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Star Wars Legends appreciation thread (spoilers for all things Star wars)

Moe_Syzlak

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TomH1138 said:
[font=Raleway, sans-serif]I guess at the end of the day, to me, it doesn't matter whether or not a story "officially" happened according to the content owners[/font]

Yeah, I’ve never understood the need to have a story be a part of “canon.” I read the Thrawn novels when they came out as I thought they were the Lucas movies that he wasn't going to make. Honestly, I thought they were terrible. I haven’t invested in much outside the movies. And, while I do wish they were a bit better, all the Disney movies have been so much better than the prequels I find it hard to complain.
 

wilhelm scream

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TomH1138 said:
When it comes to the EU, my thoughts are conflicted. (And please read all the way to the end of the post for the full picture of what I'm saying.) :)

On the one hand...

I've never considered it canon, and I'm genuinely surprised that others thought it was. Yes, Lucas referred to it as "C-level canon," but the fact that there were tiered levels of canonicity in the first place told me that it was never on the same level as the movies.

I also don't believe that Lucas was heavily involved in the EU, signing off on all stories before they were published. When Starlog magazine asked Lucas in 2005 how he keeps track of it all, he replied: "I don't read that stuff. I haven't read any of the novels. I don't know anything about that world. That's a different world than my world. But I do try to keep it consistent. The way I do it now is they have a Star Wars Encyclopedia. So if I come up with a name or something else, I look it up and see if it has already been used. When I said [other people] could make their own Star Wars stories, we decided that, like Star Trek, we would have two universes: My universe and then this other one. They try to make their universe as consistent with mine as possible, but obviously they get enthusiastic and want to go off in other directions." (my emphasis added)

(Elsewhere, Lucas and the caretakers of the EU qualified those statements by saying that the EU made every attempt to fit into the movie canon. But notice that none of them said that Lucas made every attempt to make the movies fit the EU. Quite the opposite, in fact. I think that underscores how unofficial these stories were to Lucas.)

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Canon#George_Lucas_and_Star_Wars_Canon

Plus, Lucas approached Disney with this deal, knowing full well that when they owned it, they could do what they wanted to with it. 

So I agree with Disney that they had every right to get rid of whatever they wanted, and a clean sweep is probably easier than going down the rabbit hole of deciding what stays and what goes. And it's nice that everything is now part of a single, unified canon.

On the other hand...

With the exception of Rogue One, not much of the new canon has felt worth my time. The new films are much better-made than the prequels, and I see the validity of many of the dramatic choices they're making (a conflicted Luke is more dramatically interesting than a happy Luke, for instance), but somehow it just doesn't grab me anymore like the old stories used to.

I can't even bring myself to read the new Thrawn novels, because it no longer feels like something I'm doing for fun. It feels like homework instead: I have to read these if I want to figure out how Thrawn fits into the new timeline.

I'm not giving up on new Star Wars; I still read news stories about the latest developments every day, listen to podcasts, watch fan films, and talk about it endlessly with my friends. I'm also going to keep watching the new stuff. I'm particularly excited for Jon Favreau's upcoming show for Disney's streaming service. But I am starting to feel like the baby got thrown out with the bathwater.

There's a lot of stuff that could have been kept because Disney is probably never going to touch these eras anyway, such as the Old Republic stories and the Darth Bane tales. There are other stories that probably could have been brought over into the new canon with just a few edits for continuity's sake, like the original Thrawn trilogy.

(Spoilers for a lot of already-released SW media, both EU and new canon, inside the spoiler tag.)

Not only do most fans consider it the best piece of EU ever written, introducing two of the best EU characters (Thrawn and Mara Jade), but really the only contradiction to the new canon is the name of Han and Leia's child(ren). Change one scene so that they have one son named Ben rather than twins named Jacen and Jaina, and the rest of the novel still works.

In fact, rather than change those novels, the films could have been constructed around those events. Rey could be Jaina and Jacen could be Ben/Kylo, and their stories would play out pretty much the same, since Jacen fell to the Dark Side, and Jaina ultimately defeated him. Disney could have gotten rid of everything from New Jedi Order and beyond, and then used elements of those stories in the films, and they'd play out with few differences. (There wouldn't have been a shirtless scene for Jacen in TLJ, and Jacen wouldn't have revealed to Jaina that her parents were nobodies, but the overall arc would still stand.)

