Lit Reading NJO...Again

Exactly.

NJO paints all politicians with this 'they must be corrupt, or stupid, or both.', and I think it is a horrible take on politics. There are lots of people here on earth who go into politics because they want to make things better...surely the Republic must be the same. I might not agree with every politician, but I do not think they'd sell our country out to an invading force. Sure, Shesh was ambitious and perhaps money-hungry, but did we really need her to be a collaborator? I have always had a hard time seeing her, or anyone in the Senate, go that far.

I get it, politics are hard to write, but in a series that has a LOT of grey, they didn't try very hard with the politicians. I agree with Dr. Steve in that the EU does 'worship' the military...I'd go farther and throw the Jedi in as well. The Jedi don't think they should answer to any civilians, either. The military and the Jedi...both should be autonomous? Both are government or quasi-government entities...should they not answer to someone?

 

I'd suggest the author preference is for the "ordinary military soldier" on average - military leaders tend to be painted as rather mixed - some good, some bad (incompetent, or overambitious, or seeing their forces as easily expendable).

 

The NJO Jedi, even after a ton of handwringing about their role/identity and an apparent conclusion that "yeah we arent soldiers," basically just act like soldiers throughout and LOTF and FOTJ. Which is the opposite lesson from TCW. Like, the entire theme of the PT is that the Jedi were losing their identity and character because of their service to the Republic and becoming generals.

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This is a major issue to me too with the Jedi. That's why I say the whole thing is like the Avengers (Cap) vs Sokovia Accords (Tony) issue. Cap is like the Jedi who just want to show up and do what they want to do with no regulations or questions asked. Everybody should just trust them because they have good intentions. The galaxy obviously is more like SA (Tony). They don't want "superpowered" people doing whatever wherever with no say so from others. They want to feel like they have some defense against them due to the Jedi being in their borders, collateral damage, the Jedi being "superpowered", etc. So, there is a discord between the two and both complain about the other. The question is simply, how to fix that and find common ground? Obviously, by working together, yet neither side does a good job of that w/o being begrudging the whole time and not being open and honest.

 

For whatever reason NJO decided to transplant the politics of the prequels into the late-post Jedi EU wholesale, despite those politics serving an era-specific plot thread in the PT.

What also got overlooked is that the Rebellion was not to merely bring the Republic back, but to restore it to what it was before its decline.

At least Bloodline's political paralysis had the spectres of the Clone Wars, the Empire and Vader as reason for it.

 

The politics of the prequels never really gets answered, so remains pertinent to the NJO. Are the Jedi the Avengers (to steal Outsider's perfect comparison) or do they follow the Accords?

The Rebellion, obviously, didn't have to wrestle with the role of the Jedi because there was only 1 left. As Luke trained more Jedi, it becomes more of a focus...leading to Mon Mothma's quote that started a ruckus on here a few days back. (Sorry for that.)

Part of Fey'lya's mistrust of the Jedi, I think, is that they DO seem to be like the Avengers...cloistered to themselves with no say so from others. The Jedi TELL us that they have the purest of intentions, but how is the average person going to know? Democracy is all about checks and balances...and the Jedi have none. As Outsider said, neither side is totally open and honest, both view the other with barely concealed disdain. A disdain I can never fully understand: Leia was Chief-of-State...surely the Jedi can see that being a politician doesn't have to mean being a sell-out. Leia was Chief-of-State for crying out loud: surely Borsk and the Senate can see that being a Jedi doesn't have to mean that you want to ignore democracy.

 

This is kind of the problem with taking 20th-21st century democratic ideals, smashing it together with a fantasy setting. The Jedi are essentially warrior mages, who are devoted to the mystical life force of the universe. A huge part of their training is learning to let go and trust the guidance of said mystical life force. There's an inherent tension in trying to contain that with bureaucracy from both within and without the Jedi Order.

