# Star Wars: Disney scraps the Expanded Universe



## wingsandsword (Apr 25, 2014)

http://edit.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/lucasfilm-unveils-new-plans-star-698973

Let me be honest, this pretty much means I have near-zero interest in the Disney Trilogy.

To me, the Expanded Universe is as much Star Wars as the movies, maybe even moreso.

When I think of Star Wars, my mind is as much drawn to the Expanded Universe as the films.  I've spent over two decades getting to know and love a vast continuity stretching over ~30,000 years from the arrival of the Tho Yor arks on Tython to the death of Darth Krayt at the hands of Cade Skywalker.  I've spent way, way too long in the incredible depth and breadth of the intricately-managed continuity of Star Wars, immersed in that virtual world to just walk away because the Army of the Mouse figured it was easier to go "frak it" and make new stuff.

I know Disney (seems dishonest to call it Lucasfilm now that George Lucas isn't involved with it anymore, since Lucasfilm is just another Disney brand now) wants to milk Star Wars for every penny it can, but when I look at the shelves and shelves of novels and comics, the RPG books, the video games, everything. . .for them to just say that's not canon anymore is, to me, ripping Star Wars apart just as much as saying the movies aren't canonical.

I was already skeptical about the new trilogy, but now I guess I can just save my time and effort and ignore the new stuff.  Kinda sad that no new Star Wars will be published, at least nothing worth paying attention to.

Y'know, I guess this is a lot like how the people who said that "Lucas ruined their childhood" with the Prequels felt.


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## wingsandsword (Apr 25, 2014)

Apologies if this is just a little too hot, but it honestly does feel like a kick in the teeth for the long-term dedicated fan to say that the universe you have known and loved since you were a child is essentially scrapped.

I'm sure to the casual Star Wars fan who just likes the movies and occasionally plays some of the video games it won't mean anything, but to me, it feels almost like a friend has died.


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## Kramodlog (Apr 26, 2014)

Who knows, maybe the new movies will not suck.


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 26, 2014)

Yeah.
EU was pretty much a mixed bag. There was some really good material, but there was also tons and tons of utter crap.
Ditching the crap is no loss.
Losing the good parts, however, is sad.


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## Crothian (Apr 26, 2014)

Few people can agree on what was crap and what was the good parts though. I think this is a good move.


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## Umbran (Apr 26, 2014)

I can understand it is disappointing to fans, but, to be honest, I would not want to stick them with thousands of years worth of canon they'd have to stick to.  That doesn't leave them much creative space.

And, yes, Disney wants to make money.  But, at the moment, Disney seems to have learned that to make money, they need to get good people who know and love the properties, and let them go to work.  They have done well by both Marvel and the Muppets in that regard, and if they apply the same to Star Wars, I think we can see some good things.

And, their idea to shift the Expanded Universe to "Star Wars Legends" is a pretty darned bright idea.  They allow it to be, and may pick elements from it as they will, and still have the freedom to make up *new* cool Star Wars stuff.


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## Kramodlog (Apr 26, 2014)

Anyone else think Disney should buy the D&D brand to make it better?


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## Henry (Apr 26, 2014)

I'm a little disappointed, but I can see why they would want to do that.

I would have loved to see Thrawn on the Silver Screen, though.


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## Dog Moon (Apr 26, 2014)

I honestly know very little about the Expanded Universe.  I remember reading a couple of the books when I was younger, but I couldn't tell you anything about them anymore.

To me, whether they go with the Expanded Universe or not, it doesn't matter because I wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyone.  I just hope that whatever they do, they do a good job at it and make it an  enjoyable movie hopefully without ruining too much of the canon stuff.  I do understand a little how you feel though because even though I don't feel it for star wars, I'm sure there are other things I would feel it for.

Although I do find it funny that you would say this and that there is a link below to a related thread started by you wondering if the star wars expanded universe has jumped that shark and you sound really unhappy with everything.


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## The_Silversword (Apr 26, 2014)

goldomark said:


> Anyone else think Disney should buy the D&D brand to make it better?



Its not like they could make it any worse, or could they? dumdumdum!!


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Apr 26, 2014)

I have mixed feelings.

On the one hand, I don't have a lot of confidence that Disney will do a good job with the franchise -- the announced ideas are too commercial and feel too rushed to give the universe what it deserves. On the other hand, Lucasfilm has a pretty mixed record with handling the franchise itself.

On the one hand, there is some great material in the EU -- Old Republic, Clone Wars, X-Wing, great short story collections about minor characters, and some of the early EU novels among them. On the other hand, there is a lot of drivel there, too, that has piled up to be wildly inconsistent (e.g. Boba Fett origins, neglecting wild gyrations fans have gone through to reconcile multiple versions). The EU particularly seems to suffer of late from much the same problem as the Forgotten Realms does, with not a lot of room to maneuver, and too many stories about the setting (super-weapon of the week, universe-threatening events) versus immersed in the setting.

The best period of the EU was a long time ago, before the dark time, before the prequels -- but unfortunately that problematic change is one that isn't getting rebooted by Disney who is driving their decisions based on visual media and not written product. We shouldn't be surprised; that's their business model.


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## Scorpio616 (Apr 26, 2014)

Is this really that far from EU's canon status before the sale? From what I remember, all the EU was at best a "soft canon" until it wound up in a movie.

Honestly this just sounds like 'Nothing from EU is canon unless we decide to use it' rather than "Nothing from EU will be used'.


