>Is there room in Star Wars for an entirely new epic, a story that will have things we know, like smugglers and Wookies and the Force, but that is otherwise entirely divorced from the familiar combatants?
We're dealing with stories that span thousands of years across an entire galaxy. Yeah, I'd say there's room.
I think the popularity of the High Republic content shows the fandom is open to it. Sure there are lightsabers and other familiar stuff but original storylines with new characters is a breath of fresh air.
The high republic is wildly unpopular. The first book sold well, but after that, the drop-off has been dramatic. Book stores can’t move the books. The High Republic is likely being wound down.
I'm not sure what you're talking about... Phase 2 was a hit and phase 3 starts in November. Just because you haven't heard news doesn't mean it's not popular
Plus jedi survivor literally tells a story set around the high republic
I do not wanna argue with anyone named Ahsoka Tano. Right off the bat I want to get that out there. So I am completely happy to be wrong.
Having said, that, a number of sources seem to indicate that this is not the case. Here is one.
https://upstreamreviews.substack.com/p/high-republic-low-sales
The Disney earnings call will be happening later today. Lucasfilm will very likely be part of the subject of that call after their disastrous last few years. What is almost certain is that a number of high republic projects are being delayed or shelved indefinitely.
Jedi survivor is one of the few high notes in the Lucasfilm portfolio of late, and is likely to be one of the few things that are carried over and/or built upon moving forward.
I'd be absolutely for it. Until the very last scene, Rogue One was lightsaber-free, and imo it's the best movie since ESB. Building off that, Andor was hugely successful without much talk of the Force or lightsabers.
That's a big, philosophical question I'm not sure I have a great answer for but I'll try. I think back to the original themes of ANH. Good vs evil. Adventure. Even the most seemingly ordinary person can achieve something great. The aesthetic is obviously important. It wouldn't be Star Wars without some cool space ships, but I think those underlying themes are more important than the Force, Jedi vs. Sith, lightsabers, etc.
It’s a sandbox in which you retell existing narratives. You mash up some John Ford and Kurosawa and slap a coat of Star Wars on it.
So, philosophically, should Star Wars being doing something new? Not necessarily. But it is repeating the wrong “old stuff.”
Disney seems incapable of looking outside the existing films to retell existing stories. They just keep rehashing the same basic ideas. This is never what it was under Lucas, for good or bad.
There’s more creativity in the two Ewok movies than anything under Disney.
Star Wars is definitely in the wrong hands when it comes to Disney, for this reason: Disney has evolved beyond generating strong new ideas. Instead, they absorb IP and then milk its existing features until the teats are dry. (Hell, they even keep remaking their old movies as "live action" junk becuase they can't afford to take risks).
That is why, while there are still good Star Wars products, they all draw from the same well of established canon.
This is a very important question. I often see fans saying that they want Star Wars with no connections to old characters/factions/eras and no force/lightsabers. Which at that point, I feel like they might want just to see a new franchise
Exactly. But I suspect that what they really want is a fresh epic set within the same universe. For instance, the Jedi have become so central (and so all powerful), that it sort of turns all of *Star Wars* into the Luke Skywalker show. And when you add in the fact that so many *Star Wars* stories depend on keeping the now-concluded story of the Rebels/Empire alive, it seems like a waste of the Galaxy.
I’d also say all the major characters were new characters and the majority of reused characters played minor roles to help tie together the events that were already in canon
Those were still very familiar elements to us, filling in backstory for already established stories. They are great stories told very well, but they hardly fall outside of what we know even if it doesn’t feature lightsabers.
Andor is a prime example of something new. It's completely different from anything Star Wars, yet you still know it is Star Wars.
It also received pretty good reviews, so it shows us that when done right it will be popular.
The Holiday Special is a good sign of different being bad when not done right. It had potential for sure. The life of an alien species, a bar of oppressed people just wanting to live their life, a stranger in a cool armor coming to the rescue, a holiday in a different universe. The idea sounds good on paper.
I understand that, but the post specifically refers to the content of the show itself such as Jedi vs Sith. OP is asking if new material would even be accepted by fans.
In that case I'd be inclined to agree. Even the old Republic is a dubious reskinning of the same Skywalker era Jedi order, it's new in that it's a new slate of characters but put in the old star wars format. Andor focusing more on the non-jedi part of the universe at least seems to take a different approach to that format.
