Lit The Following Takes Place Between 35:3:8 and 39:3:7 of the GCW. Events Occur in Real Time.

This thread will be taking a hosted discussion look at the stories of the Galactic Civil War, starting with events immediately after The Battle of Yavin (as TalconCard yells at me: "You fool!").

We'll be approaching events in real time, more or less (given the nebulous overlapping nature of material in this era). Some things will simply be spaced out for purposes of discussion pace, but we'll ultimately be tackling the broader strokes of every month in-universe within a month in the real world.

Now, it's also hard to lock down consensus on this era when it comes to the chronological order of some sources, but I've tried to put together a list from several sources ("You fool!"). However, I've admittedly done so in a less than ideal timespan, so I wouldn't call this absolutely comprehensive; but I've done what I can. I'm sure I'll end up skipping some video game levels or something, but not intentionally.

If you think I've skipped something as we proceed, feel free to let me know!

Will we make it to ROTJ? Let's find out!

There are some conceits that will go with this thread:

-We'll be operating on a 12 month calendar, under the notion that Year 35 will correspond exactly to the 2013 calendar (otherwise this becomes more of a math exercise than is necessary for a discussion thread), 36 to 2014, etc.

-Many sources won't have an exact day-to-day correlation: in other words, while we might spend a single day discussing a particular source, that story might span several. As I stated earlier, though, things will balance out to be correct in the broader month-based strokes.

Another element to this thread to look forward to: we'll be running an art challenge in the Fan Art Forum for pieces depicting events corresponding to where we are in the timeline of this discussion.

You can find the thread with the rules here.

It'll be a nice way to collaborate between two forums that do not normally have direct crossover. Thanks to Corellian_Outrider for helping organize the Fan Art end of things.


So, Quest, if the Battle of Yavin happens on "March 8th", why are you posting this thread now? Simple, as a little light warm up to our actual "after film" events discussion, I figured it would be fun to post this on 3:3, the day ANH begins in-universe.

Why not start outright with day 1 of ANH? Well, for one, it helps us skip the various adaptation materials of events we all know by heart a thousand times over, as well as sidestep the continuity tangle that precedes the film regarding the acquisition of the Death Star plans ("You fool!").



So, to set the stage for context: approx. 2 years ago ("Spring of 2011" to us) the Corellian Treaty was signed by Mon Mothma, Bail Organa and Bel Iblis (a Battlestar Galactica crossover happened in here somewhere too), uniting the resistance forces of Chandrilla, Alderaan and Corellia in an open declaration of rebellion, forming the Rebel Alliance (formally "The Alliance to Restore the Republic").

The Galactic Civil War had begun.

In the ensuing years, many events would transpire leading to the events of "today":

-The Rebels would establish their first base on Dantooine.
-The smuggler Han Solo would acquire a ship named the Millennium Falcon in a sabacc game from gambler Lando Calrissian.
-Emperor Palpatine would facilitate the initial invasions of Wild Space by the Ssi-Ruuvi Imperium.
-Darth Vader would clone his former secret apprentice, Galen Marek, on Kamino.
-Suspecting detection, the Alliance would abandon it's Dantooine Base and relocate to the Sith temple ruins on the jungle moon of Yavin IV.
-Grand Moff Trachta and several conspirators would attempt a failed coup on Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader.
-Jabba the Hutt assumed control of the Desilijic Clan.
-A zombie outbreak occurs on the prison barge ship Purge and the Imperial Star Destroyer Vector.
-The Battle of Turkana takes place.
-The MC Independence would launch fighter missions to take out the ISD Invincible.
-A Mon Calamari named Ackbar is rescued from slavery under Grand Moff Tarkin by the Rebels.
-The Death Star would become operational, test firing it's primary weapon on the construction prison of Despayre, destroying the planet.
-Technical readouts of the Death Star would be acquired through the various missions of Operation Skyhook.


And that brings us to a brief capsule look at "today":

35:3:3

After intercepting the transmissions of the Death Star plans over Toprawa, Princess Leia, aboard the Tantive IV, is en route to Tatooine to retrieve the exiled Jedi Master, General Obi-Wan Kenobi, when they are attacked by the Imperial Star Destroyer that has been pursuing them since Toprawa: Darth Vader's Devastator.

Princess Leia hides the plans inside an Artoo unit. The droid and his protocol companion stow away on an escape pod and are jettisoned to the surface of Tatooine to keep the plans out of Imperial hands...


So, yeah, you know the rest of what happens in those two paragraphs. Elsewhere in the EU we have a lot of concurrent storylines going on: Rookie One's adventure begins on this day (or close to it) on Tatooine. Many of the stories from Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina intersect with this slice of time as well (feel free to dissect that further if you want).