Whether GL's intent, the idea that emerged im TUF, or the direction Canon is going... it seems pretty clear that the ideal is a less dogmatic Jedi Order, and likely less bound in service to the galactic government. I dont even know what might be similar in real life. Sea Shepard Conservation Society is what jumps to mind for me. At least as regards a group going after law breakers(in this case illegal whaling) but not being an arm of any state or international law enforcement agency.

The religious elements are kind of obvious. It's the tension between Jesus and the Pharisees and Sadducees.

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Where Jedi are concerned, the line "if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear" more than likely applies and Fey'Lya has stuff to hide all right!

 

I just read the part in Dark Tide 1 Onslaught where Luke uses the Force on a black hole. It's kind of funny they we t with this idea that to do this thing Luke has to channel "more of the Force than he had in years."

As Ulicus frequently points out, this is the opposite lesson Yoda teaches Luke in ESB. Lifting the X-Wing and lifting the rock shouldn't be different, because it's not about how much Force you use. It's about not regarding those things as strictly different. It's a non-material mindset. The mentality that moving the ship needs more Force than moving the rock is materialist, and his training was non-materialist.

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So this an analysis I have stated elsewhere. Basically the NJO is the story of the Vong they are its central piece and it's their redemption is what is important. They fell into violence and darkness and lost their connection to their homeworld and the force. At the end they regain their homeworld and "mother" or "God or gods" with the hope they might regain the force one day. It reminded me a lot of the biblical hope-man is lost from God and driven from Eden. At the end of Time man returns to Eden and his connection to God is restored. The Vong are very much like this-they are spiritually lost and broken, deceived and pitiable. Their return to Zonama is their return to Eden.

I think when you think about the NJO this way it makes it so more compelling. But what does everyone else think?

 

It only really worked for me in TUF and even then it needed follow-through it never got - because no one's interested in actual rehabilitation.

Legacy gave it the best attempt on that and actually succeeded as well as it could do.

If someone had said TUF was where the Vong get redeemed, and that had informed the books that preceded it, it could have been spectacular.

The problem is, en route to redemption, the Vong kill 365 trillion - so what justice is there for those beings? NJO shys away from that.

 

Darth Invictus that's a very interesting notion, h/e, my issue would be that if that even tgat was the central premise it was incumbent on the writers to get everything around it (Jedi, NR, Force, plausibility issues, etc) right also and they didn't, it was a mess and I know I'm not going to ignore everything else and be happy/more compelled just bc one part/central premise is great

 

Legacy works so much better as a follow-up to NJO than DNT, LOTF or FOTJ. It's sort of pitiful, really. DNT is almost a reboot, because there's almost zero left of the Vong War a mere 5 years later. Coruscant is essentially back to normal, despite havijg been partially terraformed and nature overgrowing it.

Legacy has more remnants of that war than 21 novels set a few years after the war.

Shouldnt the logical place to have gone after TUF be Jedi efforts to rehabilitate the Vong on Zonama Sekot? That seems it would be more Jacen's path as well, rather than "oh, i'm gonna go learn from these other Force traditions." Jacen and Tahiri should have been the fore front of Jedi efforts to help the Vong because of their experiences. Tahiri was mentally half Yuuzhan Vong.

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A little thing that bugs me... despite DNT ignoring or misinterpreting everything in the NJO series, it's included as the conclusion to the NJO Era in old canon (when in all ways it should be part of the Legacy era).

 

That's a terrible turn of phrase Ghost.

 

How strange is it that we went from a 19 book series featuring aliens that used giant genetically engineered bugs as weapons and vehicles to a trilogy about Jedi joining the hive minds of nests of giant ants?

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Re-reading FH2 and I just feel like it's dragging. I'm not even 1/4 through.

I didn't mind FH1. I thought it was a good setup, especially going on knowing that it was the first of a sub-trilogy within the sub-series. There was a lot going on with Luke/Mara & co., Han/Leia & co., Nom Anor & the Shamed Ones, and just stuff in general. It kept my interest and was going in a neat direction.