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## delericho (Apr 26, 2014)

Scorpio616 said:


> Is this really that far from EU's canon status before the sale? From what I remember, all the EU was at best a "soft canon" until it wound up in a movie.
> 
> Honestly this just sounds like 'Nothing from EU is canon unless we decide to use it' rather than "Nothing from EU will be used'.




Actually, the read I got from the original announcement was that they had someone sorting through it. Some bits of EU were going to be 'promoted' to "full canon" status, while others were going to be 'demoted' to "not at all canon" status. (And, here, EU means "everything outside the 6 movies" - so even things like "Clone Wars" could be up for the axe.)


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## wingsandsword (Apr 26, 2014)

Scorpio616 said:


> Is this really that far from EU's canon status before the sale? From what I remember, all the EU was at best a "soft canon" until it wound up in a movie.
> 
> Honestly this just sounds like 'Nothing from EU is canon unless we decide to use it' rather than "Nothing from EU will be used'.




Here's a primer on how Star Wars Canon used to work, pre-Disney.  There were a lot of misconceptions about it.

There was an elaborate "tier" system.  Almost everything was canon, except for a few intentionally non-canon things.  Lucasfilm kept a full time employee with a database (called the Holocron) whose job was just to track the canon.

At the top was "G Canon", the stuff George Lucas writes.  This meant the 6 movies.  While Lucas didn't feel confined by the other canon, he didn't overrule it too much in the Prequels because he'd always told EU writers to not touch the Clone Wars or the rise of the Empire because he was going to do that himself.  Thus, there were some contradictions in the Prequels with established materials, but with some retcons to patch things together they were kept _relatively _light.  (Boba Fett's Origins, the history of the Republic/Russan Reformations, and Jedi being celibate were the big changes/retcons).

The next tier was "T Canon", television.  This was for the The Clone Wars series that started a few years ago.  It gave fans and canon keepers a few headaches because Lucas wanted it on a higher tier than other EU materials, but the authors of it ignored some little details of the EU.  It didn't create any really large canon headaches, but putting it on a tier to itself was a pain for tracking things.

The next tier was "C Canon".  This was "continuity".  This is the vast, vast bulk of the Expanded Universe.  All those novels on the shelves, (almost) all those comic books and graphic novels were at this level.  They all "happened" and had to co-exist, and authors had to make them fit with each other.  The plotlines of the video games and the "fluff" materials from RPG materials were at this level too (but not gameplay details/mechanics)

The tier below that was "S Canon" This was "secondary", mostly for some very old materials from pretty early in Star Wars before continuity was tightly watched that slipped by.  They generally didn't "happen", but if individual characters/plot events/other elements from them could be fit into the bigger picture of Star Wars, they would be.

The only tier that was non-canonical was "N-Canon" for non-canon.  This was meant for things that explicitly were not meant to be part of the Star Wars canon.  Mostly some comic books that told explicitly joke/humor tales or alternate universe "what if" stories like "what if Leia used the thermal detonator on Jabba" (that one ended with Palpatine surviving at Endor, and Anakin being redeemed without dying and now wearing a white suit of armor to join up with the Rebels).

Since George Lucas was done making movies, that basically meant that future canon authors pretty much had to work within the established canons, and the stuff he did was in a part of the continuity that had been carved out for him to work in since the beginning.


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## wingsandsword (Apr 26, 2014)

Dog Moon said:


> I do understand a little how you feel though because even though I don't feel it for star wars, I'm sure there are other things I would feel it for.




To get a scale on what this would be like for other fandoms. . .

If Marvel decided they were ending the main Earth-616 continuity and doing an Ultimate-style new continuity that everything would be in.

If WotC decided they were rebooting Dragonlance and ONLY the Chronicles Trilogy was being kept in common with the new continuity.

If the BBC announced that starting with the new Dr. Who series, all the classic old pre-2005 episodes were no longer canonical and would be ignored.

That's what scrapping the whole Star Wars EU is like, a 25+ year very elaborate, expanded continuity being thrown out.  New material may be like the old one, but it's still a vast bulk of continuity and acquired lore being chucked, and for fans who have been around for decades it can be pretty hurting.


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## ShinHakkaider (Apr 26, 2014)

I was 6 or 7 when I saw Star Wars in 1977. It's impacted my life in a huge way for a long
time. I love the OT. So much so that I still have my laserdisc player because I STILL have my 
OT (unaltered) laserdiscs. 

While I've read and enjoyed some of the expanded universe stuff most notably the Thrawn series and the X-Wing series. I enjoyed those because they seemed like natural extensions of the films. I could have easily seen these as followup TV series (X-wing) and movies (The Thrawn Series). That being said   I tried reading some of the other EU stuff and hated it. It just seemed like fan fiction gone horribly awry. 

I'm actually glad that the EU stuff has been ruled out for the movies. As far as I'm concerned the films and the Clone Wars TV series (which is just light years better than the prequel films) are the only canon I need. Everything else is just extra goodies in some cases or pure garbage in others. 

I'm not an ultra obsessive fan who gets personally offended at stuff like this. I enjoy the SW stuff I enjoy and pretty much ignore the stuff I dont. Doesnt make me any less of a fan.


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## Grumpy RPG Reviews (Apr 26, 2014)

Crothian said:


> Few people can agree on what was crap and what was the good parts though. I think this is a good move.




