Disney to Purge Select EU

[Scott]

I'm not sure I have read anywhere but I am curious based on a Tweet I saw from Willrow Hood, what does this news mean for all of the craptacular backstories created for the Databank?  Even if the characters are canon does it mean that Hammerhead was a plant loving hippy named Momaw Nadon or not?  Is Willrow Hood carrying an Ice Cream Maker or a (lame) Computer Memory Core?

[EdSolo]

The backgrounds would all be Legends until such a time they would be included in new material.  In a bit of weird news, the Han Solo Adventures and the Lando Calrissian Adventures from 1979 and 1983 respectively are being rereleased in the fall with a Legends banner on the cover.

[Jeff]

Even if the characters are canon does it mean that Hammerhead was a plant loving hippy named Momaw Nadon or not?

Excellent question.  Are Ohwun/Chachi De Maal, back to being Ellors Madak/Baniss Keeg, or are they nerfed all the way back to just "Duros"?  Or is that even Legends, so now they're back to being "Goggle-Eyes" as they were called in the SW call-sheet for the cantina?

These are definitely the types of things we should be worrying about.

[SnTrooper]

I really feel bad for the people that run Wookieepedia. Now every article on the site that isn't purely from the movies/tv shows (Unidentified Rebel #2, Tera Sinube, Zeb, etc) or already was noncannon (LEGO games, Tag & Bink, Infinities, etc) is outdated. Even if it just means slapping a Legends banner on it.

[P-Siddy]

Willrow Hood is legendary, not "legend"ary.  Long live the Ice Cream Maker!

[GrandMoffNick]

1) Disney had to have free reign on what happens in the new movies, books, games, etc. I understand  that.
2) Doesn't mean the books, games, etc. didn't happen, because they WERE produced, written etc. Toys were made, blah blah blah

Those are the two things that make whatever they do okay with my brain. It's fiction, I can deal if it doesn't all fit together, I will always consider it all "true" and the word canon will just not matter to me.

That being said, the biggest kick in the nuts for me on what Disney is doing, AND I have only skimmed a lot of people's posts here, so sorry if I say something wrong or attribute it to the wrong person.

But if what Jesse said was correct, ie until the Disney stuff "cancels" it out it is still canon, I'd be more ok with it. But if what Ed says, it's just all not canon right off the bat, that is the typical Disney kick in the nuts to me. Mickey says, "Who cares that this stuff has been in the lexicon for up to 37 years. We bought this, which means we can do what we want, and so it's all not canon anymore." Up yours! I think, for those of us who enjoy EU stuff, that is an ahole move. It just adds to my dislike of Disney.

Why not piss me off one item at a time? Let me think Thrawn exists while I deal with Jacen and Jaina and Mara not existing. "Un-canon" it as called for. But don't wipe it from canon asap.

The Legends thing is better than nothing, but overall bad taste in my mouth.

[GrandMoffNick]

Even if the characters are canon does it mean that Hammerhead was a plant loving hippy named Momaw Nadon or not?

Excellent question.  Are Ohwun/Chachi De Maal, back to being Ellors Madak/Baniss Keeg, or are they nerfed all the way back to just "Duros"?  Or is that even Legends, so now they're back to being "Goggle-Eyes" as they were called in the SW call-sheet for the cantina?

These are definitely the types of things we should be worrying about.

I can't even wrap my head around what this would mean if it's out.

[Jesse James]

Ed,

That's exactly why I said to you we're basically saying the same thing in my last post. 

EU was ALWAYS EU...  It was always something Lucas could, and did, dump on when he wanted to.  Even Clone Wars was kept below the canon because if Lucas had a fart crosswise on any given day, he maybe would've gutted it.  But EU was and is still EU.

And yeah, EU is going to be called Legends, which means it's still just EU that can be dumped on, just now with a longer name to type out.  That's been my point from the start.  That's my point now.  I'm glad you see it my way.    EU isn't dead, it's just there with a different name, just like before in just about every way.  Clone Wars 3D got bumped up.  Okie dokie.  Nothing changed then more or less to people.

