Speculation Why the NJO and Legacy Era are toast.

The best way to sell a lot of books is to get new readers. Comic companies figures out a LONG time ago that a great way to get new readers is to restart everything. If selling books is high on their proirity list, restarting the post RotJ continuity (or the whole EU continuity) is a goo dmove for them. The hard-core readership will still be there, and a fresh start will attract new readers and old readers who have left because of a dislike of the old EU and were it went.

The problem is introducing a character with as much back story as a Jaina or Mara Jade is problematic, it bogs down the storytelling. If they ignore all of that, then why not just let the filmmaker create his own blank slate? As for using old character being longer....not by much. And most writers/creators LIKE doing that. Thats why Mara Jade disapeared for so long in the EU, other creators wanted to take the time to make up their own characters, not use someone elses.

Putting characters on screen that need the audience to read 30+ novels to "catch up on" isn't hw you make a successful movie. Look at all the comic book movies int he last 10 years, they don't just pick up were the comics are at that given time. In Ironman Tony Stark wasn't running SHIELD after cap was killed and Fury was ont he run in the post Civil War world. It ws a great story, but its a bad place to start a movie.

 

Who says anything about Mara being a main character? i dont even think Luke is going to be a main character. If they do decide to use some previously established characters, Jaina's backstory is a bit crowded admitedly, however Ben is pretty much a blank slate for the writer and director to play with.

 

Except for the whole mother dying, master turning into a Sith lord who his cousin killed...........

 

This is what I don't get...

If the back story and lives of the characters in the EU isn't goign to be referenced or used in anyway and Ben or Jaina or Mara are just going to blank slates who's pasts will have nothing to do with the movie, story etc... then why not just have original characters? Using the characters in that way isn't really using them. The point of using Jaina in a story would be to build on her as a character, and if you have to ignore most of it becase its in a Novel from 2002......whats the point?

 

No one needs to know that. For the movie goer that don't need to know about Anakin at all. Jacen might get a mention. All they need to know about Ben's mother is her name was Mara, she is dead. But hey you all know dad, Luke here is a great guy.

Ben in FotJ is running around with Papa Skywalker and some stupid sith girl. But Ben becomes basically a Jedi Knight for fans to slowly love. What would be cool is if Ben was the elder Jedi and they introduced a new apprentice for him that would be the main protagonist, much like Obi Wan in the prequel trilogy.

 

Ive said it before and I'll say it again. The EU should be inspiration not doctrine. Look at Corran Horn, I doubt they will use him but I like the character. Rogue Squadron pilot, Jedi, not all super force powered, silver lightsaber. No one needs to know, hey I'm Corran and I sit on the council and like to wear green robes and my wife's dad has a red star destoryer that he uses as a casino, and I used to work at CORSEC, oh and my kids went crazy for a while. No, just I'm Corran Horn. I'm a Corellian Jedi and a Rogue pilot.

 

The EU will be shaken up with a new movie, we should all accept that. The question is, will they bring back character like Chewie and Akbar that we all love? And will they include the fan favorites from the EU such as Corran in the background for hardcore fans?

 

So this character you like LUke, he got married, she died, but you don't need to see any of that? Pretty sloppy story telling. would you have been happy if they never touched LUke and Mara's marriage or her death, and then a book just started "Mara Jade died but she and Luke had son first"? I'm guessing no, so why would the average movie goer be happy with that.

The point is introduce these new characters in a way that the audience can relate to them, you don't do that by starting off "mid story" for them. As I said, you don't start Ironman with Tony with the arc reactor.

 

Mara was just a breeder for Ben the minute she married Luke.
Who says that Ben's story has been told? Everything up until now is just lame back story.

No one knew any mission that Qui Gon and Obi Wan went on prior to Episode 1, but the minute you saw Obi Wan you knew he would someday train Luke.
No one would need to know every mission Ben had went on prior to Episode 7, but the minute you see Ben Skywalker. Oh that's Luke kid. Where is his mom? Then a little while into the movie, "I miss your mother too. She would be proud of the Jedi you have become"

You keep compairing people to Tony Stark. Well maybe Corran Horn is Jasper Sitwell, and there are countless adventures that Thor has with Sif and the Warriors Three we don't see. We don't need to see it. We understand that these are Thor's closest friends and loyal allies. Plus look at Black Widow and Hawkeye, they just kind of appear into the series. Widow makes her entrance and she just slowly becomes more fleshed out as time goes. It wasn't until the Avengers we get the official "I used to be Russian line" and they continue to make references to history between Hawkeye and Blackwidow.

 

You don't need to know every detail ofa new characters. But the character who married you former main character and gave birth to the next one....kind of important.