I have to agree with this assessment - it was a sprawling mixed assortment of things, so massive and so convoluted it was difficult to tell one thing from another. Dropping a lot of it, aside from the movies and TV shows, is not automatically a bad thing in my mind.


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 26, 2014)

I would keep the WEG RPG books as cannon. They were based on materials originally written by Lucas, scrapped scenes, early drafts, and concept sketches by ILM. In point of fact, WEG's books were the bible and cannon for all novels up until the Prequels.

Early Marvel Comics were fun as a kid, but not the same quality.
Timothy Zahn's books were mostly good (except where he had to include material from Kevin J. Anderson)
Michale Stackpole's books were mostly good (except where he had to include JKA)

Kevin J. Anderson's work was mostly crap (though he can describe scenery well enough), and he should be relegated to kids comics, and generally not taken seriously.


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## Crothian (Apr 26, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> I would keep the WEG RPG books as cannon. They were based on materials originally written by Lucas, scrapped scenes, early drafts, and concept sketches by ILM. In point of fact, WEG's books were the bible and cannon for all novels up until the Prequels.
> .




That's over 150 gaming books; I know I have a copy of each title. There is a lot of crap in that d6 Star Wars collection with a few gems here and there.


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## Umbran (Apr 26, 2014)

wingsandsword said:


> If Marvel decided they were ending the main Earth-616 continuity and doing an Ultimate-style new continuity that everything would be in.




So... New 52, you mean?


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 26, 2014)

The only EU stuff I really enjoyed where the Thrawn novels and the X-Wing series. Especially the Thrawn series didn't quite fit to the prequels. So for me, the interesting part of the EU is already over.

I figure if Timothy Zahn will write a new novel for the "new" EU, I'll read it, otherwise... We'll see what the new movies bring. 

I am fine with the Emperor never returning from his grave, and the Yuzang Vong never existing.


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## wingsandsword (Apr 26, 2014)

Umbran said:


> So... New 52, you mean?




I specifically didn't use DC Comics as an example because they've had multiple complete continuity reboots, and those were after continuity became so much of a train-wreck that a complete re-start was warranted.

Honestly, to me I think this will be to Star Wars what the Spellplague was to me and Forgotten Realms.

I love FR, but at the entire Spellplague thing I went "I'm out".  I haven't looked at or bought a single FR product since then.  If I ever run D&D, it's set before that, and acting like it never happened if continuity goes past that point (but once I did have an epic-level adventure where a Chronomancer come back warning of a dire future where most of the Gods have died, the world is ravaged and magic is all but dead and the PC's helped Mystra avoid an elaborate trap laid by Shar. . .and since the players were casual fans at best, none realized the reference.)  Much like how I felt WotC trashed a beloved setting so I felt no desire to keep up with it or buy anything more, I feel much the same about Star Wars.

In my head, in my heart, the EU is still Star Wars.  I'll forever look at the new Disney Continuity as an "Alternate Universe" ala the Abramsverse of Star Trek.  If I run a SW RPG, it will be in the original EU.

If, big if, I'd say they could have a breaking point with continuity to give them freedom while not screwing around with too much, I'd say the Hand of Thrawn Duology (and the comic epilogue of Star Wars: Union with the wedding of Luke and Mara) would be a good ending point.  The EU was never quite as good after that point.  I didn't care too much for the Vong, they might have been more tolerable as a minor race instead of a huge Galaxy-wide threat that spanned a 19 book series over four years.  Still, the EU as a whole was good, even if it did wear a little thin over time.


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## MarkB (Apr 27, 2014)

As a major, serious Star Wars fan who's enjoyed comics, novels, videogames and RPG games outside of the cinematic continuity and is currently running a Star Wars Saga Edition campaign, I can honestly say that this bothers me not at all.

I've enjoyed a lot of Star Wars EU stuff, but I never saw any of it as set in stone. It was always obvious to me that, if Lucas got around to making the sequels, he'd not let himself be constrained by the EU continuity, assuming he paid it any attention at all.

If someone else is continuing the series, I'm certainly not going to hold them to a higher standard. And in the end, does it matter if they take the series in a completely different direction? Those EU stories won't cease to exist or cease to have meaning just because the movies are telling a different story.


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## Alzrius (Apr 27, 2014)

wingsandsword said:


> Honestly, to me I think this will be to Star Wars what the Spellplague was to me and Forgotten Realms.




I'm with you on this. This move by Disney is the very definition of flipping the fans off - yes it was primarily motivated by money and convenience, but what gets me is that neither of those things is a very good excuse. They could still have made new movies and found new creative spaces while working within the existing EU material - hell, when I read a while back that Disney was making Star Wars have a dedicated story department, and that they were trying to make everything (or at least almost everything; not things like Star Wars Infinities) have the same level of canon, I figured that it was to avoid the exact sort of canon-dump that they're doing now.

My hope at this point is that this announcement is just a pro forma thing, and that the new movies won't actually cause any more problems with the EU than, say, the Thrawn trilogy does now held up against the stuff (I'm reading the annotated _Heir to the Empire_ right now, and it's great to see the author's insights and comparisons to what came later).


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 27, 2014)

Crothian said:


> That's over 150 gaming books; I know I have a copy of each title. There is a lot of crap in that d6 Star Wars collection with a few gems here and there.




Yes, but they established a consistent universe. One that worked, and even made sense of some of the more nonsensical parts of the OT.


