Lit Books Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker novelization by Rae Carson

I know TLJ has a huge backlash and it's popular to blame the poor performance of Solo and TRoS on fans boycotting Disney, but I don't think that's really the case for the general audience. Solo suffered from having much less of a marketing lead in (only about three months v nine for the preceding movies), moving from what was at that point a "traditional" Christmas slot for Disney SW to May, being released close to the incredibly popular Avengers: Infinity War and Deadpool 2, and being a Han Solo movie without Harrison Ford.

TRoS, on the other hand, had record pre-orders for tickets and still made over a billion dollars (nothing to be sneezed at even today), but didn't keep making money, which suggests that TRoS's biggest problem was itself (that is, critical and fan reactions).

Or to put it another way: if Solo, a Star Wars film almost entirely unrelated to TLJ, with completely different characters, writers, cast, director etc, suffered because of the TLJ backlash, why did TRoS, the direct sequel to TLJ, do so much better than it?

Like you say, Star Wars will always make money (if promoted right ...), so Disney could have kept pumping out films and making a profit - look at Michael Bay's Transformers films, they've been universally loathed by fans and critics (with the exception of the first one and Bumblebee) and yet they still kept bringing in millions. Instead, Disney have chosen to slow down production and try to make something that will get the fans on side again. Which IMO most fans should see as a positive.

(Not me - I wanted more movies like TLJ and less like R1. But most fans.)

Yep, the unified SW continuity was great, and it sucks that it's gone. But it is gone. If that's a dealbreaker for you, then the deal has already been broken. The moral is, don't make that same deal again.

 

@Jedi Comedian

Besides things like The Mandalorian are the most On Demand thing for Streaming, and TCW is second. So not like Star Wars is drying up any time soon. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/n...-1306170?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter

 

Very true. It's difficult to know how much money they've made - that is, how many people subscribed to Disney+ specifically to watch those shows versus how many people were getting D+ anyway and watched them because they're two of the highest profile exclusives - but it's still a far cry from "Star Wars is dead!".

 

I think that's the bigger cause - when I saw Solo, having bought the BR cheap? Liked it. Would I have gambled £15 on a one-time cinema viewing? Probably not.

A large reason for that is I don't see Alden as becoming Ford, the latter's too much a beanpole in ANH. I think Solo works, but it had major hurdles to overcome.

I still don't think Disney or anyone else has worked out what a gamechanger is for series like SW. Sling the Darksaber in Mandalorian? No problem, just signpost everyone to TCW / Rebels and they can access all of it. Before you'd have to pay and that's what people would object to, as 11 series of animation on DVD isn't cheap but $6 a month? Very hard to object to.

A long time ago, one of the most potent pieces of fuel for the Vector Prime wars was the quite sincere belief that if NJO was not a success, SW was dead, even with the PT running.

Deal? You lot been striking deals? I just buy stuff.

 

Reminds me of these tweets from my favorite YouTube

 

Had been here 3 months, then the forum exploded - kind of a hot reception.

 

That's why Im more interested in ST discourse ten years from now then honestly right now. More curious how things will pan out once its not longer as hot off the presses.

and when the kids of 2015 are adults or at least older teens

 

Here, it's pretty calm already - look at this thread and others in Lit, no, the fires you're talking of burn elsewhere.

 

Very true, while I do see divides I feel like the ST has been far more excepted in LIT then even our own movie forums where as you say the fires be burning.

Part of me wonders (And this is a hypothetical I've had for a while) is because well...Lit has been through the motions with the EU.

And in a strange way the larger Star Wars fandom that never cared for books and comics and Lit are experience a very EU like phenomena right now with the Movies and TV shows that get larger reception

Essentially now the wider Fandom is getting the EU experience.

 

There's probably something to that - in that there was the impact of the PT and NJO on the preceding stories, then Clone Wars 2007 on PT material people had bought, plus George not making up his mind as to whether Legends counted or not, plus DN and LOTF which for some NJO fans were what NJO was to Bantam for others, plus the Legacy comics.

