Star Wars EU - the things it got really wrong
- Thread starter Sluis Van Shipyards
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When googling for an answer, I came across STILL MORE EU ANNOYANCES! :lol One source says R5-D4 was a rebel spy that sacrificed itself. :facepalm Another says the R5 line was notorious for mechanical failure. Sheesh, one scavenged droid on the Outer Rim breaks down, and the entire production line is maligned! :lol
The EU is full of stuff like that, trying to fill in every little crack with info. And there's never a simple explanation for anything. (Couldn't R5 have had a bad motivator because....it had a bad motivator?) Occum's Razor will not be entertained in the SW EU!
Yeah there are stereotypes all over the place. Heck most novels have EVERY Corellian being a smuggler who has no use for the odds. Seriously. The games have done this too, as I pointed out in other threads. All Gran, Weequay, etc. works for Hutts because they did in ROTJ. All Rodians are bounty hunters, Bothans are all sneaky spies, etc.
Well yeah you're right, I didn't think about that. I think that power makes sense because it's something like what Yoda did with the Force lightning where he absorbed or collected it and sent it back.
Solo4114
Master Member
When googling for an answer, I came across STILL MORE EU ANNOYANCES! :lol One source says R5-D4 was a rebel spy that sacrificed itself. :facepalm Another says the R5 line was notorious for mechanical failure. Sheesh, one scavenged droid on the Outer Rim breaks down, and the entire production line is maligned! :lol
The EU is full of stuff like that, trying to fill in every little crack with info. And there's never a simple explanation for anything. (Couldn't R5 have had a bad motivator because....it had a bad motivator?) Occum's Razor will not be entertained in the SW EU!
All of this is basically the product of lack of imagination and bad writing. Really. It's that simple.
There's this impulse in the Star Wars fan community (well, certain corners of it) to try to connect everything and fill in the blanks for everything. To some extent, this has been spurred on by the merchandising arm of Star Wars, like with special limited edition action figures for EVERY member of Red or Rogue squadron who got a line or even a camera shot in the movie, and the collectible card series for naming every freaking alien in the Cantina and everywhere else.
The games have been incredibly myopic about this, too. Smugglers are always basically just gunslingers with "thief" abilities. They never fit, say, the Talon Karrde mold of an information broker with a mind for organization and subtlety.
These are people who believe that the only way to reference something is to repeat it, rather than to draw similarities between the new thing and the old thing via implication. They basically just repeat what they saw before but stick it in a new setting or fact pattern, and call it good. In my opinion, this approach also plagues the Prequels themselves. There was apparently a scene where Anakin brawls with a young Greedo and someone scolds him, saying he'll come to a bad end. Seriously. This is the kind of crap that almost made it into the movies, and arguably did make it in, via things like Anakin building 3PO, and Chewie being best buds with Yoda.
Laspector
Master Member
Actually, they were not drinking it at breakfast. They were drinking it at dinner the night before. He didn't set out looking for R2 until the next morning. So it could be like someone drinking pop or tea or something like that for dinner.
But here's the one I don't get--Jawa juice? What in the world is that? Do they squeeze Jawas until the juice runs out? Sick!
DakGibralter
Member
Oh crap, you're right. Still, they serve it at cantinas. I guess there's nothing like a pitcher of cocktails between a family to unwind after a long day. Farming moisture must be soul-crushing work.
Not just the merchandising and EU. George and Katie did a lot of that in the Clone Wars. According to them, every female Dark Side Force-user is either a Dathomiri Nightsister or an exiled Dathomiri Nightsister. Even the Witch of Endor from the TV movie.
