****The Official NEW ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO CHARACTERS by Dan Wallace Thread****

An idea:

Rather than keep revising the EGTC, you could release it as volumes, like, The New Essential Guide to Characters Vol. 1, Vol.2, Vol. 3, etc. That way you wouldn't have to worry about which characters to leave in or out, as you could just add them to a subsequent volume, and then would be able to encompass a larger range of characters as well, and as new characters come along, they can be added to a volume to come. Each volume wouldn't necessarily have to be as large as the original essential guides, since they are being released as volumes, they could be perhaps about half the size, etc. I think it'd be a good way to cover lots of characters, and that way you could even cover minor characters as well. Not to mention lots of $$$ from SW fans.

But anyway, I think the NEGTC is a home run, one of the best SW non-novel books to come out in a while

 

I agree. As well any upgrades to previous articles that need expansion could be put in the appendix. Like for instance by the end of the NJO luke will need to have more info added to his entry. So luke would get a special update in the appendix explaining what he has been up to since where the previous volume left off.

 

I think the next in line is an updated Essential Guide for Weapons and Technolgy. I didn't find the original that intresting. I can't wait for the new Guide to Vechicles and Vessels though. And of course, many years down the road, the new Chronology.

 

It's vehicles and vessles from what I heard. Possibly hayden blackman writing?

 

Dan, if you want to see a really great picture of a NJO Anakin Solo, check out the Japanese cover for EoV: Rebirth. That's the best picture of him I've found to date.

 

He looks too old on that IMO. Conquest has better, or SBS

 

I like the one on SBS, but he doesn't look quite like 17. The Conquest pic is good, but he looks like 12 not 16...
I like the Japanese covers, but he looks so nondescriptive there. And I hate the DT covers where he looks as if he were 5 years younger then the twins. I mean, it's just a year differnece. You probably wouldn't see any difference between him and Jacen...

 

Well, new page, and nobody answered my question, so I will repeat it :

What does the NEGtC says about Kanos' relationship to Jax ? Nothing, clones, or brothers ? (Given the fact that they look alike in CE)

And could someone scan the exclusive entries for Poggle the Lesser and Wes Janson that were in Insider for us poor non-Americans whose Insiders have even less EU content (that is about 0.01% of the magazine) ? That'd be really nice.

 

Nothing. But kanos does have the same height as a fett in a helmet. But so are most characters that have at one time been stormtroopers.

 

Valiento:
Like for instance by the end of the NJO luke will need to have more info added to his entry. So luke would get a special update in the appendix explaining what he has been up to since where the previous volume left off.

I didn't like Luke's entry in the NEW ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO CHARACTERS. New or casual fans who haven't read many of the books and are trying to get 'caught up' would get a very skewed idea of the events, accomplishments, and important people in his life by reading the guide's biography of Luke Skywalker.

While I know that not everything about a character could be listed, I take issue with what was included and what was left out. Why include, for example, that Luke worked with Keyan Farlander, while excluding Luke's accomplishments in helping to defeat Thrawn and the clone of C-baoth and stopping the cloning on Wayland? Why bring up Brenn Tantor, who is so unimportant that he isn't even listed in the GUIDE TO THE SW UNIVERSE or in the STAR WARS ENCYCLOPEDIA, but leave out that he saved the galaxy from the horrible Death Seed or that he had discovered the Hand of Thrawn and all of its many secrets and learned about the threats in the Unknown Regions? Why include Akanah, but not Gaeriel? Luke came closer to a real relationship with Gaeriel than he did with Akanah.

Why not explain Luke's role in Dark Empire just a little more for those who never read the comic book? Some fans are under the misconception that Luke became another Vader, killing and torturing billions because of references to that comic book in the novels. They have no idea that he was really more of an undercover agent, sabotaging Imperial plans and sending Imperial codes to the Alliance, and destroying the Emperor's clones. After being defeated by the only clone he missed, his darkness was one of despair rather than of evil. Yet, many people don't know that. I think the GUIDE TO CHARACTERS would have been a great place to include this information. It would have taken only a few sentences and it would have cleared up a lot of misunderstandings.

