ST Official Sequel Trilogy / Legends / Expanded Universe discussion thread

No please god no.

 

Come on, that was a really unlightsaber thing to say.

 

Ok, Even I admit that that opening crawl is utterly hilarious.

 

It's so utterly lightsaber.

 

OMG that opening Crawl is hilarious! (and I love the camera glare)

I actually have a thought that the EU might possibly be treated the same as Marvel comics and DC comics were, when making movies like the avengers and the dark Knight trilogy and man of steel, etc. basically using certain elements of the story line from the comics but not taking a direct copy of all the details-and even drastically changing certain details/characters/plot lines.

Considering those movies turned out great, I would be okay if they did the same thing with Star Wars EU. but I find it very difficult to believe that they would basically turn the EU into Canon to fill in the time between return of the Jedi and episode VII. (although it be perfectly fine with that! )




Lightsaber...

 

This is glorious.

 

Would you say just "glorious" or "lightsaber glorious"?

 

... Or gloriously lightsaber!!

I feel like I'm in high school again with this "initiating of new popular words!"

 

So A New Hope opening crawl was bad, because there was no explanation of the "Clone Wars", who Darth Vader is, what is "Senate", what is the history of the Jedi Order, and what is "really" going on? General audience don't have to know anything that was written in post-RotJ EU, that is obvious that something happened between VI and VII, if they won't use current EU, they will write tons of new novels set in those times.

 

hahahahahahahaha very funny

Seriously speaking though, in most movies we have a little thing called character development, story and acting which allows the audience to learn about the world the characters live in. You've never heard about the Clone Wars until Leia talks about it in ANH and we gather that it was a big event that happens in the past from the way it was spoke about. Same thing also applied to the Jedi Purges when Obi-Wan talked about it. We don't need to learn about all of the EU by the exposition provided by the opening crawl.

Yeah I can agree with that idea. Why not create an "original story" that pays homage to the best parts of the EU rather than adapt? Why not create a brand-new story involving a one Grand Admiral Thrawn leading the Imperial Remnant(with a possible teasing of an overarching Sith enemy say Lumiya, think Thanos from The Avengers) and the Yuuzhan Vong(in their full glory) as collaborating antagonists with original takes on Jacen+Jaina Solo and Ben Skywalker all Jedi Knights + brand new characters as the protagonist heroes with a special side appearance of Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa. Han Solo, Chewbacca and maybe Mara Jade all taking place 30+ years after?

Sure Thrawn's dead in the current canon, but if we can get a cool story everybody likes involving him now with say Benedict Cumberbatch playing him, quoting words similarly to:



I'd be fanboying with glee.

 

If Benedict was in this, that would be totes lightsaber.

 

The Episode IV comparison doesn't work, because not only was it the first film released, it was EPISODE IV. Before there were three films that preceded it, it was written as if those films existed. And this was true even before the episode number was added to the opening crawl. Now that the episodic format of the films has been well established, you have to proceed according the storytelling method which has been used for the previous six episodes, and specifically when viewed in numerical order. We're too far into the story to suddenly take such a radical departure from that method. I keep having to say this in various places on these boards, because it seems hard for many people to accept since Episode VI ends with such apparent finality, but these are the last three parts of a single nine part story, and this above all must inform how the story is told.

 

Lightsaber post, man.

Seriously, this analogy just makes no sense. It'd be more like skipping from Episode II to Episode VI.

 

Yeah, nobody is arguing that a story can't be written for Episode VI which fits in with the EU. Obviously it can--that's how the EU functions.

But can a good story be written for Episode VI within those constraints? IMHO, no. It wouldn't be a continuation of the saga but rather just another entry in the rather convoluted expanded universe.

 

I think its unfair to say that it can't. Even as someone who has an obvious preference for that, I fully admit that it would be significantly harder for a writer to pull off. Not impossible by any stretch, but probably twice or more the work for the same quality. {EDIT: work that I believe would be well worth it}

We can obviously debate on personal opinion whats better for the franchise, or for casual fans, or to attract new viewers or what have you, but that's not something I feel is a central factor of this debate.