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## ShinHakkaider (Apr 27, 2014)

The more that I think about it the more that I think ditching the EU stuff is a GREAT idea. 

Granted there are things about the EU that I think would work great in the films 
but as I said before alot of the EU stuff is of questionable quality. 
Great fuel for RPG's where things can be reworked or tweaked. But as far as the 
new movies go? I dont want the writers to be constrained by the EU stuff. 

I dont want to see the Solo kids and the fate that befalls them. I kinda think Mara Jade 
should be left out. I dont want dead Chewbacca. 
And I REALLY, REALLY HATE the g*dd*mn Yuuhzan Vong. 

I dont want any of that stuff as actual film canon. 

Let the new films stand or fall on their own merits not on the 
carcass of the mixed bag that is the EU. 

X-Wing Rogue Squadron needs to be a TV Series on HBO or SHOWTIME though. 
That would be AWESOME.


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## Umbran (Apr 27, 2014)

Alzrius said:


> This move by Disney is the very definition of flipping the fans off - yes it was primarily motivated by money and convenience, but what gets me is that neither of those things is a very good excuse.




Not a good excuse?  Right.  (begin sarcasm) Because none of the EU was produced for *money*!  Goodness no!  It is all for the deathless ART!!!1!  Clearly, Lucasfilm could be bought for $4 billion because they'd never done something so horrible as make money off Star Wars!  (end sarcasm) Yeah, they want to make money off it, just like everyone else who has worked on Star Wars.  

Really?  Yes, it is for convenience - they want to have space to write new stories without having to worry about conflicting with stuff from a RPG written a quarter century ago.  Much as you may be attached to that canon, it isn't actually an unreasonable desire, when the originator of that canon also felt the need to create elaborate levels to make sure it was clear that canon outside the movies not be taken too seriously.  

Guess what - Star Wars, Star Trek, and comic books are modern mythology.  The stories get retold and changed over time.  Any expectations that they will be sacrosanct for prolonged periods come from failing to recognize the role the stories now fill.


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## delericho (Apr 27, 2014)

wingsandsword said:


> I didn't care too much for the Vong, they might have been more tolerable as a minor race instead of a huge Galaxy-wide threat that spanned a 19 book series over four years.




The thing is that they had to do _something_ different - they'd done "superweapon of the week" to death by that point, and had tried "evil Force user" in several different variations as well.

The Vong were probably the wrong solution to the problem, but at least they were a solution to the problem.

(Besides, wasn't one of the purposes of "Vision of the Future", the second volume in that "Hand of Thrawn" duology _precisely_ to foreshadow "The New Jedi Order"?)


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## Alzrius (Apr 27, 2014)

Umbran said:


> Not a good excuse?  Right.  (begin sarcasm) Because none of the EU was produced for *money*!  Goodness no!  It is all for the deathless ART!!!1!  Clearly, Lucasfilm could be bought for $4 billion because they'd never done something so horrible as make money off Star Wars!  (end sarcasm) Yeah, they want to make money off it, just like everyone else who has worked on Star Wars.




You managed to miss my point completely. Money isn't a good excuse in this case because the existing EU isn't a barrier to them making money. It's not standing in their way of making new stories, so the idea that they somehow need to scrap it to be able to do what they're going to do is a false one.

Oh, and please allow me to congratulate you on setting a respectful tone in your posting that, as a moderator, sets an example for everyone else on EN World. Keep the community classy, Umbran. (end sarcasm)



> _Really?  Yes, it is for convenience - they want to have space to write new stories without having to worry about conflicting with stuff from a RPG written a quarter century ago.  Much as you may be attached to that canon, it isn't actually an unreasonable desire, when the originator of that canon also felt the need to create elaborate levels to make sure it was clear that canon outside the movies not be taken too seriously._




They have all the space they need; regardless of when the old material was written, it's easily incorporated and written around in a manner that can satisfy both the existing material and make new stories. Anyone who thinks that's impossible is suffering a critical failure of imagination. Likewise, I'm not sure what you think that George Lucas and the old "levels of canon" have to do with anything, since Disney made it clear prior to this that those old levels weren't being used anymore, without necessarily discarding any pre-existing material.



> _Guess what - Star Wars, Star Trek, and comic books are modern mythology.  The stories get retold and changed over time.  Any expectations that they will be sacrosanct for prolonged periods come from failing to recognize the role the stories now fill._




Guess what - people don't like it when you scrap large parts of their mythology. That's not an organic "retold and changed over time," that's saying that things that were part of those stories yesterday aren't today. Saying that fans should just expect large swaths of the material to be invalidated willy-nilly is a critical failure to respect the core of your existing audience.


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## MarkB (Apr 27, 2014)

wingsandsword said:


> If the BBC announced that starting with the new Dr. Who series, all the classic old pre-2005 episodes were no longer canonical and would be ignored.




When the new 2005 series began, it was far from clear that they weren't doing exactly that. It was some time before it became fully established that the new series intended to respect the old series continuity. That didn't stop it from being a huge success almost from the outset.

And the new series _did_ override and ignore the continuities built up in hundreds of Virgin New Adventures 7th-Doctor books, hundreds more BBC-published 8th Doctor books, Doctor Who Magazine comic stories, and Big Finish audiobooks.

The fandom didn't collapse. None of that material is lost. The fans (generally) accepted that each of these were alternate fictional settings within the umbrella of Doctor Who.