The coolest thing so far about FH2 is that we get a look at Csilla.

 

I think that’s a fair criticism of the redemption view. I think I viewed it as the Jedi, especially Jacen, and the galaxy itself had a choice: try and redeem what could be redeemed of the YZ or wipe them out. They came very close to closing to wipe them out. Now would that have been justice? For killing that many sentient sand destroying that many worlds? I mean, Coruscant alone is one a level that we cannot really imagine. Maybe, but consider the Shamed Ones and workers. They had very little to do with the decision to invade or the conduct of the war. Alpha Red wouldn’t discriminate. To the Jedi’s credit, they saw that pretty much immediately. Would a galaxy that used AR be worth saving?

As for the actual work of rehabilitation and redemption, there really was nothing outside of Legacy. But I could have bought a Kyp type service writ large. A sin that may never be forgiven, but the society continues to do the work, maybe like in Legacy where they worked with the Jedi on reconstruction efforts. That would have worked for builders, shapers. For warriors it would be difficult. What could they do? They’re pretty badass in combat, maybe offer their services to the NR, but could they ever be trusted with weapons again? I mean, if YV showed up as a police force or peacekeeping force, I’d be like, nah dude, I can’t trust them. They’d likely have to find another path, the warrior culture would have to end.

I think the choice to redeem the YV, at least those that could be redeemed, and the fact that a Jedi from the next generation of Knights was the hero, the moral and spiritual ultimate hero, was the main point. NJO showed us that the Order would be more than Luke, it could now sustain itself. And despite the fact that Luke isn’t the hero of the war, it was his efforts and his guidance since starting to rebuild the Order that made Jacen’s, the Jedi’s and the galaxy’s triumph possible.


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Imagine if Ghost had thrown in a palindrome...

*edited, phone’s autocorrect is so confused because I type Bahasa Indonesia half the time, hp kasian

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They could have done a better job of writing multiple heroes' journeys into the series. Jacen and Jaina should have been equally prominent, as well as other younger Jedi. They developed Jacen, sort of Jaina... they wiped out many of their classmates to make Jacen The Hero. Rather than making it a broader story of this new Jedi Order.

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For me Triebakk made the case against Alpha Red and was proven right very decisively.

What I liked about Legacy is it factored in time for the Vong on Sekot to come to understand that they had done wrong, thus the need for atonement and restitution. The Vong, as of the end of TUF, are nowhere near this, they have no understanding of what they have truly done.

TUF did do a neat touch in having the bulk of the Vong warriors kill themselves, or fly with the worldships into the nearest sun - so, in effect, those most culpable are all dead.

NJO still feels a bit too uneven for me and it could be argued that this and redeeming Vader ends up rendering SW a consequence-free environment, where it seems no matter what you do, redemption is got, like that! Now, in Legends, I think that road led to Invincible. Did that solve it? It went to the other extreme, but no, doing that didn't work either.

 

How exactly did Vader's redemption lead to Invincible?

 

More the idea that redemption comes relatively easy in the GFFA with little consequence, LOTF rendering Jacen "irredeemable" and brutally killing him being the "counter-balance."

I think we can all agree the most well handled redemption arc in Star Wars is Ulic Qel-Droma. I would have zero problems if there is a redemption arc for Kylo Ren that follows that example. The only measure by which Kylo's crimes feel "worse" to fans is because of our attachment to Han, not because he's done worse onscreen than Vader.

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I wouldn't say Jacen was irredeemable nor was his death particularly brutal at least by Star Wars standards. Denning I recall did say something about how redemption was already used(I think referring to Raynar).

 

IIRC, it was brutal physically and emotionally. Each chapter with a quote from YJK. Considering how high he was at the end of NJO, the fall was tragic and maybe the farthest it could have been. And it was his twin dueling him with the stated purpose to kill him. Denning made us witness some of the most brutal deaths and disfigurement of loved characters. Jacen’s was, for me, not an exception to that trend.


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