Lit A/V The Force Awakens and the EU [TAGGED spoilers.]

I wonder if after Crucible and Sword of the Jedi, they'll put a hold on on post-FOTJ novel material until we have a better idea of what the ST will be bringing. Hopefully, there will be some collaborative plan once the script gets written.

 

I think if the story kicks off and Luke is in his late 60s and he rubs his hands together and says "Well! Time to start rebuilding the Jedi order!" he would come across as a complete lazy layabout who did nothing for 30 years. On the flipside, if the story kicks off and Luke rubs his hand together and says "Well! Time to meet the new dozen younglings for their first day! and then organize the cafeteria rations for the 1000 Jedi we have living here in the fully refurbished Jedi temple!" would take away the point of seeing Luke rebuild the Jedi order. A happy medium should be found but how much of seeing him basically rebuild the Jedi order has been covered in the EU already? Pretty much all of it.

 

No, a new "continuity" would likely be the non-continuity that virtually every other sci-fi franchise has for their secondary material.

Jeff, you know I've been espousing the latter since the Disney buyout was announced right? (Although which continuity is being "jettisoned" is really a matter of perspective)

 

That's pretty much my take on it, too, as they're jinxed either way, as even though a future spin-off could go back and cover the earlier rebuilding, that's still years away.

I suppose it's possible Episode VII could do what TPM did and be set sometime before the following two films to provide set-up, but... that didn't exactly attract much support when Lucas did it for the PT, and if Ford etc have been approached, they aren't going to be doing stuff straight out of ROTJ...

So it's a toughie...

Even if they come out saying the Galactic Civil War has been raging for forty years and Luke's just not got around to it, that... dunno. Maybe. Could work, I suppose, if they just want a handful of personally-trained knights a la Kyle Katarn, who Luke has just had the good fortune to encounter over the years, without actively searching for recruits. But... dunno. While I personally feel "less is more" when it comes to space wizards, I must admit I strongly suspect Disney will just be thinking that huge lightsaber wars is what appeals to the lowest common denominator, as it's certainly what Star Wars has pretty much consistently been doing for the past six years in the EU, and while we are bored of it, the larger film audience hasn't experienced it yet to become bored, so tons of Jedi fighting tons of Sith would still be a novelty to them.

I mean, look no further than the original TOR trailer, which had game audiences utterly mesmerised, wetting themselves and oo'ing and aah'ing in giddy adulation.

 

i don't think anyone suggested that would happen lol

You are worrying about nothing

 

I'd argue that thinking about what they're likely to do is, at this point, just as fruitless as thinking of what they can do. All that's important is what they will do, something at this point we don't know. I certainly doubt that they'll keep the EU intact, but I wouldn't at all be surprised if they lifted some characters and elements from it.

 

It's a fallacy to reduce ignoring the EU to "reducing profits for some moronic reason." Do you really think that there's no other reason for them to ignore the EU? In terms of storytelling freedom, in terms of plot and expositional baggage, in terms of the 100% likelihood of George Lucas telling them that it's a separate universe that they should ignore? If all you can equate ignoring the EU with is being lazy and moronic for no apparent reason, then you're overinflating its importance and letting your appreciation of it cloud your judgment.

The reason I don't like the cutoff point idea is because I don't think it would be post-NJO like everyone is assuming. Post-NJO forces the writers of Episode VII to include Jacen, Jaina, and Ben, and at the appropriate ages, too. It forces them to include a Galactic Alliance and an Imperial Remnant at peace. It forces Chewbacca to be dead. It forces a whole crapload of things upon them that they probably don't want. I'm assuming that they'll want to create unique SkySolo children, keep Chewbacca alive, and probably do something different with the remnants of the Imperial fleet. That would push the cutoff point back to pre-Heir, and that's why I think it would be little different from jettisoning the entire EU anyway.

As for the idea of a new EU: I get what Zorrixor is saying, but I do think that new SW books will sell, period, and will have better longevity than you think. If the new animated series is post-ROTJ, too, it will make a huge difference. I don't see this situation as akin to the original post-ROTJ EU, but rather to the prequel-era EU. From 1999 - 2005, a huge number of tie-in books and comics were published that still sell today. Why would this situation be any different?

 

very true

Ignoring the EU as people are fearing is not going to cost them any money.

They will make new tie-ins, in new timeline, and sales will probably sky rocket as a result of the films.

 

Sometimes I feel as though we're the Whos down in Whoville shouting "We are here!" to the great Powers that Be.

