Is SWTOR still canon?

[CrutchCricket]

I think few people mentioned Vietnam when talking about Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

However, you claimed that this game affected what happened in the movies, and that now does not apply. The same thing could be said about Thermopylae. Who knows if there were no fuzzy creatures involved, because it all happened long time ago.

...sure man. Whatever you say.

 

You keep using this word hate...I don't think it means what you think it means. I've been quite clear about what I think about the SW universe -- if I had wanted to use the word 'hate', I would have.

Dislike then? Despise? Who cares? This is literally semantics at this point. You don't like SW the way I do, is that an accurate enough statement for you? It's not really relevant to the discussion at all, apart from my curiosity in asking you a few posts back.

 

Nobody is taking anything away or saying that anything that happened didn't happen. Nobody is pulling a Lucas and modifying the previous works to excise whatever you think they already incorporated. To my knowledge, all that Disney is doing is saying that nothing that wasn't already incorporated should be assumed to have happened, and that new content will only be required to adhere to a more limited set of works. The only way I see something that was already written "going away" is if a new work explicitly does something that would contradict the Legendary work. I'm sure it will happen, but it's hard to evaluate whether any specific "change" is good or bad until it does happen.

Uh... yes they are. Before Disney, the EU happened (except in specific cases where Lucas said otherwise). After Disney it didn't happen, apparently. At all. Ever. No part of it. Why is this so hard to understand?

 

Yesterday the wall was blue, except for parts that were painted white. The painter could paint whatever he wanted white but if he didn't, the wall was blue. Today it's all black and white. Now maybe they'll add other colors, maybe they'll even add a touch of blue. But it will never be the blue wall again. Get it now?

[Aries_cz]

...sure man. Whatever you say.

Merely a bit of blowing your comment out of proportion

Now for all we know the universe is the way it is because of anthropomorphic fuzzy animals.

For all we know, there were fuzzy anthropomorphic animals as Therompylae, because nobody remembers the full history anymore, just like nobody in SW movies remembers what happened during SWTOR.

 

Yesterday the wall was blue, except for parts that were painted white. The painter could paint whatever he wanted white but if he didn't, the wall was blue. Today it's all black and white. Now maybe they'll add other colors, maybe they'll even add a touch of blue. But it will never be the blue wall again. Get it now?

Pretty sure you can still repaint a black wall to be blue again, it all depends on what will you paint it over with. However, in our case, we are going to end up with kind of blue-ish color and some other colors, because lot of the new stuff is going to draw from old stuff.

And as far as anybody knows, Disney has no plans in Old Republic era for now, so it is not out of the realms of probability that they could easily decide to make SWTOR canon, especially since BW is closely working with LucasArts group during development.

[eartharioch]

...sure man. Whatever you say.

 

 

Dislike then? Despise? Who cares? This is literally semantics at this point. You don't like SW the way I do, is that an accurate enough statement for you? It's not really relevant to the discussion at all, apart from my curiosity in asking you a few posts back.

 

 

Uh... yes they are. Before Disney, the EU happened (except in specific cases where Lucas said otherwise). After Disney it didn't happen, apparently. At all. Ever. No part of it. Why is this so hard to understand?

 

Yesterday the wall was blue, except for parts that were painted white. The painter could paint whatever he wanted white but if he didn't, the wall was blue. Today it's all black and white. Now maybe they'll add other colors, maybe they'll even add a touch of blue. But it will never be the blue wall again. Get it now?

 

1) "We don't appreciate the same parts of the SW universe" would suffice. In particular, I don't like the (IMO) low quality of writing in Jedi and the prequels, nor [most] of what [little] I've read of the EU. I do appreciate the ideas and imagery of the universe, so I don't consider myself a "hater". Put another way, I like the concepts a lot more than the execution.