(Also, just wanted to mention this to the other guys I've been debating with the last few days: despite our rather vehement disagreement on the way we'd each prefer to see the sequel trilogy's writing handled, it was very classy to be able to have completely civil and agreeable conversations with you guys in other threads (sometimes simultaneously) rather than continued disagreements simply due to spite and antagonism that I've encountered on other sites for other fandoms. Good on you all.)

 

Might as well throw my $0.02 into the mix. My opinion of whether or not the ST should incorporate the EU as whole is a bit mixed. I can see the merits of both sides of the argument. As only a fairly recent fan of the EU, I admit I'm not as attached to it as many fans here on the boards are. As such I will say that I wouldn't be up in arms at all if they decided to throw out large swathes of the post-RotJ EU to make way for a better movie, perhaps even a better story, as many here insist would be more likely if they just threw out the EU. But I am an avid reader of Wookieepedia, and have the utmost respect for the LFL writers' attempts to contribute so many stories and ideas into a greater universe, one that is for the most part, coherent and cohesive. Yes, it might have become too bloated, and Lucas didn't always agree with the directions other writers took with his universe (an understatement), spawning plenty of in-universe contradictions and whatnot, but as Darth_Henning said, the single comprehensive continuity made Star Wars unique, and it would be a bit of a shame to lose it...

I highly doubt Disney will keep it completely intact now, given that they want to make the ST accessible to the widest available audience, and I think, as many do, that the bottom line of attracting legions of new fans matters more to them than alienating old, hardcore fans of the EU. Time will tell if the enterprise is profitable in the extreme long-term, but no question that in the short term, while the films are being released, Disney will more than recoup their costs in purchasing the company from Lucas, and earn continuous profits for the next decade or so. Now this brings me to the idea of a new EU. Will it attract new legions of fans to replace the old? It seems that they are going to emphasize SW as more of a visual medium now than ever before, what with spinoff/origin films and the upcoming Rebels television series, as well as a potential live-action series on the horizon. We'll doubtless be inundated with plenty of visual SW media for years to come, and I imagine they will want to publish new books to tie in the ST-created continuity. The formation of the Story Group seems to promise that from now on, everything will be built on a continuity consistent with everything George Lucas has worked on before, i.e. the films and TCW, as well as everything that's coming out next year and beyond.

If the new EU can stay relatively consistent without diving into infinities and parallel universes like Marvel, I would certainly welcome it. But only time will tell whether or not this is possible, and in throwing out the old EU completely (if they are indeed doing that), I fear that they might set a precedent that would allow for constant reboots when they can instead focus on developing different stories within this expansive universe without contradicting those created before. Perhaps contradictions will be unavoidable at the present, because Episodes VII-IX will continue to focus on the next generation of Skywalkers/Solos, but I hope that in future films/stories, that they can continue crafting new characters and narratives that won't disregard what came before.

In the end, our thoughts on whether or not they should incorporate the EU into the new films are simply opinions. Some may have more merit than others, but both sides have valid points and arguments. I do think that only tangentially acknowledging parts of the post-RotJ EU will allow for a better story than completely adhering to everything that came before, especially the events covered in LotF and FotJ. But with effort, I'm sure the writers could pull it off. I just don't expect them to. Back to the arguments, I think that it all comes down to what kind of fan you are; there are so many SW fans, with so many disparate interests and opinions, that it's going to be impossible to satisfy everybody. I imagine this EU debate won't really end until something definitive about its fate is delivered, and even then, there will probably be a good amount of fans that will undoubtedly be alienated by whatever decision Disney/LFL makes regarding the EU. In the end, I figure they will simply make the decision to satisfy and attract the most amount of fans as they can, while minimizing the losses. Disney, you can't have your cake and eat it too...

Darth_Henning, much respect for your contributions to this thread, I imagine it can't be easy being one of the only people in this thread arguing for keeping as much of the EU as possible for the new films, when nearly everyone else is adamantly against it. You definitely stayed civil throughout, especially when this thread could have easily gone down a path that's so not lightsaber. I might not agree with everything you and others have said, but all the points here have been presented in a civil and generally well-thought out manner.

