Adventures in Canon

Reading, Watching, Playing One Continuous Story

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Adventures in Canon #9: Filling in the Gaps

I've written before about the fact that the One Continuous Story isn't being written in order. Curiously, some parts of it take place entirely within other parts, as is the case with Beth Revis' book Rebel Rising, which takes place between the prologue of Rogue One and the story proper. There's a potential subversion of Edwards' film here. That prologue is there for a reason; it establishes the origins of our hero Jyn Erso as leading a fairly quiet life on a farm planet before everything she loves is ripped away by the Empire. Subsequently we learn that she has drifted into a desperate life of crime that has ended in prison. That contrast between the small girl on the farm and the down trodden criminal could work towards establishing how harsh this life is, and how bad things can easily get in this galaxy. To see the steps in between, as we do in Revis' novel, may lessen the effect.

I say 'could' and 'may' because in practice this doesn't happen, as Edwards doesn't aim for such a contrast and in any case the trailers told us what would become of Jyn Erso after the events of the prologue. But there's an interesting distinction between a conventional expanded universe and the Star Wars canon here.

By it's very nature, an expanded universe sits apart from the source material. It exists to flesh out the premise and the world and the tidbits of unexplored story for fans who want such things, and can be ignored by anyone who can't be bothered or wants to be left wanting more. A continuous story, as we are told we are getting, can make no such concession. All is equal, and constitutes part of a whole, and so in principle it cannot be ignored.

I'm not sure how all of this will play out. There are a myriad of disparate voices contributing to the story in whatever order innumerable publishing schedules dictate. There is potential for disaster, but it might just hold together enough to be great.

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Adventures in Canon #8: A Shout Out to Aftermath

At time this blog can be a bit morose, what with all the concern over whether the One Continuous Story is actually such a thing, so it’s important to note when the canon does contribute to a greater narrative. The recent conclusion of Chuck Wendig’s Aftermath trilogy is such a time.

Empire’s End, the final book of the trilogy, is filled with references to other canon works. There is mention of the Uprising, Lost Stars, The Lando comic, Rogue One, Shattered Empire, and a whole bunch of stuff I didn’t even pick up on. All those interludes and implications of the previous two books come together here, and it is all done deftly and satisfyingly.

It’s nice to know that sometimes the One Continuous Story is being told right and told well.

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Adventures in Canon #7: A Plagueis on All Their Houses

Of all the Legends works that fans wish to see brought into the current canon, James Luceno’s 2012 novel Darth Plagueis is by far the most popular. The decades long story of Palpatine’s master and the political maneuvering that preceded the events of the prequel trilogy, the novel tells a vast story only hinted at in the films. So the question must be asked, should Lucasfilm reclassify the novel as canon.

No. You, of course can consider whatever works you like to be canon. But Lucasfilm- or indeed any official publisher- is in a far more restricted position. Any attempt to declare only the best works canon will engender a backlash from fans who do not agree with the selection. Any attempt to determine which works best create One Continuous Story would face the same problem. Moreover, to declare some works good enough to ‘count’ constitutes an explicit critique on the part of Lucasfilm. To do so would tantamount to judgement of those creators who’s work Lucasfilm had profited from as unworthy, which would be grossly unprofessional, and hardly foster a good relationship with anyone who it wishes to work with in the future.

And so official canon must be established not by any measure of ‘quality’. I believe the principle used by Lucasfilm was to consider those works that Lucas had worked on directly to be canon, and to declare all others Legends works. Hence the two trilogies and the Clone Wars series are canon, while all else is now Legends, including Luceno’s book.

However, it is worth discussing whether Darth Plagueis is worth considering canon, irrespective of what Lucasfilm tells us is the case*. There’s some inconsistency with the Darth Maul- Son of Dathomir comic regarding how the young Maul came to be Sidious’ apprentice, but you could explain it away if you really wanted to. Reconciling the story with the Clone Wars episode The Lost One might also require some hoop jumping. Marvel’s Darth Maul comic (I’m waiting for the trade, or perhaps Aftermath: Empire’s End (it’s in the post) may also contain something contradictory. As a source of backstory it’s incredibly efficient, detailing not only Palpatine’s apprenticeship but Dooku’s temptation to the dark side and who the hell Sifo-Dyas is. Luceno’s canon novel Tarkin reintroduces a good chunk of Darth Plagueis’ premise into the canon, and as such the broad strokes of the narrative are pretty much canonical.

