Karen Traviss and her Clonetroopers novels. Good decent author but during a bad time

I also don't understand the argument that she's the only author that doesn't "kiss the Jedi's ass." What does that even mean? She's the only one that shows them with flaws? Most of which I cound as simply being more horrible characterization. Well, she really isn't. She's the only one that has people speak out against Jedi with something other than their genocide in mind? I'm pretty sure there's examples of that from various other writers in every era of the EU.

 

I never found that Traviss was able to equal Hard Contact, which did things exceedingly well. It was after that, with the likes of Triple Zero that the Mando elements took off - I disliked TZ greatly, but the Mando stuff didn't help either. If I could have ignored the existence of Klingons, it wouldn't have been so bad but I couldn't, to me the whole Mando thing feels like it plays on SW EU fans being insular and not reading anything else. Nor do Mandos really need their lingo splashed everywhere, why? Because they're already - or used to be - dead cool, they have jetpacks and missiles and flamethrowers and - you get the picture. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

 

This is perhaps the crux of the issue. Certainly within the Commando novels the Jedi (and the whole republic) are behaving very badly.

The problem is that this portrayal doesn't mesh with the portrayals in other sources.

There are many examples ranging from the minor: Traviss says the Clones never got leave or had any money. Death Star describes cantinas of the era as dominated by Clone troopers on leave. To the major: in the Commando novels the war is a farce, Palpatine's toying with the Separatists solely for political reasons, while in every other source there is a very real Separatist threat and at times the CIS and Grievous are even winning.

This discontinuity really hurts the very strong views that Traviss presented regarding Old republic institutions, particularly the Jedi Order. Consistently referring to the Clones as a 'slave army' in the modern western sense of slaves is perhaps technically accurate, but extremely pejorative. In reality the Clone Army has no earthly analog, but it is probably close to the Janissaries of the ottomans, who weren't exactly free men, weren't exactly slaves, but were highly valuable and provided for and certainly had it better than the average citizen.

Ultimately I think it's fair to say that Traviss backed a specific side and then supported it ruthlessly (she even admitted it openly, in Imperial Commando Maze says something to the effect that Skirata simply save the commandos for Mandalore, and Skirata doesn't really contest it), but use of such a distinct lens meant she failed to present all sides in a fair or even honest light.

 

Karen Traviss had a lucky shot with "Hard Contact", but from there it went downhill.

Even ignoring the entire "size of the clone-army"-debacle, this is the woman, who made Jaina Solo, the "Sword of the Jedi", member of Rogue Squadron, decorated heroine of the YV-war and so on incapable of fighting her own brother without the help of Boba Fett (the guy, who got taken out by a blind man in ROTJ) or incapable of using a com in a star-fighter without asking Ben Skywalker for help.

This is also the woman, who gave a bunch of nomands, mercenaries and farmers better metallurgy than the combined resources of the Galactic Empire and the New Republic.

And her bad-mouthing the Jedi doesn't make her special either. In fact, the way she repeatedly hits you in the face with it shows a remarkable lack of subtelity.

 

She was good as an author writing her own Commando and Clone Wars novels, with her own characters, as long as someone kept her in check with the continuity.

But she should not have become one of the authors of a flagship series, like in LOTF.

 

Mani has pretty much summed up my views. I'm a big fan of Karen Traviss's work in general, as many know, and even a defender of her work, despite not having enjoyed every book she wrote.

Karen did play loose with canon and Karen did speak her mind, for better or worse, which forced(or allowed for) extra confrontation with fans that didn't share her views. Her narratives and characters were often anti-Jedi(and anti Jedi Order), thats just how she was/is.

The book store wouldn't be selling books by 10,000 different authors if everyone liked the same styles and themes.

In contrast one of the things that has really stood out ot me about FOTJ is how the Jedi Order is being painted in the narrative as always being right, with the one voice that disagreed with the rest of the Order now being silenced permanently.

It's like the polar opposite of Karen's books where the Jedi were often presented as commiting morally questionable actions and being hammered for it, in FOTJ the Jedi commit morally questionable actions and are constantly cheered and admired for it. It's an interesting contrast in styles.

To me Karen's greatest skill was the ability to create characters that I emotionally connected with, something that most current authors simply don't do. For example she made me care about Kad in a way I've never been made to care about Allana - and likely thats not the way Star Wars fiction should work. I should care about a character like Allana a great deal yet the authors give me no reason to.