 

2) I really don't get your idea of canon. Lucas (and Disney) were never under any obligation to continue to license new EU works (books, games, whatever), and Lucas (and thus Disney) was never obligated to incorporate anything from the EU (at whatever below-G-level canon). Basically, it sounds like people are mad that Disney chose to make entirely new movies instead of adapting a bunch of books that most potential moviegoers hadn't read -- despite the fact that that's probably exactly what Lucas would have done if he had made more movies.

 

If it's any consolation, I do think that certain things, like renaming Korriban to Moribund (or whatever) are/were pretty lame. It's one thing to ignore what was really no more than glorified fanfic, it's another to make it obvious that you read [some of] that fanfic and want to take something from it but don't want to actually admit that that's what you're doing.

[CrutchCricket]

Pretty sure you can still repaint a black wall to be blue again, it all depends on what will you paint it over with. However, in our case, we are going to end up with kind of blue-ish color and some other colors, because lot of the new stuff is going to draw from old stuff.

And as far as anybody knows, Disney has no plans in Old Republic era for now, so it is not out of the realms of probability that they could easily decide to make SWTOR canon, especially since BW is closely working with LucasArts group during development.

You can. But will you? Probably not. Otherwise you'd have left it blue from the beginning, at least for the sections you weren't going to apply new paint to. And when I say blue I mean blue. Not blue highlights, not blue dots, not aqua or navy or whatever the hell. Blue. The same shade we've been used to for over two decades and we (as defined only by the people who will agree with this view) love.

 

Disney blew it all away because a) they don't care and b) they plan on screwing with it. Otherwise they'd have left the unobtrusive stuff alone. And don't get me wrong, If Disney came in tomorrow and announced everything's back except for the stuff they're going to do in the movies, I'd be ecstatic. Except we both know that's not going to happen.

[CrutchCricket]

1) "We don't appreciate the same parts of the SW universe" would suffice. In particular, I don't like the (IMO) low quality of writing in Jedi and the prequels, nor [most] of what [little] I've read of the EU. I do appreciate the ideas and imagery of the universe, so I don't consider myself a "hater". Put another way, I like the concepts a lot more than the execution.

Cool.

 

2) I really don't get your idea of canon. Lucas (and Disney) were never under any obligation to continue to license new EU works (books, games, whatever), and Lucas (and thus Disney) was never obligated to incorporate anything from the EU (at whatever below-G-level canon). Basically, it sounds like people are mad that Disney chose to make entirely new movies instead of adapting a bunch of books that most potential moviegoers hadn't read -- despite the fact that that's probably exactly what Lucas would have done if he had made more movies.

No. Not at all. I never held anyone under obligation to continue to make books/games/whatever (but figured they would because they're partial to money). I also never expected them to adapt any existing EU work, or otherwise specifically validate it. It would've been awesome in my opinion, if Ep VII-IX turned out to be the Thrawn trilogy but I never expected it to. What I did expect is, for the parts that weren't in their way, at least the common courtesy to leave them the hell alone. New movies set post-Jedi were going to overwrite some things. Realistically everyone needed to make peace with that. But that's a far cry from going out of your way to invalidate every single damn thing in the EU, regardless of whether it had any bearing on what you were doing or not. That's what happened.

 

If it's any consolation, I do think that certain things, like renaming Korriban to Moribund (or whatever) are/were pretty lame. It's one thing to ignore what was really no more than glorified fanfic, it's another to make it obvious that you read [some of] that fanfic and want to take something from it but don't want to actually admit that that's what you're doing.

Exactly, it's a slap in the face and the one thing I'm afraid of more than just arbitrary definitions of canon. These are indications that more things like this are down the pipe, namely screwing with all lore, just because they can.

[Edzew]

I don't hate Star Wars, I just accept it for what it is (and isn't). I don't see why this would be a huge blow for people who love the EU, though. Nobody is taking your books and lore away, just nobody is planning on filming it, but (to my knowledge) nobody was ever planning on filming it, so you haven't really lost anything.

 

you are correct they are not taking the books i already have and have read away BUT they ARE taking the ones that continued their story.