There were other things I didn't like about the Luke entry that I mentioned in several posts in Skydancer's SOS SON OF SKYWALKER thread.

On the whole, the book basically seems better than its predecessor though. However, I'm disappointed that except for Vader, none of the characters from the OT are on the cover of the book. The OT characters remain my favorites.

 

Why include, for example, that Luke worked with Keyan Farlander, while excluding Luke's accomplishments in helping to defeat Thrawn and the clone of C-baoth and stopping the cloning on Wayland? Why bring up Brenn Tantor, who is so unimportant that he isn't even listed in the GUIDE TO THE SW UNIVERSE or in the STAR WARS ENCYCLOPEDIA, but leave out that he saved the galaxy from the horrible Death Seed or that he had discovered the Hand of Thrawn and all of its many secrets and learned about the threats in the Unknown Regions? Why include Akanah, but not Gaeriel? Luke came closer to a real relationship with Gaeriel than he did with Akanah.

I think this could be because many of these characters have their own entries. Keyan does not have his own entry, and Brenn wasn't created until after those sources you listed came out. Akanah does not have her own entry; Gaerial does. Stuff like that. Although I would've liked the book better if it were twice as long as it is and had much more comprehensive bios.

 

Okay, thanks Val.

Then I may ask Dan about it, since he's kindly answering questions.

Dan, I've always wondered if Kanos and Jax are related, that is if they're clones or brothers ? They look so much alike. Could you please help me on this one ?

It has 'tormented' me ever since I first read CE , and nobody was ever able to answer me.

 

Child of winds much of the information you are after is cross-refrenced into other people's entries. If you want to know more about luke you need only go into another person's entry to see how they interacted with luke.

It is that way for many of the characters. They get cross-refrenced in other entries and expanded on that way.

Also mastadge hit the end of the nail on the other stuff.

 

Valiento:
If you want to know more about luke you need only go into another person's entry to see how they interacted with luke.
It is that way for many of the characters. They get cross-refrenced in other entries and expanded on that way.

Ahhh! Thanks for the explanation. Well, I guess I don't really like that style then. It doesn't make it very easy to use as a reference, as one wouldn't always have time to read through the whole book to seek a specific answer when one just wants to find out or check a particular thing about a character. To just read through it, that would be fine, but it wouldn't be very useful in looking up something specific when writing a fanfic, for instance. (Not that I write, but I know others who do.)

Does the book go into any detail about what really happened on Byss in Dark Empire?

 

It's not the easiest style for some to follow, but if it wasn't used, there would have been a TON of repitition and wasted space. As a result, a lot of interesting character bio's might have been cut to make room. It's a trade off.

 

I'm just wondering, even with respect to the fact that TK wasn't a big character yet, how, for instance, Isolder made it in there as a main entry while she didn't. I don't REALLY care, I'd just like to see what the artist could've done with her.

 

I have this feeling that if she was in, she'd look great, but miss the wrong arm. The funniest mistake in the world, happens

 

This might consitute as a spoiler for JKII but no where in Kyle Katarn's profile is there anything about his relationship with Jan Ors and she isn't even in the book (maybe in the back but I didn't see anything). I thought maybe a little background on her would be great, but truthfully, what is going on between the two?

 

Remember, JO wasn't out yet when they were writing the book.

 

Ah, you are correct on that but I thought some budding romance in JKI

 

Child of Wind's post got me thinking . . .

I have read on the Lit board that Mr. Wallace is a master of SW EU obscurities. Maybe that is the reason that he includes obscure characters in his bio's. Personally, I think that makes the book very very cool. But I can understand why the casual EU fan would be occaisionally bewildered.


Actually, I think that most of what Child of Winds was wishing to read in Luke's bio was covered in detail in the old Essential Guide to Characters.

 

More replies...