Sure we don't see Qui-Gon or Obi-wan in action before TPM, and its assuming they are doing what normal Jedi do. But what you're suggesting would be starting the first movie were AotC picked up - take the main characters and give them bagage. They couldn't have started a new trilogy were Obi-wan and Ankina lready knew each other and Anakin ahd a crush on Padme. Thats what you're suggesting.

Sure Thor and co. went on adventures. But none of them died. Thor didn't get married, have a kid and have his wife pass away. Thor didn't kill Loki before the movie etc....

 

This is true, but look at Tron and Tron Legacy, Flynn has a son named Sam. No one even bothered to ask who the mother was the entire movie

 

It continues to amaze me how almost everyone seems to have this all or nothing attitude to the EU. Your talk about backstories and so forth just... well, it seems that you're forgetting that this thread is about why the NJO and its follow ups are likely to be ejected from the EU, not about the EU's inclusion in general.

In 1991 Bantam released Heir to the Empire, beginning the Bantam Era of books with a trilogy that is arguably the most read set of stories in the entire Expanded Universe... When I got to a bookstore and hit the Science Fiction section they usually have ZERO New Jedi Order books, 2-3 of the new Legacy books, most of the X-wing Series, and The Thrawn Trilogy. Most people know who Mara Jade is, she's part of the popular culture and listed as one of the top heroes of the Star Wars saga... actually beating out Qui-Gon Jinn in terms of popularity. Those that dismiss her out of hand seem to be the sort that refuse to acknowledge anything outside of the films. Then in 1998 Vision of the Future was released and the Bantam period in the EU came to a close. It was the end of an era... the Empire had sued for peace and Luke was getting married.

The Bantam Era was one of disorganized spasmodic story production with books often times retreading ground and so forth. The only real well documented coordination was between Timothy Zahn and Michael Stackpole since they utilized each others characters while everyone else went their own way. Despite that, or in part thanks to Zahn reading other peoples stories there is a clear, consistent, and easily usable chain of events.

The Rebels become the New Republic, the Empire slowly falls and sues to peace. Luke Skywalker begins to assemble a New Order and so forth. It's really not that complicated, until Del Rey decides to burn the Star Wars universe to the ground with the NJO, Legacy, and so forth.

I'd describe the NJO as a sort of Star Wars: Crisis on Infinite Earths or New 52 ala DC. Will we ever see that referenced in a Batman, Superman, or Green Lantern film? Hell no. It's a mess. The same thing is easily true of Star Wars. Establishing Mara Jade or Jaina Solo is easy without that mountain in the way. Lets face it, if Jade was in it she'd be on screen for about as much time as Mace Windu in Episode I or less. All you need to establish is A. She's Luke's wife and B. She's a jedi. Hell I don't expect Luke to be on screen for much longer than Yoda was in Episode I either.

Jaina Solo is even easier as everyone expects Leia and Han to have children. All you need would be for someone to say her full name, and boom everyone knows who she is. It's not that hard if you sort what's useful and necessary from what's apocryphal and unnecessary.

 

Set it a little later and Jaina will probably be Empressing it with Jag...

 

Oh God... good luck explaining that to the General Audience... "You know the Empire... they're sort of still around and Han's Daughter is their leader."

 

Set it a little later and Jaina will probably be Empressing it with Jag...[/quote]
Oh God... good luck explaining that to the General Audience... "You know the Empire... they're sort of still around and Han's Daughter is their leader."[/quote]

Not thrilled with Jaina getting pulled from the Jedi Order side of things to do Empressing. However I loved the Imperial Knights from legacy. Kind of hope they make Legacy part of the infinities and either let Jag step down to be a normal human without the responsibility

 

There's a Poll card just under the thread title.

It is also a 'Speculation' thread where the very title expresses a presumption.

 

The filmic Star Wars canon - which, for the purposes of this example consists of the existing films in the Saga (Episodes I-VI), the The Clone Wars movie, and the The Clone Wars 3-D animated series - follows a very distinct storytelling and stylistic formula that is intrinsically based on and around the mythological motif of the 'hero's journey'; because of this motif, there has not been a single piece of filmic canon which has put in-depth plot backstory or character backstory into its Opening Crawls or into in-story dialogue. It is not likely that this will change with the Sequel Trilogy, which means that, if there are EU scenarios and characters incorporated into the Sequel Trilogy's films, the majority of the relevant information concerning those scenarios and characters will be imparted to us on-screen, not in the form of dialogue or Opening Crawls, which in turn leads us back to this idea of the events of the EU 'handcuffing' the films.

