Is Kathleen Kennedy Ruining Star Wars (a catchall thread)
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All this talk of relinquishing control over the world and accepting that we are essentially small seems quite fitting given the subject matter.
A great deal of therapeutic technique draws from the very same cultural and philosophical wells which informed the concepts inherent in the force. Ironic when people cannot apply those very lessons to how they view SW.
In fairness for many of us it was (as we all keep reminding each other) a major part of our childhoods, something we each felt was in some sense special and personal. For years that was essentially the case even if we extended that ownership to a greater whole we elusively call "fandom".
What the PT and now the ST have brought into sharp relief is that that was only ever an illusion.
How each of us responds to that is, I feel, important in informing how we view the actual subject matter of the films themselves.
A great deal of therapeutic technique draws from the very same cultural and philosophical wells which informed the concepts inherent in the force. Ironic when people cannot apply those very lessons to how they view SW.
In fairness for many of us it was (as we all keep reminding each other) a major part of our childhoods, something we each felt was in some sense special and personal. For years that was essentially the case even if we extended that ownership to a greater whole we elusively call "fandom".
What the PT and now the ST have brought into sharp relief is that that was only ever an illusion.
How each of us responds to that is, I feel, important in informing how we view the actual subject matter of the films themselves.
I don't think it is that unusual, especially for something that you've followed for most of your life.
I think they did to be honest, bear in mind for many it was something that was meaningful before they reached an age where they could really rationalise a movie as a commercial product and that will have shaped how they felt about it from an early age. Also for many years the real creative forces were licensed novelists and fan creations, things that people were either personally involved in or at least part of the subculture which generated them.
Even if ownership is too strong a word, there was definitely a sense of it having been a cultural touchstone which people treated (and still treat) as having personal significance.
I guess that as someone who has never been into fan fiction, I just don't understand that point of view at all. What I can understand is why fans of the EU might feel upset, since the world they've created in their heads based on the novels they've read just disappeared.
For me, Star Wars was just 3 movies... eventually 6 movies. Now its a lot more movies. Yay! So I have a hard time relating.
I can dip a toe in either pond, so to speak. I enjoyed the EU and grew up immersed in both SW and ST, but I'm conscious of the fact that they are all ultimately commercial ventures.
Perhaps it's worth viewing the films as being in a sense distinct from their cultural significance, a franchise intended to make money on the one hand, but also something which has left an indelible mark on the consciousness of at least two distinct generations.
Wait until Picard deep-sixes the continuity the Trek novels have been building for twenty years.
We were never told that it was canon though... the EU was presented as canon.Wait until Picard deep-sixes the continuity the Trek novels have been building for twenty years.
I'm sorry, but anyone that bought the EU was canon wasn't really paying attention to how these things work. The cart (novels/comics) was never going to drive the horse (movies/TV). It simply isn't how it works.
Some people just buy the party line, even if its clearly not the truth.
In theory, the franchise owner determines what is or is not canon, as opposed to random people on the internet. Random people on the internet always claim the EU was not canon, but it was, that was the whole point of decanonizing it in the first place. Otherwise there would have been no need to decanonize it. This is what was told to the general public, and it was also what was told to the authors of the books. Anderson, for example, specifically told the anthology authors that they were writing canon. The prequels included references to EU material. Not everything adheres to the Star Trek model, despite people acting like that franchise's system is some irrevocable all-encompassing law of the universe.
So you think, that if they made a spanking new $100+ million dollar movie, that they were going to be beholden to some story bit from a comic/novel/short story?
The Clone Wars presented a totally different version of the Mandalorians, and there were several other instances of the shows and movies going in a different direction from the EU, that's all the proof you need that the EU wasn't canon to the onscreen material.
As for the EU, I really wasn't that sad to see it go. I did read and enjoy quite a few of the books, but by the time we got to the New Jedi Order books it had gone so far off in it's own direction, that it was barely even recognizable as Star Wars.
So far I've been very happy with the Disney canon books and comics, and I think they've done a better job keeping it recognizeably Star Wars.
As for the EU, I really wasn't that sad to see it go. I did read and enjoy quite a few of the books, but by the time we got to the New Jedi Order books it had gone so far off in it's own direction, that it was barely even recognizable as Star Wars.
So far I've been very happy with the Disney canon books and comics, and I think they've done a better job keeping it recognizeably Star Wars.
A New Hope and Empire were both made under the guidance of George Lucas. I believe he said he didn't pay attention to the novels. So...
Which makes it kind of weird when his movies make references to events in the novels or rip off dialogue from them.
That's what you hire people for. To read and pull any decent ideas out for him to file the numbers off of and claim as his own.
No, it's an absurd question to even ask given the positive reactions to the sequel films and the direction of the franchise. She's one of the most successful producers in history, second to Spielberg. In fact, they share credits on most of those projects. Given her history with Lucasfilm, producing the Indiana Jones films, she was the perfect choice other than Spielberg.
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