If nothing else, we did all get used to defining our engagement with SW more on our terms instead of LFL's.

What's odd but cool - as I quite like some things being lesser known - is a lot of the best new material resides in the YA range, no one expected it but there it is.

 

I mean I think we all should, make us happier

Personally from I can gather I think George never considered legends HIS Star Wars but was totally willing to cherry pick things like Coruscant or a design he liked because he was a comic book reader and was like "Oh, I like that design...Yoink" If anything I George while not considering Legends HIS Star Wars was more likely sympathetic to the comic side of things than the book side given George was a known comic book writer

He might have given his consent and guidelines but he never considered it HIS Star Wars or HIS vision

Oh defiantly YA has certainly not let me down, some of the best stuff comes from there. Truly never judge a book by it's cover

 

You can find a Lucas quote for just about every occasion. The answer to why there is? He changed his mind.

Early 90s he was fine with selling stories written by others, that seemed to change with the prequels.

I think Lucas struggled with the mass success of SW. On the one hand, he knew he had created something more than himself and no longer entirely his. On the other hand, he still wanted it to be his.

 

That actually adds to my theory that in a weird way Lit was more prepared for the New Era than most and why it's not always so ....on fire here.

I notice ALOT of the movie fans still hold George as the end all be all of Star Wars

"The ST didn't follow George vision" you hear and yada yada.

Lit/EU fans have read tuff not written or touched by George and have enjoyed them and I now a few that may honestly be "Objectively" better than things George touched.

Now your mileage may very if you enjoy the hand of George in Star Wars or not but Lit has more experience in "Non-George Creatively touched" material.

 

You did also have a lot of movie fans crediting the OT's success to other people like Gary Kurtz, Irvin Kershner, Lawrence Kasdan, Marcia Lucas etc when the prequels came out. Hard to believe now but there was a time when George Lucas was the most hated figure in a large segment of the Star Wars fandom and people tried to distance him as much as possible from the media they liked.

 

I got whiplash from when one moment that was all anyone would talk about is how Star Wars succeeded in spite of Lucas and then BAM! Disney bought Star Wars and George Lucas is The Maker who would have done the ST right.

 

Discourse is a fickle thing

 

George Lucas.

You never know what you had, until he's gone.

 

I think Star Wars will be okay.

 

True but I feel like Baron Papanoida needs some appreciation.

 

Um, you guys do know that it wasn't fans who threw out George's story treatments for the sequel trilogy right? It was the Disney executives who did that entirely on their own. I don't believe Iger in his book or anyone else claimed that hordes of fans mailed them begging them to throw out Lucas' outlines or that Disney took a monitored fan vote or anything like that.

It sounds like youtube haters are being blamed (I sympathize I don't like their videos either) for a decision they had absolutely nothing to do with.

We're seeing now that Disney is making a new SW holiday special. I don't think anyone was begging them to do that either considering the infamy of the last SW holiday special. They are making their own decisions, and the phasing out of George's influence was one of those decisions.

 

This has nothing to do with the conversation we were having though.

We are taking about the Fan Discourse surrounding George Lucas which went from Praise during the OT, downright panning during the PT and then back to praise during the ST.

It's the fickle nature of Fan discourse and how quickly the conversation can change on a dime.

 

George said that he sold Star Wars because no one appreciated his work there too. Which is just sad.

 

I can't find a link now, but I'm positive multiple interviewers were asking him circa 2005 whether he would do more and he said no. One interviewer even asked him if he would have a younger director continue that work and he said no, Revenge of the Sith is the end of the story, Star Wars was the story of Vader that's it. He even followed up with a sort of joke of Han and Leia baking burgers on a grill or something.

These were mainstream media outlets asking him without any indication of cruelty or mockery in their questions. He can't really say that genuine interest wasn't there.

 

True, we fans are pulled and pushed depending on when the wind blows. We are the franchise's great strength and its biggest downfall.