Lit Will people still read the old EU?

There will always be people interested in it.

Most likely less than when it was the only 'game in town' so to speak.

I think it also depends on how the ST ends and if Lucasfilm keeps ignoring legends.

I they did some animated adaptations of it like Marvel and DC do with some of their older comics, people might get more interested.

 

Animated adaptations of Legends stories is a rumor that's been circulating for a while now.

The Wookieepedia admins' heads will probably explode from trying to decide if the original or the adaptation takes "priority."

 

I could see that, maybe do like what DC does with there animated adaptions but make them good.

I’d just use the pictures of the scenes but keep the book top priority.

 

Some of them are good.

But I think that would be the best solution.

 

I think that there might still be some people who will still read Legends. Though I feel like that circle may grow smaller and smaller as time goes on, but I don't think it will ever truly go away. Like others have pointed out in this thread, SWTOR is still pumping out new content and even though I haven't played lately, it's still a fun game to go back to. So to answer your question, yes, I think that people will still be reading and keeping up on Legends lore for quite some time, at least until either they stop re-publishing the books, or canon becomes the superior version (which probably won't happen because people's tastes are different).

 

There may come a time, in decades in which the books have grown obscure and few enough people have read them that it may indeed be seen as forgotten, but that will likely be in decades.

 

I wanted to post here instead of the still-popular "What from Legends will be Remembered" thread; although there's some overlap between the two what I want to say is more appropriate for this one, despite its two months of inactivity.

Basically, the mere rumour of an all-but-announced Obi-Wan TV series has, per one of JJM's tweets, caused a sales spike for his 2013 Legends novel Kenobi.



... As did a number of other incarnations of the same rumour throughout the past few years, according to the same tweet. He also apparently sold out of Kenobi paperbacks at this past weekend's Michigan Comic Con --- in his own words, "Gee, I wonder why?"



This is in line with some of the speculation on page one of this thread --- that Thrawn showing up in Rebels probably led to a renewed interest in Heir to the Empire, that Solo may have done the same thing for Daley and Crispin, and that if Rogue Squadron ever get their own anything in the new canon, it would probably get some royalty cheques thrown Stackpole's way. Especially with how easily most Legends works are available as e-books. And the original Rogue Squadron N64 game is on Steam, too.

A lot of us on these forums have compared the EU vs current canon to Marvel comic continuity vs Marvel film continuity, and I think said comparison is especially apt here --- I would guess, based on no hard data at all, that there was probably a renewed interest in the original Infinity Gauntlet graphic novel last year. Or Days of Future Past in 2014. Or The Long Halloween in 2008 (not Marvel but same idea). People would have known that what they were buying wasn't in the same continuity as the movie and would have no effect on its story, but they'd be interested in it nonetheless. Those of us who post on these forums tend to care about continuity a lot more than most readers.

 

I think it's all about interest in characters or settings. I still think if it's out there, and people want to read about it, they'll find a way to it, canon or no. As long as Sith or Jedi or smugglers or whatever really gets somebody to search something out, they'll find what they're looking for.

 

the thing is nothing else is ever gonna equal the 35-ish-year single-continuity collaborative project that was the legendary canon. there's never been anything quite like it before or since, and there's definitely never gonna be anything like it again. the new ancillary stuff is gonna get rebooted before the coming decade is out and it's extremely unlikely we're gonna make it 35 years before they cave and remake even the movies. but the original star wars universe will still be there, untouched, this monument to the wonderful weirdness that was Lucasfilm Ltd., the goofy little privately owned company that controlled the biggest modern mythos since Tolkien. Even if they stop printing all of the old stuff (and they well might at some point, who knows, the mouse is a capricious beast) it's all long ago been digitized and preserved for future generations of nerds to rediscover, and I'm pretty confident time will be kind to the the first iteration of star wars vs the many that will come after. if nothing else it is and always will be a pretty fascinating and unique chapter in the history of popular fiction.

so, yes. people will still read the old EU.

 

I used to care more about the 35 year single-continuity aspect, having one canon you can follow and invest in. Now days not so much. The post NJO stuff was just really bad in my opinion, so thats probably mostly why. Now as long as I can find a book I like, I don’t care whether it’s from the old EU or new EU. And in general I’ve been mostly pleased with the new stuff and the new authors. All of Claudia Gray’s work is excellent.

