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Post by geoffrey on Apr 23, 2021 11:49:58 GMT -6
I for one think that the very notion of Star Wars canon is unfortunate, above and beyond the fact that any such canon is doomed to collapse under its own accumulating contradictions.
For most people, Star Wars is something like this: "Star Wars? Oh, yeah. I saw that a long time ago. Let's see... Luke and his friends (including some robots and the big hairy guy--Chewbacca?) fight against Darth Vader and the evil empire. They win when Luke blows-up the Death Star. Oh, yeah. He used the Force. May the Force be with you!"
Now start asking such people about events and characters in the prequels, the sequels, the novels, the video games, the comic books: "UHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH..."
So "canon" loses most potential viewers/readers right out of the gate. ("Thrawn? Rey? Dooku? What? Who are all these guys?")
I wish that Star Wars would instead adopt the near-total lack of consistency as found in the Kong/Godzilla/Rodan/Mothra/Ghidorah/etc. movies. It doesn't even matter that Kong was killed in 1933 and Godzilla in 1954. There they are again, alive and well and no explanation necessary! Just giant monsters fighting the military and each other.
So any Star Wars movie, TV show, book, comic, game, etc. would have perfect freedom to adopt and/or ignore any and all Star Wars stuff that came before. Contradictions? Irrelevant! Rey and Mace Windu team up to fight against Darth Vader? Perfectly fine! ("But.. But... None of those three even existed at the same time!" Balderdash! Rey, Mace, and Vader don't exist in real life, so you can do anything you want with them.)
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Post by Deleted on Apr 23, 2021 11:59:04 GMT -6
Hence my idea of "pocket continuities" in the Splinter of the Mind's Eye thread. If "ownership" of a franchise is spread out than canon can be pick-and-choose, the same way that what's "canon" in OD&D is. It depends on the house. The house always wins. In my house, Dooku and Thrawn have a place, but Rey...well, I prefer the Solo twins and Ben Skywalker. Sorry, not sorry.
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Post by geoffrey on Apr 23, 2021 12:09:19 GMT -6
Indeed.
Splinter of the Mind's Eye includes Cthulhu.
Is King Kong a good guy or a bad guy? Is Godzilla a good guy or a bad guy? In both cases, depends on the movie!
So maybe Darth Vader is a good guy and saves the galaxy from Cthulhu...
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Post by Deleted on Apr 23, 2021 13:10:01 GMT -6
I agree, people asks too much for explanations and consistency nowadays.
It's fiction! Let's have some fun and that's it!
Consistency and details sometimes is cool, but sometimes isn't.
About Darth Vader being good... I don't think he's "Evil" at all.
The Emperor is Evil for sure, but Darth Vader for me looks like a "blinded by faith" guy, doing what he think is right for the good of the Galaxy.
I love Count Dooku, I also think he's a Good guy, if you consider the Animations as Canon there is a lot of moments when he shows mercy, but I consider him more "aware" of the Evilness of the Empire than Darth Vader... Vader sounds a very passionate/blind guy to me.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 23, 2021 15:50:59 GMT -6
I agree, people asks too much for explanations and consistency nowadays. It's fiction! Let's have some fun and that's it! Consistency and details sometimes is cool, but sometimes isn't. About Darth Vader being good... I don't think he's "Evil" at all. The Emperor is Evil for sure, but Darth Vader for me looks like a "blinded by faith" guy, doing what he think is right for the good of the Galaxy. I love Count Dooku, I also think he's a Good guy, if you consider the Animations as Canon there is a lot of moments when he shows mercy, but I consider him more "aware" of the Evilness of the Empire than Darth Vader... Vader sounds a very passionate/blind guy to me. I think the casting of Christopher Lee as a conflicted ex-Jedi who joins a separatist movement from pure motives but gets in too deeply with evil was one of the high marks of the prequels. That and letting Ian McDiarmid ham it up as Palpatine in episode III, and Ewan McGregor as young Obi-Wan. I also really enjoyed Liam Neeson as Qui-Gonn and he was sorely missed in the other films. But that's just my preference and is probably heavily influenced by me having been young when those movies came out. I'm from a particular generation who grew up with the originals on VHS and the prequels as they came out. People either older or younger by a few years might or might not share my views on those subjects. |
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Post by Malcadon on Apr 25, 2021 8:37:21 GMT -6
Humm...? A long time ago in a béthorm far, far away. . . .Oh boy! There are too many crazy 'ships' I would canonize. No! The power of headcanon is too great!  |
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Post by verhaden on Apr 25, 2021 18:02:14 GMT -6
I agree, people asks too much for explanations and consistency nowadays. It's fiction! Let's have some fun and that's it! Consistency and details sometimes is cool, but sometimes isn't. About Darth Vader being good... I don't think he's "Evil" at all. The Emperor is Evil for sure, but Darth Vader for me looks like a "blinded by faith" guy, doing what he think is right for the good of the Galaxy. I love Count Dooku, I also think he's a Good guy, if you consider the Animations as Canon there is a lot of moments when he shows mercy, but I consider him more "aware" of the Evilness of the Empire than Darth Vader... Vader sounds a very passionate/blind guy to me. Vader is absolutely evil -- ham-fisted redemption scene in RotJ not-withstanding. In the first film, he tortures Leia and actively works to recover the plans for the Death Star. He stands by as billions die on Alderaan. He intends to kill Obi-Wan and believes he has. He has no qualms about freezing Han in the second film and tries to convince Luke to join the Dark Side. When he realizes Leia is Luke's sister, he tries to use her to get him to convert -- threatening to turn her to the Dark Side. In the prequels, especially RotS, he kills everyone in the Jedi temple -- including the "younglings." He tries to kill Obi-Wan. If you drown your children in a bathtub because you think God told you so... In other fiction, Sauron believes he's doing good by bringing about order to Middle Earth. After the changing of Arda, he's convinced himself that Eru has washed his hands of Middle Earth. He sees the Istari as spies and the Valar as would-be conquistadors. Saruman believes he can work good by "pretending" to ally with Sauron, but is ultimately doomed to follow the same path towards evil. Only Gandalf recognizes that, with the ring, while he would try to do good it would ultimately turn sour -- like a celestial North Korea. |
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