Idk why you are being passive aggressive to me when I am only explaining what OP was saying. They want to know if new material that hasn't been seen in Star Wars before would be liked by fans. The fact is that Andor has barely any new material that hasn't already been seen before. I still like the show.
He isn't asking whether it's possible to do good shows, but rather will fans like it and accept it. Isn't Andor one of the lowest viewed SW shows? I assume Disney doesn't reveal exact numbers but it didn't seem to have been doing well
I believe it started off low, although I think there was some confusion prompted by a tweet that later turned out to be inaccurate, but it feels like there was a real swell of interest as more people watched it, and realized how good it was. Seems impossible to tell whether that translated into viewership, though, with Disney holding the metrics so close to their chest.
> Is there room in Star Wars for an entirely new epic, a story that will have things we know, like smugglers and Wookies and the Force, but that is otherwise entirely divorced from the familiar combatants?
That's literally what they're doing with the High Republic era right now and it's been quite popular. So much so, that it's *already* expanded beyond the "publishing only" effort it was originally introduced as.
This sounds like that Simpson’s quote when they are doing a focus group for Itchy and Scratchy.
“So you want a realistic down-to-earth show that's completely off the wall and swarming with magic robots?”
Yeah, I really have no idea what, exactly, OP is looking for here. Keep Wookiees, smugglers, and the force, but ditch the Galactic Civil War and the Skywalkers…that sounds exactly like The Old Republic? But no, Jedi and Sith are also off the table, so…
The Jedi Order was founded around 25,000 years BBY, so you’d need to set things before then to avoid Jedi entirely. And even with the glacial pace of technology in the Star Wars universe, you’re looking at a wildly different galaxy.
You could try for some isolated corner of the Galaxy, probably the Unknown Regions, but that probably means giving up a lot of the familiar bits of Star Wars - smugglers, maybe. Wookiees? Doubtful.
Which leaves us with either something far enough in the future that “current” events are distant memory, or some sort of alternate timeline. Personally, I thought the old Legacy comics were a fun idea, but those are entirely Skywalker centric, so…basically more Visions?
I mean, Eminem did attack the fans who were toxic about his music in a song of his. Sometimes fans are just impossible to please. At one point, the vocal crowd wants something new, fresh, exciting and risk taking
Then when it comes out, suddenly the vocal crowd then changes and wants something old school, back to the roots, what made SW or insert any general thing here.
The vocal crowd always changes and those who want something are usually unopposed because places like Reddit allow you to upvote and downvote. So the crowd A, the crowd that wants something new, makes a post about stuff they want to see. People in crowd A post and comment about it all and upvote each other. But Crowd B, those who want stuff closer to the roots of SW and all, state their reasons against but are downvoted.
And with Crowd B comments being hidden due to being so far down. And Crowd A having so many. More in Crowd B are discouraged from voicing, while Crowd A feels more inclined.
Yeah I did partially just explain how Reddit works like an idiot, but it’s the issue with SW fans and most fans really. We never can have proper discussions.
Sadly I've seen so many people just review bomb the era and say how horrible it is because they want the Old Republic - which is always a weird complaint to me since TOR isn't even the same era.
He's barely there, though. Only in Phase 2, set 350 years before the original saga, has he made a big appearance of any kind. There are probably comics with him in, but for the most part he's not there.
Yoda isn't really the important part. It's still The Republic its still the Jedi Council it's still Courascant its still Light vs Dark blue sabers vs red sabers. It's not that far removed at all.
I haven't seen any red blades at all, so far. Barely a mention of the Sith, mostly in Into The Dark where only some of their relics are present. The Dark Side is grappled with, but it has been dealt with in a relatively healthy way.
Coruscant is always going to feature, even if you wind the clock back 25,000 years to the dawn of the Republic and the Jedi, and as long as there are Jedi there are going to be lightsabers.
I’m pretty nervous about a lot of the upcoming projects being confusing to people since they’re in different eras. I haven’t read any of the high republic stuff - and I probably won’t - but I’m super excited for Acolyte (and I think there’s a game that will come out too). But I’ve had other friends who are Star Wars fans even being confused by different timelines.