Now, again, this is just a brief overview of the day as part of this prelude (info mainly skimmed from Wookieepedia, I'll cite other sources I use as we progress). For the actual post-Yavin content, we'll be commenting/reviewing things source by source. Look for that to start Saturday.

 

Well, there are greater experts on the era than I, but I think it makes for a unique framework for a discussion of the era (and allows a lot of people to sort of examine the timey-wimey continuity of the era at the same time).

It'll also give me an excuse to final read the Mission and RF books that have been sitting on my shelf for so long, as well as, eventually, finish the Marvel series that I only got a couple trades into many years back. The info I've skimmed from the various sources out there about them have actually made me want to read them finally, ha.

Either that or we can all laugh at my crazy undertaking.



EDIT- Came up with the idea last summer. Remembered a few weeks ago. Plenty of time .

I've had a lot of the groundwork on hand already though, mostly from sources that have really done all the heavy lifting: Wookieepedia, the SW EU timeline at Timeline Universe, Timeline Gold, as well as some older timeline files I had sitting around that TalonCard, NightOwl and Maverick879 did about 9 years ago.

My job was mainly to resolve those together with my own choices within the framework structure needed for a regularly updated discussion thread. Though no doubt the actual experience of analysis, discussion and reading specific sources will shed light on necessary alterations for future reference.


EDIT 2- Oh, I almost forgot, since the question will no doubt come up: Obviously the Brian Wood series is ongoing so it will be filling in new events long after we've surpassed them chronologically, so I intend to cover the first arc, In the Shadow of Yavin, when we get to 2 months ABY (since that arc will likely have been finished by time we get there) but after that we'll move on beyond it.

 

There's a lot running parallel to ANH. Not going to include everything in the prelude overviews, just (hopefully) everything ABY. But you're right, I forgot to mention those (probably mentally checked off X-Wing after the Turkana, Skyhook and Invincible mentions).

 

The Manga material is Infinities, though, isn't it? I don't think that could be cleanly resolved with the actual means in which the Devastator was able to track the Tantive IV: U-3PO was reprogrammed by the Empire as a spy and inserted aboard the Tantive IV on Ralltiir, later sending the signal for the Devastator to track it to Tatooine.

If the Imperials had the tracker signal to follow, they wouldn't have fallen for the Tantive V decoy which would have been lacking said signal (and the Rebels were clearly unaware of U-3PO's spy status until the Devastator got the drop on them).

 

I, uh, volunteer to write in-universe fake newsnet stories about each day's events under the Coruscant Daily Newsfeed channel (therefore, I am only interested in high society events).

I don't know what this has to do with your project at all or if it'll even contribute, but the date system made me think of NewsNets so why not

 

Feel free to counter my propaganda with your own

 

Yeah, the "jump ship" thing was a cover story.

It's probably the Conquest or Thunderflare (I think that was the second ISD), post-Falcon escape from Tatooine.



Moving on with the overview prelude:

35:3:4

Last night, Artoo was jacked by Jawas, meeting up with Threepio in the hold of their sandcrawler. This morning, the detachment of Stormtroopers from the Devastator deploy in the desert and locate the escape pod and evidence of droids being aboard.

Meanwhile, the sandcrawler arrives at the Lars moisture farm, ultimately selling the two droids to the Lars. The Lars' nephew, Luke Skywalker, stumbles across a hidden message for help inside Artoo from Princess Leia while cleaning the droid.

While the Lars have dinner (and Luke pauses to take in the binary sunset), Artoo flees into the desert once more, intent on finding Obi-Wan Kenobi. Upon discovery of the droid's absence, Luke plans to go out the following morning in pursuit.


Another source I should have mentioned yesterday as concurrent to these events would be the various subplots taking place aboard the Death Star in the Death Star novel. Also aboard the station is the investigation of trooper TK-622 into a suspected saboteur in Empire #13: What Sin Loyalty? TK-622 is likely either just starting his investigation now or is just arriving aboard the Death Star from Ralltiir.

 

I found it difficult to determine for sure if that happened today or tomorrow (or it happened today and it took a day for word to reach the Death Star/Horuz system). However, I came across 3:5 more often so I was going to go with that,

But, if it happened today, it happened late tonight (which, I guess would really be "now" given when i'm posting these ).

If it is happening now, another key point about the senate dissolution mentioned on Wookieepedia is that that also results in the official disbandment of the Trade Federation (even though it had technically been dissolved and Imperialized since the conclusion of the Clone Wars)

 

They already have. His name is Kyle Katarn.