Q&As About 'Star Wars': What would it take to recreate the Star Wars sequels based on the Star Wars Expanded Universe rather than the new Canon?

Photo Credit: Alex Diaz-Granados

What would it take to recreate the Star Wars sequels based on the Star Wars Expanded Universe rather than the new Canon?

For this to occur, you would need to be living in a totally different universe, one where:

1. George and Marcia Lucas had never gotten divorced, thereby creating an environment in which a less stressed-out Lucas would not have taken a hiatus from making Star Wars films
2. Lucas personally oversaw the Expanded Universe and gave it co-equal canon status to the films
3. The EU was consistently good and written by a core of authors who could work with Lucasfilm - and George himself - and not have any tonal or narrative dissonance
4. The EU authors would not bring any of their non-Star Wars “eccentricities” or import weird versions of crossover stuff from other franchises (Star Trek) thinly disguised as Star Wars
5. Luke Skywalker would not become a ridiculously overpowered demigod whose portrayal differs from one author to another
6. The EU actually expanded beyond the Skywalker family
7. The EU excluded children’s books such as The Jedi Prince series
8. The EU excluded tropes such as Boba Fett’s escape from the Sarlacc and his Moby-Dick-like obsession with the Solo family

In short, in this alternative universe, the EU is carefully plotted, its authors all work in concert with the franchise creator, and stay true to the themes and tropes of the films.

In reality, this did not happen. The EU, beloved by a small subset of the larger Star Wars fandom, was a hodgepodge of novels, comic book series, the roleplaying game sourcebook materials, young-reader books, and even video game backstories that George Lucas had extremely little interest in.

Locking new Star Wars films to a mishmash of stories that includes Dark Empire, The Crystal Star, Children of the Jedi, Planet of Twilight, The New Rebellion, and the overlong and tedious New Jedi Order series (which borrows heavily from Star Trek’s Borg story arcs) is a horrible idea. For every EU/Legends fan out there who claims that the ancillary materials are more canonical than the films and that they consider the EU to be the real Star Wars, there are hundreds, perhaps thousands more who either (a) have not read the books and don’t plan to, or (b) have read enough of the books and comics to be in a position to judge them subjectively.

In addition, from a moviegoer’s perspective, going to films based on books is hardly a thrilling “I wonder what will happen next in Star Wars?” experience. For fans of the books, it would most certainly always be a disappointing experience; movie adaptations have to cherry-pick the essential themes and core plot points of a novel or short story, but they can’t include every detail or plot twist from a 300-page novel. It simply cannot be done, not in the feature film format, where the ideal running time for the average movie is between 90 and 120 minutes. Try, say, taking Timothy Zahn’s Star Wars: Heir to the Empire and strip it to a two-hour movie that is both faithful to the tone of the novel and still has surprises for an audience.

Also, there are fewer Star Wars readers than there are viewers of the films. This is a reality that even the most ardent EU/Legends fan has to come to grips with. Yet, I keep seeing these die-hard “Never Disney” EU-besotted fans who keep on proposing that Lucasfilm somehow erases five films from the public consciousness and replace them with adaptations of stories that only a small fraction of the Star Wars fandom has any knowledge of. Talk about a case of the tail wagging the dog.

Also, let’s say Lucasfilm agreed to this rather silly proposition. Not only would it rob filmmakers and screenwriters of any creative freedom whatsoever, but it would also be a constant source of tension between the fans and the studio. Fans being fans, there would always be some geeks griping that “Thrawn would never do this!” or “Boba Fett’s daughter never did that in the books!” Or we’d hear choruses of “Rian Johnson raped my childhood because he didn’t make Luke Skywalker a Super Ninja Sayan Demigod Grand Poobah Jedi Master with a hot redheaded wife named Mara Jade.”

So, please, stop. Just stop.