If the Vong invasion - or another major galaxy-spanning event from the EU - did end up being something that the filmmakers decided they wanted to incorporate, in some form, into the Sequel Trilogy, we would see said invasion or other galaxy-spanning event play itself out, with characters such as Jaina and Ben - as well as Luke, Leia, Han, and others - being in the forefront of things as part of their 'hero's journey', and we would be introduced to them at a point in their lives where they are at a 'crossroads' and standing 'on the brink' of something. They wouldn't be introduced with these complicated backstories in place that would have to be referenced in dialogue. In other words, if Jaina and Ben were used, they'd likely be used in a fashion very similar to the way that Jacen and Jaina were first utilized in the Young Jedi Knights books, with Ben taking Jacen's place in the overall narrative tapestry of things, and would likely be equals, not Master and Padawan as someone suggested earlier. They would also likely be somewhat similar in age.

 

All happening off-camera! No need for anyone to know unless there's a State Visit!

 

Ugh, I can't believe people want to see the Vong, or even have them referenced. It's such an artifact of the 1990's, real downer stuff, runover from the Grunge Era. I'm kind of curious to re-start and finish that series, out of curiosity, but I sure as heck don't want it included in the new films in any way whatsoever.

 

Either pick up in a galaxy where NJO never happened or do the opposite, pick up with no reference to NJO at all after the fact, no one needs to know.

 

^ I used the Vong as an example because they were used as one earlier. The point of what I was saying that, if the filmmakers lift a major event from the EU - whatever it might be (take your pick) - we will likely see that event play itself out; it won't be referenced as having 'happened in the past'.

Before anyone goes 'the reference to the Clone Wars in ANH says you're wrong', the Clone Wars were not relevant to the actual plot of Episodes IV, V, and VI and, in the grand scheme of things, were not as important to the tapestry and fabric of the SWU as the Vong War was.

 

Civilisation facing extinction, major space battles, plenty of Lightsaber/Amphistaff action, not all that much Force use, nasty appeasement politicians, evil collaborators, a cast of trillions (and one self-aware planet). Wouldn't audiences be on the edge of their seats, cheering the Republic/Jedi on?

 

That sounds great, but we're talking about NJO, right?

 

If Ben Skywalker was the central character, I don't necessarily think that you have to go into a long backstory of establishing who his mother is. In 1983, no one knew who Luke and Leia's mother was, and honestly, it didn't really matter at that point. The prequels cleared that up for us, but still it isn't a central point, and one can argue that the mystery was better than the actual explanation (especially if you consider, which I do, that Padme was a selfish b**** who could have lived and raised her children but instead chose to die because of a broken heart - nevermind that your newly born twins need their mother!! My first son was born on the day ROTS released in theaters and when my wife and I ultimately saw it, she was mortified at Padme in the end of the film).

But getting back to the point of Ben Skywalker, it's not an unheard of plot device to use the mystery of a death to drive a story (like The Princess Bride!); you could meet Ben, Jacen, Jaina, Anakin (not sure who is still alive at what ages in the books; I honestly stopped reading the EU after the book about the fake Thrawn) - and part of the mystery could be Ben's focus on finding out the truth, which would ultimately lead to a grizzly and unsettling discovery. I have NOT read the books that deal with this, so I have no idea how that's handled, I just know from a macro level what occurred.

Regardless, if the story is to focus on the Skywalker/Solo family with the elder statesmen of the family that we knew from the OT are to make Obi-Wanesqe appearances in the ST, then I'm fine with that. As someone said much earlier in this thread, you have to give the audience some credit. It isn't a leap in logic to assume Leia and Han get married - they don't need to read The Courtship of Princess Leia to find out the details (what a horrible book). "Jacen and Jaina are their kids? Cool, that's fine, I'm good with that," says the average movie-goer in 2015.

Honestly though, I think while Disney will probably use names from the EU as to not completely contradict what has been written (like what Lucas did with the name of Coruscant), I think the main story of the ST will take place even outside the scope what was know from the EU as it has been established. Star Wars fans haven't had to deal with contradiction issues like other franchises have faced because only one guy, Lucas, has been rubber stamping what goes out that is canon. With franchises like Marvel, DC Comics, and Star Trek, you have dozens upon dozens of people involved in various projects over the years and things tend to get a little messy. Heck, the next X-Men movie, Days of Future Past, is going to be a time travel movie to address contradictions that the X-Men movies have made from film to film, let alone from the comics. And yet, for the most part, these films are enjoyable and we can suspend disbelief long enough to watch them.

Ultimately, the same will be true for Star Wars in my opinion.

 

That's a potted synopsis. But it is the NJO.