I'd really love to see Allana's story presented better, I mean she's a kid who lost her father and grandfather, who's been forced away from her mother for her own protection and is now living with her arguably excentric(and half crazed) grandparents.

It's not a story that far different for Kad's, who lost his mother and was forced apart from his father, ending up living with his excentric relatives on Mandalore.

Yet where Kad's story is all emotion, Allana's story is all fluff. I think that highlights what I miss about Karen's work, that emotional connection she tries to provide between her characters and her readers.

Yet when they were not broken, according to you, I could care less about them. Karen made me take a real interest in them.

Jetpacks, missles and flamethrowers meant nothing to me. I felt that Boba Fett was a nothing character before George(and then Karen) expanded on him, which in turn made me actually care about him.

Now I may be in the minority(no real way to prove that though) but there is the possibility that for every fan that took Karen's work the way you did, another(like myself) came onboard.

 

I'm not sure I'd ever describe myself as either wanting or needing to care about Fett or Mandalorians though. Good villains, yeah, they've got the look down, got the rep of being able to fight Jedi and walk away but none of that means I have to like or care about them, if anything villainy is supposed to inspire the opposite, we're not meant to like them but should see them as worthy adversaries.

On the slave army point, I wish someone, somewhere had done a good examination of the Jedi take on their dilemma - don't use the army and Dooku a known darksider wins, use it and war begins, which is hardly a great alternative. What no one ever seems to have given is a credible alternative for what the Jedi should have done, to a large degree that's because there isn't one! Sidious built it as a lose-lose for the Jedi and it worked, yet fans have this notion that the Jedi should somehow be able to get out of it - the expectations are sky-high and off the scale. The nearest we've got to really seeing how the Clone Wars work as a Jedi Trap is Shatterpoint and that's a rarity of a book.

Also I get the impression people think Traviss was the only one to criticise the Jedi when Jedi uncertainty over what they've ended up doing is all over the place in the Clone Wars, the cost, the corruptive effect, the slow slide into Empire and everything that entails.

 

See but that really shouldn't be up to you. I don't know how you can go into a novel and decide ahead of time "I'll like this character, but not that one".

I never enjoyed Dooku as a character either until I read Dark Rendezvous, then I felt more for him after that.

I had no need to care about Boba Fett or the Mandalorians either, it was a bonus that I did start to care due to Karen's novels.

 

They Jedi had no options? They had to fight? That sounds too much like an absolute to me. What if Dooku did win? What if the Republic did crumble into separatist factions as a result of the Jedi refusing to lead an army bred only to fight and die? The Jedi had sworn to uphold political ideas. Basically the Jedi played themselves when they decided that protection of the Republic came before the Force.

 

I think we need to seperate out a couple of things here Rob, namely:

Liking and caring about characters in the story and liking the role a character plays, even if you despise said character.

I can't say I like Fett, the Mandos or Dooku as characters, I want them to lose, to get screwed over because all they contribute to the galaxy is death and chaos but I do like the role they act in of villains and adversaries. In terms of reading a book neutrally with an open mind to all characters, nope, can't do it - like many people I can, do and will play favourites.

Mani,

As to the Jedi, OK then - they let the Republic collapse, they deny the use of the Clone Army, would you be backing them or would you be claiming they should have found another way, been less damn fool idealists, been made of stronger moral fibre to fight the enemy? Would you have accepted they let the Republic collapse for a vision of the Greater Good?

 

The line is used once, by someone under a great deal of duress, grasping at straws to try and save his student's soul and suddenly it's the Jedi motto.

Okay, so the Republic collapses. Civil order breaks down, anarchy descends, society crumbles... then Palpatine sweeps in and takes over. So, yeah. Lose/lose here. They did what they thought was right to stave off the Night.

 

My take is that the Jedi could see the Republic was crumbling but they were faced with Dooku, who had gone to the dark side, which for the Jedi is the pre-eminent form of evil. They didn't have the resources to tackle both so they prioritised Dooku. Were it not for Sidious playing everyone, that wouldn't have been such a bad decision, but as it was....

 

Possibly. It is at least an option.