At the end of the Thrawn trilogy, Mara and Luke part on friendly terms. She isn't in quite a few stories after that in the timeline, including Dark Empire and the Jedi Academy trilogy. She and Luke don't meet again, fall in love, and get married until many stories later. So all of those could have been wiped from the canon and the Thrawn trilogy would still be intact. 

There are many other stories that are huge touchstones for the fans that could have been included with just a little rewriting (or, in some cases, none at all), such as Splinter of the Mind's Eye, Shadows of the Empire, and The Force Unleashed

Still other stories, such as the Droids comic books or the original Han Solo novels by Brian Daley, aren't huge touchstones but leave virtually no mark on the timeline, so there's no reason not to include them.

But I realize I'm now going down the rabbit hole that I said Disney was wise to avoid.

Anyway, I'm not sure what can be done at this point to fix things, although bringing back The Clone Wars to wrap up its stories was one step in the right direction. (I'm not sure why fans keep calling it EU, though, since Lucas officially said that this show was always canon, and Disney hasn't contradicted that.) Maybe the streaming services can feature some original animated movies that loosely adapt some of the most beloved EU stories, thereby bringing them into canon. But that's just a random thought.

I guess at the end of the day, to me, it doesn't matter whether or not a story "officially" happened according to the content owners. Many of DC Comics' most popular and acclaimed stories don't fit anywhere in the official timeline. And if an EU novel or comic or video game entertained me, then that's all that matters, and no one can take that from me. And if it wasn't entertaining, then there's no need to cling to it, either in or out of the current canon.

Whew! Sorry for rambling on so long. And thanks for the discussion starter, Wilhelm Scream!

Nice to see somebody who isn't a blind fanboy to the Discanon movies, and somebody I can actually respect and not get frustrated by.
 

Moe_Syzlak

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wilhelm scream said:
TomH1138 said:
When it comes to the EU, my thoughts are conflicted. (And please read all the way to the end of the post for the full picture of what I'm saying.) :)

On the one hand...

I've never considered it canon, and I'm genuinely surprised that others thought it was. Yes, Lucas referred to it as "C-level canon," but the fact that there were tiered levels of canonicity in the first place told me that it was never on the same level as the movies.

I also don't believe that Lucas was heavily involved in the EU, signing off on all stories before they were published. When Starlog magazine asked Lucas in 2005 how he keeps track of it all, he replied: "I don't read that stuff. I haven't read any of the novels. I don't know anything about that world. That's a different world than my world. But I do try to keep it consistent. The way I do it now is they have a Star Wars Encyclopedia. So if I come up with a name or something else, I look it up and see if it has already been used. When I said [other people] could make their own Star Wars stories, we decided that, like Star Trek, we would have two universes: My universe and then this other one. They try to make their universe as consistent with mine as possible, but obviously they get enthusiastic and want to go off in other directions." (my emphasis added)

(Elsewhere, Lucas and the caretakers of the EU qualified those statements by saying that the EU made every attempt to fit into the movie canon. But notice that none of them said that Lucas made every attempt to make the movies fit the EU. Quite the opposite, in fact. I think that underscores how unofficial these stories were to Lucas.)

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Canon#George_Lucas_and_Star_Wars_Canon

Plus, Lucas approached Disney with this deal, knowing full well that when they owned it, they could do what they wanted to with it. 

So I agree with Disney that they had every right to get rid of whatever they wanted, and a clean sweep is probably easier than going down the rabbit hole of deciding what stays and what goes. And it's nice that everything is now part of a single, unified canon.

On the other hand...

With the exception of Rogue One, not much of the new canon has felt worth my time. The new films are much better-made than the prequels, and I see the validity of many of the dramatic choices they're making (a conflicted Luke is more dramatically interesting than a happy Luke, for instance), but somehow it just doesn't grab me anymore like the old stories used to.

I can't even bring myself to read the new Thrawn novels, because it no longer feels like something I'm doing for fun. It feels like homework instead: I have to read these if I want to figure out how Thrawn fits into the new timeline.