As for the card and role-playing games, it makes sense to have a name and backstory and stats for every extra seen on-screen. It's for flexibility and play value. I never necessarily ascribed "gospel truth" credence to a lot of it, though. As for action figures... I wish they hadn't stopped at just pilots. I hate the cost I'm looking at to get a dozen of the accurately-proportioned limited-edition Red 2 X-Wings so I can tweak the details into all of Red Squadron at the Battle of Yavin, but I'm glat that there are at least most of the pilots shown (Leader, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, and 12) in action figure form (think we're still missing 10 and 12...). Other people want all the Jedi. Other people want all the cantina aliens. Etc. But you don't need names and backstories for action figures. *points back to "Walrus Man" and *Hammerhead" figures from 1978 as a for-instance*
All of that bugs me still. Not just because we shouldn't have seen Yoda in the Prequels at all, but because George felt the need to connect everything to everything else.
--Jonah
Solo4114
Master Member
Right. Instead of having a wide, expansive universe, you have a fishbowl.
What's weird is that he attempted to do some of that (and much of the EU does the same) by introducing new locations, new characters, etc....but then undermines it with "overly coincidental" stuff, with the net effect feeling as if the universe is very, very small.
These days, Rebels is doing an amazing job of showing a broader vision of the Star Wars universe, in my opinion.
What's weird is that he attempted to do some of that (and much of the EU does the same) by introducing new locations, new characters, etc....but then undermines it with "overly coincidental" stuff, with the net effect feeling as if the universe is very, very small.
These days, Rebels is doing an amazing job of showing a broader vision of the Star Wars universe, in my opinion.
Not to mention how often we go to frikkin' Tatooine... :facepalm
--Jonah
--Jonah
Solo4114
Master Member
I'm still kinda annoyed that they're going back again in Ep. VII. For a planet that's farthest from the bright center to the universe, it sure seems to be the actual center of the universe. I expect there are good in-story reasons to do it, but I'd really like to break out of the same ol' same ol' with this series and see some really new, very different stuff. I gather we're gonna see that in other aspects of the new film, although I'm still largely maintaining my media blackout.
Riceball
Master Member
Are they going back to Tattooine? I haven't heard any mention of that except for some theories that Jakku(?) is just a code word for Tattooine. Regardless, it's bad enough that they felt it necessary to include another desert world in the new trilogy, it will be really disappointing if Jakku just turns out be Tattooine.
Everything I've seen indicates Jakku is a different planet -- from a different number of moons to no reason I can think of why the Empire would be fighting over Tatooine. We'll find out in a couple weeks when the new comics and novels start coming out for the "Road to the Force Awakens".
--Jonah
--Jonah
Solo4114
Master Member
Oh, I don't know. I've been in a media blackout, like I said. I just saw "desert world" and assumed "Oh. Tatooine again..."
Hopefully they can really distinguish the two planets effectively and otherwise move beyond "desert world," "ice world," and "forest world." I mean, I get that Flash Gordon is an influence, but isn't it about time for us to see, like, open fields and grass for a change? Jungles? Aquatic planets? And so on? Let's stretch the imagination a bit.
That, I will concede, was one of the strengths that'd pop up from time to time in the EU. They introduced places like Nar Shadaa and Coruscant and Myrkr and whatever the name of the dead planet was that the Noghri lived on. The films have done some of that, but each time they went back to the old places...especially when they made critical action revolve around them, it just made the universe smaller.
Random thought: the book cover artists almost never deviated from hair and clothing styles depicted in the OT. I guess nobody ever decided to change it up...
Hopefully they can really distinguish the two planets effectively and otherwise move beyond "desert world," "ice world," and "forest world." I mean, I get that Flash Gordon is an influence, but isn't it about time for us to see, like, open fields and grass for a change? Jungles? Aquatic planets? And so on? Let's stretch the imagination a bit.
That, I will concede, was one of the strengths that'd pop up from time to time in the EU. They introduced places like Nar Shadaa and Coruscant and Myrkr and whatever the name of the dead planet was that the Noghri lived on. The films have done some of that, but each time they went back to the old places...especially when they made critical action revolve around them, it just made the universe smaller.
Random thought: the book cover artists almost never deviated from hair and clothing styles depicted in the OT. I guess nobody ever decided to change it up...
The Noghri planet was called Honoghr.
