A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

Are Star Wars animated series only placeholder canon until the movies decide what actually happened during that time frame? No.  Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Star Wars Rebels,  and  Star Wars: Resistance  are coequal in canon to the live-action films. Especially  Star Wars: The Clone Wars,  because that series was created and executive produced by George Lucas and was the last  Star Wars  content he personally oversaw. The only animated series that meets the “placeholder” criteria is the 2003–2005  Star Wars: Clone Wars  2-D micro-series created by Genndy Tartakovsky and co-produced by Lucasfilm and Cartoon Network. Intended as a means to bridge the three-year in-universe gap between  Attack of the Clones  and  Revenge of the Sith,  Tartakovsky’s series was just one of many elements in Lucasfilm’s multimedia Clone Wars campaign, as well as a backdoor pilot to George Lucas’s CGI animated series.  Star Wars...

Note: This review discusses the  Genndy Tartakovsky-directed 2003-2005 microseries, not the George Lucas-produced Star Wars: The Clone Wars series that aired on Cartoon Network between 2008 and 2014. As a Star Wars fan of the '77 Generation, I remember vividly the yin-yang effect of the seemingly endless wait between Episodes when it became apparent that George Lucas' unexpectedly successful space-fantasy film was part of a larger storyline that was destined to span nine “saga” films. On the one hand, my friends and I looked forward to the release of The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi with a mix of enthusiasm and impatience, with thoughts such as Man! Three years till the next one? That's like freakin' forever! often crossing our minds. On the other hand, the waiting period also became a time of much speculation about the characters, possible story developments, and both the characters' origins and possible future fates. A...

Cover art by Steven D. Anderson. (C) 2005 Del Rey Books and Lucasfilm Ltd.  One of the more challenging aspects Star Wars fans face when they read any of the “expanded universe” novels set in the Prequel Era is dealing with the fact that the characters from the films have their destinies set in stone. Most of them, especially those that have followed George Lucas’ space-fantasy saga since the first Episode premiered in 1977, are keenly aware that the Galactic Republic depicted in the Prequel years is being transformed into the Galactic Empire, that the once-unassuming and politically unassailable Palpatine of Naboo is the mysterious Sith Lord known as Darth Sidious, and that the brash and headstrong Anakin Skywalker will turn his back on his fellow Jedi Knights and every good thing he stands for and become the infamous Darth Vader. These broad strokes on this huge celluloid and literary canvas have, of course, been visible for over 40 years, but there are still plenty of l...