Lit Sequel Trilogy or NJO story, which was the better choice?

It's funny, I was thinking about putting up a Legends vs Canon poll today. As with most EU fans, I was lukewarm (no pun intended) to the whole new canon, But TFA was good, and the new novels are just as good as the old ones, and I understood the reasoning behind the restart. TLJ has changed my opinion. TLJ has funny, interesting, and even great moments, but the plot of so full of holes it wasn't entirely enjoyable to me (at least after one viewing). The past week I've found myself wanting the Legends canon back. There was such potential there, so many good ideas. Canon is restricted by not re-using Legends and by the age of the actors, so perhaps TLJ isn't surprising, but I liked TFA, so maybe it is surprising.

To me Legends offered three very nice trilogies: The Thawn trilogy (with elements of Dark Empire such as the Galaxy Gun and kidnapping the young Solo children mixed in), the Yuuzhan Vong invasion, and finally the Legacy of the Force (I know the books are flawed, but the concept is sound, and could even use some of the concepts of the current Sequel Trilogy). These were the three plots in Legends that had galaxy-spanning consequences and involved all the characters from the OT, while making room for new ones. We all know Legends has it's flaws, but overall it presents a much more plausible and enjoyable sequence of events after the destruction of the second Death Star.

Trilogy I: The New Republic has made steady gains since Endor, the Empire has fractured and warlords remain at large. Thrawn returns to unite the Empire for one last fight against our heroes.
Trilogy II: The new jedi order joins the established cast and take up the fight against inter-galactic invaders.
Trilogy III: A Skywalker-Solo falls to the dark side and tries to impose his own view of peace on the galaxy.

Of course the age of the actors made this an impossibility a long time ago.

Thank god for head-canon.

 

The worst part of the ST is no NJO, and no plausible explanation in TFA for what Luke was doing in 30 years if he wasn't training students (hunting old Jedi lore shouldn't take 30 years, did Luke change his job title to history professor?)

We could have had a NJO and still had an epic ST. Rey's story would not have been affected--Harry Potter's story was not affected by having an order of mages around to guide him.

Snoke's villainy might even have been enhanced by him wiping out a trained NJO. Right now it seems he just got lucky having Kylo wipe out some untrained kids. Imagine the prelude of the Fellowship of the Ring. Elrond shouting orders, and then he looks in horror as Sauron marches onto the battlefield and swats the men and elves away like insects.

TFA could have opened with a similar prologue, Luke taking the Elrond role and shouting orders to his Jedi as they are defending Coruscant from a First Order ground invasion. Then Snoke marches onto the field, force pushes and force fries countless Jedi as Luke looks on in horror.

 

Legacy of the Force is better than both... by far.

 

The Yuuzhan Vong were more engaging than the FO.
The OT Big 3 actually get a happy ending in the NJO series.
The NJO series has an actual next generation of Skywalker's/Solo's and other Force users as well.

 

NJO will always be my personal canon.

 

NJO will always be my personal canon.

 

NJO will always be my personal canon.

 

The NJO will always be superior in my heart of hearts.

 

C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER

 

That's a hard one because I enjoyed both a lot. At this time, I'd probably have to say I prefer the Sequel Trilogy.

 

Is there a thread about the post-NJO EU?

 

So, the Luke scene at the end of TLJ.
Would it be fair to say that the Anakin Solo/Vua Rapuung mission to save Tahiri and or Ganner's Last Stand from the NJO series would be somewhat equivalent?

 

Yes

 

No, Luke's Jedi being separate from the government was probably the best idea to ever come out of a Jedi's head. Separation of church and state is important in any galaxy. Also it makes its collapse so believable. It was so fragile and never had gumption. I'm starting to see why Luke was so jaded. He was building a deck of cards with greasy hands.

 

If the Jedi Order was with the NR and on Coruscant Ben's betrayal wouldn't have happened, or at least been more difficult. The Jedi were an invaluable asset to the NR. It almost seems a bit selfish to run off and isolate the order from the galaxy. The NR needs the Jedi's power and the Jedi need the NR's security.

 

The Jedi besides Luke weren't even trained yet, it would be generations before there were more than a hundred.

 

The Jedi needed to be held accountable to some jurisdiction, and the New Republic fit that. Luke, Jedi Master or no, is not supposed to be running his own little kingdom unaccountable to anyone. His students presumably were citizens of somewhere (New Republic, Hutt space, Mandalorian, etc) and those families and governments deserved an answer on what happened when Kylo's massacre happened.

It's like when a plane in international air has some kind of incident. The governments of all those onboard send investigators.

It's clear even if there was a formal investigation, Luke was not entirely truthful. Han and Leia obviously did not know about Luke's saber slip-up from their 7 dialogue (and they'd be in the investigation too as parents of the perpetrator). More importantly, the New Republic does not seem to know that Kylo is Leia's son, as it's never brought up and this is something people would be talking about.

 

this is essentially the lesson at the end of the NJO (that was promptly ignored) but it's nice that it was something Luke innately knew coming out of the films in the new continuity, even if it wasn't seen to fruiton

Even if the NJO's shift of the Jedi toward being spiritual rather than emulating their flawed predecessors was ignored, it's nice that everything we've seen of the Jedi in the new continuity has gone in that direction