[Jrr_hypernova]

you are correct they are not taking the books i already have and have read away BUT they ARE taking the ones that continued their story.

 

You mean the ongoing retread of the movies plot lines I mean really the post ep6 eu has so much stupid crap it's better to burn the whole thing and grab the few good stories from the burning pile of trash to reincorperate latter. Audio us was better when was a puppet master not a Saturday morning cartoon villain who won't stay dead. Also did half the books really need to be all we have our own super weapon that makes the Death Star look like a pea shooter. They trivialized the triumphs in the movies by doing that and dragging out the empires back and more evil with a new comic book reject bad guy in charge thing for too long.

Edited September 25, 2014 by Jrr_hypernova

[DarthDymond]

You mean the ongoing retread of the movies plot lines I mean really the post ep6 eu has so much stupid crap it's better to burn the whole thing and grab the few good stories from the burning pile of trash to reincorperate latter. Audio us was better when was a puppet master not a Saturday morning cartoon villain who won't stay dead. Also did half the books really need to be all we have our own super weapon that makes the Death Star look like a pea shooter. They trivialized the triumphs in the movies by doing that and dragging out the empires back and more evil with a new comic book reject bad guy in charge thing for too long.

Not for nothing, but Dark Horse comics put out something in the area of 600 different issues of Star Wars comics over 23 years of publishing, and a grand total of 14 of those issues dealt with the resurrected emperor, the last issue of which came out 19 years ago.

 

Bantam's novels definitely got into a fairly tiresome pattern of "new Imperial Warlord with a super-weapon!" for a while in the mid-90s but the last book to rely on that retreaded plot was published around 18 years ago. And in the end totaled way less than "half the books".

 

Your "so much stupid crap" description doesn't really reflect most of the last two decades of EU publishing.

Edited September 25, 2014 by DarthDymond

[Aries_cz]

Disney blew it all away because a) they don't care and b) they plan on screwing with it. Otherwise they'd have left the unobtrusive stuff alone. And don't get me wrong, If Disney came in tomorrow and announced everything's back except for the stuff they're going to do in the movies, I'd be ecstatic. Except we both know that's not going to happen.

 

Majority of EU took place after ROTJ or between movies, which are the key periods for Disney's current plans, so they decided to take the easy way and declare everything non canon (with possibility of bringing something back), because otherwise, it would need them to see each specific thing and declare each non canon on case by case basis.

Legends rebranding does, the way I understood it, concerns itself mainly with books and terminated products. Given the fact that SWTOR is still ongoing development (with collaboration with LucasArts), and brings some serious cash home, its chances of not being put out altogether are much higher than old books that almost nobody was buying anymore...

[Edzew]

You mean the ongoing retread of the movies plot lines I mean really the post ep6 eu has so much stupid crap it's better to burn the whole thing and grab the few good stories from the burning pile of trash to reincorperate latter. Audio us was better when was a puppet master not a Saturday morning cartoon villain who won't stay dead. Also did half the books really need to be all we have our own super weapon that makes the Death Star look like a pea shooter. They trivialized the triumphs in the movies by doing that and dragging out the empires back and more evil with a new comic book reject bad guy in charge thing for too long.

 

you obviously never read any of the books and have no clue what you are talking about.

[CrutchCricket]

Majority of EU took place after ROTJ or between movies, which are the key periods for Disney's current plans, so they decided to take the easy way and declare everything non canon (with possibility of bringing something back), because otherwise, it would need them to see each specific thing and declare each non canon on case by case basis.

Legends rebranding does, the way I understood it, concerns itself mainly with books and terminated products. Given the fact that SWTOR is still ongoing development (with collaboration with LucasArts), and brings some serious cash home, its chances of not being put out altogether are much higher than old books that almost nobody was buying anymore...

*sigh* Why must I repeat myself ad nauseum?

 

"Everything post-Jedi is no longer canon. Everthing else is."