Really though what I'm saying is that they got themselves in the mess of the Clone Wars. They helped Palpatine more than they had to. In fact they did nearly everything for him. They were damned fool idealists because they honored the protection of some government body no matter what. Or until it was far too late. They lept right into the Clone Wars. As soon as Yoda got to Geonosis, he gathered up and deployed his 10 year old men. There wasn't a scene in AOTC where anyone on the council said, this is nuts! Why are we doing this? Worst of all it was utterly surprising to the Jedi that their slave army (that they didn't even remember ordering) revolted. How could they not see that coming? 3 years into a war that never made sense to any of them? Let's face it. These Jedi were thick.

 

Well, in that respect you're granting more than most Mani.

It's an interesting point you bring up though - the lack of plurality in SW. The overriding emphasis in SW is always The Republic and The Galaxy, with the one practically being equated to the other, though it could be argued that's set by ANH, "the Jedi were the protectors of the Republic", by the time it fell, that was the way it had always been and no one considered changing it.

Yet the same thing happens in the EU - there's been a steady move for years now towards one version only of the Jedi Order, there must always be a galactic governnment, singular. The notion of there being differences, being ppower blocs, being a plurality of things occurs as much to LFL et al as the Jedi realising they don't have to protect the Republic.

On the clone army though, were the Jedi the worst option? I think it could be suggested they did the best they could to not waste their soldiers in futile heroics, can the same be said of a Republic commander who only wants to win? How would a General Haig use the Clone Army? Another theme in the PT is of having to opt for lesser evils because the good options are off-limits.

 

Give me a glass of that kool-aid please.

 

The most significant point for all sides is this:
Everything related to Traviss and Star Wars is PAST-tense.

As long as that doesn't change, the argument can rage-on, ad infinitum.

 

I find this an interesting question especially because when such themes were brought up during the NJO, the Jedi as idealistic pacifists was generally unpopular with people to the point Jacen Solo became reviled by many for his refusal to be more practical in his approach to serving the Force first. I can't imagine refusing to fight and allowing the Republic to fall on a point of principle would have been much better received.

In fact, I think Traviss would have been one of the first judging them on it given her prioritisation of Mandalorian practicality over idealism, for example, Boba Fett blaming the Jedi for not taking out Jacen Solo earlier.

I think the Jedi would have faced harsh criticism for either using a clone army OR refusing to fight. The third option then being to fight but not to use a clone army. However, how would they have fought a war without one?

Or rather, the question I always want answered but have never had answered - if the Jedi refused to command the clones, the clones would still have formed the Grand Army of the Republic. They would simply have been commanded by less capable military commanders, and likely fought less effectively and suffered even greater casualties.

While not one I think was raised in the novels, one certainly could form an interesting line of inquiry as to whether the Jedi would have been failing in their duty to three million men, forced onto the front lines, had they refused to stand alongside them on a point of principle.

Which is very different from defending the simplistic writing in the prequels that meant no one on the Council ever actually investigated where this magical army came from or the myriad plotholes that exist. Because yes, the prequels pretty much make everyone look like complete and utter idiots. But the dilemma underlying the layers of plotholes - that's potentially interesting. And while I don't think it was necessarily explored as much as I'd've liked in terms of why they did it, when told they shouldn't have done it, my immediate, instinctive response, is to question what they should have done instead. And I come up blank. The Republic were going to use those soldiers anyway, the Jedi had no legal recourse to stop them, and . the Jedi instigating a Coup d'Etat would have been fantastic for Palpatine not to mention also against the ethos of the Jedi.

(In the time it took to type this, Ben has commented touching on some of the issues I raised, but I have to go to bed, so have this post anyway, unedited! Rah!)

 

Thats pretty good animation. Is the rest of Avatar like that? I might watch it.

Anyways, this dance again. She is a polarizing author who had her own view of the galaxy explained through her characters. She was well liked during her first three novel's runs, but ran afoul of much of the community during online arguments. Some people like her books, some people don't. Don't want it to fit into your personal canon? the Republic Commando series is so small scale compared to the rest of the EU that it wouldn't matter one bit if you took it out. It is there for people who want it, ignored by people who don't.

 

I think KOTOR is a great example of what would happen if the jedi utterly refused to fight... it wouldn't be pretty. In KOTOR II especially, the Jedi Masters were arrogant and absolutely refused to acknowledge that they didn't do everything they could have... all while calling the Exile arrogant for defying the Jedi. If they were to totally stay out of the fight, they'd just be repeating history. As much as I like the Jedi, they suffer from arrogance every bit as much as the Sith do, particularly the ones of the Old Republic era. At least later ones somewhat learned from their mistakes.