Star Wars movie continuity has already overwritten EU material in the prequels. Star Wars TV continuity has overwritten EU material in the Clone Wars animated series (heck, the Clone Wars CGI series overwrote the continuity of the Clone Wars cartoon series). Any Star Wars fans who weren't expecting the new movies to overwrite EU continuity were kidding themselves.


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## ShinHakkaider (Apr 27, 2014)

MarkB said:


> Any Star Wars fans who weren't expecting the new movies to overwrite EU continuity were kidding themselves.





As most obsessives tend to do. 

This thread kinda represents the alternatively the Best and Worst of fandom.
The more rational fans understanding how these things work and the other side 
taking it personally and kind of lashing out at the thing they love and other fans. 

I love my hobbies! 

*but I REALLY sometimes hate the fandom*


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## Umbran (Apr 27, 2014)

Alzrius said:


> You managed to miss my point completely. Money isn't a good excuse in this case because the existing EU isn't a barrier to them making money. It's not standing in their way of making new stories, so the idea that they somehow need to scrap it to be able to do what they're going to do is a false one.




I will quote delerico, just above:

"The thing is that they had to do something different - they'd done "superweapon of the week" to death by that point, and had tried "evil Force user" in several different variations as well."

So, the old canon was a barrier, and led them to some things that are widely regarded as poor decisions as to what stories to tell, and collectively that canon does severely limit what stories they can tell, because some 5000 years and more of history has already been stipulated.  A clean slate helps with those restrictions.



> Oh, and please allow me to congratulate you on setting a respectful tone in your posting that, as a moderator, sets an example for everyone else on EN World. Keep the community classy, Umbran. (end sarcasm)




Seems to be your week for disappointment.  First Disney says they won't be bound by the EU continuity, then moderators turn out to be humans, rather than logic-driven machines or Vulcans or something.  



> Guess what - people don't like it when you scrap large parts of their mythology. That's not an organic "retold and changed over time,".




I happen to be a fan of Aruthurian myths.  I was reading a work by Peter David recently, in which he has the entire story as a parable on US politics.  Arthur was cast as dim-witted, weak-willed, but altogether personally pleasant person.  This was not organic "retold over time", but was instead a drastic departure from the centuries-old tradition. 

Mythology gets bent to the times, always has, always will.  They recast Spock.  They tossed out the EU.  Things change.


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## darjr (Apr 27, 2014)

What does this mean to the RPG? How much of it is now no longer Cannon because it came from the EU? That would be weird.


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## Alzrius (Apr 27, 2014)

Umbran said:


> I will quote delerico, just above:
> 
> "The thing is that they had to do something different - they'd done "superweapon of the week" to death by that point, and had tried "evil Force user" in several different variations as well."
> 
> So, the old canon was a barrier, and led them to some things that are widely regarded as poor decisions as to what stories to tell, and collectively that canon does severely limit what stories they can tell, because some 5000 years and more of history has already been stipulated.  A clean slate helps with those restrictions.




If you need help with those kinds of "restrictions," then you're not the right person to be telling those stories in the first place. Simply put, there are many things that are widely regarded as wise decisions regarding what stories to tell, and it's far and away better to build on them rather than throw your hands in the air because you lack the imagination to figure out how to incorporate them into new materials.

Canon is a strength, not a weakness. The people who think otherwise are the wrong sorts of people for the kind of writing required for an existing intellectual property.



> _Seems to be your week for disappointment.  First Disney says they won't be bound by the EU continuity, then moderators turn out to be humans, rather than logic-driven machines or Vulcans or something._




Hm, so a moderator thinks that not being rude to other posters means being a machine or a Vulcan. In that case, yeah, I'd definitely call you a disappointment.



> _I happen to be a fan of Aruthurian myths.  I was reading a work by Peter David recently, in which he has the entire story as a parable on US politics.  Arthur was cast as dim-witted, weak-willed, but altogether personally pleasant person.  This was not organic "retold over time", but was instead a drastic departure from the centuries-old tradition. _




Did that also come with a blanket statement that all of the old Arthurian myths were now no longer valid, and that that story was now to be taken as the canon myth? No? Then, as the young people say, "irrelevant analogy is irrelevant."



> _Mythology gets bent to the times, always has, always will.  They recast Spock.  They tossed out the EU.  Things change._




But they don't always change for the better. People make stupid decisions - this is one of them.


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## delericho (Apr 27, 2014)

Umbran said:


> I will quote delerico, just above:
> 
> "The thing is that they had to do something different - they'd done "superweapon of the week" to death by that point, and had tried "evil Force user" in several different variations as well."
> 
> So, the old canon was a barrier, and led them to some things that are widely regarded as poor decisions as to what stories to tell, and collectively that canon does severely limit what stories they can tell, because some 5000 years and more of history has already been stipulated.  A clean slate helps with those restrictions.




To an extent. Bear in mind the "superweapon of the week" and "evil Force user" have _still_ been done to death. Those stories may not be canon any more, but they're still in the memories of people who've read the books.

But what this gains them is that they don't need to worry about contradicting "EU novel #253" (or, worse, some fan's obsessive not-quite-right memory of the novel). Which is itself a boon, since their field of possible script-writers isn't limited to EU obsessives.



darjr said:


> What does this mean to the RPG? How much of it is now no longer Cannon because it came from the EU? That would be weird.




For existing material, absolutely nothing - no more than the latest Drizzt novel retroactively changes all the existing FR games out there - a group can choose to adopt the changes or not, of course.

