Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Today's big Star Wars news out of Celebration is a doozy.
When Disney bought Lucasfilm one of the core creative decisions made was to draw a distinct line between what was officially canon and what was now "Legacy" (Formerly Expanded Universe). They decided that if everything that had been written in novel and comic form was official then it would tie their hands when continuing the main saga.
So they chose the prequels, OT, The Clones Wars and Rebels to be their canon and everything else became essentially fan-fiction, to the frustration of many of the hardcore who have spent countless hours (and money) filling in the gaps in George Lucas' gigantic universe. I applauded that decision then (mostly because I wasn't a fan of 98% of the EU stuff, admittedly) and am still behind it.
At the time they said that didn't mean they wouldn't cherry pick some stuff from the Legacy work, just that they didn't want to be bound by a book from 20 years ago that says what Luke Skywalker is doing now.
Today at Star Wars Celebration they announced the biggest inclusion of previously non-canon material when they showed the trailer for Season 3 of Star Wars Rebels.
Grand Admiral Thrawn is the character that the vast majority of Star Wars EU fans were complaining about when they got upset that all previous book were cut loose from the greater franchise. Timothy Zahn's Heir to the Empire Trilogy is the best of the best, in my opinion, of the EU stuff.
We don't know exactly what this means for Thrawn and the previous books he appeared in. The Heir to the Empire Trilogy were essentially the original "what happened after Return of the Jedi?" story, with the Grand Admiral picking up the pieces of the Empire. Since so much is still unknown in the space between Episodes VI and VII it's possible some of that may appear, but what we do know is that he's now officially involved in Star Wars Canon in the years leading up to A New Hope.
They also announced that Timothy Zahn will be writing another, in canon, book simply titled THRAWN.
Lars Mikkelsen (Mads' brother) provides the voice for the blue-skinned character in Rebels Season 3. And how about that trailer, huh? Big things are happening in one of my absolute favorite additions to the Star Wars lore since the OT. Can't wait to see how it unfolds.
Thoughts?
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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