SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
With most of the Expanded Universe declared officially non-canon, the Universe is relatively open and unexplored. Disney publishing along with Lucasarts have announced 20 new stories to fill in some of the details before the new movie is released.
Some love all the extra background material, while others never bothered. Are there any of the EU stories that you felt made for a better setting overall, and why? What might they do better this time around?
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
20 New Star Wars Books and Comics to be Released
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 28 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Remember the good old days, when CPU was singular?
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @05:56AM
Yeap! Some European Union stories may benefit of a better setting; e.g. Greece's story.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @08:49AM
Well, from the point of story telling, the setting of Greece's story is great. Lots of drama and conflict, surprising twists, definitely not a predictable plot. A top author couldn't have invented it better.
Of course, as something happening in the real world, it's not so great.
(Score: 2) by bootsy on Friday March 13 2015, @09:39AM
You mean the Iliad and Odyssey?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fishybell on Friday March 13 2015, @06:08AM
Step 1: Remove canon of expanded universe stories
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Profit!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @06:15AM
The EU almost to a page is fucking awful. The only ones even CLOSE to readable was the Thrawn trilogy.
TBH, while I'm not surprised this discussion is now on..... I honestly thought the other place and here would have had something about Terry Prachett?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by ticho on Friday March 13 2015, @06:48AM
Anything written for EU by Timothy Zahn was quite good. Above mentioned Thrawn trilogy, Hand of Thrawn duologu, Outbound Flight + Survivor's Quest. The rest, well... Mostly average.
Still, it will be miles ahead of anything Disney will come up with.
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Friday March 13 2015, @08:43PM
This was originally submitted before Terry died.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by frojack on Friday March 13 2015, @06:12AM
I stepped into the Google Play Books store on my phone, and literally got tired of scrolling before I hit the end of the Star Wars books. Hundred.
Why should I care about THESE 20 books any more than the others? Will they be better?
This whole Canon / Non-Canon proclamation is a strictly financial decision by the new owners of the copyrights attempting to wring a few more millions out of a franchise that had pretty much run its course.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Friday March 13 2015, @06:23PM
Can you still do that in 2015? Dark Horse lost the rights to distribute the franchise on Dec 31, 2014. Incidentally, for a few days prior to that date, they offered their entire Star Wars digital library (through their online reader) for $300, which you could continue to read after they were no longer allowed to sell them.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday March 13 2015, @10:08PM
just did it yesterday.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @07:05AM
anyone else want to see JD wielding a light saber while dressed as a pirate?
(Score: 1) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @08:00AM
https://www.fanfiction.net/Star-Wars_and_Pirates-of-the-Caribbean_Crossovers/8/1617/ [fanfiction.net]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @11:05AM
No.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @07:54PM
"anyone else want to see JD wielding a light saber while dressed as a pirate?"
JD? Who's that? Judy Dench? Sure - could be entertaining!
(Score: 2) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Friday March 13 2015, @11:19AM
I made the mistake of trying to read an "EU" novel once. It was so bad that remembering it still makes me want to vomit. I think Lucas Film would put anything out with the words "Star Wars" on the cover. They did not care about quality. The hired hack writers who could meet a word count by a deadline, and if the product was any good, it was accidental to the process of pumping out the product.
So, the line jumped out at me: "many are still being written and edited" ... ! Disney isn't going to change the modus operandi here. They're still going to hire hack writers who can meet a page count by a deadline. The quality level is going to be atrocious.
(E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
(Score: 3, Funny) by The Archon V2.0 on Friday March 13 2015, @01:40PM
I find myself reminded of the time Penny Arcade mocked the SW novels, where the evil undead-themed Sith guy was called Darth Andeddu. Made worse because this was an audio book, so the alternate spelling did nothing to mask it.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2012/01/25/hope-springs-eternal [penny-arcade.com]
http://www.penny-arcade.com/news/post/2012/01/25/star-wars-crap [penny-arcade.com]
Darth Fruitbasket is part of my headcanon.
(Score: 2) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Friday March 13 2015, @03:03PM
I don't know whether to laugh or cry, but after a decade of Disney cramming their version of Star Wars down our throats (and I mean this Negan style, to mix metaphors), some day in the future I imagine people are actually going to be nostalgic for the bumblingly inept and stupid prequels, which will have a sort of innocent charm (except the part where Vader kills kids) and be quaint compared to Disney's marketing blitz.