What it does mean is that _future_ SW RPG materials will incorporate the new canon and not the old. Which shouldn't really be a surprise.


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 27, 2014)

Sorry, MarkB, but your analogy doesn't hold
The New Doctor Who came with a built-in reason for being able to contradict the previous stories. In fact, Doctor Who (original) came with a built-in mechanic: parallel universes. In one universe, Mars spawned the Ice Warriors. In another the Osirans. In another, the Fehndal. And bouncing between parallel universes was so easy that they never had to even mention it.
Where NuWho fell is that be making season-arcs, they anchored themselves in One universe, and when they contradicted themselves, they made a glaring discontinuity.

Big Finish and NuWho have had massive cross-pollination since the show began, including script and story ideas, writers, producers, and script editors.

Also, one of the delusions behind the 1996 Fox movie was that it would be a pilot for a new show/series reboot. Yet another way in which it utterly failed.

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As for the RPG and how it will be affected: same as any RPG: use the rules you want, dismiss the ones you don't.

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On another level, and yes, this is the pot calling the kettle black, can we please keep this civil and not devolve into personal attacks like bickering, squabbling children or CNN politicians?


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## darjr (Apr 27, 2014)

but what happens when setting content informed rules contradicts the new supplements and setting details? I'm not talking about home games, what does ffg do when they have to contradict what they've already published or hon non canon? can they?


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## Water Bob (Apr 27, 2014)

darjr said:


> but what happens when setting content informed rules contradicts the new supplements and setting details? I'm not talking about home games, what does ffg do when they have to contradict what they've already published or hon non canon? can they?




From what I understand, only the EU set after RotJ is being scrapped.  And, FFG has wisely kept their game set before that time.


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## MarkB (Apr 27, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> Sorry, MarkB, but your analogy doesn't hold
> The New Doctor Who came with a built-in reason for being able to contradict the previous stories. In fact, Doctor Who (original) came with a built-in mechanic: parallel universes. In one universe, Mars spawned the Ice Warriors. In another the Osirans. In another, the Fehndal. And bouncing between parallel universes was so easy that they never had to even mention it.




This sounds like a bit of Fanon you've made up in your own head to reconcile the show's inconsistencies. It's certainly not anything I've heard of being referenced officially. In fact, in-show, it was firmly established in both the original and the new series that travel between parallel universes was practically impossible.

And you're proceeding from a false premise - that, in order for these continuities to all be 'valid', there must be some in-fictional-universe way to link them all together. That's simply not necessary. All of these continuities are entirely fictional, so there's no need to establish one of them as 'true' and declare all others as 'false' unless they can somehow be tied into the 'true' canon.

There is no One Truth - it's all fiction.


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## delericho (Apr 27, 2014)

MarkB said:


> When the new 2005 series began, it was far from clear that they weren't doing exactly that. It was some time before it became fully established that the new series intended to respect the old series continuity. That didn't stop it from being a huge success almost from the outset.




As I understand it, RTD was basically allowed to use as much, or as little, of the old lore as he wanted for the new series - he could have ditched everything but The Doctor, the exterior design of the TARDIS, and the Daleks if he had wanted to. Fortunately, he decided to keep some stuff in, though he certainly didn't feel beholden to everything (and rightly so).

Steven Moffat is much more of an old-series fanboi than RTD, though, so since he's taken over there has been a marked up-tick in the amount of old continuity that the show leans on. This is a mixed blessing - on one hand, the show has a 50-year history to draw from, and there's a lot of good stuff there; on the other hand, in those 50 years there's also a _lot_ of dross.

Pretty much exactly like the SW EU, really.


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## delericho (Apr 27, 2014)

darjr said:


> but what happens when setting content informed rules contradicts the new supplements and setting details? I'm not talking about home games, what does ffg do when they have to contradict what they've already published or hon non canon? can they?




Have FFG published anything that draws on material outside the movie-universe?

IIRC, WotC had to run everything by Lucasfilm prior to publishing. I would expect FFG to have a similar requirement. That would suggest they will have to stick with the approved canon, whatever that turns out to be.


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## delericho (Apr 27, 2014)

(Sorry for three posts in a row, but they're on different sub-topics...)

What I would expect to happen is something like what tends to happen after Marvel/DC culls - they cut back to a minimal set of 'accepted' material (the big characters, plot points, etc). Then, as time goes on, they gradually start to reintroduce material that was in the old canon. So, Supergirl comes back from the dead, Gwen Stacy dies again, or whatever else. Naturally, whoever is calling the shots at the time brings back whatever he or she thinks is the 'best' of the old material - and when they move on in a couple of years, the new guy brings back his own favourites.

Unfortunately, the pattern in comics has tended to be that things get brought back too fast, it very quickly becomes a sprawling mess again, and so they have another cull, and the cycle begins again. (And, worse, each time they do it things get shifted around just a little bit, which makes things even more complex as people have to remember not just who the key players are but also the details of their back-stories _this time around_.)

But... thus far, Disney have been very disciplined in their handling of the Marvel film universe, so I do have some hope that perhaps they do understand the dangers. In which case, maybe they can avoid them? I guess we'll see.


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## billd91 (Apr 27, 2014)

delericho said:


> Have FFG published anything that draws on material outside the movie-universe?




They have. Adventure *Beyond the Rim* is partly set on the Wheel, a location that first appeared in Marvel's initial Star Wars comics line.