I think a conversation you have with Atris perfectly exemplifies that. The Jedi get so caught up in the force, their higher power that only they can use, that they are in danger of forgetting their duty to protect people. The Exile criticized Atris for sitting in her chamber and meditating while people were dying, and refused to help in order to "better assess the situation". They were afraid, really, afraid that war would turn them to the dark side. One of my favorite SW lines ever, from Stover's Shadows of Mindor, embodies this; Kar Vastor, telling Luke that he is better than the Jedi of old, because he is not afraid of the dark.

The irony in it all is, of course, that in the Old Republic era, the Jedi were totally wiped out because they refused to fight. In the Clone Wars, they were wiped out because they fought. Really no win for them.

 

Part of the dislike comes from the way KT conducted herself. Instead of considering the points and arguments of her opponents, she argued "things are this way, because I say so, I'm the author picked by LFL, not you and I am the military expert since I've been an embedded journalist (or some such - her actual expertise is questionable at best) - at least this is what I remember from the discussions with her.

Now, to get back to the Jedi. There is an interesting quote by Mace Windu in "Shatterpoint". The Jedi don't protect the Republic, they protect civilisation, which is represented by the Republic.

Also considering, that the important parts of the galaxy have been ruled by a single government for 25 millenia (more than three times the amount of human civilisation here on earth), is it really so inconcievable, that the idea never occured to the Jedi to "let the Galactic Republic rott"? People are quick to condem the Jedi for their mistakes, but they ignore the fact that unlike us the Jedi don't have all the facts and that their (cultural) conditioning might be vastly different from ours (and not just because they are members of a monastic order of sorcerers).

As a last - if any official author or so reads this - I wish to see a stormtrooper-turned clone, who reveals in his role as enforcer for Palpatine, chackling with glee at the thought, that he is now oppressing the very people he was created to fight for, because they were too lazy/complacent/cowardly to do it themselves.

 

Gold!

 

Ie.

"Con: Lucas's writing = Pro: Traviss."

Sorry. Bull. Not buying it.

Your equating the fact that Lucas didn't write that scene and inserted it into AOTC prior to the scene of Yoda with his "10 year olds" (which is a non-context basically) to that Karen then spends her entire literary EU career in basically using her works and writing to attack Lucas for his writing; story elements; or if you want to use the term plothole. Thats all her Commando novels were; was yelling at Lucas for creating a story about Jedi "morally righteous" [whom she didn't think of as morally righteous because of the next part I'm about to say...] who use a "slave" [indirect term; not compatible outside of our galaxy] army to fight - which was a misnomer then for Karen. She couldn't see the two relating and thus felt that they were incompatible. Karen viewed it as "Morally Righteous" =/= "Use """SLAVE""" Army". Use non-Earthian history and please describe to me a Slave Army. Detail to me how the cloning is an issue in a galaxy and universe that is literally 25,000+ years old altogether and detail to me the here's and why's and there's and how's of this all and detail to me the philosophical nature of it all. You can't. Therefore we should stop using Earthian ideology to attack a story created by another person. Thats in effect all she is doing with her PT work. Attacking the story Lucas set forth; which was: "Jedi are morally righteous." "They are losing a battle with an unseen enemy." "Their main stature and defense; aka the Republic; is crumbling." "They feel hamstrung." "A war starts." "Their offered an army."

Thats the story in a nutshell and she dislikes it. Thus she spends her PT works on attacking that story.

*shrug* Is there anything really more to her? Nope.

 

Karen wasn't a bad writer anymore than GL is. Star Wars is a lot things and in the end its a fictional universe that sadly uis becoming too much like star trek. With the exception that star wars has a continuity that star trek does not. This is not bad per se, but in the very end, that also in it self ruins the opportunity of telling really cool stories.

 

Fixed it for ya

 

I have a proposal to make. I suggest that we fans of KT's work agree to stop using the slave army argument, if the opposing side agrees to stop arguing the three million clones idea.

This comes in the wake of the revelation that the true canon from GL's clone wars states that adding a mere five million clones to the army somehow can manage to bankrupt a galaxy. Even if KT's 3 million figure was low, the canon number ain't much bigger.