 

"Everything is canon. However any new movies, books or other content that contradicts previous content will automatically overwrite previous content. Subsequent content that is dependent on now non-canon work will be updated or removed as needed."

 

There is zero extra difficulty in uttering those sentences over what we got.

[Arkerus]

*sigh* Why must I repeat myself ad nauseum?

 

"Everything post-Jedi is no longer canon. Everthing else is."

 

"Everything is canon. However any new movies, books or other content that contradicts previous content will automatically overwrite previous content. Subsequent content that is dependent on now non-canon work will be updated or removed as needed."

 

There is zero extra difficulty in uttering those sentences over what we got.

 

I appreciate what you are saying but thats not how it works. You have a valid suggestion but it doesn't work from a business standpoint. It will only create additional confusion. They don't want to two versions of the "truth" out there. Yes, its easy to say "why don't they just say the movies overwrite everything if it conflicts with the EU" but that isn't how people will perceive it.

 

Why?

 

Because what IS a direct conflict with the EU? Does it have to be a direct contradiction? What about a contradiction that isn't clear? What if its a character trait or something more subtle like their morals?

 

It makes no sense to say "well its all lore and canon unless it isn't" because its not black and white. Many "contradictions" would be grey areas and it would create confusion for the customer (aka reader or movie goer).

 

Now there is a clear distinction. Yes, it sucks for people like you who wanted the EU to become official but we all knew it never really was. It was always a side story that was licensed out and frankly, it was mismanaged in the name of making money.

 

The only logical conclusion is to separate the movie lore/canon and the EU. Remember, the movies aren't made for lore hounds and fanatics. They are made for the general public.

 

I think Maddox said it best. If you are a comic/book nerd and came out of a movie screaming that they didn't follow the real story of the books/comics, you should have known better. Its not made for you. Its made for the general public and directors aren't going to read every inch of lore trying to make a movie.

 

Does this suck sometimes? Yes. But that's life.

Edited September 25, 2014 by Arkerus

[CrutchCricket]

Because what IS a direct conflict with the EU? Does it have to be a direct contradiction? What about a contradiction that isn't clear? What if its a character trait or something more subtle like their morals?

 

It makes no sense to say "well its all lore and canon unless it isn't" because its not black and white. Many "contradictions" would be grey areas and it would create confusion for the customer (aka reader or movie goer).

Perhaps conflict is a better word. As in "If A conflicts with B, A is canon and B is not". If they set Ep VII five years after the Battle of Yavin and it wasn't an adaptation of Heir to the Empire, the whole of Heir to the Empire would be non-canon. If they use Thrawn in the new movie but nothing else from Heir, then canon is whatever Thrawn did in the movie, not in the book. I think that's how you get around the subtle stuff like traits and motivations. Cherry picking bits and pieces of works can get a little confusing. On the other hand though, they've been doing some of that for years anyway so it's not like it's impossible.

 

And they have a whole Story Group to track that now. It's not like before when only Chee was doing it. When I heard they were forming a Story Group to "re-evaluate the canon", I calmed down a bit. I thought "surely they don't need a damn committee if they're throwing everything out. Thus they must be finding a way to make it work." But no, all in the trash the next day. What's the Story Group doing now, twiddling their thumbs?

 

The other thing that's overlooked and undercredited is how adaptive the writers of the EU can be. They have to be, since Lucas never paid any attention. If he did something out of left field (like renaming a whole damn planet) they'd have to roll with it. And roll with it they did. Even now the *shudder* Legends page for Korriban reflects that at one point it was also called Moraband. So even if Disney drops a whole load of new movies right on top of previous content, they would've found a way to make it work. And hell if we're being real, Disney could've made another quick buck getting authors on board to release "updated" versions of the books where applicable (it would only work for some things, of course, but something is still better than nothing). And if authors couldn't or wouldn't do it, who cares? All character and story rights are part of the franchise. You could do the same thing with other writers or editors.

