Full Series The Even Piell Centre for Canon and Continuity Catastrophes

It's likely going to be mainstream, they want as many people to watch it as possible. Perhaps they'll do for Star Wars what they did for superheroes and make it so it's not considered so "nerdy" anymore. Not sure how to feel about that, but whatever, it worked for Star Trek in the eyes of everyone except trekkies.


And Twilight isn't mainstream, Twilight has a specific target audience.

 

I don't know that superheroes were really ever "nerdy" in themselves. If someone said their favorite movie was Tim Burton's Batman or they watched Spider-Man, I don't think anyone would be like "OMG, NERD!" I mean the success of superhero films show that they have a huge audience. Comic book reading on the other hand does carry that stigma I think in pop culture when it comes to things like the Comic Book Guy in Simpsons (and I've seen comic book store employees that are eerily similar).

Find out someone's favorite movie is Iron Man, and nobody cares. Go to their house and see long boxes filled with Iron Man comics in plastic sleeves and I think that generally carries a negative connotation.

I think in the case of Star Wars, it applies to novels as well. Nobody here that I've seen has really ridiculed others for reading SW EU, but then again we're all part of the same fandom and many people here do it. But I think when it comes to "main stream" that they carry the same negative connotations as the comic book geek.

I remember hearing on the radio that Erotic Novels were on the rise in sales thanks to digital books which allow customers to buy them anonymously, and allow customers to read them from a portable device rather than a book whose title betrays what it is they are reading. A person on a plane might feel more self conscious busting out Fifty Shades of Grey as a hardcover novel in public, whereas if they are reading it off of a mobile device, nobody is going to know.

I would figure that digital novels/comics are only going to help sales by catering to the self-conscious geek too.

On a tangent: I've not seen Star Wars books in stores in a loooong time. I remember going into book stores as a kid and seeing them on racks along with any other novel, particularly I'd see things like the Rogue Squadron series. Darth Plagueis and Revan are the only two SW novels I've seen in a long time for sale as hard copies, and that was at a single Meijer that no longer carries them. I don't know if it's an indicator of EU novels falling from a golden age, or if people are just using Amazon and buying digitally (or pirating). But hard copies seem way harder to find - at least where I live.

 

I'm not saying its impossible, but I don't think most people want an ST with a dead Chewie and Han and Leia already having two dead kids. Too depressing.

 

Um, 2 of the 4 children of the big three and mara are dead, am I correct? That'll be some great marketing. Hey buy this action figure of a character who died in some EU novel before the movie even began!

No one faction is stronger than the others... what if Lucas has it in his mind that The New Republic is firmly in control at the beginning of the ST?

 

"It's of a higher quality when it's part of a cohesive universe, but also able to be watched alone."

In general, this is definitely true. However, in this case there are severely limiting aspects that come with this so-called cohesive universe.

 

I think there are simply just a lot more quality fantasy type of shows for fans to get into these days then there used to be. Probably the most popular serial drama on t.v. these days is about a zombie apocalypse. Lost was even more popular back when it was on. And you have a lot of other good sci fi/fantasy tv shows and movies come out every year. The Lord of the Rings movies were arguably better than any of the Star Wars movies. There is just a lot more quality fantasy shows out there to get into then there used to be. The desire to dig so deep into the Star Wars universe to where you read stuff that was not written by the shows creator simply because it gives you more Star Wars simply isn't as strong anymore.

 

kubricklynch lrn2edit

Triple post, just what I expected from a primitive.

 

Sorry, I was responding to two separate people. Can you quote more than one person in a post?

 

Oh, for fraks sake. I like reading novels. Get that?

I'm not reading the EU because I desperately crave more SW but because I want to read a book and why not read it in a universe I already know I enjoy? It helps that a book lasts longer than 22 minutes though (so saying that there is now enough material is just stupid - 120+ novels > Weekly 22-minute TV show), and that they try to not overwrite each other, and coexist.

If your argument has come to - there's no point in reading books any more, I think you've reached the bottom of the barrel. Also, I do watch The Walking Dead, and I've been rewatching BSG and Caprica. I plan to rewatch FRINGE in May when I buy the Blu-Ray box set.

Still got time to do some reading.

They hardly have to bring them up. It's been almost 20 years in one of their cases (no major spoilers!).

My point there was that the blank slate allows them to put pretty much any faction in power if they desired. Just set it a little while after FOTJ. They really can mold the galaxy to whatever they want pretty much, if set after FOTJ.

 

This. I hope that it is set that far in the future for this very reason. You can simply avoid mentioning the 40+ in-universe years of the ROTJ EU by setting the movies after it. There's little reason to mention any of it.

 

Again you EU fans are probably hoping for a pipe dream that it will take place that far off in the future. The fact that it looks like they are bringing the OT actors back probably confirms this. If they were to have it be around 50ABY Han, Luke, Leia would have to be in their 70's/80's. Chances are much better that they will have it take place around 30/35 ABY. That would closely tie in to the age that the current actors are.