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## billd91 (Apr 27, 2014)

I think it's a great decision to not adhere to the EU canon. I'd rather they not be beholden to it and forge new territory given the conditions they have to work with... such as old actors no longer able to play the parts the EU stories would need them to play.


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 28, 2014)

MarkB said:


> This sounds like a bit of Fanon you've made up in your own head to reconcile the show's inconsistencies. It's certainly not anything I've heard of being referenced officially. In fact, in-show, it was firmly established in both the original and the new series that travel between parallel universes was practically impossible.
> 
> And you're proceeding from a false premise - that, in order for these continuities to all be 'valid', there must be some in-fictional-universe way to link them all together. That's simply not necessary. All of these continuities are entirely fictional, so there's no need to establish one of them as 'true' and declare all others as 'false' unless they can somehow be tied into the 'true' canon.
> 
> There is no One Truth - it's all fiction.



No, in the first NuWho ep with the cybermen, The Doctor said that it _Used _to be easy (as Mickey suggested), but without the Time Lords to keep control and order, the system broke down.
The only thing the original series had was travelling through a CVE was bordering on impossible. The CVEs were pocket universes created by Logopolis to combat entropy.
The third Doctor even managed to travel to a parallel universe with a broken TARDIS and sabotaged understanding of time travel.


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## Scorpio616 (Apr 28, 2014)

darjr said:


> What does this mean to the RPG? How much of it is now no longer Cannon because it came from the EU? That would be weird.



FFG will be trying to shove a revised edition into the market to resell you the books you just bought a few years back. Worked for D&D 3.5.


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## Jhaelen (Apr 28, 2014)

delericho said:


> Have FFG published anything that draws on material outside the movie-universe?



Yes. They use EU material in all of their licensed games: in X-Wing and in the Star Wars LCG, too.


Scorpio616 said:


> FFG will be trying to shove a revised edition into the market to resell you the books you just bought a few years back. Worked for D&D 3.5.



This!


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## trappedslider (Apr 28, 2014)

Here's at statement on it from Timothy Zahn

[sblock]Having now had a few days to process the news from LFL, a few thoughts:First, since many of you are wondering, I have *not* yet been asked to write any new Star Wars books. But that doesn’t mean I won’t receive such an invitation in the future. If that happens, whether or not I accept will depend on what kind of story I’m asked to write, what input I’d have on the content, what era the story will be set in, etc. I would certainly *like* to return to the GFFA, but at the moment that’s not my decision to make.


Second, as far as I can tell from the announcement, LFL is *not* erasing the EU, but simply making it clear that nothing there is official canon. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, nor does it immediately send everything into alternate-universe status. If nothing from the Thrawn Trilogy, say, is used in future movies (and if there’s nothing in the movies that contradicts it), then we can reasonably continue to assume that those events *did* happen. It looks to me like the “Legends” banner is going to be used mainly to distinguish Story-Group-Approved canon books from those that aren’t officially canon but might still exist.


Third, even if something from the Thrawn Trilogy *does* show up in a movie in a different form, we authors are masters of spackle, back-fill, and hand-waving. For example, if Ghent appears in the movies but never mentions Thrawn, I can argue that he simply doesn’t want to talk about that era, or else has completely forgotten about it. (Which for Ghent isn’t really much of a stretch.)


Finally, there’s nothing inherently demeaning in the term “Legends.” Think back (a little farther…a little farther) to Disney’s 1950s “Davy Crockett” TV series, (a show I grew up with) which presented stories and legends about the King of the Wild Frontier. Historians have Crockett’s genuine history, but there’s nothing that says these TV adventures *didn’t* happen, right? So until and unless the legend puts Davy in Tennessee at the same time the real history puts him in Virginia, we can still believe those adventures happened. That’s how I expect it to be with the “real” Star Wars history versus the “legendary” adventures of the EU.


Bottom line: let’s all sit back and relax and see what new adventures are offered to us, both in new books and new movies. It’ll be Star Wars, and that’s what counts. [/sblock]


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## jasper (Apr 30, 2014)

Which canon are we talking about? because every time I get in geek fight over SW, I need the rules explained to me. I was always in favor of the "broadcast" canon.  With broadcast meaning the movies on tv shows.


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## trappedslider (May 6, 2014)

what could have been...http://www.bigshinyrobot.com/57412/star-wars-legends-gets-trailer/  *sigh*


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## Water Bob (May 6, 2014)

trappedslider said:


> what could have been...http://www.bigshinyrobot.com/57412/star-wars-legends-gets-trailer/  *sigh*




Goose bumps.


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## sabrinathecat (May 7, 2014)

That was pretty neat. Thanks for that.


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## Nellisir (May 7, 2014)

trappedslider said:


> what could have been...http://www.bigshinyrobot.com/57412/star-wars-legends-gets-trailer/  *sigh*




As someone completely unfamiliar with the Expanded Universe, that was a long list of meaningless names with no reason to care. I got bored after 90 seconds.


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## Homicidal_Squirrel (May 7, 2014)

Nellisir said:


> As someone completely unfamiliar with the Expanded Universe, that was a long list of meaningless names with no reason to care. I got bored after 90 seconds.



Yup... totally agree. Although, I got bored at 41 seconds. I forced myself to watch it, but it was just so pointless.