CBaoth_The_Crazy wrote:
I realized another fairly important they left out, Bail Organa;I think he's an important important character; well, maybe you didn't want to divulge too much into AOTC, I think you still could have included a pre-AOTC bio of him.

Bail Organa was one of those characters that I suspect won't really come into his own until Episode III. Just the same, we made sure to include him in the appendix.

AniSS wrote:
With regard to Dan's question, both the Obi-Wan and Anakin narratives talk about events in the three books in the same order:
1) Deceptions
2) Rogue Planet
3) Jedi Quest: Path to Truth
However, in Obi-Wan's bio, after a brief description of the events of Deceptions, the text continues with...
"EARLIER the same year..."

Aha. What we've got here is another apparent typo. My original manuscript says "Later that same year." As you noted, the flow of the paragraph is meant to express Deceptions-Rogue Planet-Jedi Quest in linear order.

Mateo wrote:
There was only one piece of false information in the book, it says that Xecr Nist was captured on Onderon by Luke Skywalker and died in prison, he was captured on Vjun, it says nothing about the 3 Dark Jedi killed by Vaders statue crash and it says nothing about the fate of Tiaz who lost his hand or the dark side adept with oracle stone on the emperors shuttle.

The other darksiders on Onderon were not members of the Dark Side Elite. And that was Xecr Nist on Onderon in Empire's End. I don't have my notes handy, so I'll come back to this in more detail later.

Mavrick wrote:
Dan, just a question in regards to Ackbar's entry: How long before A New Hope would you say Ackbar got freed during the assasination attempt on Tarkin? A few months?

Darksaberseems to imply it wasn't more than a couple weeks (Tarkin and Ackbar were on their way to the newly-completed Death Star when the Rebels attacked), but I don't think that allows enough time for the Battle of Turkana and Operation Strike Fear from the X-Wing computer game. So yeah, my instinct is a few months.

Sturm wrote:
If you're interested in hearing the Corporate Sector reference in the Tales of the Jedi audio drama, listen closely to the part where Aleema and Satal Keto are watching the holo-news. After the reporter mentions the conflicts between the Naddists and the Republic, turn up the volume and listen to the background dialogue that continues. That is when the Corporate Sector is mentioned in some kind of stock report.

Wow, major kudos to you for picking up a continuity reference from background noise. I don't have the TOTJ audio drama, however. If anyone has it and can make a transcript of the line, I'd be most appreciative.

Matthew Trias wrote:
The Battle of Turkana hd to take place at least 7 months after Yavin.
According to the godwin comics,the Empire is unaware that the Mon Calamari are allied with the rebellion during the time that the Battle of yavin tok place . They remain unaware for the next six months after the battle.

The Battle of Turkana clearly takes place before Yavin -- there's no other way to interpret the events of the X-Wing game. But you've got a good point about apparent continuity conflicts between X-Wing and Goodwin's Classic Star Wars comics. The Ackbar entry in the NEGC is meant to address these discrepancies, including some troublesome info regarding Ackbar's rank in WEG products such as Strikeforce: Shantipole. The gist of the revised, holistic, NEGC situation is that Ackbar and some loyal Mon Cal followers joined the Rebellion after Ackbar's rescue from Tarkin. They participated in events such as the Battle of Turkana, and Ackbar retained his Mon Calamari title of "admiral" (but held a lower official rank [I think commander] in the Rebel Alliance hierarchy). After the Battle of Yavin and the events shown in t

 

ChildofWinds...
"Does the book go into any detail about what really happened on Byss in Dark Empire?"

If you want to know what really happened in Dark Empire, then the best place to check is Dark Empire.

All of these reference guides are just that - encyclopedic reference tools. None are substitutes for the original sources.

 

Oh, and if you wanted to know if palpatine was the real palpatine, the book explains that he is, and it explains why mara didn't believe it. It also explains why palpatine didn't contact her during dark empire. Though the reason why he didn't contact her can be traced back to the dark empire sourcebook.