But they won't like the fiction. I love what the link says about SW:TOR making the guy want to read the novels, and then the reaction he had. I hope he had a barf bag handy. The fiction is so ... bad ... I almost can't believe anyone would publish it. I would enjoy the monkeys with the typewriters more.
(E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Archon V2.0 on Friday March 13 2015, @05:36PM
> some day in the future I imagine people are actually going to be nostalgic for the bumblingly inept and stupid prequels
The scary thing? Talk to a 20 year old. A lot of them love the prequels more than the originals because the light saber fights are "awesome".
I don't know, maybe I'm a freak. I mean, if you asked me to name my favorite fight between a master and a former apprentice who changed sides, it sure as hell wouldn't be the tedious CGI extravaganza at the end of the 3rd prequel.
Hell, add in the qualifier of "my favorite fight *involving lava* between a master and a former apprentice who changed sides" and it's still below both the Darths & Droids version of the same scene AND the fight between Logray and Morag in the Ewoks cartoon "Sunstar vs. Shadowstone" (which I thought was actually pretty good).
> But they won't like the fiction. I love what the link says about SW:TOR making the guy want to read the novels, and then the reaction he had. I hope he had a barf bag handy.
I've never been brave enough. I read some spinoff fic for other franchises when I was a book-starved teenager. Even though teenage-me had both more patience for crap and less ability to determine a good book, I eventually switched to tracking down fanfic on the pre-Google Internet because while it was more uneven in quality it somehow still had a better average.
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Friday March 13 2015, @08:50PM
I'd be curious which you read. there are some real stinkers out there, but there are also a lot of great stories.
(Score: 1) by Noble713 on Friday March 13 2015, @04:55PM
Obviously Zahn's Thrawn trilogy takes the cake, but I also enjoyed Karpyshyn's Darth Bane: Path of Destruction. Haven't gotten to the other 2 Bane books though.
Most of the rest is crap, I especially despise all that Yuuzhan Vong stuff.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @05:06PM
Anyone else not give a fuck about star wars anymore?
I liked the first trilogy of movies.
I didn't mind the second trilogy of movies.
I even liked the first two animated TV series (especially the one by the Samurai Jack guy [wikipedia.org]).
I really enjoyed reading the Han Solo Adventures. [wikipedia.org]
But all of this expanded universe stuff is starting to seem like Disney just cranking the meat-grinder.
I never had any interest in the 90s fad of authors writing stories in the "universe' of another author - I wish I could name an example, seemed like the genre practically took over the SF&F shelves in most bookstores, but since I didn't read them, I don't remember any of them. But it feels like the same corporatized blandness where the unique stuff that distinguishes space opera from regular soap opera - the "world" of the story is barely more than a rubber-stamp. If I wanted soap operas, I'd stick to soap operas.
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Friday March 13 2015, @09:06PM
THe first EU novel came out in 1979. This is not a new or Disney thing. In fact, Disney has not released any new EU material yet. All of the hundreds of books and comics came out between 1979 and 2012.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2015, @10:22PM
> THe first EU novel came out in 1979.
You mean the Han Solo book that the OP linked to?
Thanks for adding useful information to the discussion.
(Score: 3, Informative) by GeminiDomino on Friday March 13 2015, @11:11PM
Second, actually.
Splinter of the Mind's Eye [wikipedia.org] beat Han Solo Adventures to print by a year.
The latter was better, though, IMO. Brian Daley also did a pretty fantastic job writing the NPR radio shows, I think.
"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of our culture"
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2015, @01:17AM
Gotta give credit to Splinter which turned me on to Foster.
Haven't thought about that guy for like 15 years.
He had a knack for really fun and light adventures built on top of some great SF premises and he did a good job building his own worlds.
(Score: 2) by GeminiDomino on Saturday March 14 2015, @06:52AM
Absolutely. I didn't mean to imply that Splinter was bad at all, so I hope I didn't give that impression. I've just been a Han fanboy since I was 4. :D
"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of our culture"
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Wednesday March 18 2015, @07:39PM
If you have not yet, read "Sentenced to Prism"
Not Star Wars, but one of my favorite books by Foster. A fun read with a unique point of view.
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Wednesday March 18 2015, @07:30PM
I agree. I loved Han Solo Adventures. Still do, though they are written as juvenile fiction. Splinter was interesting, but it did not fit the universe, and was almost immediately invalidated by ESB RotJ.