As of the end of Andor S2, there's now over 251 hours of onscreen Star Wars canon. Lately I've been sorting each movie, show, short, video game cutscene, etc. into chronological order and comparing how much onscreen content we have for each era of Star Wars.
New version of my timeline comparing our world and the Star Wars timeline with ANH aligned to 1977. In addition to using the new information from Star Wars Timelines and including content published since I made the original in 2020, there is now a new second including the High Republic and earlier dates. That part has been some of the most interest. The Jedi are as old as the stone age. The Sith were destroyed in 945. The High Republic takes place in the 16th to 18th centuries, ancient my ass. It is currently all new eu information, but my plan for a third version whenever I feel enough new stuff has come out is to include a Legends Old Republic section.
The other big change is that this was made in Google Slides instead of one large image, and the original presentation can be found here.
I'd love to answer any questions people have about the decisions I made.
It’s pretty easy. New trilogy and everything connected to it, when judged objectively (world building, continuity, believability), does not belong in the same timeline, and I could only accept it as some form of "alternate SW universe."
The New Republic and their policies seem laughable and hardly believable. The sense of larger galactic civilization is forever lost as we’re always led to believe the action takes place in some “alienated” Unknown Regions, yet apparently, during the first movie, the First Order becomes so powerful that Republic is eliminated and the entire Galaxy (including the vast reaches of space we know from previous movies and shows) remain at their mercy, completely powerless. Nobody can muster a fleet, nothing. Their only hope is the distant “Resistance” led by veterans of the old Rebellion against Palpatine’s regime (which took place AGES ago!). They are all grandpas and grandmas and they are still at it, in their old ships that belong in junkyard. UTTER. NONSENSE. Not to mention the ridiculously overpowered First Order… with their troopers who are essentially slaves and forced conscription by the VERY radical, cruel regime of stereotypical Nazis… and they need to restore order and Empire back to the distant planets and sectors they know nothing about. The First Order is the epitome of convoluted logic and weak connection to the old timeline. Some officers ended up with a bunch of ships in a distant, unknown system and build a force even more powerful than the previous empire… yeah, I guess their base was well-hidden and they built lots of mines over the years. Because you know… mines gather "resources" and then you can spend those resources on powerful ships that immediately emerge from your hangar… Is this a computer game? How did they obtain the resources? How did they gain the loyalty of systems? How did they become such a powerful political force? What happened with Thrawn’s people who were supposed to be a major power in the region? If you tell me it’s all because of political maneuvers of Snoke, I’m going to laugh in your face. I mean, Palpatine was planning all of this since day one, and he had a powerful political body to work with. Also, in order to gather support and allow for the creation of his totalitarian regime, he needed a FREAKING galactic version of WORLD WAR ONE. But Snoke? He just pops up one day… and then becomes "a Palpatine" of the First Order, a force so powerful that New Republic becomes dust within a single day, one Leader and a bunch of indoctrinated idiots are enough to govern it (without any resistance from the general population, scientists and work force), and there is literally NO ONE in the known galaxy that could challenge their rule and their overpowered, oversized ships. But why the fuck can’t they hit a smaller ship? WHY? LOL But calm down, everything can be explained because the New Republic (which constitutes 80-90% of the known Galaxy) are a bunch of hippies. Charming.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m NOT an obsessed fanboy who promotes my "blind rage." It’s just an honest, objective assessment, based on what we got. I understand what Disney was trying to do and that some people enjoy it. Some people are just glad to be in the world of Star Wars again, they feel the nostalgia and it’s about fun, they don’t give a fuck. Same with new generations because they discover it for the first time. But here is the issue: the new trilogy is essentially a remake take on old Star Wars but instead of being honest about it… it kind of "pretends" to exist in the same timeline. It really bugs me and kills my enjoyment of Star Wars whenever the two "universes" interact and try to pretend they belong in the same, coherent timeline.
Now I’m NOT saying this was a bad marketing decision. The masses don’t care, crazy fanboys with their rage (or really objective viewers like me) are the minority. Cheap hype, bigger sizes and remakes rule the cinema, repetition of same old only in a new, shiny form. Also, it is better to have Star Wars that can be considered the same Star Wars set in the same timeline… than some kind of different Star Wars. They NEEDED new SW numbers beyond VI, not straightforward remake trilogy with distinct numeration, for example. Because it allows them to have their cake and eat it too. They get to attract the newcomers and new generations with their "remake" approach (stereotypical, crazy Nazis in place of a decent regime, Resistance in place of Rebellion, Snow in place of Palpatine, angsty Kylo in place of Vader, Unknown Regions as the setting in place of the Galaxy we knew) but at the same time sustain most of the long-term SW fans with their "supposed" connections to the old timeline and return of old characters, ship models and so on. I UNDERSTAND IT. But I don’t buy it. I don’t enjoy it. For me, it cheapens the universe. IT FEELS OFF. But I don’t really hate Disney. If anything, I would first blame the market and average viewers of this world, THEN Disney.
If you are a passionate defender of this new trilogy and love to ponder about connections between older movies and new ones… then OK, I don’t know, maybe it’s just not for me, if you enjoy it then OK… but consider this: everyone who dislikes it – ESPECIALLY it’s connection to the past timeline – has a very legitimate reason to feel that way.
I put together a timeline illustrating how the real world and Star Wars timelines, starting with aligning 0BBY/ABY to 1977. I hope this can help people get a better understanding of the proportions of the Star Wars timelines. (The events I chose for the real world are basically from a US perspective, because I have a better idea what events had a big cultural footprint). I used the New EU canon, and have plans to update it after a while when we have a lot of new content. Feel free to ask me about any of the decisions I made in the process.
Click onto the images and swipe through on Tumblr so you can actually read them. And the timeline in a single image can be found under the cut.
