Lit New Timothy Zahn Interview About Starwars

So, i didn't know where to put this so I decided to create a new thread since I know he's famous around here and I took the most relevant part of the interview for us to discuss.

http://www.blastr.com/2016-11-10/au...e-one-and-why-george-lucas-doesnt-read-novels

 

This is an incredible interview. It's nice to know Zahn is such a big EU fan.


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Someone inform Zahn that Coruscant was in the prequels.

Also ask if he's seen them.

 

Fantastic interview. Thank you for posting it! I don't typically like to read any interviews, but it's Zahn and getting his insight was wonderful.

 

This is also another reminder that bringing back characters from Legends is not his call to make.

 

I love that he advocates using the X-Wing novels as the basis for a live-action series.

 

Interesting. Maybe there is hope the main events of the Thrawn Trilogy (minus the birth of Jacen and Jana) or a new version of it could become canon...

 

I hope this never happens.


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WE HAVE HOPE!

Wait -- if Caliban hopes one thing, and Daneira hopes another thing, who's hope wins???

 

Hmm, it seems unlikely now with the Aftermath trilogy covering (spoilers for Aftermath)

Spoiler

Leia's pregnancy with Ben. Presumably this would have been the timeframe a canon Thrawn Trilogy adaptation would have covered.

Maybe as far as the Thrawn Trilogy in canon goes, Myrkr was the first test site for Starkiller base (for obvious reasons--Snoke and Kylo Ren can't have those yellow lizards running around for use by the Resistance). Oh, and as I mentioned before on this forum, Maz Kanata is obviously the original Guardian of Mount Tantiss. Either that, or Mara Jade sold Anakin's lightsaber, which she got from Luke, to Maz for some quick credits...

 

Sinrebirth

 

Zahn didn't even compare his vision of Coruscant to Lucas's prequel one. Vastly different worlds if you ask me, that kind of makes the book versions obsolete. He seems overly arrogant to think Lucas took his "force lightening on a lightsaber" from his story, I doubt that GL even read the comic either.

 

So DG did Zahn piss in your cornflakes, run over your cat frequently, BBQ your dog or microwave your hamster to get that level of sheer antipathy from you?

 

I love how candid and honest about everything he is. It's not one of those boring, by-the-book interviews full of cliches where nothing is actually said.

lol no it's not. It's out of the goodness of their profits. Thrawn by Zahn will sell. I'm sure he knows this though, obviously, and is just being polite.

That sounds a bit silly tbh. Considering tv budgets, and the financial requirements of space battles, the show would have to be like 2 minutes per episode of starfighters and 48 minutes per episode of the characters standing around talking.

Lol 100%, I found that interesting as well. Not sure if he actually thinks that Lucas would have needed to read his book/comic to come up with that pretty obvious action set-piece.

 

Interesting that he was allowed to be honest about TFA

 

It's interesting the he first said starting from scratch was the best decision and then in the next question he said Abrams had all of Legends to choose from, so which is it?

 

Yes. Next.

 

Indeed. I think he's just ticked off that all of his books are now completely written off by Disney now....at least he got one character salvaged from his Zahn EU, be greatful for that at least. So he basically has no say on any of the characters he created because he doesn't own the rights to them (Not that he ever did)....that would kind of suck for a writer that worked hard on establishing them. But this is Star Wars and you have to expect that whatever you make in that franchise won't end up being yours anyways.

 

Yeah. He knows all that. He's said it before, loooong before Legends ever happened.

 

That's not exactly a 'gotcha' moment.

They start from scratch for the new films rather than try to make it work with 100s of existing stories, but there's nothing stopping them mining that lot of scratched stories for ideas and concepts.

That's also been done from the start on the new stuff with Tarkin transferring in stuff, as has Rebels e.g. Interdictor Cruiser.

That said, given that what they selected was basically, in Legends terms, Death Star + Galaxy Gun, I doubt Zahn would agree because he's never been interested in superweapons of that kind.

 

Did you even spot this bit?

It's not exactly a hyperbolic reply declaring eternal hatred for LFL, is it? No, not least because he took the invite to write the new Thrawn book. If he was really so hacked off he wouldn't have.

Zahn is a professional author, he knows the deal that is work-for-hire, the above quote proves it.

 

I kind of like how Zhan acknowledges that Legends was a legitimate decision in the face of revamping the entire franchise.

 

I don't think anyone ever argued it was not a "legitimate" decision. I (and others) do argue against it being the "best of all decisions".

Did it work? Sorta. Personally, I rank TFA as the third worst Star Wars film, but that's not due to it being part of legends or not. Simply on what it is (or rather is not) as a stand-alone film.

Could something else have worked as well or better? I personally think so, but since reality only ever allows one path to be taken on this, there's no way we can ever have a real comparison. Financially its been a success and that's what matters to Disney/LFL. Rogue One looks like it could be one of the best Star Wars films by contrast.

So, valid decision? absolutely. Best/only decision? no.

 

And AOTC!