The expanded universe isn't "dead" though, is the main point (which was being bandied about way too much from Twitter to forums)...  It's there.  You can't kill something created like that.  Even if overwritten it'll be there for people to enjoy, who did enjoy it.  It won't, in some dipshitty nerd argument online, override the films or whatnot, but who cares?  It's a hypothetical argument about a fictional galaxy, so who cares what anyone says you can think? 

If someone comes up and says, "No that's not true because Book X overwrote that story in the Disney era!  You can't think like that!", you can calmly explain to that person what a woman actually feels like, and then tell them you don't want to talk to them about Star Wars anymore because they're being a ******bag.

Like what you want, F what anyone tells you, and enjoy Star Wars how YOU want to enjoy it.  That's the best advice anyone can be given.  It's like these new movies...  They won't take away the first 3 you loved, so why let them make you hate a franchise you loved?  I have learned to loathe Episode 1, but it won't make me hate Star Wars. 

If the people making the new stuff have the EU at their fingertips to dip into, why can't fants?  I'll take and leave what I want.  It's easy.  Likewise I'll do the same with any novels, games, comics and other junk coming forward in the Disney era where someone who didn't even create this fictional universe is now buying said fictional universe to make money off said fictional universe.

Again, the simple point this whole thread has been that EU isn't "dead".  Dead implies it ceases to exist.  You can't make a book cease to exist in the mind of someone.  Likewise, EU may be called something other than EU, but elements of EU are already being written into whatever they think the new definition of "canon" is, which means elements of the things you or I loved will still be around and that gives EU now as much credibility as EU had before.  IE: There till overwritten.

And who knows what's coming from books, comics, and games...  It could be some really dismal work.  I don't know what they are, how good they'll be, etc.  LFL always said they kept that in check, but every interview with Lucas can clearly show you they didn't and that he found most of it laughable.  So I imagine Disney will be equally light-handed and look at it as the investment it is, not as something holy to be cherished.  If the guy who created it didn't, Disney won't.  To that end, I'll stick with picking and choosing from the new EU-canon they're rolling out.  I want to like it all.  I just know better from decades of being a fan that it won't all be quality work.

[Jesse James]

Even if the characters are canon does it mean that Hammerhead was a plant loving hippy named Momaw Nadon or not?

Excellent question.  Are Ohwun/Chachi De Maal, back to being Ellors Madak/Baniss Keeg, or are they nerfed all the way back to just "Duros"?  Or is that even Legends, so now they're back to being "Goggle-Eyes" as they were called in the SW call-sheet for the cantina?

These are definitely the types of things we should be worrying about.

The two guys who WERE are now brothers  One named Duros, who works in a Tatooine adult toy store with his brother Harold.  They're arguing about the fake dong selection because Harold says they should be organized by size, and Duros says it should be a color palette. 

I like the new direction this new EU is going with this because some guys just work at an adult toy store on a backwater planet, and aren't out to assassinate Jabba The Hutt, or flew with Darth Vader once in the Clone Wars, or were secret spies for the Alliance or Empire.

Some guys are just guys, working at a crummy job with their brother, arguing about adult toy displays.

[P-Siddy]

Some guys are just guys, working at a crummy job with their brother, arguing about adult toy displays.

And others want to serve ice cream in a nice quiet floating city on Bespin.

[Jesse James]

Exactly.

Some guys just fix AT-ST's...  That's it.  They do nothing else.  They have a wife and kids...  They get up, go to work, and start fixing.

Some guys build Destroyers for a living...  Welders, electricians...

Star Wars' biggest EU flaw was everyone had to be something.  The world's made up of nobodies.  Not everyone in a bar is a criminal, or an assassin stalking his prey.

