Lit A question on Karen Traviss and her work(s)

I feel like you guys mistake space opera for military sci-fi and I can't tell if it's on purpose (and you're being willfully ignorant in defence of something you like); or if it's just a lack of exposure to wider sci-fi works. Military space opera exists and would be your Rogue Squadron books. Tell me, of the RC books or Rogue Squadron, which feels more grounded militarily?

 

Please explain to me what a space opera is and why all Star Wars has to be that.

 

Star Wars doesn't have to be space opera; Star Wars is Space Opera. I feel like you guys just don't read much outside of SW novels?

Go read Dan Simmons then Peter Hamilton, and tell me what's different.

 

The Ewok Adventure was Space Opera?

 

The Ewok Adventure was 80s Made For TV Movie, much as the Holiday Special was 70s Variety Act Show.

 

It's closer to the spirit of SW than a KT novel, yes.

 

I wish a Star Wars author had the ambition to do a story like Hyperion.

 

So it is not Star Wars then?

 

It doesn't seem to be marketed as such.

 

I didn't think so at the time, certainly. That's why I gave Star Wars a miss for a decade or so.

 

Just like I'm going to give Star Wars a miss for the next decade or so.

History does seem to repeat itself at times.

 

What exactly do you mean by the spirit of star wars? Honestly not trying to knock your opinion but whenever i hear people say things like that it baffles me.

Wraith squadron was about a group of crack commandos who didn't even team up with any jedi to accomplish their missions, but no one ever goes off about how they weren't "in the spirit of star wars."

The bounty hunter wars is about a plot by Xizor to wipe out the bounty hunters guild.
I'm not even going to talk about all that went on in children of the Jedi or Planet of twilight.

I can understand people getting upset over something that messes up some giant aspect of what is star wars
( the force? Well, that's just microscopic bacteria in your bloodstream called midi-chlorians.)
The point is what the big deal that she wrote a book thats a little more military focused in star wars.
even if it doesnt fit into a perfect definition of "space opera" it still fits into star wars.

 

When you watch Star Wars, how do you know who the bad guys are? It's pretty cut and dry, right? The reason is that Star Wars is an Opera; it is the story of a Hero, or Heroes fighting a very clear and defined evil. Or if you want to look at it from a macroscopic view, it is the tragic story of a Hero's fall from grace and ultimate sacrificial redemption. Either way, thee are clear defining lines between good and evil. Star Wars was not interested in exploring complex battlefield moralities because the bad guys WERE undeniably evil. I would go so far as to say that Darth Vader literally lived up to the description that Obi-Wan gives about being a good man twisted. Palpatine uses Anakin's false perspective on justice and law to twist him to the Darkside. He capitalizes on Anakin's love of Padme and fear of her inevitable deat, as well as his anger and jealousy of the Jedi Council...and to an extent his Hatred of the Sandpeople. The mark of evil in the Star Wars universe are these traits. That is why you have criminals like Han Solo as a hero because even though he is a smuggler, he does not display these traits. Everything in the Star Wars universe boils down to black and white, right and wrong, good and bad, and you are either in one camp or the other. The best parts of the EU follow this; and Timothy Zahn agrees with this if you read his Reddit AMA.

When you start to force the perspective that everything is grey, you lose that. The Jedi are supposed to be heroes, the sith the bad guys and the Good guys win and ride off into the sunset. Darth Traviss is doing to you what the Emperor did to Anakin; she is twisting the narrative to create a situation where her pre-planned soapbox, which is the anathema of everything that came before, fits.

Tl;dr- Karen Traviss is a Sith Lord.


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A case could be made that Zahn likes "greyer" characters as well - Mara, Karrde, the Hand of Judgement, Thrawn (Outbound Flight & Choices of One) as well.

Admittedly most of these end up being redeemed in one form or another.