But alas, Disney doesn't have an elephant to hear our woes. Except that drunk schmuck Dumbo. He doesn't count.

 

Whatever they do, Chewie SHOULD be alive in the ST.

 

Jeebus. It really is all about the toys man.

I don't know why anyone is screaming about the films > EU. Seems to me it's all a vehicle for selling toys. Does that make me a pessimist?

 

And his ears are so big. What a waste.

 

The EU allows more toy opportunities

 

The think about that is, Bungie did even originally intend to ever make a game about Reach, they actually contemplated making their own Halo 4 before they decided to make Halo: Reach. Bungie let Eric Nylund write FoR when they didn't plan on telling the story of Reach themselves, and as I understand it, its not as if the game and the novel so drastically different that they can't be reconciled, unlike TCW completely rewriting how the Clone Wars happened. I haven't even read the Halo novels, but I definitely want to, though I am rather worried about the latest novels, especially considering what I have heard about the Kilo-Five Trilogy by Karen Traviss (that what she started doing after she left Star Wars).

To me, Halo 4 feels like the perfect sequel to Halo 3.

 

This is habitual with you, isn't it?

 

I wouldn't say that, I have and have read the short story anthology Halo: Evolutions and fully intend to buy the first six novels, its just I kind of don't have a job yet, so I really shouldn't even have bought the books did buy last year. I read the Bantam novels, NJO, and several other Del Rey novels through the library years ago for a reason. I am also on the last leg of finishing my Bachelor's of Science in Computer Information Systems, so my plate is a little full at the moment, I haven't even finished my rereading of I, Jedi that I started at least a month ago.

 

"If an NJO or post-NJo cutout would be compatible with the story" is a very, very big if. More on this below.

All of those examples are based on big ifs. If Episode VII happens to have a Jaina character (or Solo twins) around the right age, if it has a Skywalker son around the right age, if the character archetype is the same... I've already provided a counterargument to your Chewie argument that you haven't addressed --- Lucas gave the EU permission to kill Chewbacca with the understanding that the EU was a separate universe from his own. Chewie's death in the EU is going to be a nonissue to the writers of Episode VII, and I can guarantee that Lucas's story treatment and the subsequent screenplays and scripts aren't going to exclude him because he died in Vector Prime. Lucas's approval of the decision to kill off Chewbacca isn't a relevant point.

You're misinterpreting me --- if they make a new EU, I'm saying that it will be the new, canon EU. The old stuff will be deemed non-canon (or an alternate timeline). The new stuff will be the canon spin-off material and will be kept in print.

What's absolutely essential to remember is that the script of Episode VII won't be written with the EU in mind. Do you really think that the finished product will be EU-compatible? As I mentioned above, your reasoning is based on a huge number of fanboy-hopeful ifs. You're not thinking critically here. You're letting your love of the EU colour your judgment on this one. Try to look at it from their perspective instead of the perspective of a longtime EU fan. So far, I don't believe you've done that.

Keeping in mind that the script won't be written with the EU in mind --- there are infinitely more ways that it won't be compatible with the EU than there are that it will. There are a great number of things that will need to line up in order for the EU to be compatible (not perfectly, but they'll still need to line up), and any one of an infinite number of deviations from that line-up will ruin it. Assuming that none of those deviations will happen, and that the script will line up in the appropriate ways without major contradictions... that's the silliest assumption of all.

 

You don't KNOW that.

It's that kind of attitude that frustrates me.

 

If he really didn't care, though, why didn't he let them kill Luke like they originally wanted, or let Anakin be the hero?

 

That... is something that's been on my mind for a while now. You could say 'welp gotta sell those novels and we can't get rid of the 'big three' or 'it's george being silly about the whole anakin thing' but...

In retrospect, I think the EU's days have been sorta numbered since George specifically said 'WELL GUYS NO LUKE KILLING. KTHXBYE.' back in the late 90's. Because if he really didn't care about the story beyond ROTJ, he would just have approved it. I don't care how much lip service he gave about the whole 'NO STORY BEYOND ROTJ.' He's always had a story. Otherwise we wouldn't be talking about this in a Episode 7 thread ATM. What it came down to was his willingness to stop bullcrapping the rest of the world and get down to having it made.

 

He didn't let Anakin be the hero so that fans wouldn't get confused about the two Anakins undergoing hero arcs at the same time. As for not killing Luke --- who knows? He sees the EU as someone else's story, but in 1999 he probably didn't think Episode VII would ever happen. He would understandably want Luke to survive in what looked like it would be the final word on post-ROTJ story.