 

Now there is a clear distinction. Yes, it sucks for people like you who wanted the EU to become official but we all knew it never really was. It was always a side story that was licensed out and frankly, it was mismanaged in the name of making money.

 

The only logical conclusion is to separate the movie lore/canon and the EU. Remember, the movies aren't made for lore hounds and fanatics. They are made for the general public.

 

I think Maddox said it best. If you are a comic/book nerd and came out of a movie screaming that they didn't follow the real story of the books/comics, you should have known better. Its not made for you. Its made for the general public and directors aren't going to read every inch of lore trying to make a movie.

 

Does this suck sometimes? Yes. But that's life.

Again, it was run by Lucasarts, thus making it as official as it needed to be and as official as it could be given the overall creator of the whole thing just wanted to do his own thing. And mismanaged though you might think it, it made money then, it could've made money now.

 

And again, nobody here expects the director to read and follow all the lore. He doesn't need to adapt the lore. The lore would've adapted to him. At the risk of Goldbluming it: lore uh... finds a way.

 

Unless you carpet bomb it into oblivion as a dick move.

[LordArtemis]

I thought it was pretty clear that Disney defined canon as the movies and Clone Wars TV show AND NOTHING ELSE. Someone else mentioned a few storylines that they accepted as canon.

 

From what I understood everything else was considered Legend.

 

On October 30, 2012, Lucasfilm was sold to The Walt Disney Company for $4.05 billion. After the acquisition, Disney and Lucasfilm established Lucasfilm Story Group, a committee whose job is to keep track of and define the "canon" in an effort to unify the films, comics, and other media with the existing canon.

 

On April 25, 2014, Lucasfilm and Disney revised the franchise's canon. They announced that the existing six films and The Clone Wars television series are the "immovable objects" of Star Wars storytelling. Previously published material has been relabeled under a "Legends" label, and future content will present a different vision of people, places and events after Return of the Jedi. They also announced that all future Star Wars stories will be connected, with guidance coming from the Star Wars story group.

 

http://www.starwars.com/news/the-legendary-star-wars-expanded-universe-turns-a-new-page

Edited September 26, 2014 by LordArtemis

[Aries_cz]

They also announced that all future Star Wars stories will be connected, with guidance coming from the Star Wars story group.

 

See, this part is main source of confusion around SWTOR's status. The game still releases future stories (while working with the Story Group, as they are included in Credits), which, according to that statement should be connected to canon.

Also, lot of the report's wording looked like it was concerned mainly with books.

[Arkerus]

Perhaps conflict is a better word. As in "If A conflicts with B, A is canon and B is not". If they set Ep VII five years after the Battle of Yavin and it wasn't an adaptation of Heir to the Empire, the whole of Heir to the Empire would be non-canon. If they use Thrawn in the new movie but nothing else from Heir, then canon is whatever Thrawn did in the movie, not in the book. I think that's how you get around the subtle stuff like traits and motivations. Cherry picking bits and pieces of works can get a little confusing. On the other hand though, they've been doing some of that for years anyway so it's not like it's impossible.

 

And they have a whole Story Group to track that now. It's not like before when only Chee was doing it. When I heard they were forming a Story Group to "re-evaluate the canon", I calmed down a bit. I thought "surely they don't need a damn committee if they're throwing everything out. Thus they must be finding a way to make it work." But no, all in the trash the next day. What's the Story Group doing now, twiddling their thumbs?

 

The other thing that's overlooked and undercredited is how adaptive the writers of the EU can be. They have to be, since Lucas never paid any attention. If he did something out of left field (like renaming a whole damn planet) they'd have to roll with it. And roll with it they did. Even now the *shudder* Legends page for Korriban reflects that at one point it was also called Moraband. So even if Disney drops a whole load of new movies right on top of previous content, they would've found a way to make it work. And hell if we're being real, Disney could've made another quick buck getting authors on board to release "updated" versions of the books where applicable (it would only work for some things, of course, but something is still better than nothing). And if authors couldn't or wouldn't do it, who cares? All character and story rights are part of the franchise. You could do the same thing with other writers or editors.