The Battle of Jakku is the central story point of the new Battlefront game coming out, I know that much... Ad I know there are several other new worlds in TFA and Rogue One, plus one or two we've seen before.
--Jonah
The Battle of Jakku is the central story point of the new Battlefront game coming out, I know that much... Ad I know there are several other new worlds in TFA and Rogue One, plus one or two we've seen before.
--Jonah
TooMuchBBQ
New Member
"Hopefully they can really distinguish the two planets effectively and otherwise move beyond "desert world," "ice world," and "forest world." I mean, I get that Flash Gordon is an influence, but isn't it about time for us to see, like, open fields and grass for a change? Jungles? Aquatic planets? And so on? Let's stretch the imagination a bit."
Aquatic Planet = Kamino
The most diverse planet so far has been Naboo, with grasslands, jungle/forest, and significant water. Alderaan seemed a little more diverse as well, but we didn't really get to explore it much.
I think the only EU I've read is the first Rogue Squadron novel. I never read anything else because I just had this nagging feeling that none of it was 'really' Star Wars. It sounds like they fell to the same temptation of the Prequels in shoehorning everything in and trying to make it fit somehow. C3-P0, a clearly mass produced protocol is built, from scratch, by Darth Vader. He should have been working with the Jedi, you know, since he's a Protocol expert, might be handy to have along on trade negotiations. Then they could meet the funny little R2 unit on Amadala's ship. Easy.
(but then....Annakin should have also been an established pilot when he meets Obi-Wan, not a miracle birth 6yo in love with a 16yo princess...)
Aquatic Planet = Kamino
The most diverse planet so far has been Naboo, with grasslands, jungle/forest, and significant water. Alderaan seemed a little more diverse as well, but we didn't really get to explore it much.
I think the only EU I've read is the first Rogue Squadron novel. I never read anything else because I just had this nagging feeling that none of it was 'really' Star Wars. It sounds like they fell to the same temptation of the Prequels in shoehorning everything in and trying to make it fit somehow. C3-P0, a clearly mass produced protocol is built, from scratch, by Darth Vader. He should have been working with the Jedi, you know, since he's a Protocol expert, might be handy to have along on trade negotiations. Then they could meet the funny little R2 unit on Amadala's ship. Easy.
(but then....Annakin should have also been an established pilot when he meets Obi-Wan, not a miracle birth 6yo in love with a 16yo princess...)
I don't think it was supposed to be from scratch. I think the implication he was swiping protocol droid parts from Watto, and kept building until he had a working droid. Now, if that means Threepio's CPU/brain/whatever, and thus personality, was pre-existing from a former life within another frame, ya got me.
I was never a fan of the canonizing of BioWare's Knights of the Old Republic game series. The very foundation of the first game was to take place so far back in Star Wars' past that you could believe these massive events could happen either way yet still have enough time between than and now to develop into the Star Wars we know. The freedom in shaping the galaxy, choosing alliances and do things your way was awesome. Fans were given this one era to do with whatever they wanted and Lucasfilm decided to take the events and make their own canon and say this is how it all went down. Not to mention if your preferred way of playing the Knights of the Old Republic games are any different than what's told 'in canon', than you've just been hit with a double dose of de-canonizing. BioWare says your play through doesn't count, and Lucasfilm says your play through doesn't count regardless of the choices you make. Grr.
I agree somewhat, but my take is that the Force was behind all of these things and that's why things played out. I wouldn't mind seeing Coruscant pop up in the new movies because that's a planet that is really interesting in my opinion.
Yeah it's a totally different planet. I posted way earlier in one of these threads that when the SW Battlefront game details were coming out that they said Jakku was the scene of a massive battle right after Endor. That's why there are crashed ships all over the surface.
I agree and I hope some of people doing the new SW projects look through the old EU if they are looking for a certain kind of location. There are a lot of interesting places rather than just deciding they have the ability to make something up so they'd do that.