 

Pretty sure it gets mentioned somewhere that the whole reason Thrawn was trying to reestablish the Empire was to defend the galaxy from an outside invasion. mainly the YV. So he was trying to protect the galaxy, by uniting it behind a strong government. Landing him firmly in the grey column.
Also Fetts been a pretty grey character for most of his EU travels. .

Again i feel like i just keep repeating the same point but her "pre-planned soapbox" was not first used by or is unique to her.

Also the whole Good guys win ride off into sunset being overdone is the whole reason the writers got together and decided to shake things up with the NJO.

 

- Intentions do not justify the means; Anakin as Darth Vader was trying to bring order and justice to the Galaxy, but in doing so he became an oppressor and tyrant. He was ultimately redeemed, but not without self-less sacrifice. So Thrawn is NOT a gray character, he is very much an Imperial, both with his methods, and his philosophy.
-It is my personal opinion that Shapiro and the post Bantam world of Star Wars created a Star Wars that did not hold the same soul as either the movies or the EU up and to that point, and yes...I'm still pissed they offed Chewbacca. So I'm not saying that only Karen Traviss has hurt Star Wars, but I think that she is the one that has most departed from it. Traviss blatantly and intentionally turned everything on its head with the Jedi, blurring the lines of the meta-narrative of the entire universe, and ignoring the very core of what Jedi were and are. Let me lay it out here in a post I put somewhere else on the internet:

Karen Traviss has quite possibly departed the most from the spirit of Star Wars (whereas Troy Denning has done the most damage with his Übermensch Jedi.) I boil it down to one concept; Star Wars is a Space Opera. It is a simple story based on individual heroism with clear lines between good and bad. The Good Guys display the positive traits and support the Jedi who follow the light side of the force which epitomizes the positive aspects of humanity: "Knowledge and self defense, never for attack." The Bad Guys crave power and are enslaved by that desire: "Anger, Fear, Aggression, the Dark Side are they. Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you, it will; as it did Obi-wan's apprentice." The story is about the dichotomy between good and evil, right and wrong. It is at the core of the story.

As Star Wars has aged, Authors have taken the platform and re-purposed it to tell their own stories, however the best stories keep the history in mind and build on the idea that good ALWAYS wins, and the heroes ride off into the sunset. This is even true about Anakin Skywalker who, though he falls to the darkside and becomes one of the galaxies most terrifying and evil agents, ultimately redeems himself sacrificially and joins Obi-wan and a bunch of drunken Ewoks on the forest moon of Endor. The story is SIMPLE.

But ever since 9/11, in our post-post-modern era when the lines between good and evil, right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable are up in the air, and with variable truth being preached from all corners of the globe, this has come to show in Star Wars now. The call for a 'darker' 'grittier' 'more human' Star Wars has taken the franchise to a place where it has lost it's soul. Karen Traviss calls into question the very premise of the dichotomy of the Force and its agents and turns Star Wars into Battlestar Galactica or Starship Troopers- Military action with near dystopian underpinnings. I don't like it. Don't get me wrong, I love Starship Troopers and Battlestar Galactica, but the beauty of Star Wars is it's childish innocence, and the clear Good/Evil separation.

 

KOTOR may have set the trend by having the Jedi brainwash Revan. KoTOR II also goes out of its way to paint the Jedi Order in a fairly dim light.

In the KOTOR comic series, Zayne Carrick asks why the murderous Jedi (who killed their own Padawans because they prophesied that one of those Padawans would doom the galaxy) haven't Fallen to the Dark Side dramatically and visibly, and speculates that "If you don't know that what you're doing is wrong, maybe The Force gets confused".

A case could be made that when AOTC had the Jedi willing to take command of the clone army and lead it into battle - the stage was set.

