Disney has some exclusive Lithographs if you preorder from their on-line store.  However, their price is $5 more than amazon and they don't have expedited shipping available, so I'm not sure if you would receive it on release day.  Shipping is also $5.  They do give you a $10 off a future order coupon, so it could be a wash if you order stuff from them in the future.

Quote from: Jeff on March  8, 2016, 10:27 AM

I'm sure recasting James Bond the first time freaked out all the folks at JamesBondDefender.com back in the day.  They were all like, "Sean Connery = James Bond"!  But they recast him and life moved on.  I guess at the end of the day, I'm fine with recasting Han Solo because no matter what happens, we'll always have Harrison Ford Han Solo. 

Well, they did recast James Bond with George Lazabey which turned out to be a disaster. The producers had to get Connery back.

Quite a different situation here.  Connery had starred in five consecutive Bond movies in a short time and then they changed the actor for one film.  On Her Majesty's Secret Service is easily a better movie than Connery's return in Diamonds are Forever.  In this situation, there is no way you can have Ford star as a young Han Solo.  It would be like trying to get Connery back to replace Craig.

Turns out McAfee was signed in all the way, so that fixed the problem.  The preinstalled Mail program is pretty poor, but the live mail is pretty similar to outlook express, so it isn't to bad.  Got all my stuff transfered over pretty quickly.

Quote from: Dave on February 23, 2016, 09:55 AM

I personally like that the new movies will not be forced in to some crazy continuity Twister game. 

THIS.

This is ultimately what the whole CANON vs LEGENDS is all about.  I know that the Zahn-Thrawn trilogy is one of the most beloved story arcs of the EU, but even that is something where if the movie had treated that as part of the backstory, TFA might have lost the audience in serving those story points.  But more likely TFA would have been a completely different movie.

Yes, that is why I support the whole Legends thing even though I own and have read all the adult novels and a lot the younger reader stuff that has been released since the original ANH novelization.

There would be just too much to have to adhere to if Disney were to follow the old EU and would severely handicap themselves.  Not only would they have to adhere to all the characters that had died, they would also have a far future endpoint to build towards due to the Legacy comics.

The Zahn trilogy is always held up as an EU story that feels the most like Star Wars and many EU fans wanted to see that trilogy as Episodes VII to IX.  While it does well on the page, it would make a really boring trilogy.  There isn't too much in the novels to adapt as an action movie.  Even if it were made at the time of the novels release, it just wouldn't have been that great.  While Thrawn is/was a tactical genius, I don't know how well that would translate to the big screen.  I'm not sure where they are going to go with Snoke, but Snoke could have more potential, especially if he is skilled in the dark side.

Here is how it worked in terms of canon.  The films were the top level and CW (the cartoon, not the comics, or the micro series) was level below that and about the books and comics.  Lucas always reserved the right to overwrite the EU at any time.  While there was a continuity where contradictory items were either retconned or removed from continuity, it was never on the same level as the movies.  Like was mentioned above, the Karen Traviss Mando novels are a prime example.  She detailed the culture and the training of the clones.  Lucasfilm decided that having pacifists ruling Mandalore was a better idea and essentially threw the Traviss stuff out of continuity, hence why she quit writing Star Wars novels.  The Dark Horse comics were similarly run rough shod over.  Dathomir is another case where Lucas's daughter essentially took credit for the whole concept of the Nightsisters without giving any credit to Dave Wolverton.

Fast forward to the Disney purchase.  Disney purchased all the rights to Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and Lucasfilm.  Lucasfilm created the Story Group and really did the only thing they could by shoving all that was the EU into what is now Legends.  Regardless of any of us who have read enjoyed many of these novels, the general public has not.  Imagine trying to go into what was the newly announced Episode VII trying to explain to the general public that Han and Leia eventually got married, had a set of twins named Jaina and Jacen and then another son named Anakin.  Much later Luke gets married to a Mara Jade who worked as an assassin for the Emperor and was tasked with killing Luke.  They eventually have a son named Ben.  A group of aliens invade the galaxy and they can't be sensed in the Force and they do a number on the New Republic and the newly formed Jedi.  The essentially destroy Coruscant as it was seen in the prequels.  Anakin dies as a teenager fighting said aliens.  Jacen is captured and tortured, eventually sending him down a dark path, because heaven forbid we would have been smart enough to distinguish Anakin Solo from Anakin Skywalker, hence the mandated killing of said Solo.  Years go by, and Jacen is trained by obscure Marvel comics character Shira Brie aka Dark Lady of the Sith Luymiya, who was trained in secret by Darth Vader.  Jacen takes over the government, kills Mara and becomes Darth Caedus.  His twin sister is then trained by Boba Fett and the Mandalorians.  She eventually suceeds in this task.  Han and Leia are left to raise Jacen's daughter in secret.  Jaina eventually marries Jagged Fel, son of a former Imperial ace pilot and eventually will become Empress of the Imperial Remnant, or so we are to assume because in the future their are Force wielding Fels who are in charge of the Empire.  Oh, and Chewbacca is dead because the aliens mentioned above dropped a moon on him and he sacrificed himself to save Anakin Solo who was then mandated by Lucasfilm to be killed off since they could not have Anakin Skywalker in the prequel movies at the same time their is Anakin Solo in the books.