With regards to the ever-persistent theory that Snoke and Plagueis are the same person, Pablo Hidalgo has explicitly debunked the notion. It’s entirely possible that someone-maybe even Luceno- will retell the story in a canonical way in the future.

As I said, whether Darth Plagueis is good enough to be worth considered canon is subjective. I found the style to be something of a stilted word-of-the-day salad, and so I didn’t enjoy it that much. Your mileage may vary.

Darth Plagueis explains a lot about Star Wars, but it’s just not canon.

*For reference, I don’t really consider Heir to the Jedi canon myself, as it is terrible.

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Adventures in Canon #6: SPOILER ALERT

One of the more significant aspects of the attempt to tell One Continuous Story is that it is not being told in order. Indeed, the Darth Vader comic (to pick one example) explicitly explores a period of it’s protagonist’s life with the assumption that the audience knows the Skywalker lineage. It is hardly alone in doing this, as the prequel trilogy itself assumes the audience is aware of the events of the original trilogy. And yet the questions may be asked (so I can use this material I wrote for something else), should it? Should any installments of the story that come after those they chronologically precede assume the audience is familiar with them?

On the one hand, that reveal in The Empire Strikes Back is the defining moment of the original trilogy, completely subverting what the story has been about so far and thrusting it in a new direction. There is thus an argument to be made that it’s impact should be preserved for those who wish to watch the films in chronological order. On the other hand, it is also the most famous reveal in cinematic history, and it is reasonable to assume that the audience for any additional canon at the time of release will be familiar with the Skywalker lineage, and will be expecting to learn about it’s origins in the full knowledge of where it ends.

The story that can told depends greatly on this; if it is assumed that the films should be watched chronologically, then the prequels (and everything else) can’t give anything away, and must proceed with no regard for the known future. If it is assumed that the audience is familiar with the original trilogy, then there is no need to pretend otherwise and the potential for foreboding and foreshadowing that follows from such an assumption can be harnessed.

To assume the films will be watched chronologically assumes they will be watched as such well after they have have been released, which means they will be available on rewatchable media- that they would be watched on video (and yes it was VHS in 1999, I still have my Phantom Menace tape somewhere). But if that is the case then it must be acknowledged that the films will be watched repeatedly, and this assumes that the story is still effective even if the reveal is known. So if the prequels and other works are made to preserve the reveal, they could only be watched as such in a manner that assumes the effect of the reveal is not in the revealing.

It’s worth noting that there is some evidence that Star Wars keeps working even if you know that Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father. The franchise has endured long after other works that hinge on a twist have faded into obscurity (looking at you, collected works of M Night Shyamalan). Personally, I found out Luke’s paternity from the back of a bend-ems gift set:

And yet here I am still talking about Star Wars. Vader’s reveal of his true nature to Luke may not keep the audience returning but Luke’s screams of anguish does, as does his subsequent resolve to turn his father back to the light.

And so, the weight of logic is in favour of assuming that the audience knows where all of this is going, and telling the One Continuous Story as such. But it can only be so if the Story hinges on more than surprise. Big reveals and shocking twists and cliffhangers need to work as more than audience temptation, they have to aim for a narrative that is rewards when it is experienced again and again and again.

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Adventures in Canon #5: Let’s Talk About Rogue One

Rogue One is very much a first for the One Continuous Story. Star Wars has long explored the galaxy beyond the Skywalkers, but never on screen. Now, we get to see what that looks like. SPOILERS HO.

Before I go on I’m going to clarify my thinking regarding references in works to other works, as that’s something that’s crucial to understanding a film like this. Any film that is part of a larger universe will face the task of identifying itself as part of that universe while also being required to add to it. Too much familiarity and it feels masturbatory, too much novelty and it feels like badge engineering. The greatest criticism The Force Awakens faced was that it was a retread of the beats of A New Hope, but to say so misses a crucial detail: It is not just the film but it’s characters themselves who are doing the retreading. The First Order builds a bigger Death Star because it seeks to surpass the Empire it apes. Poe Dameron dares to fly his little ship into the heart of the beast because that is what his heroes did. Those great big facsimiles of the past are explicitly there for narrative purpose, and their egregiousness depends on how well that narrative works. As it happens, I thought that first part worked really well, but we shall have to see what the rest of it looks like.