I'm not giving up on new Star Wars; I still read news stories about the latest developments every day, listen to podcasts, watch fan films, and talk about it endlessly with my friends. I'm also going to keep watching the new stuff. I'm particularly excited for Jon Favreau's upcoming show for Disney's streaming service. But I am starting to feel like the baby got thrown out with the bathwater.

There's a lot of stuff that could have been kept because Disney is probably never going to touch these eras anyway, such as the Old Republic stories and the Darth Bane tales. There are other stories that probably could have been brought over into the new canon with just a few edits for continuity's sake, like the original Thrawn trilogy.

(Spoilers for a lot of already-released SW media, both EU and new canon, inside the spoiler tag.)

Not only do most fans consider it the best piece of EU ever written, introducing two of the best EU characters (Thrawn and Mara Jade), but really the only contradiction to the new canon is the name of Han and Leia's child(ren). Change one scene so that they have one son named Ben rather than twins named Jacen and Jaina, and the rest of the novel still works.

In fact, rather than change those novels, the films could have been constructed around those events. Rey could be Jaina and Jacen could be Ben/Kylo, and their stories would play out pretty much the same, since Jacen fell to the Dark Side, and Jaina ultimately defeated him. Disney could have gotten rid of everything from New Jedi Order and beyond, and then used elements of those stories in the films, and they'd play out with few differences. (There wouldn't have been a shirtless scene for Jacen in TLJ, and Jacen wouldn't have revealed to Jaina that her parents were nobodies, but the overall arc would still stand.)

At the end of the Thrawn trilogy, Mara and Luke part on friendly terms. She isn't in quite a few stories after that in the timeline, including Dark Empire and the Jedi Academy trilogy. She and Luke don't meet again, fall in love, and get married until many stories later. So all of those could have been wiped from the canon and the Thrawn trilogy would still be intact. 

There are many other stories that are huge touchstones for the fans that could have been included with just a little rewriting (or, in some cases, none at all), such as Splinter of the Mind's Eye, Shadows of the Empire, and The Force Unleashed

Still other stories, such as the Droids comic books or the original Han Solo novels by Brian Daley, aren't huge touchstones but leave virtually no mark on the timeline, so there's no reason not to include them.

But I realize I'm now going down the rabbit hole that I said Disney was wise to avoid.

Anyway, I'm not sure what can be done at this point to fix things, although bringing back The Clone Wars to wrap up its stories was one step in the right direction. (I'm not sure why fans keep calling it EU, though, since Lucas officially said that this show was always canon, and Disney hasn't contradicted that.) Maybe the streaming services can feature some original animated movies that loosely adapt some of the most beloved EU stories, thereby bringing them into canon. But that's just a random thought.

I guess at the end of the day, to me, it doesn't matter whether or not a story "officially" happened according to the content owners. Many of DC Comics' most popular and acclaimed stories don't fit anywhere in the official timeline. And if an EU novel or comic or video game entertained me, then that's all that matters, and no one can take that from me. And if it wasn't entertaining, then there's no need to cling to it, either in or out of the current canon.

Whew! Sorry for rambling on so long. And thanks for the discussion starter, Wilhelm Scream!

Nice to see somebody who isn't a blind fanboy to the Discanon movies, and somebody I can actually respect and not get frustrated by.

200w.gif
 

TV's Frink

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Lol thanks for the laugh there Wil.
 

wilhelm scream

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Moe_Syzlak said:
wilhelm scream said:
TomH1138 said:
When it comes to the EU, my thoughts are conflicted. (And please read all the way to the end of the post for the full picture of what I'm saying.) :)

On the one hand...

I've never considered it canon, and I'm genuinely surprised that others thought it was. Yes, Lucas referred to it as "C-level canon," but the fact that there were tiered levels of canonicity in the first place told me that it was never on the same level as the movies.

