Classics Why are the Droids and Ewoks Cartoons Ignored?

I recently found the complete series of both Droids and Ewoks in a remastered form and they are pretty good. Its obvious Lucas used parts of it for the Prequels, and for kids cartoons they are rather good. Any reason why they haven't been officially released for years? They should be every bit as canon as the Clone Wars cartoon.

 

Not sure why - I think they're being cautious about what's canon and what isn't, but might bring some things back later.

The Holiday Special, and the two Ewoks movies, and the first Clone Wars cartoon, are all Legends at the moment, as well.

 

The two Ewok films had more Lucas (80's Lucas as well!) involvement than almost anything barring the Trilogy, thats surprising they are Legends. The first Clone Wars cartoon fits in with the existing canon of the CGI Clone Wars so I'm not sure why its not canon as well.

 

Wonder if now that Marvel has the rights and part've same ownership, if the old Marvel series will become canon.

 

I can understand Droids falling under the Legends banner since it does directly interfere with the canon material, but Ewoks probably should still be counted as canon as it doesn't interfere with canon. As for the two Ewok movies and the original CW cartoon, they probably should be counted as canon material as well on similar grounds, but Disney/Lucasfilm has made their choice to ignore them all so nothing can really be done to change that. Too bad.

Returning to Droids & Ewoks, even though they are Legends material, it would still be nice if they eventually got complete DVD/Blu releases (and as for the remaster thing the OP is talking about, I would suppose it's a fanmade restoration of the two shows).

 

Refresh my memory, if you don't mind, as to how Droids, specifically, conflicts with what's currently deemed canon?

I'm quite certain that I could be forgetting something, but what with the series being set in a time (15 BBY) not yet covered by anything reiterated as canon per the recent announcement, off the top of my head, other than Antilles losing ownership of the droids for awhile (something he was said by Lucasfilm to have simply regained at a later time), I can't recall anything that would be a problem with the six films or TCW.

Yes! Yes! Yes! It sure would be nice.

Canon or no (and I'd prefer Droids, at least, were one day made canon again), I'd still absolutely love a fully restored blu ray package of the complete run of both series (and the Ewok films, too).

If nothing else (and I know I've said this before), I'd still love it should the likes of Thall Joben, Kea Moll and Admiral Screed (or even Jann Tosh, Mungo Baobab, etc.) show up in some new canon material. Whether it be something as grand as a guest starring-turn in Rebels, or as minor as an off-the-cuff mention in a new Imperial Period novel, I think it would be just terrific.

Though they may not be among the heavy-hitters of the franchise, like a Luke Skywalker or a Darth Vader, allowing characters such as these (who many of us remember fondly from our childhoods) their place in the canon storyline serves to make the GFFA that much richer a galaxy to explore.

 

Yes, I'm referring to the fact that Antilles lost 3PO and R2 and they then switched between different masters during the series and it does seem like it lasted for quite some time before seemingly being returned to him some way or the other. The thing is, with Rebels (which is canon and set between ROTS and ANH) coming up, I'm thinking that Droids might very well get retconned if the two droids will still be there with Antilles & the Alliance.

 

I thought that might have been it, and yeah, once we saw that Antilles took possession of the droids at the end of ROTS, it definitely raised some legitimate questions of continuity.

As you know, since Lucasfilm still viewed Droids as canon at the time, they went to some lengths to address the discrepancy by saying that Antilles lost possession of the droids for a time, that the events of the cartoon took place during the period that Artoo and Threepio were separated from their master, and that Antilles eventually somehow just regained possession of our two intrepid droid explorers.

It was a classically wonky, clumsy retcon, to be sure, but my thinking is "Hey, that if that line of reasoning was good enough for Lucasfilm before, maybe it could be again?"

Maybe there's still room to suggest that Antilles lost the droids some time before the wacky adventures in the 1980s cartoon took place, and then R2 and 3PO found their way back to Antilles before Rebels in 5 BBY?

I know, it's silly. And since Droids will likely never be reintegrated into canon, it's all moot, anyway. But even if it's completely improbable, I like to think it's still at least remotely possible.