Rogue One itself is replete with references. Blue Milk, Ponda Barba, Red Five, they’re all here. Again, that’s necessary to an extent in order to establish Rogue One as a Star Wars Story. The blue milk isn’t a problem in itself- surely other people like the drink as the Larses, and it’s something fun for the fans to notice- but the fact that it is the subject of a lingering shot is. This is Edwards making sure we get the reference; it interrupts the narrative for the sake of trivia. The same is true of Ponda Barba and Dr Evazan, but here there is a further issue. The appearance of these two so far from the Mos Eisley cantina makes the galaxy feel smaller, and therefore less interesting. Who wants to explore such a small world?

The appearance and demise of Red Five rehashes the oldest saw of any expanded universe: the need to Explain Everything. How did Luke get his callsign? Well there was a vacancy. Again that can be fine to an extent, the opportunity to clarify plot holes may as well be taken, provided it doesn’t interrupt the flow of things. However, Red Five is far from the only supposed inconsistency that Rogue One seeks to explain.

How did the Empire, with all it’s might, allow such a design flaw as the exhaust port to become part of the Death Star’s construction? Well, it turns out the flaw was deliberate, a creation of the secretly rebellious scientist Galen Erso. More than a simple happening of the plot, this detail recontextualises the theme of Rogue One, the purported rebellion built on Hope. Star Wars as originally presented posits that the rebellion finds the flaw in the Death Star because it believes it can. With no other explanation, we have to assume that the good guys succeed because they have the audacity to try and the wits to succeed. The Empire explicitly fails because it is arrogant enough to think such a thing is impossible. The revelation of Erso’s actions don’t invalidate that sense of hope as such; our heroes still need to believe in the goodness of Galen Erso in order to have a hope of success. But that’s a far smaller thing than the universal sense of hope Star Wars evoked without an explanation of the details of it all.

There is one great aspect of Star Wars that gains some much needed complexity from Rogue One, and that is The Force. At first the Force was a great hereditary mystical power, and then it was an equation: more midi-chlorians equals more The Force. We are told here that Chirrut Imwe doesn’t “have the Force”, and yet all indications are that his belief in it makes it strong with him. The blind monk navigates blaster shots and downs the enemy to an improbable degree, and it is an open question as to whether this is due to mundane skill or the supernatural. It’s mysterious and obtuse and not readily clarified by a blood test. It’s tempting to see this as a willful ignorance of the metaphysics of the prequel trilogy, but here at Adventures in Canon we can’t do that. We know that The Force can be scientifically analysed, and yet in profound ways it can’t. We don’t know to what extent an understanding of Jedi blood correlates to an understanding of the Force proper, and we can ask whether such a banal understanding is any understanding at all. Rogue One restores the Force to a place of mysticism, and yet we know it can be known empirically. That’s a complex thing indeed, and a good addition to the One Continuous Story.

[adventuresincanon]

Adventures in Canon #4: A Thrawn in the Side

Rebels Season Three has seen the return of Legends legend Grand Admiral Thrawn, and the results have been… underwhelming. Thus far, the strategic genius hasn’t provided much of a challenge for our ragtag bunch. It’s probable that at this point he is merely toying get with the Rebels, feeling out their tactics and the weaknesses therein in order to crush them later, and it just so happens that this part of the season isn’t written particularly well.

But what if he isn’t? What if his much vaunted study of the enemy’s art doesn’t actually work very well (at least in this context, he must be a grand admiral for a reason), and Thrawn is completely ineffectual? What if, just as we expect a master plan, Thrawn is fired and replaced with someone truly dangerous; such as Tarkin or Vader or Governor Pryce?