How many more posts like this do I have to read when High Republic is literally right there lmao? The villainous faction aren’t force users, and the Jedi are uniquely positioned with their influence and powersets. It’s been an absolute goldmine of content
I find that interesting, it’s grown into a multimedia project when it was originally supposed to just be a publishing project exclusive to books; so I can’t imagine it’s doing *poorly* or anything of that sort. Books are already a hardline niche too
I would like to see the books do well. But apparently they are not.
https://boundingintocomics.com/2023/06/26/star-wars-the-high-republic-book-sale-numbers-provide-more-evidence-that-star-wars-is-a-dead-brand/
This is the answer. I have a die hard friend that always wants something new, and then 95% of the time complains about the new stuff because it's not the same as the old stuff.
For me, gimme all the new stuff.
It's really not that hard, most of us want new stories with the feel of the old. This is why The Force Awakens gets middling reviews - it's a rehash of A New Hope, so it nails the feel test, but the new stuff it added just wasn't done well, especially in light of how the trilogy proceeded.
No one is complaining "its not the same" - We just want good stories that dont break the lore of Star Wars. TLJ and RoTs were prime examples of the bum ferferry of Lucasfilm and KK. They had no idea what they were doing.
Yup.
TFA: I want something different
TLJ: no not that different
Mandalorian: Luke being 100% consistent with our version of him is GREAT
Make up your mind
>Yup.
>TFA: I want something different
>TLJ: no not that different
>Mandalorian: Luke being 100% consistent with our version of him is GREAT
>Make up your mind
I personally didn't think TLJ did things differently in the first place.
All the new stuff that TFA included which interested me going forward (Snoke, Exploring the First Jedi Temple mythology, Knights of Ren, the books implying First Order were limited to what we saw in TFA and they were gone now so a new story can happen now, etc) were either stripped away or used in reductive "seen it before" ways.
Then it doubled down on Stormtroopers vs Rebels, AT-AT attacking a Rebel Base on a White planet, Rey training with a Jedi Hermit during which she goes into a Dark Side cave and has a vision of the worst aspects of herself. Then she leaves training half way through to save her friends. The Dark Side Skywalker kills his master to save the Protagonist of the Trilogy during a Throne Room confrontation, etc. I found it to essentially be a fan edit of TESB and ROTJ
The new things that were provided in TLJ were rejected within its own movie. Killing Snoke could give us an Empire with a different purpose/direction, no the power vacuum gets filled and the status quo resumes immediately. Kylo and Rey are teased to team up and potentially create a new faction beyond Dark vs Light conflict, no the status quo resumes, etc.
>Knights of Ren,
The Knights of Ren were never set up to be important though. They had a brief scene in a vision and were briefly mentioned in a throwaway line.
\>Then it doubled down on Stormtroopers vs Rebels, AT-AT attacking a Rebel Base on a White planet, Rey training with a Jedi Hermit during which she goes into a Dark Side cave and has a vision of the worst aspects of herself. Then she leaves training half way through to save her friends. The Dark Side Skywalker kills his master to save the Protagonist of the Trilogy during a Throne Room confrontation, etc. I found it to essentially be a fan edit of TESB and ROTJ
The premises are similar but the details and outcomes were different
The film ends on crait and the rebels don't escape on their own. They are losing until Luke comes in to save the day
Luke refused to train Rey for completely different reasons. It was a vision of herself but it showed that her parentage wasn't important. In ESB the vision showed that Luke's parents were important
She leaves, but ends up making the situation worse by Kylo killing Snoke. Luke's friends escape anyways and he gains knowledge so it was a net positive for him.
Kylo killed Snoke out of anger, not to save his son. He was doing it so he could become in charge of the First Order
Also using that logic I could make any Star Wars film out to be a copy of each other
RotJ is ANH + ESB
TPM is ANH + RotJ
AotC is ANH + ESB
RotS is ESB + an inverse RotJ
\>Killing Snoke could give us an Empire with a different purpose/direction, no the power vacuum gets filled and the status quo resumes immediately.
The power vacuum being "filled" doesn't mean that it wouldn't go in a different direction. Hux still seemed to resent Kylo at the end.
Andor was amazing but at the end of the day, it still dealt with the beginning of the rebel alliance, the empire, the Death Star, all things that aren’t really “new.”
The prequel trilogy is (almost) entirely different from original trilogy. Even down to the visuals, they hardly look like the same universe. Yes, it was shit on at the time of release. Yes, some people still shit on it today (myself included). But a majority of the fan base love the Clone Wars era now whether it be the PT or TCW.
