Clone Wars The Even Piell Centre for Canon and Continuity Catastrophes - Please use spoiler tags!

Everything but very old material that didn't concern itself with maintaining continuity is canon. Its the people who ignore the books that is helping people like Dave Filoni to contradict the books and get away with it. This is in turn ruining the experience for those of us who love the books as much as the films. For example, TPM novelization had a lot of input from Lucas on the backstory of the Sith. Video games are unique in that only their story is canon, not gameplay mechanics.

You should familiarize yourself on what is canon and what isn't.

Are you sure you aren't confusing Star Wars with Star Trek?

I think you should.

Lucas had a lot of direct input into both TPM and RotS novelizations, the history of the Sith and a line by line edit, respectively, so they are indeed nearly as canonical as the films themselves.

And yet they're different from the movies.

So what, just because they are different doesn't make either of them any less authoritative than the other, other than the films being the highest G-canon material. For example, all of the novelizations have many deleted scenes from the films.

LFL's official position on Star Wars canon is that everything is canon unless explicitly marked or stated to be otherwise. People talk about various levels of canon (G-canon, T-canon, etc.), but that really only confuses the issue. In theory, everything is equally a "real" part of the Star Wars universe. The canon levels only apply to internal LFL continuity-keeping and how they resolve contradictions that crop up. For example, the old Marvel comics from the '70s and '80s are all considered S-canon, but they are just as canon as any of the modern-day novels, all C-canon sources. The canon levels only determine which source will generally be given preference in the event of a contradiction, although it varies from case to case.

Keep in mind that this is only LFL's policy; they can't force anyone to acknowledge any stories in their own personal view of Star Wars that they don't want to. But if you want to talk about the official definition of canon, it's basically everything.

• G-canon is George Lucas Canon; the six Episodes and anything directly provided to Lucas Licensing by Lucas (including unpublished production notes from him or his production department that are never seen by the public). Elements originating with Lucas in the movie novelizations, reference books, and other sources are also G-canon, though anything created by the authors of those sources is C-canon. When the matter ofchanges between movie versions arises, the most recently released editions are deemed superior to older ones, as they correct mistakes, improve consistency between the two trilogies, and express Lucas's current vision of the Star Wars universe most closely. The deleted scenes included on the DVDs are also considered G-canon (when they're not in conflict with the movie).[1]
• T-canon,[2] or Television Canon[3], refers to the canon level comprising the feature film Star Wars: The Clone Wars and the two television shows Star Wars: The Clone Wars and the Star Wars live-action TV series.[4][5] It was devised recently in order to define a status above the C-Level canon, as confirmed by Chee[6].

• C-canon is Continuity Canon, consisting of all recent works (and many older works) released under the name of Star Wars: books, comics, games, cartoons, non-theatrical films, and more. Games are a special case, as generally only the stories are C-canon, while things like stats and gameplay may not be;[7] they also offer non-canonical options to the player, such as choosing female gender for a canonically male character. C-canon elements have been known to appear in the movies, thus making them G-canon; examples include the name "Coruscant," swoop bikes, Quinlan Vos, Aayla Secura, YT-2400 freighters andAction VI transports.

• S-canon is Secondary Canon; the materials are available to be used or ignored as needed by current authors. This includes mostly older works, such as much of the Marvel Star Wars comics, that predate a consistent effort to maintain continuity; it also contains certain elements of a few otherwise N-canon stories, and other things that "may not fit just right." Many formerly S-canon elements have been elevated to C-canon through their inclusion in more recent works by continuity-minded authors, while many other older works (such as The Han Solo Adventures) were accounted for in continuity from the start despite their age, and thus were always C-canon.

• N is Non-Canon. What-if stories (such as stories published under the Infinities label) and anything else directly and irreconcilably contradicted by higher canon ends up here. N is the only level that is not considered canon by Lucasfilm. Information cut from canon, deleted scenes, or from canceled Star Warsworks falls into this category as well, unless another canonical work references it and it is declared canon.

I think this will help you Venger. Leland Chee recently said in the ForceCast that Star Wars films and EU was still all one universe, despite what Dave Filoni says on the matter.

I have a question for @GGrievous and anyone else who wants to take a whack at it: if both the films and the novelizations are canon, when there are differences between a film and its novelization, which version counts as canon?

I've heard a lot of people complain about Boba blowing up what supposedly had to be Jango's only helmet, so I figured there was some EU source for it, which would mean the other stuff mentioned would contradict it. But maybe I was wrong to think there was a reason for that complaint.

Everything in a novelization that does not outright contradict its film is canon. So stuff like deleted scenes that are included in novels would then count as canon. As far as dialogue goes, I'm pretty sure the film takes precedent, even though half the time the dialogue in the films sucks.

EDIT: Or, yeah, what JackG posted.

@HJ_hating_troll_AKA_DLT see my post above. If the novel contradicts the film, the film is correct. If the film contradicts the novel, the film is correct. It's a higher level of canon.

Okay, thanks, and don't the two Clone Wars television series also effectively have the same level of canon as films relative to novels? That's how I read your previous post.

So that means in the Ep. IV novelization when Luke and Ben talk about ducks, that counts as the highest canon because the film doesn't necessarily contradict it? I don't know if I like that.

Ducks appeared in TPM. They are indeed the highest canon.

Argh. They're in 1/3 of SW film novelizations, then, because they're definitely in the Ep. IV novel too.

Not my canon!

I need that Dubya "Not My President" graphic but with a picture of GL and "Not My Canon".

Only TCW is T-canon for some ineffable reason. The Droids, Ewoks, and original Clone Wars cartoons all fall under the realm of C-canon. But like I said before, the canon levels are virtually meaningless in fan discussion. They only exist to help LFL resolve continuity errors between sources of varying prominence. The only reason we even know about the canon levels is because people kept asking Leland Chee how the Holocron continuity database works. As far as the EU fan should be concerned, all sources are equally valid until there's a contradiction.

Gotcha, and I agree about as much as I understand. To me both Clone Wars series are equal with the films, but I don't count Ewoks or Droids.

Do Darth Plagueis and End Game, a short story by James Luceno from latest edition of TPM novelization, acknowledge the ridiculous "return" of Darth Maul?

T-canon was invented so Filoni can crush previous canon and then claim TCW is a higher level, and therefore right.
@Zeta1127 yes. End Game at least.