And I definitely think people will still read legends books. The local library has all of the NJO books, I occasionally barrow them since I gave mine away years ago. And they seem to be regularly taken out. Also with so many books out there, it’s just inevitable that people will constantly discover new books that interest them. I only in the last year discovered the Witcher novels, for example.

 

well, there's a reason I said 35-ish years instead of 37 (counting the ANH novelization as the beginning) or 38 (counting the film)... because, yeah, the EU was definitely losing cohesion there in the final 6 years or so. enough so that I think it's not inaccurate to in retrospect say that there was a sort of dragged-out, rolling reboot underway during that period.

and, yes-- sneaky reboots aside, the post-NJO novels are a blight on the entire legacy-- moreso in my opinion than even the aforementioned stealth-reboot stuff of the final half-decade--and unfortunately they're forever something you have to caveat when recommending the EU to newcomers. But I think even they don't totally undermine the project as a whole, especially since Legacy exists. Thank goodness for John & Jan.

 

Earlier this month I read Dune for the first time ever. Granted, it's a classic, but hey, a lot of people say the same thing about Heir... hell, it got a 20th Anniversary Release.

And the same used book shop where I bought it has a ton of Legends novels.

 

And...? You can't just say you read Dune for the first time and not give at least a small hint of how it affected you.

 

Stuff that's not set during the OT era will still remain popular, I believe.

Dawn/Tales of the Jedi/KOTOR/TOR/Knight Errant/Bane era material forms one long and rich continuity that actually isn't really connected with the original films and can be enjoyed on its own merit as its own universe, you could say. A conflict that begins before the Republic is formed and lasts until it is reformed, followed by a long era of peace with a cryptic "evil never truly dies" ending. This is its own saga and can be enjoyed without ever having watched a single movie. That has merit. A 25,000 year epic about a conflict between good and evil magicians to protect or conquer a Galacitc Democratic republic.

Back in the day, I compiled a comprehensive Clone Wars timeline that kept all the EU material with the TV series, using only a small amount of retcons and assumptions. I even did a viewing/read-through with this order after season 6 came out (shortly before the big canon purge) and it was actually very enjoyable. While some titles will be harder to fit than others (Dark Disciple messes with some of the Dark Horse run pretty heavily, and we still don't have season 7 out yet), I still believe one should enjoy the TV show with at least some of the supplementary old EU stories (especially a few items that were released during the frickin' show!)

Same as above, the Dark Horse Vader comics/early Empire stories still fit in with what is established pretty well (including the most recent Vader series) and should absolutely be enjoyed by viewers now. Maybe the same could be said for "Droids" era material as well.

It is the era from Solo through Ep 9 that has been the most extensively rewritten. A few small outliers like Shadows of the Empire may still be worth a read for a "what if" type scenario in that era, and stories like the Thrawn Trilogy/Dark Empire will always be popular for their impact, but stuff like LotF and FotJ will probably fall out of popularity, as they were never super popular to begin with. NJO may also still have some merit as a self contained era separate from the rest, and because they were more critically acclaimed.

Similarly, like the ancient era, the Legacy comics are so distantly removed from the rest of the post ROTJ EU material that they too are kind of like their own "what if" universe, or one could even read them as a distant future to the ancient material where the Sith rise again but are finally defeated for good after another 1140ish years have passed since Bane.

 

Star Wars Legends will be remembered as the Star Wars Universe before Disney
I feel that Legends will be more appreciated over time and much of his material will become collectible in the future

The Disney Canon will surpass the EU in terms of material in maybe 3 or 4 years from now and when that happens the EU will be more valued
At least that's what I think nostalgic fans will always comeback to this universe

 

I was wondering if there were any Legends books I'd never read that I still may get around to reading some day... I'll probably finally do Kenobi if the Obi-Wan TV series does happen. And I may finally read Emissary of the Void some day, which is basically a full-length novel when all six parts combine. But also maybe not.