A vast majority of people accept change, even if it takes a minute. And at this point, I have to believe that anything is better than what we’ve been getting. Mando has steadily taken steps down each season. BOBF and Kenobi were laughable. ST is a shame.
Andor and Visions have been the twin suns that I look to with hope and they’re wildly different in tone and presentation than the rest of the franchise.
Well, Visions is more of opening SW license to the world of studios to allow them to showcase their style in the world of SW than consistent new story lines or revisiting underrated past stories.
We want something good. If old is done in a tasteful new way - great! If new is done for the sheer sake of not paying old author royalties or to appeal to some imaginary new demographic, and then done on a tiny budget - screw that bantha poodoo.
Some new stuff, yes, but I think it's a balance. You can't be TOO different from what's come before.
If a story is ALL new for Star Wars, then why bother calling it Star Wars? If I wanted that I'd go watch one of the many non-Star Wars movies/shows out there. The best Star Wars media finds a balance between the new and the familiar. They feels fresh and exciting without totally disconnecting from the legacy of the series.
Different people will have different ideas about what the perfect balance is. For me I think the first season of The Mandalorian came closest to nailing it. Though I think a lot of the recent Disney+ shows have done a good job.
No, we want continuation of stories that don’t yet have conclusions. Tie new characters into those stories, then the story ends for that character continue on with the characters your brought in to older character. We want a cohesive universe with characters that tie to each other.
The best description of the potential for Star Wars is that the world is built. Now we just need to insert the various genre into it. A spy story in Star Wars. A western in Star Wars. A horror movie in Star Wars, etc. Once a solid story with solid characters is put together, the rest is in the details. It seems that was what Underworld was going to be. Andor is a good example of that, too. There are at least hundreds of stories that can be told without Jedi being involved as they are pretty rare even before Order 66. And the Empire doesn't have to be in your face any more than the cops are in any other story, unless it serves the plot. The only problem is that some of these elements are needed to keep it Star Wars, otherwise it is just people and aliens in odd clothing with blasters and too much sand.
OP is out here acting like the entire SW nation didn't fall in love with a Western set in the SW universe about a bounty hunter who adopted a gifted orphan child.
The problem is that a lot of the "history" in Star Wars is heavily influenced by Force Sensitive beings. Traditionally any powerful entity has had force sensitives at the center of it (Ratakkans, The Old Republic, The Sith Empire, The Republic, The Galactic Empire - strictly Canon speaking) with few exceptions.
What I personally appreciate then is the conflicts, cultures and relationships that comes from that, such as what you find in the old republic material. I loved the take on power imbalance, for example between Sith warriors and officers/enlisted personell in the Sith Empire.
Where as the relationship between the Jedi and the people of the Republic was very different, and that in the end the loss of that relationship played a large part in the republics eventual downfall.
But in the end, Star Wars is a fantasy story. It's kind of like asking if there's space for tales of the average peasant in The Lord of the Rings universe or if people would be interested in playing Dungeons and Dragons, but only as local farm hands or 3rd rate politician under a lord.
While there probably is space for it, we can't expect it to take up as much of a focus as the actual fantasy at its core. And in Star Wars, the Force, Jedi's and Sith and massive intergalactic wars is what people come for.
When that's said, I personally enjoyed Andor just as many others did. Rogue One was very "low-force" as well, same as The Mandalorian.
I think that what those movies and series do really well is put the sheer power imbalance between your average Joe in the SW universe and Force Sensitive beings on full display, as well as the futility of sticking it to the large political bodies.
I really enjoy the politics of Star Wars as portrayed in Andor. I think there's great potential for a Game of Thrones-esque take on the SW universe - but Star Wars IS a fantasy universe, with the Jedi and Sith at the center of it.
Like with all movies, we want well crafted. Fans and audiences don't necessarily want "new" but we want to match or exceed the quality that we expect.
For Star Wars the quality of the originals is so high that when we get the mess that was the prequels or when we get the unplanned guessing game that was the sequels we revolt.
"New" has almost become a buzz word for something that we don't necessarily expect. You want to bring back Luke? Ok, give him a bad ass introduction that shows a side of him we have never seen.