As for the covers, that is the one and only thing I think the New Jedi Order series did well, particularly the Japanese covers. They actually aged the characters and have them look different.
I only read the early EU and Vector Prime because I knew Chewie died. Thrawn was great. Super weapons are pretty boring and are really only useful when you're getting started. Once your are up and running you need someone who is all brains and psychology, not power. That's why you had the Death Star in Star Wars, and Vader and his big reveal as the thing in Empire.
The lack of imagination really sucks. Too many super weapons for one thing. Also the Clone Emperor was really stupid as was resurrecting Luke's struggle with the dark side. Been there, done that. Yawn.
One thing I really dislike is explaining plot holes that aren't plot holes. For some reason, everyone is convinced that Vader and the Emperor should be able to locate Yoda, Kenobi, Luke and Leia through the Force no matter where they are, and the fact that they didn't do this for 20 years is some kind of huge plot hole that needs to be explained. For Yoda they explained this "plot hole" by saying the Dark Side cave masked Yoda's "Force scent," or some such.
I'm not really sure why anyone would think this kind of "Force GPS" is even possible. If Vader could have done this, why does he use probe droids to find Luke at Hoth and torture his friends to lure his son to him in Empire? How come Luke and Vader are surprised to encounter each other when the former shows up at Endor in Jedi? How come Vader never locates Kenobi until his old master is in the same hanger with him, maybe 50 feet away?
Stuff like that just makes me think of the EU as being kind of dumb, especially when I went and spoiled myself on authors like Asimov, Clarke, etc. They were really smart guys that were knowledgeable about many things; science, language, science, history, logic, and did I mention science? Too many authors (and filmmakers) seem to lack well-rounded education.
But what really irks me is how often EU writers are really dumb when it comes to understanding meaning and subtext and what Star Wars was all about.
The EU's escalation of Force "super powers" is a great example of this. In the movies it was pretty clear that, while Force users had some amazing physical and mental abilities, these were fairly limited. They can run faster and jump higher, survive some environments and events that would kill others, and had some limited precognition, telekinesis, and telepathy. Yet the EU has Jedi initiates flinging a fleet of Star Destroyers out of the Yavin system or the Cloned Emperor creating "Force storms" that ripped apart super star destroyers, Force body swapping, etc.
The justification for this is always to cite Yoda's line about "size matters not" and telling Luke that moving stones and moving an X-Wing are "no different, only different in your mind" so technically throwing starships around doesn't contradict what Yoda says and in fact it's exactly what Yoda was talking about.
No. Wrong. It's not what Yoda or the Empire Strikes Back was about at all. Not one bit. The "Do or Do Not" scene was all about Luke's attitude and how it was holding him back and he was setting himself up to fail. Lifting the X-Wing out of the swamp was just used to make a point because Luke thought it was impossible.
With Yoda, we were expecting a "great warrior," not a frail old muppet who walked with a cane. The whole point of making Yoda physically weak was to show us that the Force was something that transcended the physical world. It was a spiritual thing. Yes you could do some amazing magic tricks but that wasn't the point.
Relying on super powers and super weapons is easy. Lots of franchises fall victim to it. If the bad guy has a big gun, you beat him by blowing it up. It's got a David vs. Goliath underdog element built in. So easy. The trouble is it only works once. It works in the first chapter when you don't have time for a complex villain, but after that it needs to get psychological.
In Star Trek II the genesis device was just a mcguffin; what made the movie interesting was the battle of wits between Kahn and Kirk. Kahn get the upper hand initially by outsmarting Kirk, and Kirk beat him by doing the same. They beat the super weapon by making the ultimate sacrifice with Spock's death.
In Star Wars the Death Star explosion always gets a cheer, but the more memorable moment is Vader's "I am your father," line. Though he had already beaten Luke physically, that line destroyed him psychologically.
With Batman Begins the plot is to destroy Ra's train. With the Dark Knight the whole movie is about what Batman has to do to defeat the joker. Does he cross that line and kill him? Does he reveal his identity and surrender?