I also don't believe that Lucas was heavily involved in the EU, signing off on all stories before they were published. When Starlog magazine asked Lucas in 2005 how he keeps track of it all, he replied: "I don't read that stuff. I haven't read any of the novels. I don't know anything about that world. That's a different world than my world. But I do try to keep it consistent. The way I do it now is they have a Star Wars Encyclopedia. So if I come up with a name or something else, I look it up and see if it has already been used. When I said [other people] could make their own Star Wars stories, we decided that, like Star Trek, we would have two universes: My universe and then this other one. They try to make their universe as consistent with mine as possible, but obviously they get enthusiastic and want to go off in other directions." (my emphasis added)

(Elsewhere, Lucas and the caretakers of the EU qualified those statements by saying that the EU made every attempt to fit into the movie canon. But notice that none of them said that Lucas made every attempt to make the movies fit the EU. Quite the opposite, in fact. I think that underscores how unofficial these stories were to Lucas.)

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Canon#George_Lucas_and_Star_Wars_Canon

Plus, Lucas approached Disney with this deal, knowing full well that when they owned it, they could do what they wanted to with it. 

So I agree with Disney that they had every right to get rid of whatever they wanted, and a clean sweep is probably easier than going down the rabbit hole of deciding what stays and what goes. And it's nice that everything is now part of a single, unified canon.

On the other hand...

With the exception of Rogue One, not much of the new canon has felt worth my time. The new films are much better-made than the prequels, and I see the validity of many of the dramatic choices they're making (a conflicted Luke is more dramatically interesting than a happy Luke, for instance), but somehow it just doesn't grab me anymore like the old stories used to.

I can't even bring myself to read the new Thrawn novels, because it no longer feels like something I'm doing for fun. It feels like homework instead: I have to read these if I want to figure out how Thrawn fits into the new timeline.

I'm not giving up on new Star Wars; I still read news stories about the latest developments every day, listen to podcasts, watch fan films, and talk about it endlessly with my friends. I'm also going to keep watching the new stuff. I'm particularly excited for Jon Favreau's upcoming show for Disney's streaming service. But I am starting to feel like the baby got thrown out with the bathwater.

There's a lot of stuff that could have been kept because Disney is probably never going to touch these eras anyway, such as the Old Republic stories and the Darth Bane tales. There are other stories that probably could have been brought over into the new canon with just a few edits for continuity's sake, like the original Thrawn trilogy.

(Spoilers for a lot of already-released SW media, both EU and new canon, inside the spoiler tag.)

Not only do most fans consider it the best piece of EU ever written, introducing two of the best EU characters (Thrawn and Mara Jade), but really the only contradiction to the new canon is the name of Han and Leia's child(ren). Change one scene so that they have one son named Ben rather than twins named Jacen and Jaina, and the rest of the novel still works.

In fact, rather than change those novels, the films could have been constructed around those events. Rey could be Jaina and Jacen could be Ben/Kylo, and their stories would play out pretty much the same, since Jacen fell to the Dark Side, and Jaina ultimately defeated him. Disney could have gotten rid of everything from New Jedi Order and beyond, and then used elements of those stories in the films, and they'd play out with few differences. (There wouldn't have been a shirtless scene for Jacen in TLJ, and Jacen wouldn't have revealed to Jaina that her parents were nobodies, but the overall arc would still stand.)

At the end of the Thrawn trilogy, Mara and Luke part on friendly terms. She isn't in quite a few stories after that in the timeline, including Dark Empire and the Jedi Academy trilogy. She and Luke don't meet again, fall in love, and get married until many stories later. So all of those could have been wiped from the canon and the Thrawn trilogy would still be intact. 

There are many other stories that are huge touchstones for the fans that could have been included with just a little rewriting (or, in some cases, none at all), such as Splinter of the Mind's Eye, Shadows of the Empire, and The Force Unleashed

Still other stories, such as the Droids comic books or the original Han Solo novels by Brian Daley, aren't huge touchstones but leave virtually no mark on the timeline, so there's no reason not to include them.

But I realize I'm now going down the rabbit hole that I said Disney was wise to avoid.

Anyway, I'm not sure what can be done at this point to fix things, although bringing back The Clone Wars to wrap up its stories was one step in the right direction. (I'm not sure why fans keep calling it EU, though, since Lucas officially said that this show was always canon, and Disney hasn't contradicted that.) Maybe the streaming services can feature some original animated movies that loosely adapt some of the most beloved EU stories, thereby bringing them into canon. But that's just a random thought.