 

 

Again, it was run by Lucasarts, thus making it as official as it needed to be and as official as it could be given the overall creator of the whole thing just wanted to do his own thing. And mismanaged though you might think it, it made money then, it could've made money now.

 

And again, nobody here expects the director to read and follow all the lore. He doesn't need to adapt the lore. The lore would've adapted to him. At the risk of Goldbluming it: lore uh... finds a way.

 

Unless you carpet bomb it into oblivion as a dick move.

 

Just re read what I wrote. There isn't much more to say.

[PavSalco]

"Everything is canon. However any new movies, books or other content that contradicts previous content will automatically overwrite previous content. Subsequent content that is dependent on now non-canon work will be updated or removed as needed."

Hmm, I wonder why the official site starwars.com doesn't include brief information on TOR era. It doesn't even mention Ruusan Reformation. According to this site, the Republic is over a thousand years old. Geez, I wonder why. Hmm. Maybe because TOR era is not a part of the official storyline aka canon at this moment?

Edited September 26, 2014 by PavSalco

[Arkerus]

See, this part is main source of confusion around SWTOR's status. The game still releases future stories (while working with the Story Group, as they are included in Credits), which, according to that statement should be connected to canon.

Also, lot of the report's wording looked like it was concerned mainly with books.

 

It's not confusing, at all. They work with the story group to make us sure they stay withing the reasonable bounds of the Star Wars universe. The story, however, is no longer connected to episode 1 in any way. Its a "legend" so to speak.

 

This is now an alternate universe where the writers are free to express themselves as they wish but within certain rules and traditions of the Star Wars universe. I don't find anything confusing about that.

[jedip_enguin]

People sure do make a big deal out of this 'Star Wars Canon'

 

Artillery has come a long way since black powder was used to propel giant iron balls into the ranks of your enemies.

 

We have all sorts of cool cruise missiles and stuff these days, y'all need to stop getting so rustled over a silly old canon.

[TravelersWay]

a committee whose job is to keep track of and define the "canon" in an effort to unify the films, comics, and other media with the existing canon.

 

This (emphasis mine).

 

It's not confusing, at all. They work with the story group to make us sure they stay withing the reasonable bounds of the Star Wars universe. The story, however, is no longer connected to episode 1 in any way. Its a "legend" so to speak.

 

This is now an alternate universe where the writers are free to express themselves as they wish but within certain rules and traditions of the Star Wars universe. I don't find anything confusing about that.

 

And this.

 

The Keepers of the Holocron, Story Group, Canon Police, or whatever you want to call them were established so that anyone who received a license from LA to create a work that took place in the Star Wars universe would have certain guidelines to follow. They couldn't just do stuff all willy nilly - the EU and everything else had to follow what was laid out in the "official" canon and lore as created by George Lucas. Make no mistake, none of the extended works beyond the movies was ever "official" canon, no matter how someone wants to spin it in their own mind. The Almighty George stated and repeated time after time that none of it occurred in "his" universe - the "official" universe - everything outside of the movies happened in an alternate reality, and thusly were not official canon. Otherwise, there would have been no need for 6 tiers of canonocity - we would have just needed what we have now - Official and Non-canon.

 

Disney did the easiest thing possible - simply re-affirm what was already taken as a given from the outset. There is absolutely nothing wrong with what they did. To think it was anything other than a business move (or to call it anything other than such) is asinine. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I am pretty sure Disney knows what they are doing when it comes to business decisions. Certainly, locking up movies in a "vault" for decades certainly hasn't hurt the bottom line one iota. Declaring works that were never official canon "Legend" material is not going to affect their bottom line, any more than a book that goes out of print anyway. People who have bought the books have already spent the money. People who have not will still buy the books regardless, if the book is telling a good story. There's going to be a lot of hype surrounding the new movies, and there will be a whole new generation of fans getting into and growing up with Star Wars, just as there was with the Prequels. For every lorehound that does not buy something marked with "Legends" there will be three people who will. Disney is not losing any money with this deal, that much will be certain. What will also be certain is that the new fans will have a much more streamlined lore and canon to follow, and that is the best thing of all.