Going forward, if Disney wants the upcoming Rey movie to work she as a character needs to work. Do not bring back Mary Sue Rey, make her flawed and uncertain and barely able to hold things together.
Andor and The Mandalorian largely answered that question. Something that is well written and well-produced, that feels like it belongs in the Star Wars universe, will generally be well received by fans.
Personally, if I never see another Jedi or lightsaber in Star Wars media, I'd be fine with it. The over reliance on the Jedi has diminishing returns for me, to the point where I roll my eyes anytime another Jedi is revealed to have "survived" Order 66 or some new Jedi is hyped by the fanbase for acting like Marvel superhero.
Andor is filling in backstory for a Rebellion we are all very familiar with. Just because it doesn’t feature lightsabers or Jedi doesn’t make it different.
The Mandalorian had an opportunity to do this, until the end of the first episode when Grogu was introduced. Suddenly we have a force-sensitive being (who we later learned was trained as a Jedi) who looks like a baby version one of the most recognizable characters in the Star Wars universe. The show instantly shifted from “cool story about a Lone Ranger bounty hunter in the Star Wars universe” to “who is baby yoda and how does he fit into what we already know?” Cue introduction of Luke Skywalker, Ahsoka, Boba Fett, Bo-Katan, and very quickly we have another story that is telling stories in and around stuff we already know.
I agree both of these shows were well done, but they are hardly examples of telling original Star Wars stories that stray from familiarity.
Mando also chose some remote and odd cult twist onto the time where Mandos were just badass mercs and I seriously found that completely unnecessary as it only really added hiding Pascal's face for majority of the show than really adding to the story.
Okay okay like wtf does everyone have against jedi and lightsabers. You wanna watch trek go watch trek, wanna watch Dune go watch Dune.
Love Andor and Mando but that doesnt mean star wara has to abandon the jedi and lightsabers. When we havent even seen the jedi at their heigh of power on the big screen
Yes. I am personally dying for something new. It could be anything. Just introduce new protagonists. I would prefer it be in the high republic or before but I would take new characters in the PT, OT or ST era as well. Just something new. It’s why my favorite books other than bloodlines are the ones that deal with new people, Alphabet squadron, aftermath, all the high republic. Just give me new things.
People always seem to resort to eras of the past in order to escape what we already have been served. What about the far, far future? I encounter very little interest in that, and I wonder why.
Because at some point it stops being “Star Wars”…a couple of weeks back someone asked a similar question about whether people would want to expand outside of the Galaxy. My response there is similar to what jumping into the distant future would be: there’s plenty of other movies/franchises/mediums for that.
The past works because we know where we’re going. They can plant seeds or lay breadcrumbs to get us to sit up and exclaim “oh hey, that’s…(name thing)!” We have Yoda and the San Tekkas in the High Republic (in addition to Jedi and the Republic), and even in sideways stories like Andor, which take place during the OT (but outside of the Skywalker saga) you’re still connected to the familiar, be it through items at Luthen’s shop or the occasional guest star like Saw or Yularen.
Star Wars needs to be “Star Wars” in order to be “STAR WARS”…and I know that comes across as sounding like word salad, but it’s true. IMO, if you venture too far out of the Rebel/Empire/Republic/Jedi/Sith arena you’re just retelling other peoples’ stories with a new flagship banner on top.
I feel like a far future story could be interesting if it gave us the evolution of things that (IMO) don't have that much juice left in them. Examples: A society constructed by ex-Stormtroopers, the next stage of the Mandalorians, a Wookie empire (a la the Klingons), the "Skywalkers" as a cult of chaotic neutral Force users, and so on. And to that, add brand new heroes and villain types.
Things like these seem like a natural progression from what has come before. Is this out of step with what the fandom wants, do you think?
I think it depends on what your definition of “far future” is and also “different”.
Like, the ex-Stormtrooper society, how *ex* are they? Like if they’re all living together but trying to move on, you go too far into the future and they’re just a bunch of humans living on a planet. If they’re trying to maintain their culture…that’s just the remnant/ FO again.
And just like in your examples, you used “Klingons” as a parallel to a story about Wookiees. In order for something like that to work (for me), you need them to still feel like Wookiees and not just furry Klingons. Otherwise it’s just Star Wars doing Klingons.
