosen One star 8

    Registered:
    Oct 13, 2003
    Exactly. Especially with Snoke, since he's the one who changed the whole trajectory between ROTJ and TFA.
     
  17. JediBatman

    JediBatman Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    May 3, 2015
    Overall I think the amount of "background info" or "context" we've been getting (both in the films and in tie in materials) is relatively similar for what we were getting for the other trilogies. However, I do think TLJ was a lot better in this regard. We've got Hux expositing that the Republic is no more and the Resistance is considered war criminals. We've got Rey explaining that the FO is well on their way to taking over the major systems. We've got the constant mention of "allies in the outer rim".

    I don't need to hear the history of Jakku or Luke's Academy, but I do think TFA could have benefitted from one or two lines like that. (Especially since, as others have mentioned, the whole Republic/Resistance dynamic is a bit confusing).
     
  18. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2002
    It's really just two tweaks to set up what the Republic is and their relationship to the Resistance.
     
  19. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    What's done is done. However, a cartoon series set during the New Republic Era would add emotional heft to the Senate's destruction in TFA. We've heard that the New Republic was very successful for the first 15-20 years +/-, it would be nice to see some of the positive effects that the New Republic had on the Galaxy.

    --Adm. Nick
     
  20. AusStig

    AusStig Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Feb 3, 2010
    I think the NR should be shown as a corrupt mass, fully of greedy politicians and a cynical populace, with criminal gangs ruling entire worlds. And full of failure.

    To help explain why no one seems to want to fight for it.

    Or full of idealists who fail in the 'real world' in order to make the whole thing more tragic.
     
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  21. JediBatman

    JediBatman Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    May 3, 2015
    Obviously the New Republic shouldn't be perfect given it's state in the TFA era, but I have two problems with this:

    1. An era of peace and a mostly successful New Republic shows our heroes actually accomplished something. You say you want it "full of failure". Haven't we seen enough failure from the OT heroes?
    2. Can we for once, just once, have a functioning democracy in Star Wars? I don't know if it was an attempt at complex/gray morality, emulating the Prequel Trilogy, or what, but Legends really overdid it. For all of Star Wars championing freedom and fighting tyranny, at this point it also seems to have the underlying message of Kent Brockman's "Democracy just dosn't work". Or "hey, the Empire may have blown up planets, but at least it made the space trains run on time".
     
  22. The Raddinator

    The Raddinator Jedi Knight star 2

    Registered:
    Dec 18, 2017
    Yes, I 100% agree with this. The basic contours of the situation are laid out waaaaay better in TLJ and it doesn't mean lots of focusing on them, just working it naturally into the dialogue (And using the opening crawl a little better). Now in fairness, the TLJ set-up is simpler and easier to describe than the TFA one, but I do think it's far clearer.
     
  23. BobaMatt

    BobaMatt TFN EU Staff star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2002
    This isn't what's going on.
     
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  24. mnjedi

    mnjedi JCC Arena Game Host star 5 VIP - Game Host

    Registered:
    Nov 4, 2012
    The NR allmost couldn't muster the votes to finish off the imperial fleet due to rampant corruption. its first election cycle concluded with the loser orchestrating an open assassination attempt on the winner. The NR in bloodline is completely unable to govern at all, and we find out that it was set up that way by design.

    If it has any success in the years in between I have to imagine it being allmost solely of off Mon Mothmas cult of personality keeping the system allmost functional. Then when she retires everything falls apart.
     
  25. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    The New Republic is a democracy. No democracy is entirely free of political strife or corruption. That still doesn't negative the positive impacts that the New Republic has had to date:
    • Re-established the Senate with senators directly elected by their constituents
    • Removed majority of "emergency powers" from the chancellor position
    • Worked to de-militarize a galaxy plagued by two massive wars within a generation
    • Abolished slavery within it's borders
    • Re-started galactic trade
    • Rebuilt worlds ravaged by the Empire
    • Instituted common laws and rights for it's citizens (and potentially even droids)
    • Successfully brought former Separatist worlds (which were themselves former parts of the Galactic Republic) back into the fold
    • Expanded it's membership, but without an obsessive need to have the entire Galaxy under it's banners
    • Maintained peaceful relations and trade negotiations with independent worlds
    It was almost fanatically egalitarian, it espoused the rights of it's citizens and their worlds first and foremost, and genuinely tried to maintain a peace that held for 2-3 decades. Yes, the New Republic was naïve in some ways. Yes, it was sometimes filled with political inaction. Yes, it was idealistic to the core. These aren't sins, these aren't signs of corruption, these are signs of a government that tried to do it's best and failed.

    It drives me nuts how many folks love to gloss over these events. We've really only seen the New Republic at it's birth and in dire straights. There is a lot of time inbetween that makes it a government worthwhile.

    RE: the Galaxy not "fighting" for the New Republic. That is totally missing the point. The Galaxy is WEARY of war. The Galaxy was cowed into submission with the destruction of Hosnian Prime. Neutral systems surrendered without a fight. The remaining New Republic worlds ARE fighting, but as Rey noted they might not last more than a few weeks. The Galaxy nearly lost hope.

    A hope, I'll add, that was only recently reignited by the sacrifice of Luke Skywalker. :luke::greensaber:

    --Adm. Nick
     
    Last edited: Feb 9, 2018