[CrutchCricket]

Just re read what I wrote. There isn't much more to say.

I read and responded to what you said. The idea that it'd be too confusing because of minute details like character traits is not convincing. Particularly when that's the easiest stuff to justify.

 

Hmm, I wonder why the official site starwars.com doesn't include brief information on TOR era. It doesn't even mention Ruusan Reformation. According to this site, the Republic is over a thousand years old. Geez, I wonder why. Hmm. Maybe because TOR era is not a part of the official storyline aka canon at this moment?

No one's arguing that TOR is still canon anymore. Congratulations, you're about twenty pages behind.

 

Make no mistake, none of the extended works beyond the movies was ever "official" canon, no matter how someone wants to spin it in their own mind. The Almighty George stated and repeated time after time that none of it occurred in "his" universe - the "official" universe - everything outside of the movies happened in an alternate reality, and thusly were not official canon. Otherwise, there would have been no need for 6 tiers of canonocity - we would have just needed what we have now - Official and Non-canon.

 

Disney did the easiest thing possible - simply re-affirm what was already taken as a given from the outset. There is absolutely nothing wrong with what they did. To think it was anything other than a business move (or to call it anything other than such) is asinine. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I am pretty sure Disney knows what they are doing when it comes to business decisions. Certainly, locking up movies in a "vault" for decades certainly hasn't hurt the bottom line one iota. Declaring works that were never official canon "Legend" material is not going to affect their bottom line, any more than a book that goes out of print anyway. People who have bought the books have already spent the money. People who have not will still buy the books regardless, if the book is telling a good story. There's going to be a lot of hype surrounding the new movies, and there will be a whole new generation of fans getting into and growing up with Star Wars, just as there was with the Prequels. For every lorehound that does not buy something marked with "Legends" there will be three people who will. Disney is not losing any money with this deal, that much will be certain. What will also be certain is that the new fans will have a much more streamlined lore and canon to follow, and that is the best thing of all.

And here we go again:

 

Yes the EU was official, no it was not ranked on the same level as the movies nor did it need to be to be considered official. The six tiers of canon (of which only three were active and constantly used) were there to keep everything official while having the best of both worlds between letting Lucas do his own thing and still letting other authors enrich the universe in the background.

 

No Disney did not do "the right thing", it was equally easy to frame the announcement like I posted above with only the conflict bits of EU removed, or with a statement of dynamic overwrites. However measly you consider the dollars and even cents lost by the outrage the canon nuking has caused, such losses are entirely unjustified given the was a way for them to not occur at all with zero added effort on the company's part.

 

I'm happy to continue discussing this but if we're just going to repeat ourselves maybe we should leave it here.

[Arkerus]

I read and responded to what you said. The idea that it'd be too confusing because of minute details like character traits is not convincing. Particularly when that's the easiest stuff to justify.

 

 

No one's arguing that TOR is still canon anymore. Congratulations, you're about twenty pages behind.

 

 

And here we go again:

 

Yes the EU was official, no it was not ranked on the same level as the movies nor did it need to be to be considered official. The six tiers of canon (of which only three were active and constantly used) were there to keep everything official while having the best of both worlds between letting Lucas do his own thing and still letting other authors enrich the universe in the background.

 

No Disney did not do "the right thing", it was equally easy to frame the announcement like I posted above with only the conflict bits of EU removed, or with a statement of dynamic overwrites. However measly you consider the dollars and even cents lost by the outrage the canon nuking has caused, such losses are entirely unjustified given the was a way for them to not occur at all with zero added effort on the company's part.

 

I'm happy to continue discussing this but if we're just going to repeat ourselves maybe we should leave it here.