After all, tomorrow never knows...

 

Did C-3PO say that Captain Antilles was their only master? Haven't seen ANH but could have sworn that he said last master.

Looked at the script. Last master.
How does that imply only master?

 

Threepio said: "Our last master was Captain Antilles."

This clearly implied multiple Masters over the years for Threepio and Artoo.

As a kid watching the films, I imagined all kinds of fantastic adventures for the duo, undertaken under the ownership of any number of exotic Masters. That was a big part of the charm and appeal when Droids later premiered.

I just never could have imagined that Anakin and Lady Arcadia Skywalker would have been among those previous Masters!

 

I always thought that line implied that as well, but I do not believe it is a necessary implication. We are still extrapolating information that isn't really there in the quote. Antilles is not currently their master when they say that, so I think the wording works either way.

 

No idea why they wouldn't be canon.

I doubt anything in Rebels will conflict with Droids (which is actually a pretty good show), nor does anything in Rebels even need to tread there in the first place.

I haven't seen Ewoks, but I doubt that'd conflict with anything either.

Endor movies shouldn't be outside of canon at all considering they're George's.

 

I have to admit that my apathy about the canon status of Droids and Ewoks stems from my opinion that they're pretty boring. Then again, I don't think I ever cared that much about canon rules anyway.

 

The timelines between ROTS (19 BBY), then Droids (c. 15 BBY), and finally Rebels (5 BBY) are all separate enough, I'd think, where I agree, it wouldn't necessarily be an issue.

It could just be that the Story Group simply doesn't care for what the series gave us, and would prefer to keep those stories out of canon. Or maybe they are being really hardcore about keeping everything they can as wide open as possible, thinking that they need the freedom to do something different if they decide to set a project close to 15 BBY? I get that line of thinking.

Still, as I said, I'd rather they re-canonize the series, if only because I find it to be too much fun to ignore.

The Ewoks films get a little harrier, what with the Towani family and their adventures on Endor taking place prior to ROTJ, but I don't think it's an insurmountable issue, if they wanted to put it back in.

The cartoon? Well, the one thing that usually comes up is that it showed the Ewoks speaking Basic (English), and though the argument could be made that it was only an OOU translation done for the benefit of the audience, if I remember correctly, the Ewoks did communicate with other outside beings in the show (beings who we wouldn't have thought had known how to speak Ewokese), so it gets a little muddled, there.

 

It seems that the Ewoks/Droids cartoons get a new thread every so often, proving that the shows are still desired by at least some SW fans. I'm just guessing here, but it's possible/probable that there are some younger fans out there who haven't really seen either show, but may be interested in them due to their being SW & unavailable on DVD/Blu.

I really liked both series, especially Droids - not only was the show very innovative and well-done, but it was cool to see the cameos of characters from the films, including "Boba Fett" and the "Sy Snootles band". And the animation for both shows was innovative - Droids especially reminded me of the French comic book artist Moebius...(I believe this was intentional).

To answer the question in the OP, IMHO the reason these cartoons are largely ignored & haven't yet been released in their entirety on DVD/Blu is because Llfm./Disney probably doesn't feel that it's worthwhile to take the time/money to release these the way they should be released. The show is very obscure, and probably didn't do that great when it was on TV in the mid '80's. It seems that the only people that really want this are:

- Hardcore SW fans who want everything on DVD, no matter how obscure.
- Fans who watched/liked the show when it first came out in the '80's.

I fit into both of the above categories, though I may be in the minority. IMHO both of these cartoons were great, and do have some historical value to SW fans -at the time (1985/1986), SW was dying, and there was very little new material out there.

Circa August 2012, there was a rumor that Lflm. would release both shows as streams on their official website in Fall 2012. However, in October 2012 Disney bought Lflm. & also announced the ST films, so obviously that took priority. It's too bad, because at this point the ST & Rebels are the focus now, so who knows when we'll see these Droids/Ewoks cartoons...maybe when there's another lull in the franchise, i.e. after the ST has been released & between spin-off movies?! However, the spin-off films are supposed to come out on a regular basis, so maybe we'll see the Ewoks/Droids cartoons in 2020....