That would make for an interesting twist, but more importantly it would mean the Canon is explicitly killing the darlings of the past. So far we’ve seen the new canon tread familiar ground- Han and Leia’s fallen son, stealing the Death Star plans, a young Han Solo- and it would be good to see it break with how things have been done before. What better way than to take one of the sacred cows of Fandom and make them a fop?

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Adventures in Canon #3: So Long Pal Acino

A little over a year after release, Kabam has shuttered the servers on Star Wars: Uprising. Ostensibly an RPG, Uprising followed a smuggler in the Anoat sector (the bit of the galaxy with Bespin and Hoth in it) and their sister Riley as their attempts to make a living for themselves takes them further and further into conflict with the Imperial forces that seek to suppress knowledge of the Emperor’s death. Uprising was not a particularly good game; while the cut scenes followed a fun enough story that added some things to the Star Wars galaxy, the gameplay itself was simplistic and repetitive-with the exception of some intensely frustrating bosses. Moreover, Kabam got the play-to-win formula wrong; it was necessary to grind through the game regardless of whether you made in-game purchases or not (which gave me something to do on the train to work), and the in-game purchases weren’t really necessary to finish it. In summary, it wasn’t much fun and it didn’t make money, so now it’s gone.

The end of Uprising serves as a blunt reminder of the true nature of Star Wars. It is not ultimately a space adventure, nor a hero’s journey, nor a love story. It is a franchise, and it exists to make money. When Star Wars stops doing that, it goes away. This is true of the vast majority of media, and long has been and long will be. As a reality that’s fine really; to get the things people make we have to spend money and if we don’t spend money they won’t make things. However, it is important to remember that any official canon must serve that purpose, and while there is no reason to think that those telling the one continuous story are trying to tell anything other than the best story they are capable of- indeed, all evidence points to the contrary- there remains a central singular motivation for all of this. If there is anything to be wary of regarding canonical works it is the potential to use the notion of canon to sell us poor stories for the sake of completion. I don’t think this has happened, at least intentionally, but the use of canon as a tool for profit must be considered when spending your time and money.

With regards to that one continuous story, Uprising didn’t really contain that much that affected the larger narrative. The Uprising in the Anoat sector is referenced in a few other works, but in such a way that it is indistinguishable from incidental world building. Lando turns up with a mission to free some guy from an Imperial prison, which constitutes one of his few appearances after the events of Return of the Jedi. Beyond that, the only thing of interest is our hero’s use of the Force. While Uprising is primarily concerned with the scum and villainy of the galaxy, there are two side quests to gain both light side and dark side powers, and these skills come not from the Jedi or Sith but from some old mentor to the “Anoat Noble Court” and a NIghtsister. So our hero receives an opaque and incomplete education on both sides of the Force... and turns out just fine. There are some interesting implications there regarding the intensity of the Jedi’s own training and the ability of the average Force user to cope with both sides of it. I shall let you mull that over.

Whether or not Uprising will continue to matter remains to be seen. It was one of the more high-profile canonical works to be released in the months before The Force Awakens, but now it is no longer available beyond a few Wookiepedia entries and play-through videos it may simply fade into obscurity. Potentially it will be adapted in another medium or released in some form that doesn’t require server space, which would be nice for... the sake of completeness. Either way, I shall have to find something else to do on the train.

P.S Pal Acino was the name of my character, a red twi’lek lady.

[adventuresincanon]

Adventures in Canon #2: A Twit’s Understanding of the Scourge of Malachor

Author’s note: I am aware that  Malachor is some significant thing in Knights of the Old Republic, but here I am considering only it’s appearances in canonical works. Anyway

Kylo Ren’s lightsaber, the Force Awakens Visual Dictionary tells us, is “an ancient design, dating back thousands of years to the Great Scourge of Malachor”. Which is all well and good, and the kind of world building that reference works are good for. It gives us a dot to connect to make that one continuous story, one that relates directly to the Rebels season two finale, in which our heroes visit Malachor and find the remains of the Great Scourge in question. Significantly, Ezra Bridge picks up a lightsaber of that very same design:

Again, another dot to connect.

