Lit your personal "core"/ essential Star Wars saga

Generally speaking, my personal Star Wars canon is the original and sequel trilogies plus everything in the old Legendsverse up until The Unifying Force. Nothing after that is real, save Mercy Kill. Pretty much everything before that is real, save the TCW series (the late 2000s/early 2010s one), which I consider part of the new canon rather than the old one. The new universe - including the Disney films, TCW, and Rebels - is mostly fun, but it's an alternate universe and not the "real" Star Wars. (You might say that to me, that's "legends.")

More specifically than that, "core" sagas... it's often hard to tell which books are important and which aren't. I do have a "core saga" for the New Republic era: the X-wing series, the Thrawn trilogy, and the Thrawn duology, plus I, Jedi. Zahn, Stackpole and Allston coordinated their stuff well.

 

For me there are two cores depending upon approach. The "classic" approach would be to me:
The Original Trilogy (sans SE alterations)
The Thrawn Trilogy
Dark Empire Trilogy and Tales of the Jedi
The Jedi Academy Trilogy
Shadows of the Empire
The Jedi Knight games
The X-Wing books and comics
The first Knights of the Old Republic game

As for the more modern approach:
The Original Trilogy
The Prequel Trilogy
The Sequel Trilogy
The Clone Wars and Rebels

The reasons I did not include the New Canon's EU books and comics is largely because of how non-essential and less well known they are. With the classic pre-Disney era of Star Wars a lot of the old EU books, games, and comics felt inseparable with the saga as whole. This is not the case nowadays.

 

For the new canon, which is what I am most familiar with, I would have to say the "Jyn Erso Trilogy" aka Catalyst, Rebel Rising, and the Rogue One Novelization are all very essential to me, since it tells you the life story of one of the main characters of Rogue One, as well as shining a light on what the galaxy was like post-ROTS. It also gives you more of a scale for what Jyn's life was like and why Saw is annexed from the Rebellion proper.

Honorable mentions go to:

Ahsoka (explains how she became Fulcrum and where she got her new sabers from)
A New Dawn (prequel to Rebels which is becoming more important to the overall canon in my eyes)
Tarkin
Thrawn (shines a light on the political scene of the Empire and Thrawn's rise to power)
Leia Princess of Alderaan (Same as Thrawn but also shows us a young Leia and hints about her Force powers)
Before the Awakening (shows us that Rey isn't such a Mary Sue as well as shows us the origins of Poe and Finn).

 

For me, the core of Star Wars has always been the battle between the Jedi and the Sith. Although I like the characters from the Rouge Squadron, I've never been interested in the pure military or political aspects of the Saga. I think the most interesting parts of Star Wars are the battle between Light and Dark and the mystery of the Force. So if we go down to a bare-bones essential list of Star Wars works, mine would be: TOTJ, KOTOR, Jedi vs Sith/Bane Trilogy, Darth Plagueis, the PT, Republic comic series, the OT, Jedi Academy trilogy, NJO, and Legacy comics. I liked DOTJ, but it isn't essential. SWTOR has become too convoluted for me with the Eternal Empire story arcs, but I wasn't bothered by the Shadows of Revan. Thrawn trilogy and Dark Empire are iconic, but not essential to understanding the story. I pretend that LOTF and FOTJ never happened. I'm sorry to say that works like Republic Commando and the X-Wing series just bore me. If there aren't crazy monks wielding laser-swords, I'm not interested.

I'm sorry to say that I have no interest in the New Canon.

 

The OT
The PT
Rogue One
The Entire EU especially everything between ROTJ and The Unifying Force.
Jacen's fall to the dark side/sith after NJO, and Jaina killing him in a tragic duel I accept. Because I think that is a strong, emotional, and moving climax that rhymes with the films.

But I pretty much reject Legacy of the Force, Fate of the Jedi and Dark Nest because I felt like Troy Denning had too much control of the universe after that. They felt disconnected with the rest of the Saga/EU. I also reject the Sequel Trilogy by Disney because they are the least Star Wars out of everything that has ever come out of the Star Wars universe.

 

Anyone says that "all of Legends" is essential is lying. There's no way you all think Episode I Adventures, Ewok children's books, every WOTC supplement, etc., is essential.

 

Anything related to Luke Skywalker.

 

I would say for me the only "essential" works from Legends is Dark Empire (in that it ties in with ROTS in a way that canon has yet to do) and the Clone Wars 2d microseries cartoon.

So far I find the only "essential" work from new canon is Rogue One.

 

Months after my OP (and reading a whole lot of SW novels ) I think that for me there are two essential "sagas",

The first saga begins with the OT and includes the Early EU novels that IMO best capture the feel of "classic SW":

• SW (ANH) novelization
• ESB novelization
• ROTJ novelization
• Thrawn trilogy
• Shadows of the Empire
• Tales from/of.. series (Mos Eisley Cantina, Jabba's Palace, Bounty Hunters, Empire, New Republic)
• I, Jedi
• Hand of Thrawn duology
• Survivor's Quest
• Outbound Flight

These novels are not part of my personal "main saga", but enhance the above-mentioned novels wirh their connections to the OT:

• Splinter of the Mind's Eye
• Allegiance
• Choices of One
• Scoundrels
• Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor

The second saga revolves around the PT:

• Cloak of Deception
• Darth Maul Shadow Hunter
• TPM novelization
• The Approaching Storm
• AOTC novelization
• Shatterpoint
• Yoda: Dark Rendezvouz
• Labyrinth of Evil
• ROTS novelization
• Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader
• Darth Plagueis

This series is not a part of my personal "main saga", but works as good background material:

• Darth Bane trilogy

 

Just the original films. Everything else is just an addendum.