I bet one of the people wandering Mos Eisley that probably got some assinine backstory was just looking for a place with a public toilet because he'd eaten some bad Bantha and had the trots.  His "EU" story probably was that he was a spy, for the Alliance, monitoring Imperial Patrol numbers in the city, and alarmed by the increased Sandtrooper presence!  *Gasp!*

Nah, he sharted, and was looking to clean up.  That's all.

[P-Siddy]

Nah, he sharted, and was looking to clean up.  That's all.

Yeah, that makes me think of the poor street cleaner on Mos Espa that didn't get around to cleaning up so Artoo ran through it.

But that's a valid reason why I didn't like some EU: everyone was connected to some major character through some reason.  Some of this was from the card game.  But I liked the backstory for Nobot (the 3-PO wandering around Mos Espa).  He was considered some ghost robot, cursed... but his story is likely nowhere to be found now.

[Jesse James]

The "Tales of" books really crapped out a lot of spanners in their time too.

[SnTrooper]

The expanded universe isn't "dead" though

It is in the sense that there won't be any new stories coming from it. "Canceled" might be a better term. Like a TV show. Sure you still have the DVDs, it's still being shown in reruns, but there isn't going to be any new episodes. And the remake they are working on is, for the most part, going to ignore the old show and do their own thing.

[Jesse James]

Yeah, cancelled is maybe better...  But, there's more "EU" coming, in a sense.

Really, if you wanted to, ALL this stuff is expanded universe now, including these new movies, just as it used to be...  Classic Star Wars "Certain point of view" coming. 

It's not Lucas anymore.  It's not like these people created Star Wars, they're just being allowed to play in that universe because someone with money bought the rights to do so.  Lucas is more or less washing his hands of it.  Wanna bet he's not looking at it like it's "canon"?  Wanna bet he's even laughing at some of the ideas?  There's a quote where he said Luke would never have married, the story's about Vader and a tragedy, he'd never have written 7-9 anything like the EU that's out there, and he isn't writing 7-9 now.

Think about it like this...  I'm a huge LOTR fan, to the point I jumped at a chance to take a class on studying JRR Tolkien as a writer...  If someone wrote more stuff based on Tolkien's Middle-Earth simply because his family sold the rights to do so, I wouldn't consider it anything but EU to that world, no matter what the guy who bought it told me.

The hypothetical he/she who did this (paid for it, etc) may think their work is "canon", but who cares what they say?  View the new books, games, etc., as just more EU if you feel like it...  Like I said SnTrooper, who's to tell you you're not right?  Would you want to be engaged in a conversation on Star Wars that's supposed to be fun, or interesting, or make you think about something you didn't think about, when they're going to throw the "canon" word around at you like there's laws and rules to a world that doesn't even exist?

Why do your thoughts not matter?

I find that person sad, personally.  They want to control the thoughts of others.  I doubt Disney even views it so rigidly.  They'd probably roll their eyes at this conversation even being entertained.

Me and my customizing buddies used to spend evenings chatting about different designs we came up with for ships, aliens, whatever.  We'd cite real-world tech, biology, Star Wars Tech or design commonalities, etc.  But it was just brainstorming...  Sometimes people would come into the conversations saying, "Well it can't be like _____ because comic _____ established that it can't be... blah blah blah".

Yeah, THAT's a guy I want to waste 1 second of my life talking to.

You can cite things sure, but when someone says, "Eh, I don't like that", guess what?  He's as right to say that as you were to cite it because you're neither one George Lucas...  And hell, even George Lucas LAUGHED at EU, regularly.  I can dish quotes all day long of him poo-poo'ing the EU that made him lots of money, and gave fans mixed feelings.  Boba getting vomited from the Sarlacc?  Lucas hated the idea.  Coruscant?  He had to be convinced to use it because it was a major planet in the PT and he wanted to name it himself. 

I wouldn't doubt for a second Lucas, in his heart, doesn't think the Disney Era Star Wars is really Star Wars to him.  He may like aspects of it, but I bet he's going to his grave thinking Star Wars was basically 6 movies he made about Darth Vader, and it ended there.