 

Once again, there really isn't any reason any of these shows can't be canon other than sheer laziness on Disney's part to make them fit with whatever they may have planned (and it's doubtful much will be released that does actually mess with their story, let alone make their occurrence impossible).

Make of their canon status whatever you want. It will probably still make logical sense when Disney's done with this era, and there's tons of time to work with and only a few actual stories from each show to play with.

 

Cause they're terrible?

 

Slotting the entire run of the Droids adventures canon-wise basically between episode 3 and episode 4 always seemed like a bit of a stretch (Geeze, those droids damn get LOST for years at a time from Tantaive IV, then go back to Capitan Antillies presumably five minutes before the opening of episode 4) but there are more improbable things in Star Wars canon.

 

I always read it as the droids were lost, and the series explores their journey making it back to Antilles, but that the whole thing took no longer than a few weeks. Okay, maybe a month or two (but certainly within the c. 15 BBY year).

Kind of like the way the pair went on all of those crazy adventures during the TCW Season 4 "Mercy Mission"/"Nomad Droids" duology, only to return to the Republic as if nothing happened.

In fact, those two TCW episodes always played very much like a mini tribute to the Droids series to me, and under the new system, it kind of feels as though they are probably the closest the old series will come to canon.

 

Well I can say this much. If the holiday special is done away with, I'm all ok with that!

Anyways, when George Lucas added in Boba Fett to ANH, I think that kinda decanonized it anyways.

 

yeah, I dug the TCW mini-arc if only because I was like "hey! They're doing Droids in Trouble Again! Nice!" I was cracking joke about them being lost for years at a time, but I'm also thinking of cramming in the Droids comic book series as well. Let's go with a solid month or two for their entire Droids-branded adventures.

 

I was disappointed to see that there was nothing new Droids or Ewoks related after the recent starwars.com redesign. They could at least be included under the TV section to acknowledge that they exist. The original Clone Wars series is pretty much in the same boat too. Too bad starwars.com couldn't open up communication with fans a bit more so they could at least tell us that the shows may still be available to watch someday on the official site or give us a reason why they won't. Next year is the 30th anniversary of Droids and Ewoks, so if starwars.com is going to do anything with them, then that would be the ideal time.

 

I don't think TCW is a priority anymore on any avenue. The same with Ewok and Droids, everything has pointed out to Rebels, Episode 7 and the first Spin off movie and soon within the next two weeks it'll be about what Marvel is going to do with the star wars line.

 

I would definitely like to see some new Droids/Ewoks toys/collectibles, comprehensive DVD sets, and or official cleaned-up streams of the shows for the 30th anniversary next year. That being said, unfortunately I don't think anything like this will come out since next year Lflm./Disney will almost certainly be focusing on Episode VII, which is slated for release in December 2015....

 

You folks said it!

To Hasbro and Lucasfilm's everlasting credit, we have seen the release of some fantastic new Ewok action figures over the past couple of years; some even with an Ewoks slant (TVC Wicket came with his green hood from the series as an added accessory, and a wonderful Princess Kneesaa was released, too).

But figures sourced from Droids? Unless I'm forgetting something, other than a single release of Boba Fett with BL-17 five years ago, we haven't had anything like that since 1985. I'd love, L-O-V-E to see figures with modern sculpts and articulation based upon the likenesses of the more memorable characters from that series.

How excited would collectors be to find out we would see the release of new Thall Joben (with lightsaber, 'natch), Kea Moll, Jann Tosh or Sise and Tig Fromme updates? Or first ever releases of characters like Admiral Screed, Mungo Baobab or Mon Julpa?

I'd be thrilled for lovingly restored blu-rays, but even just to see the OS stream the shows would be cool. And then there's always SW books as an unexplored avenue.

There's a lot which could be done to satisfy the fans of these old SW classics. And, I think, without detracting from the public's attention on Rebels, Episode VII or the standalone films.