It's interesting to see Obi-Wan's thoughts in the novelization:

Obi-Wan stared at the closest embryo, floating contentedly in its fluid, curled and with its little thumb stuck in its mouth. In ten short years, that tiny creature, that tiny man, would be a soldier, killing and, likely, soon enough killed.
He shuddered and looked to his Kaminoan guide.
"Come," Lama Su bade him, walking along the corridor.
...
"Would you care to inspect the final product now?" the Prime Minister asked, and Obi-Wan could hear excitement in his voice. Clearly he was proud of this accomplishment. "I would like your approval before you take delivery."
The callousness of it all stuck Obi-Wan profoundly. Units. Final product. These were living beings they were talking about. Living and breathing and thinking. To create clones for such a singular purpose, under such conditions, even stealing half their childhood for efficiency, assaulted his sense of right and wrong, and the fact that a Jedi Master had began all this was almost too much for him to digest.
The tour took him through the commissary next, where hundreds of adult clones- all young men Anakin's age- sat in neat rows, all dressed in red, all eating the same food in the same manner.
"You'll find they are totally obedient," Lama Su was saying, seemingly oblivious to the Jedi's discomfort. "We modified their genetic structure to make them less independent than the original, of course."
"Who was the original?"
"A bounty hunter called Jango Fett," Lama Su offered without any hesitation. "We felt that a Jedi would be the perfect choice, but Sifo-Dyas handpicked Jango himself."
The notion that a Jedi might have been used nearly floored Obi-Wan. An army of clones strong in the Force?
"Where is this bounty hunter now?" he asked.
"He lives here," Lama Su replied. "But he's free to come and go as he pleases." He kept walking as he spoke, leading Obi-Wan along a long corridor filled with transparent tubes.
The Jedi watched in amazement as clones climbed up into those tubes and settled into place, closing their eyes and going to sleep.
"Very disciplined," he remarked.
"That is the key," Lama Su replied. "Disciplined, and yet with the ability to think creatively. It is a mighty combination. Sifo-Dyas explained to us the Jedi aversion to leading droids. He told us Jedi could only command an army of life-forms."
And you wanted a Jedi as host? Obi-Wan thought, but he did not say it aloud. He took a deep breath, wondering how Master Sifo-Dyas, how any Jedi, could have so willingly and unilaterally crossed the line to create any army of clones. Obi-Wan realised that he had to suppress his need for a direct answer to that right now, and simply listen and observe, gather as much information as he could so that he and the Jedi Council might sort it out.

 

I like black and white good vs. evil as much as the next person but shades of grey are needed along the way.

 

But not in Star Wars. Watch the movies, there is no gray. Han and Chewie are smugglers, yes, but they consistently exhibit heroic traits. The entire story is built upon the simple idea of good and bad. Remember "once you start down the dark path...." It does not leave room for a blurring of lines. There are only two camps in Star Wars: good guys and bad guys.


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Lando? At least when we first meet him.

 

Situations do not determine the heart of the people. Lando at no point ceases to be a Hero. That is the other thing- While our characters may learn and grow within themselves, Star Wars icons are, at their heart, always the same. EVEN Anakin Skywalker is redeemed, but the redemption is only possible because that is WHO HE IS.

 

There's plenty of people who aren't Heroes or Villains. Bystanders, mostly.

In TCW, some characters are on the side of the Heroes one week and the Villains another. Bounty hunters, mostly.

 

But these characters all inevitably fall on one side or the other. No one actually ever changes or learns; they simply are who they are.

TCW is, again, Karen Travissy and so it will show her edge.

 

She was only involved with the novelisation of the movie - and played no part in writing the TV series.

To quote ROTS:

"There are heroes on both sides. Evil is everywhere."

 

In my personal canon I rate novelizations lower than the movies, if there is a conflict in situation or in philosophy I go with the Movie. That being said, if we split hairs long enough, I'm sure there is SOMETHING to hang your hat on. What I am making my judgement on is the entire story, all six movies. In the end, everything else needs to fit within the perimeters set forth there. That takes me back to Traviss...she didn't watch the movies, so how would she have been able to reconcile her story?