You get the idea.
The lack of imagination really sucks. Too many super weapons for one thing. Also the Clone Emperor was really stupid as was resurrecting Luke's struggle with the dark side. Been there, done that. Yawn.
One thing I really dislike is explaining plot holes that aren't plot holes. For some reason, everyone is convinced that Vader and the Emperor should be able to locate Yoda, Kenobi, Luke and Leia through the Force no matter where they are, and the fact that they didn't do this for 20 years is some kind of huge plot hole that needs to be explained. For Yoda they explained this "plot hole" by saying the Dark Side cave masked Yoda's "Force scent," or some such.
I'm not really sure why anyone would think this kind of "Force GPS" is even possible. If Vader could have done this, why does he use probe droids to find Luke at Hoth and torture his friends to lure his son to him in Empire? How come Luke and Vader are surprised to encounter each other when the former shows up at Endor in Jedi? How come Vader never locates Kenobi until his old master is in the same hanger with him, maybe 50 feet away?
Stuff like that just makes me think of the EU as being kind of dumb, especially when I went and spoiled myself on authors like Asimov, Clarke, etc. They were really smart guys that were knowledgeable about many things; science, language, science, history, logic, and did I mention science? Too many authors (and filmmakers) seem to lack well-rounded education.
But what really irks me is how often EU writers are really dumb when it comes to understanding meaning and subtext and what Star Wars was all about.
The EU's escalation of Force "super powers" is a great example of this. In the movies it was pretty clear that, while Force users had some amazing physical and mental abilities, these were fairly limited. They can run faster and jump higher, survive some environments and events that would kill others, and had some limited precognition, telekinesis, and telepathy. Yet the EU has Jedi initiates flinging a fleet of Star Destroyers out of the Yavin system or the Cloned Emperor creating "Force storms" that ripped apart super star destroyers, Force body swapping, etc.
The justification for this is always to cite Yoda's line about "size matters not" and telling Luke that moving stones and moving an X-Wing are "no different, only different in your mind" so technically throwing starships around doesn't contradict what Yoda says and in fact it's exactly what Yoda was talking about.
No. Wrong. It's not what Yoda or the Empire Strikes Back was about at all. Not one bit. The "Do or Do Not" scene was all about Luke's attitude and how it was holding him back and he was setting himself up to fail. Lifting the X-Wing out of the swamp was just used to make a point because Luke thought it was impossible.
With Yoda, we were expecting a "great warrior," not a frail old muppet who walked with a cane. The whole point of making Yoda physically weak was to show us that the Force was something that transcended the physical world. It was a spiritual thing. Yes you could do some amazing magic tricks but that wasn't the point.
Relying on super powers and super weapons is easy. Lots of franchises fall victim to it. If the bad guy has a big gun, you beat him by blowing it up. It's got a David vs. Goliath underdog element built in. So easy. The trouble is it only works once. It works in the first chapter when you don't have time for a complex villain, but after that it needs to get psychological.
In Star Trek II the genesis device was just a mcguffin; what made the movie interesting was the battle of wits between Kahn and Kirk. Kahn get the upper hand initially by outsmarting Kirk, and Kirk beat him by doing the same. They beat the super weapon by making the ultimate sacrifice with Spock's death.
In Star Wars the Death Star explosion always gets a cheer, but the more memorable moment is Vader's "I am your father," line. Though he had already beaten Luke physically, that line destroyed him psychologically.
With Batman Begins the plot is to destroy Ra's train. With the Dark Knight the whole movie is about what Batman has to do to defeat the joker. Does he cross that line and kill him? Does he reveal his identity and surrender?
You get the idea.
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I'm annoyed I can only 'like' this post once...
Except go back further. "The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force". I like to think -- whatever limitations one does have -- that he was talking about more than telekinetically choking Motti out from across the room.
--Jonah
Except go back further. "The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force". I like to think -- whatever limitations one does have -- that he was talking about more than telekinetically choking Motti out from across the room.
--Jonah
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