I guess at the end of the day, to me, it doesn't matter whether or not a story "officially" happened according to the content owners. Many of DC Comics' most popular and acclaimed stories don't fit anywhere in the official timeline. And if an EU novel or comic or video game entertained me, then that's all that matters, and no one can take that from me. And if it wasn't entertaining, then there's no need to cling to it, either in or out of the current canon.

Whew! Sorry for rambling on so long. And thanks for the discussion starter, Wilhelm Scream!

Nice to see somebody who isn't a blind fanboy to the Discanon movies, and somebody I can actually respect and not get frustrated by.

200w.gif

I don't get it.
 

thecuddlyninja

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^Yeah, no shit. But we all do, and the irony is hilarious
 

wilhelm scream

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Well... my personal life and lack of free money and time have prevented me from continuing this thread as much as I wanted to. However, while I get distracted by a bunch of other things (like the original screenplays I'm writing), A special edition of the 3rd episode of the KOTOR movies has been released. I haven't watched it myself yet, but it looks awesome!  
 

wilhelm scream

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OK, just finished watching it. It was better than the original, with better effects and some new scenes to make it feel more complete. Oh, and stick around for the post-credits scene!
 

wilhelm scream

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OK. This was announced a few months ago, but I decided to wait until now to tell you all about it, so that it will be more memorable considering it's at the end of next month: LEGENDS IS RETURNING! It's only a 1-issue one shot, but it's still better than nothing. It's a sequel to issue #50 of the Marvel comics run from the late 70's-early 80's: https://comicstore.marvel.com/Star-Wars-2019-108/digital-comic/51371
 

Duragizer

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wilhelm scream said:
OK. This was announced a few months ago, but I decided to wait until now to tell you all about it, so that it will be more memorable considering it's at the end of next month: LEGENDS IS RETURNING! It's only a 1-issue one shot, but it's still better than nothing. It's a sequel to issue #50 of the Marvel comics run from the late 70's-early 80's: https://comicstore.marvel.com/Star-Wars-2019-108/digital-comic/51371

I'll bet Marvel still finds a way to make it as generic and disposable as 99% of the rest of their current output.
 

wilhelm scream

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Duragizer said:
wilhelm scream said:
OK. This was announced a few months ago, but I decided to wait until now to tell you all about it, so that it will be more memorable considering it's at the end of next month: LEGENDS IS RETURNING! It's only a 1-issue one shot, but it's still better than nothing. It's a sequel to issue #50 of the Marvel comics run from the late 70's-early 80's: https://comicstore.marvel.com/Star-Wars-2019-108/digital-comic/51371

I'll bet Marvel still finds a way to make it as generic and disposable as 99% of the rest of their current output.

Actually, it's not generic at all.

I was a bit busy to read it sooner, but I have now, and it's a great issue. It maintains the feel of the 70's/80's comics, yet the art has been given a substantial upgrade since then. And there are so many tiny and fun references to other legends materials. I love it! 

Judging from how issue #108 has outsold some of the Discanon titles, I think we will be getting more Legends comics in the future. I'm not sure what I would like to see next because there's so much I would like to see. Maybe show old Luke dying from old age, surrounded by friends and family, and the force ghost of Mara Jade eases him into becoming a force ghost. That would be beautiful in comic form.
 

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It's Duragizer, he's not gonna like it. I read his post too far scrolled down on the page to see the username and i still knew it was him that posted it.
 

wilhelm scream

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Possessed said:
It's Duragizer, he's not gonna like it.  I read his post too far scrolled down on the page to see the username and i still knew it was him that posted it.

I'm not very familiar with him.
 

Duragizer

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Possessed said:
It's Duragizer, he's not gonna like it.

True, I didn't like it. I didn't hate it, either. "Meh" was my overall reaction.
 

Possessed

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wilhelm scream said:
Possessed said:
It's Duragizer, he's not gonna like it.  I read his post too far scrolled down on the page to see the username and i still knew it was him that posted it.

I'm not very familiar with him.

He gets pretty good reviews from critics,  but you can't always trust that.
 

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Canadian critics, for whatever that's worth.
 

Possessed

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He said "Canadian critics, for whatever that's worth."
 
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