 

You don't have a dog in this fight. Reasonable people have explained WHY and yet its like talking to a wall.

[Mozepy]

There was this guy who once took the entire Planet of the Apes body of work (Original movies, cartoon series, comic books, and new movies) and explained, fairly well considering the source material, how they could all fit together in a unified canon.

 

Star Trek the Animated Series (TAS) was written as a continuation of Star Trek (TOS). Around the time of TNG it was said that it was not canon, supposedly by Gene Roddenberry himself. In 2007 TAS was confirmed to be canon. There have always been fans that considered it canon and there are those that still don't.

 

Doctor Who Has no official canon mostly due to legal issues, however if you read an article on Tardis Data Core you find references to the entire body of work as if it is all canon (with a few exceptions). TDC has it's own policy on canon but acknowledges that fans can choose their own canon.

 

My point is these, along with the Star Wars Universe, are all fictional universes and their bodies of work are constantly growing and changing. They can't ever be entirely consistent but there is probably somebody who can explain how it all fits together. The powers that be will have their own opinions, that will change over time, but ultimately it's the enjoyment by the fans that matters. If you enjoy certain works and wish to consider them canon then do so. If someone says "that's not canon, blah blah blah", give em a swift middle finger and carry on.

[LordArtemis]

See, this part is main source of confusion around SWTOR's status. The game still releases future stories (while working with the Story Group, as they are included in Credits), which, according to that statement should be connected to canon.

Also, lot of the report's wording looked like it was concerned mainly with books.

 

I think that is a fair point. There does seem to be some room for interpretation there. But I personally err on the side of going by what I read, and I read everything but X.

 

Now, that doesn't mean I am right...naturally it is likely Disney will clarify moving forward. But my money is on everything but what was mentioned is NOT considered canon.

Edited September 27, 2014 by LordArtemis

[CrutchCricket]

You don't have a dog in this fight. Reasonable people have explained WHY and yet its like talking to a wall.

I could say the same thing, only in multiples.

 

There was this guy who once took the entire Planet of the Apes body of work (Original movies, cartoon series, comic books, and new movies) and explained, fairly well considering the source material, how they could all fit together in a unified canon.

 

Star Trek the Animated Series (TAS) was written as a continuation of Star Trek (TOS). Around the time of TNG it was said that it was not canon, supposedly by Gene Roddenberry himself. In 2007 TAS was confirmed to be canon. There have always been fans that considered it canon and there are those that still don't.

 

Doctor Who Has no official canon mostly due to legal issues, however if you read an article on Tardis Data Core you find references to the entire body of work as if it is all canon (with a few exceptions). TDC has it's own policy on canon but acknowledges that fans can choose their own canon.

 

My point is these, along with the Star Wars Universe, are all fictional universes and their bodies of work are constantly growing and changing. They can't ever be entirely consistent but there is probably somebody who can explain how it all fits together. The powers that be will have their own opinions, that will change over time, but ultimately it's the enjoyment by the fans that matters. If you enjoy certain works and wish to consider them canon then do so. If someone says "that's not canon, blah blah blah", give em a swift middle finger and carry on.

None of the other examples you mentioned had an official unified canon at some point. That's part of what made the Star Wars canon special. That's part of why losing it now sucks so much. It's got nothing to do with one or two things changing. It's everything getting thrown out the window.

 

And I'm fine with giving middle fingers left and right concerning what I like vs what I don't. But I'm also quite fond of discussing the lore and now with the nuking it'll become increasingly difficult to do so without some dolt running in going "nope not canon anymore lololol". That and Disney and Star Wars just feel too big to ignore. With the **** they pulled I should be boycotting the whole thing. But what good would that do? Even if I screamed at the top of my lungs till I got national media attention I'd still be a gnat in the face of the Disney corporate machine and the pop culture might that is Star Wars. I can't rebel against it, I can't even ignore it. When those movies hit the theaters I know I'll end up going. It's too big not to. So I'm screwed either way.