BUT! But. That lightsaber is green, most certainly not a “red blade”, and therefore constructed by a light side user. As far as we know at this stage, that design Kylo Ren has aped belongs to the Jedi. Perhaps Kylo Ren has no real understanding of the particulars of the Scourge, and ultimately chose that design for his lightsaber because it appealed to him. He chose not that which was relevant to his beliefs but that which looked cool. That’s an interesting thing to happen to someone so driven by his understanding of his legacy, and part of an organisation that idolises past glories.

Or, perhaps we just haven’t seen the Sith version of the same design. I wonder if we will ever find out.

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Adventures in Canon #1: An Alternate Reading of Heir to the Jedi

Kevin Hearne’s Heir to the Jedi was one of the first books released as part of the new canon, and it’s... terrible. Really really terrible. Within the first ten pages we get a mention of Admiral Ackbar’s ‘moist charisma’, something that forced me to put down the book in order to compose myself. Luke notes that he points his lightsaber away from his face ‘for safety’, because memes. The narrative has so little structure it is simply a series of events, and the first person narration sounds nothing like how a young Luke Skywalker should sound. There is a whole bunch of maths. Maths!

But! But. Heir to the Jedi is one of the few Star Wars books to be written in the first person (the other is Michael A. Stackpole’s Legends book I, Jedi). In Star Wars, we know, “everything is true, from a certain point of view”, and a first person narrative is most certainly from a specific point of view. Therefore, if we want, we can interpret Heir to the Jedi not just as an objective telling of events but as Luke Skywalker’s version of those events. Why is the writing so bad? Because Luke Skywalker can’t write. Why does the young Luke Skywalker sound so wise and steady? Because the old Luke Skywalker looking back on his life is so wise and steady. Why does Admiral Ackbar have moist charisma? Because those are the two things a desert farmboy might notice about an alien leader (and besides, its fun to imagine Rey reading along and gagging as well).

So fine, it is possible to interpret Heir to the Jedi in a way that makes it palatable and interesting. The question must be asked, is such an interpretation canonical? It isn’t definitely non-canon; the events of works of fiction can be wholly or partially obfuscated by the perspective of their telling and that work will still be legitimate. The notion of canon says nothing about the objectivity of the story being told, merely that things did or didn’t happen. Nor does it prescribe a given reading of the text, saying only which texts it considers to describe things that did or didn’t happen. So a specific reading of a canon text is not at odds with that text’s canonical status. We can read Heir to the Jedi however we want, needing only to accept that it is some version of events actually happened in the Star Wars universe, and that they are part of the one continuous story.

So there you have it, you can read a bad book a different way and still consider it canon.

[adventuresincanon]

Welcome to Adventures in Canon (EDITED 23/10/16)

Hello! Welcome to Adventures in Canon. In order to avoid filling my movie blog with posts on nerdy Star Wars stuff, I’m starting this tumblr to discuss the current Star Wars canon, and it’s attempt to tell ‘one continuous story’.

Before I go on, I must explain something. In essence, in a franchise that covers multiple installments and media, ‘canon’ denotes the stuff that counts. What is canon supposedly ‘actually happened’ in the property’s universe and should therefore be internally consistent. You may have noticed that nowhere in that explanation is any mention of a work’s quality. Just because something counts doesn’t mean it’s good, and indeed work that breaks with established conventions might well be better than those made to fit a larger universe. In the final analysis a work’s quality is far more important than it’s canonicity.

EDIT 23/10/16: And of course, prescribed canon is in no way binding. If you personally wish to consider the only canon works to be The Holiday Special, The Force Unleashed, and Attack of the Clones, that is entirely your business. You can decide what counts for you and ultimately no one can stop you.

Having said that, prescirbed canon still matters, if only to inform a given fan’s understanding of the thing they love. In the case of Star Wars the story group established by Lucasfilm in the wake of the Disney purchase is intended to ensure that the new canon- including the six films of the original and prequel trilogies, the Clone Wars TV series, and everything published after 25th April 2014 except The Old Republic expansions (phew)- tells ‘one continuous story’. It stands to reason therefore that all of Star Wars should form a greater narrative. Exactly how well the new canon material does that, how well it can possible do that, and exactly what shape that narrative takes forms the subject of this blog.

So strap in nerds, it’s time to talk about that one continuous story.