 

Yeah I'm not here to make enemies. There are many people here who I have great respect for and even like quite a bit who I almost never agree with. It's easy to get passionate about this stuff, but at the end of the day Star Wars is fiction and we aren't. As part of a community, it behooves us to always remember that every other member of the community is a living, breathing, feeling person who has just as much right to their own opinions as everyone else, and that we would have very little to discuss and keep these boards interesting if we all agreed on everything anyway.

 

For the sake of the EU, it would be a good thing to hope for some sort of catastrophic event to take place just after ROTJ that could split the timeline. For instance, the people are celebrating when suddenly Order 67 is put in place. A contingency plan created by Sidious that eradicates the now open and exposed rebels. Be it a parting shot or whatever. Then Episode 7 can open with the first two paragraphs explaining all of this and how dire the situation is 25 years later.


That way the current EU can continue on without that ever taking place and the movies can follow another path.

 

See, I have a problem with just smiling and doing the "both sides have a point" thing when that's not actually true. I've tried (not always with complete success) to not make it about the people holding the different opinion, but from where I stand this is not a subjective issue where both points of view can be considered equally valid based on one's opinion. Incorporating the existing post-ROTJ EU into the ST, as is, would be the wrong decision. As a fan of Star Wars and - much more importantly - a writer myself, I'm not just going to shrug and say "who cares, it's fine either way."

Again, this does not reflect my opinion one way or another about the post-ROTJ EU. On balance I don't think most of it's that great, but there's far too much stuff there to make a sweeping statement either way.

 

After watching EP3 & then going into EP4 the opening crawl of EP4 gave no indication of what happened in the last 19 years !..........

 

But very little had changed in the intervening years. In fact, nearly everything was exactly as it was when the previous movie ended, or was at least a very natural progression of those events. The one and only new factor was the Rebellion, and that was the primary thing that the crawl addressed.

The only thing I can think of in Episode IV that even qualifies as a slight mystery after the previous movie is how Chewbacca hooked up with Han Solo, and that's really a very trivial matter in the scheme of things.

 

Well, although I think keeping most of the post-ROTJ EU out of the ST is the right decision, I don't think we can or should say that it's the right decision because it's objectively true. It does depend on where you "stand." The correct answer is a pragmatic answer related to what you value most. I think if you're Disney, then the correct answer is much different than if you're a fan of the EU. Disney cares about making the most money possible, and that means having the freedom to create the best ST possible. The EU fan is rightly concerned that all this time and money getting involved in this world will be wasted (although since these books can always be reread, I'm not sure how serious this problem really is).

Personally, I love the idea of rebooting this period for the following reasons: 1) the original post-Jedi EU didn't seem to be planned out very well and often the characterizations and stories are poor. Now with a more planned approach, we have the opportunity to rework some of these problems and build a better EU. 2) This time around we'll be getting a more authentic version of GL's ST. While the old EU seemed to be mainly tolerated by Lucas, and to be fair, many writers were doing their best to guess what this period would be like, the new EU will be envisioned and endorsed by the creator himself.

I also believe that we can look forward to Disney keeping the best aspects of the EU from this era while cutting the less successful aspects or aspects that work against the new continuity. So maybe there will be some compromise out there for EU fans to embrace? For example, it's possible that the Imperial Remnant and maybe even Thrawn will be maintained as events directly after ROTJ. Certain generalities may be kept while their specifics are revised. Would EU fans accept such a compromise? I hope so.

 

I think Disney will just sideline EU as a separate universe - which George Lucas and others have seen for years. It's the best way forward; I'd be surprised if Luke is/was married in the ST with a son.

 

I never claimed I did ... just was teasing that I was underway expanding upon it because of I Are The Internets joke about the opening crawl needing to being 647 paragraphs long . I mean really how could I have made and posted a video like that within 30 seconds of his comment, didn't even realize people thought I made it till you said something ... after all I recalled it from prior convos most of us here where involved in and assumed others did too.

Nice crawl (I say again to you) btw.