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## trappedslider (May 7, 2014)

Nellisir said:


> As someone completely unfamiliar with the Expanded Universe, that was a long list of meaningless names with no reason to care. I got bored after 90 seconds.



Not surprising since it was mainly aimed at those who know Legends I mean the EU..considering there's new characters in the next 3 movies that you haven't heard of either why care about them?


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## sabrinathecat (May 7, 2014)

Nellisir said:


> As someone completely unfamiliar with the Expanded Universe, that was a long list of meaningless names with no reason to care. I got bored after 90 seconds.




Then why did you two keep watching?
Seriously?
If you're bored by something, Stop Watching It.
That's my golden rule for entertainment. Sadly, I'm bored by a lot of shows and movies that are popular.
But what's the point of watching something that bores you?


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## Nellisir (May 7, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> Then why did you two keep watching?



Who says I did?



> Seriously?



Yes, seriously. Who? Because that person is a liar.



> If you're bored by something, Stop Watching It.



Yup, that's what I do. If something interesting happened at 1:32, I didn't see it because I closed the window.



> That's my golden rule for entertainment.



Well, that's kind of a bummer of a golden rule.



> Sadly, I'm bored by a lot of shows and movies that are popular.



Maybe your golden rule should be "watch good stuff" and not "turn off boring stuff". It's important to think positive. I don't watch much tv either - there are shows I intend to watch, but mostly that doesn't happen. 



> But what's the point of watching something that bores you?



Well, sometimes they're informational or educational, even about modern culture. But otherwise? I dunno.

Edit: Oh, wait!  I got it! Hope! Hope, that pandoric phoenixian sylph of irrationality. Hope is the reason to keep watching.


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## Nellisir (May 7, 2014)

trappedslider said:


> Not surprising since it was mainly aimed at those who know Legends I mean the EU..considering there's new characters in the next 3 movies that you haven't heard of either why care about them?



The point of a trailer is to make you want to see the movie. That trailer fails.


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## Elf Witch (May 7, 2014)

Enjoyed the trailer quite a bit and I only knew about half the names. I have enjoyed most of what I have read in the EU. There are a lot of stories that I think would translate onto the screen.


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## sabrinathecat (May 7, 2014)

How many people knew who Qui Gonn Jinn, Padme', Queen Amidalla, Jar Jar Binks, Watto, or Boss Nass were before they saw the movie (that weren't involved in the production)? Yeah, they were a bunch of names that didn't mean anything.
Given that the person who made that trailer had very little to work with (just fan films and videos taken out of context or altered, and maybe some video game footage), I think it works pretty well.
Yes, it's tailored to those knowledgeable about EU. Duh.
They had a lot to cram into very little time, with no budget because they were doing this for fun.
Yup, Fun.
That's why they did it.
Go figure.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2014)

You're missing the point though Sabcat. You watched because you were already invested in it. People watched the prequels in part because they were already invested in the property. 

Imagine someone talking about stories set in their home brew DnD game. How interested are you in gaming stories?  That's how interesting I find the EU. 

That's why they have to set aside the EU in large part. Because it's very very unlikely that a hundred million Chinese viewers have any idea about most of the written EU.


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## MarkB (May 7, 2014)

Hussar said:


> That's why they have to set aside the EU in large part. Because it's very very unlikely that a hundred million Chinese viewers have any idea about most of the written EU.




Indeed. The trailer didn't bore me, and I knew most of the names, but _as a trailer to attract new viewers_ it would have worked just as well - or as poorly - with a bunch of made-up names that had never featured in the EU.


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## Nellisir (May 7, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> How many people knew who Qui Gonn Jinn, Padme', Queen Amidalla, Jar Jar Binks, Watto, or Boss Nass were before they saw the movie (that weren't involved in the production)? Yeah, they were a bunch of names that didn't mean anything.



Exactly two names were mentioned in the first trailer for Episode I: Anakin Skywalker and Obi Wan Kenobi.  



> Given that the person who made that trailer had very little to work with (just fan films and videos taken out of context or altered, and maybe some video game footage), I think it works
> pretty well.



The piece from Serenity was really jarring, but aside from that, yes, it was put together well.  I think there was too much voiceover and not enough text; it would have been stronger with a "less is more" approach.



> Yes, it's tailored to those knowledgeable about EU. Duh.



And so it's less appealing to those without that knowledge. Thanks for making my point.



> They had a lot to cram into very little time, with no budget because they were doing this for fun.
> Yup, Fun.
> That's why they did it.
> Go figure.



And hurrah for them. It's a good product for a niche audience; it just doesn't work outside that audience.


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## sabrinathecat (May 8, 2014)

Nellisir said:


> And so it's less appealing to those without that knowledge. Thanks for making my point.
> And hurrah for them. It's a good product for a niche audience; it just doesn't work outside that audience.




Sounds more like a general lack of interest in Star Wars beyond just watching movies.
(Not meant as a personal attack)


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## MarkB (May 9, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> Sounds more like a general lack of interest in Star Wars beyond just watching movies.
> (Not meant as a personal attack)




I think it's fair to assume that there _is_ a general lack of interest in Star Wars beyond just watching movies. Given the inherent geek-friendly nature of these forums I'm sure most people here who are Star Wars fans will have experienced it to some extent in other media, whether it be RPGs, computer games, novels, comics or something else, but generally speaking, I doubt whether anything more than a small minority of the people who watch and enjoy the Star Wars movies have had more than a glancing acquaintance with the Expanded Universe.


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