It was OK. I think I would have liked it more if I had read it when I was in High School. I wasn't crazy about the quotations at the beginning of each chapter giving away nearly every plot point before they actually happened --- following Paul and how his experiences changed him would have been more interesting if I weren't constantly being told what endpoints the bits of character development were working toward. I won't read any of the sequels, but I'm definitely going to watch the David Lynch movie, which I've heard is awful in the most bat**** insane way and oh man that's definitely the kind of movie for me.

 

Sorry to keep beating the same drum, but I think it's interesting and noteworthy that at a random Salt Lake City fan con, people are still buying out the entire stock of Kevin J. Anderson's SW books. No idea which ones he was selling, but he hasn't written anything for SW since 2000's The Essential Chronology. Did people go up to his booth and be like "Oh, a story about Luke's Jedi Academy set in an alternate universe? Sounds cool!" I mean I know I've said it tons of times but I'm really thinking that the casual fan just wants to read a fun SW story without caring about any canon consequences and understands that these books don't take place in the same universe as the movies which is a one to one analogy with a Marvel fan picking up a comic and... yeah you get it.

 

Exactly, granted I’m not a comic person...at all....But I don’t go around seeing comics and going “Is this New 52, Pre-52, Rebirth?” I go...Was this good, or more ...Was i entertained buy said comic...If the answer is yes...Then I will buy...if the answer is no...I won’t by...Simple as that.

Or in some cases I go by Author.

Grand Morrison and Tom King-Yes
Scott Synder -Not.

Etc. Etc. Etc.

 

Hell yes.

From the books with my username to the Old Republic to the Denningverse.

Still great content from the 90s to the early 2010s that I have yet to discover.

God, I actually really liked the Denningverse and was hooked all the way from The Unifying Force to Apocalypse.

There were some great authors in there; Miller, Christie Golden, etc


My first EU book was Jedi Quest #2, but I really got into it with Legacy of the Force and Heir to the Empire.

I’m glad that Luceno and Zahn are still involved to varying degrees and I hope to see some more old-school authors too.

 

I've read a few Legends novels and some I liked, some I felt were a little odd, especially Hard Contact. I don't know what it is about that book but it was really hard to get into up until near the end. Maybe it was the way that the clones were using military speak and I'm not super familiar with that. Maybe it was the stark difference between Legends Mandos and Canon Mandos, especially the whole Jango Fett issue. I have to say though, my favorite Legends novel has to be Darth Plagiues ( apologies if I spelled that wrong.) that novel was perfect in my mind and I wish more canon novels were like that.

 

Animated adaptations of legends material is certainly possible(its cheap and doesn't require much investment from Disney's end), though that will probably be just of things that remain iconic of the old EU.

I think there will always be a small group of people, that read it.

And YT videos explaining it, and its lore do a great service by exposing people who might never pick up a book of the old EU to old EU characters, plots, settings, and ideas.

 

Yes.
The stories are still being published, and a lot of them are the most iconic Star Wars literature. Some of them will get lost in the shuffle of material, but an interest will remain. I still read EU novels that I previously hadn't read. There's some terrific stories.

 

This is why I wish instead of making sequels they'd made the new films a KOTOR trilogy or something else from an earlier era. Leave the OT and the entire universe of books around it alone and just set the stories in a new era that still has Jedi and starships but allows you to tell a different story. It's what Star Trek did when it came back as TNG. And with 25,000 years of history to cover (and that's just the Republic era), it really wouldn't have been hard for Star Wars to do.

 

I dunno if Trek is a good contrast to SW in that regard --- before TNG they did, after all, make a bunch of sequel films to the classic series, just like SW is doing now. Then they did new stories in a new era with TNG, which is what SW might do next.

They also made an animated series before they made the sequel movies, just like SW! Huh their trajectories are a lot more in parallel than I realized. But ST:TAS is much better than TCW. Seriously it's on Netflix and it's delightful.

Will people still read the non-canon Trek EU? I mean I'm going through Peter David's New Frontier series these days and I don't care that it's not in the same continuity as the upcoming Picard. Trek fans were never conditioned to put their EU on a canon pedestal like we were, and these days fans like us who spent years conditioned to believe that the SW EU was the canonest of the canon are getting fewer and fewer. Newer and more casual fans have never cared about its place in the hierarchy like we always did, and its fall from that pedestal probably isn't going to discourage them from reading it.