That is where we would have been this past December (or May if the original date was pushed) if the EU were raised to canon and forced to be followed as the template.  Way too much meta knowledge to please us geeks who read all these books.

When the Story Group was established and they relegated EU to Legends, they said they could pick and choose what to use from Legends.  If the Thrawn in Rebels is true, that does not mean all the Timothy Zahn novels become canon.  The Story Group has said that canon contains all the episodic movies, all the spin-off stand alone movies, the Clone Wars series (but not the Gendi series), the Rebels series, including the unfinished episodes, all novels and young reader novels starting with A New Dawn, all the Marvel comics, all video games going foward.  The Dark Horse series, Son of Dathomir, counts as both in the Legends continuity and the new canon.  It is included in the new canon because it is adapted from unused Clone Wars scripts.  The on-going MMO The Old Republic has been branded Legends and is currently the only on-going Legends series.  That is why Lucasfilm has stated the ST Finn fights was one of his four squadmates from his training days per the short story in the young adult novel Before the Awakening.

Some of the new canon books reveal how much Luke has grown in his Force powers.  One of those books is called 'The Weapon Of A Jedi' and revolves around Luke after the events of A New Hope.  And Sarco Plank from The Force Awakens got brought into play in that story which revolves around Luke and the Skywalker lightsaber.  And from what I've heard he does duel with the lightsaber in the course of that story.

As for Vader?  The backstory that I've read with him is that he had hunted down the majority of the Jedi in the first few years following the foundation of the Empire.  By the time of A New Hope it had been a long time since he had dueled anybody.  And the same goes for Obi-Wan.  Both of them were far from their prime, and that's why their dueling capabilities were significantly diminished from the time of the Clone Wars and the events of Revenge Of The Sith.  However, I've also read that Vader had resumed his lightsaber training following his duel with Obi-Wan Kenobi on the Death Star, and that's how he was in much better form when he encountered Luke at Cloud City.

The problem with that explanation is that it is revisionist history under Disney.  While it is now the official canon, it certainly wasn't when ESB and ROTJ came out.  While we didn't have the internet back then, there isn't any evidence of the amount of whining we see about Rey while giving Luke a pass in a similar situation.

The new comics have also had Luke fight a Rancor pre ROTJ.  ROTJ doesn't give the impression that he had run into a rancor before.  While the new canon may fill in the holes, your average Star Wars "fan" doesn't read it and does not have the knowledge to say "Luke did this between ANH and ESB".  They only know what was in the movies.  The young reader novel does have Finn and his sqaudmates duel with melee weapons, so it is easy to assume that he wouldn't be completely useless with a lightsaber.  However, again, the average fan doesn't know that and just assumes he has never used anything, but a blaster.

I too am tired of the "Rey is good at everything, Kylo Ren should have kicked her butt".  Let's ignore the fact that Chewie shot Kylo Ren before the duel or that Finn got a hit on him.  Yes, Finn shouldn't have been able to do it because he doesn't have the Force.  It isn't like he was trained in melee weapons like the ST he faced on at Maz's place.  If people can't stand Rey, then they should hate Luke and ROTJ.  When Luke beat Vader, he had exactly one duel against a live opponent, unless you count the cave on Degobah.  Even on Cloud City, completely unskilled Luke Skywalker scored a hit on Vader, who had infinately more lightsaber dueling experience.  Rey has some experience in melee weapons as shown when she fought off the thugs with her staff.  If Luke can beat Vader in ROTJ, then Rey can beat an injured Kylo Ren.