Your best hope for it taking place 50ABY or further off in the future would have been if the actors did not want to come back.

 

Luke and Leia were like 19 in ANH. I think ESB is 5 years later (EDIT: 3 years later). And ROTJ is 1 year after that. So Luke is like 23 when the whole thing's done. Skip 40 years and he's 63. Mark Hamill is 61, he's the appropriate age to play as Luke 40 years later. And Harrison IS 70.

But Star Wars is pretty much on a floating timeline. The films almost NEVER say how much time has passed. Never in ESB does it say that it's been 3 years. The only instance I know of it Anakin telling Obi-Wan that he hasn't seen Padme in 10 years and Obi-Wan stating that Sifo-Dyas died nearly 10 years ago.

There's the realistic possibility that Episodes 7-9 won't even specify how long it has been since ROTJ. So the EU could potentially shove them wherever it wants, since the EU is where everything is given a fixed date.

The biggest hurdles would be things like including another Sio Bibble-esque unneeded quote like "The Sith have returned?! But the Emperor died at Endor, that's impossible!" Or naming Han and Leia's kids Stinky and Pedunkeemufkin.

 

You know in the movies it really seems more time was meant to pass between ROTJ and Empire than just a single year considering how much different Luke looks. At first I thought that he looked so much differently because of the accident Mark Hamill had but he had that accident before Empire. Also there is a significantly more amount of difference between him in his character development between ROTJ and Empire than there is between him in Empire and ANH.

I'm not sure you can totally trust the EU when it comes to those timelines. After all they just created those timelines to fit their own stories in.

 

Three years passed between ESB and ROTJ out of universe, so just for the hell of it, let's say that hypothetically George meant for there to be a three year gap between the two movies in universe as well, that would make Luke 25 years old during ROTJ and 65 years old 40 years after ROTJ. That's a difference of a 4 years age difference between actor (Mark Hammill is 61) and the character he portrays, which is not significant. Natalie Portman was like 19 or 20 when playing a 14 year old queen, and Alec Guinness was like 63 playing a 57 year old in ANH. And Carrie Fisher is 5 years younger than Mark and plays his twin, etc.

 

Yes but it sounded like you EU fans felt there needed to be more than a 40 year gap in order to make the EU fit in. I was basically going off of what that one person was saying who wanted it to take place in 50 ABY.

 

I have read a whopping 1 novel that takes place post-ROTJ, so I'm not the person to ask in regards to what time periods can/should be used to avoid continuity issues. Someone mentioned setting them 40+ years after ROTJ, 40 fits pretty well with the actors' ages. Even if they make it 45, that's still within the realm of plausibility for Carrie, Harrison, and Mark to play those characters, plus makeup can do wonders if they need to age or de-age the characters at all.

Some fans are pretty adamant that the dates remain unaltered. Personally, I don't care. Dates can be shifted so long as the chronology is maintained or so long as entire events aren't thrown out the window. And again, personally when it comes to the idea of throwing ideas out the window, there are some I'd be okay with (e.g. I hate the concept of Sidious being cloned and Luke joining him - for any reason) . But there are some things, like the names of Han and Leia's kids that there would be no reason to ignore. Lucas borrowed the name Coruscant from the EU, and I don't see why it would be a big issue to have Jacen/Jaina/Anakin (or whomever is still alive - again, I don't know a whole lot about the time period).

The one biggie that I think might be an issue is Mara Jade and Ben Skywalker. Lucas has said in the past that the EU did something that he never would have done in having Luke get married. So unless he's changed his mind, it's possible that there will be no mention of a wife or child, which might create a hiccup for the EU to deal with - if both of those characters were still alive during this time period.

 

I always wondered if Coruscant was taken from the EU or if it was from one of the movies novels. Did the movies change Coruscant a lot from what it was described to be like int the EU? Lucas's notes stated that the PT would take place anywhere from 20-40 years after ROTJ.

 

Of course George hates Mara, she's well written and a fan favourite, we can't have that.

 

So if the remaining Clone Wars eps don't end up leading into the start of "Sith" does that mean that the CW mico-series is back into canon? (crazy Force powers aside, I guess the Jedi just took their Jedi-wheaties that day. That and Grevious has a switch to change his vocal inflection. When he doesn't have his cough I guess he sounds like John DiMagio voiced him). vol 1 is pre-TCW show, then TCW, then vol. 2? I'm comfortable with that. I love TCW but the possibility that they could do the lead up / invasion of Courscant again and overwrite CW Vol. 2 always kinda irked me.

 

It was never actually out of canon. Officially, the timeline's always been exactly as you noted.

 

Yeah, I always assumed CW Vol. 2 was "chopping block" canon since TCW seemed to be leading there anyway. I'd much rather still have the show going strong but, hey, small comforts.

It's still possible that the final run of TCW hold-over stuff will lead up into the start of "Sith", maybe they'll even get to punch out a wrap-up episode to do so, but seems somewhat unlikely. So CW Vol. 2 it is!

 

Although they never did seem to decide how CW V2 and LOE relate to one another.