 

TCW Yoda arc (force ghost explanation)
RoTS
Rebels S2E7 (B-Wing Origin), S3E4 (Wedge Origin), S3E12+13 (Saw Gerrera + Rogue One setup) S3E18 (Mon Mothma + formation of the Alliance) S4E3+4 (More Saw + R1 setup)
Rogue One
ANH, ESB, RoTJ

The OT is at the very core. I don't see TPM and AoTC as essential viewing. RoTS, Rogue One and this handful of animation episodes expand upon the OT well enough IMO. The ST isn't over so i'll wait on that to update this list.

 

All of it! Seriously. From The Crystal Star to the Droids cartoon. I love it all.

As far as the core essentials go - it's the film/television for me. As in, I start with the film and move on to the rest - books, comics, and the like

The Phantom Menace
Attack of the Clones
Clone Wars (2003)
The Clone Wars (Film)
The Clone Wars (TV Show)
Revenge of the Sith
Solo: A Star Wars Story
Droids
Rebels
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
A New Hope
The Star Wars Holiday Special
The Empire Strikes Back
Ewoks
Ewoks: Caravan of Courage
Ewoks: Battle for Endor
Return of the Jedi
The Force Awakens
The Last Jedi

 

Oh boy, my list is going to be a long one, but here we go:

The Prequel Trilogy (Rise of the Empire and Vader)
TCW (introduces us to Ahoska and Mortis among other things)
The Vader comics from 2017 (more Vader action and also we see the growth of Vader and how he became the monster that he is)
Catalyst (Rogue One set up)
Ahsoka novel (explains the cool sabers and her role in the rebellion)
Thrawn (because it explains who the character is)
Leia, Princess of Alderaan (young Leia story and introduces us to Holdo and Crait)
Rebels (shows the formation of the Rebel Alliance)
Thrawn Alliances (shows how Thrawn and Anakin first met as well as what happened in between Seasons 3 and 4 of Rebels)
Rebel Rising (young Jyn story)
Solo (explains who Han is and how he got to where he is)
Rogue One
A New Hope
The Marvel Star Wars run
ESB
ROTJ
Aftermath Trilogy (because Battle of Jakku)
Bloodline (formation of the Resistance)
Poe comic series (because it explains how Poe found Lor)
ST.

I might have missed a few things here and there, but that is generally what I would consider being the "core" of Star Wars, at least to me. It will obviously change as we get new material, but for now, that's about it.

 

A fan after my own heart

My "core essentials" list looks very, very much the same. Even though I love them I might leave off the Droids / Ewoks cartoons (if we're talking absolute "core essentials") but that's about it. I can't imagine Star Wars without the Holiday Special or the Ewok TV movies... I just can't.

 

This thread is a bit useless, since there's no actual discussion going on.

 

I respectfully disagree..

my OP (and the "updated" one fro, 2 days ago) mentioned what my personal "core" SW material is, and I asked others to share theirs (if they have a "core" list).. that's what the responses had been so far.

Would you rather see people start disagreeing with other members' personal choices?

 

The PT
OT
Thrawn Trilogy
Dark Empire
New Jedi Order
Legacy
KOTOR

This list isn't what I include as my "Canon"-in fact as a completionist I accept just about all the EU-I don't necessarily like all of it but I don't disregard it even if I don't like it. My philosophy on that is that to disregard any of it one is in essence disregarding all of it. So I acknowledge and accept it even the bad parts or the parts of which I have little knowledge of or enthusiasm for.

What core means for me in this list is-if you the rest away in a thematic sense-what is the essence of Star Wars to me? What is the heart, mind and soul of the franchise? The above list would be my answer.

Come to think of it I could probably cut out the Thrawn trilogy using the above criteria.

 

Same here, the only difference being I really do enjoy it all - the only Star Wars material I had a hard time accepting was Legacy of the Force and Fate of the Jedi , but I came around to appreciate those stories eventually

 

The "hard core" of my own personal Star Wars are the six Lucas movies, the novel "Cloak of Deception," and the Anakin/Obi-Wan parts of the CW microseries.

 

Even though my personal "core SW" is more inclusive, if I look at what comprises the Old-School / Classic / "vintage" Star Wars to me, it’s a very concise list:

• The OT, and even more so, the OT novelizations (the ANH novelization came before the film)
• Splinter of the Mind's Eye – the first continuation of SW ever, with a very "vintage feel"
• The Thrawn Trilogy – the first proper continuation of SW (before the establishment of the wider EU)

This was before the Jedi/Sith focus, before SW became a *franchise* (or a wide fictional *universe*), and while this is far from the core saga when looking at it from a modern perspective, this is how SW began and to me, still representing the core story as it had been back then.

 

My personal core cannon is a Darksaber built in secret in a Hutt shipyard, slung under a five-mile-long Super-class Star Destroyer...

Sized for a crew of Ewoks, obviously...

- The Imperial Ewok