Lit The EU going the ''Star Trek'' route?

There are only a few novels i did not care for.

 

I wasn't thinking of film novelizations given their close association with the films themselves; they'd be spared the axe. But with respect to Luceno, Labyrinth of Evil was a good read, but in my opinion nowhere near as spectacular as the ones I mentioned.

 

I'm reading LOE now and it's just filler. It's another book set between two films where loose ends are explained, some stuff happens, but characters don't develop and nothing new is introduced. It's a bit better than Dark Lord, but if the book suddenly caught fire I don't think civilisation would suffer for it.

 

Get to the end of the book. The first half could arguably be called "filler", but well done filler. Second half is one of the most pivotal events of the Clone War.

 

Whaaaaa---

that book established Grievous's (kickass) backstory! It explained why Palpatine was forced to move his plans ahead of schedule! It escalated into a race between Jedi & Republic cops vs Sith that culminated in the first scene of ROTS!

And it featured back-slapping Separatist leaders!!!

"Caught fire" indeed. Sacrilege, my dear sir!

 

I'm approximately 20 pages from the end.

It's the book that harps on about a chair and its non-assassinated engraver for 100 pages.

I prefer the Clone Wars miniseries cartoon that this book keeps referencing.

As I said, explaining the back story for unremarkable characters doesn't make a book good. It's just tying up loose ends that I didn't consider even beginning to care about. If I wanted to know General Grievous' inside leg measurements then I'd buy the Star Wars Encyclopaedia of Irrelevant Information. If I thought Grievous was on Geonosis, it would be because we saw him in Episode 2; a book telling us he was there isn't going to change anything except my opinion of the book.

More frustrating is the use of Americanisms in the speech of 'English' characters like Kenobi and Palpatine. Even Yoda's dialogue sounds out of character from time to time. Luceno is obviously one of the best writers working for the SW franchise, but this, like Dark Lord, was obviously written to pay the bills. Either that or Darth Plageuis was a fluke and this is his standard.

 

If there's one thing we should all be thankful to Disney for: at least cancelling TCW means LOE is now safe from Filonification.

 

Other way around. Labyrinth of Evil came first, cartoon loosely adapted it.

 

How is that possible when Clone Wars came out 2 years earlier?

 

Unless I'm getting my timeline mixed up (which is very possible), I believe the first half, which was season one and two, came out before Labyrinth of Evil, but the second half, season three, came after. However, it gets mostly a free pass, because I believe it was in production about the same time LOE was written.

 

Sorry but what gets a free pass? I looked it up and the last 3 chapters of Clone Wars were written at the same time of LOE, but they depict different people doing different things at different times. The earlier parts of the series were written years previously.

 

I meant that it gets a free pass for the various inconsistencies depicted in the battle, most of them involving Mace Windu and Shaak Tii's actions. There could of course have been better coordination, but the battle did work better in an animated format anyway (though I was sorry to see the Mace and Grievous train battle go).

 

So that was a pre-emptive excuse for a criticism I hadn't yet made? Wow okay.

 

Well, the cartoon is usually what gets the blame for the inconsistencies . I feel they're both relatively blameless.

Speaking for myself, I prefer the animated series take on the Coruscant War, but prefer Luceno's Anakin subplot by miles.

 

Who cares, that was a different star wars. GL is ot involved with this and neither are his people anymore. Disney is the new master now and they are going to do whatever they like. They can change and add anything. Gosh

 

You, um... realize that has absolutely nothing to do with what I was saying, right?

 

We must agree to disagree then. I love the source books, but they are a far cry from the chapters describing Grievous's memories, and Dooku's reflections on what happened to Grievous. The source books are an outline of the basic facts... they don't carry the same emotion as the book.

Then again, I first read LOE when it was released pre-ROTS. I'm coming from the perspective of someone who had been excited about the new villain and saw his LOE backstory as the foundation of a unique and elaborate character, who would undoubtedly be developed further in subsequent novels/game/shows/etc.

...yeah. About that.

So I might be able to sympathize with you on that account. You already know where Grievous's character went. For me, LOE is nostalgic.

 

Dukat was never an anti hero, he simply had goals in line with the DS9's crew for a short time.

He had a damn good actor, but he was always a just a monsterious man.

 

I would be completely indifferent if this were to happen. I think the idea of a post-ROTJ ST is a bad idea anyway (for reasons I've already gone over in other posts), so if it contradicts the SW EU that I like (Marvel comics, Splinter of the Mind's Eye, the Han Solo novels, Tim Zahn's HTTE trilogy & his other books, DH's Dark Empire comics, Crimson Empire, etc.), fine. I heard somewhere that Lucas only felt the films were "canon" anyway, so if the ST contradicts something in HTTE (for example), that doesn't take away any enjoyment I had from reading HTTE.

And, what does "canon" really mean when it comes to the SW universe anyway? When it comes to early '70's/'80's EU (Marvel comics, UK comics, SOTME, etc.) many of this material is already contradicted by the films. When it comes to the "second wave" of EU that began in 1991 with HTTE & Dark Horse's Dark Empire, though I'm not 100% sure about this, I'm sure there are some contradictions here as well - with probably over 100 novels/stories at this point (I think) how can there not be?!

 

Gotta echo the sentiment that Labyrinth of Evil was far from Luceno's Star Wars opus. It had some great moments, it had some meh moments, it had some silly ones. I loved the idea of Sidious being pursued, but the execution was weak as hell; the same goes for chasing Dooku to Tythe. Grievous was awesome, but I wanted more tactical badassery than trying to [wrongly] make him Windu's equal.


I still can't quite figure out the scene where the clones glimpse Sidious before dying. Were there really Geonosians escorting Sidious there or was it some sort of illusion?

I'd give LoE a 6.5/10.

 

I think they were there for the Death Star plans, perhaps helping with the logistics of the planning.

 

Didn't think about that. Palpatine's mind trick of Grievous was pretty creepy, too.

 

I agree with this completely.
LOE is a good read, but it's not on the same level as other Luceno books

 

I don't follow canon religiously, so I don't think it'll bother me all that much. As long as the story's good and I get some enjoyment out of reading the book, and they don't start inserting weird things, then I'll be fine. Now, that's not to say that I won't have any opinions or questions about a book or story line if they do get away from canon.

 

The EU hasn't been worthy of the SW name. I found the PT disappointing but I knew how it would end, with Anakin becoming Darth Vader, but even still GL really should have done a better job. The CW movie and T.V show weren't as good as they could have been CW should have been either part of the PT or a stand alone film. Instead of Willow and Indiana Jones and the last crusade George Lucas should have been doing the ST or the PT. I really feel SW needs Disney. The EU was almost always disappointing.