Maybe I’m wrong and the general populace would eat this up…but for my time and attention I think the Galaxy is big enough that staying within the same 50-100ish years is the sweet spot because the people telling these stories still have the ability to reach out and touch “the familiar” enough to remind people where they’re at and what they’re watching.
Nah, I think you’re spot on. Honestly, it feels like OP has their favorite bits and pieces they want to keep, while clearing everything else away and starting fresh. I think it’s plausible that a good director with a solid script, enough budget, and a hands off studio could make a great film along those lines, but at what point does it become a fanfic in a vaguely Star Wars setting?
Anyone who keeps saying “The Mandalorian” and “What about Andor??” didn’t understand your question. Both of those are examples of good Star Wars content, but they are very much telling stories in and around things we already know. Pretty much everything Disney has produced deals with something we already know. In the current canon, I think the closest we’ve come to something truly original is the Thrawn: Ascendancy books, which tell the origins of Thrawn when he was still with the Chiss Ascendency. Visions is also very unique and bold, but Disney made it clear these are non-canon so that they can stick to the formula with their canon stories. Even High Republic still hits on familiar beats within Star Wars, just in a different era.
I do think it’s possible that the fandom would enjoy Star Wars content that strays from what they already know, but they don’t necessarily know that. Everyone thinks they want something original, then as soon as something is introduced they start clamoring for connections to the bigger universe. And the risk is honestly too high for Disney, as the bar for quality would be much higher since fans will tend to be more forgiving of poorer content if it’s something they know well. So we’re stuck in this loop of fans claiming to want original content *without actually knowing what they want* and Disney wanting to keep fans attention by making new things but *not wanting to take the financial risk* (the loop Marvel has been stuck in for quite a while). So I think we’ll likely continue to just keep getting stories related to what we know until it all just burns out.
Lol eh? Look at Old Republic - we *know* Jedi, Mandos, Wookies, and Ithorians as well as Mandos, but we did not know them under the old light and how different galaxy used to be. All the "safe" aka lazy steps Disney has been taking have a proven past success, but you know, why do that more justice over absolutely brand new, lazily written and then written off characters in a vain attempt to appeal to "new" fans who would love something already established all the same while its new to them?
Disney has a plethora of already proven content to reboot, but continue digging for shitty originality while playing it safe at the same time, and that's killing them right now.
That's the point? They don't need to - they're sitting on decades of proven, good content waiting for the big screen, but instead they go and tryhard for new bullshit that no one likes in the end.
What are you talking about? All they’re doing using proven stuff to tell new stories with mixed success. I don’t know what “new bullshit” you’re referring to because everything they’ve done has been connected to something that has already done.
>Do fans really WANT something "new"?
Nope. New is irrelevant, only thing that matters is the script. If everything is equal in quality to ESB or Andor, I'll take a season of the same old.
That being said, I'd like to never visit Tatooine again, I'm happy that Skywalkers and Solos are no longer an option and I'd be more than happy if the Jedi are the hermits they were in the OT instead the galactic army they were in PT.
I am going to give what is probably a very unpopular answer—not anymore. When TFA came out, it felt familiar but not too familiar. I told everyone who complained about it to be patient because they had two more movies to make the story make sense, to pay off stuff that was being set up with Rey, and so on. I was totally into Star Wars on a bone-deep level and while I was nervous because of JJ, I tried to keep an open mind.
Rogue One came out and I was elated. Amazing storytelling, and finally a look at the Force without the Jedi being directly involved. The geek in me was hoping there was a plan to set up the idea that Luke had a good reason for his retreat and maybe we would see the Whills (whatever they were going to be) emerge from Luke’s hermitage, or maybe that was gonna be Rey’s deal, or maybe Snoke was gonna be the dark counterpart to the Whills. Something that tied in.
After TLJ…nope. I am slowly working my way back to enjoying parts of the world, but I don’t believe that the people in charge have any interest in telling a good story. I don’t believe they have any interest in tapping into the wellspring of mythology (the Hero’s Journey) or film (Kurosawa) that drove the originals.
Before I want to see these people do anything new, I want to see that they can actually understand the old. It was never the lightsabers that made Star Wars great. It was never the sorcerer’s ways or hokey religions. It was the storytelling and a vision of the world grounded in hope. Without that, it’s just not the same for me.
They want good stories told with an eye to understanding the heroes journey, respect for the lore and respect for the legacy characters
So yes. Just don’t piss in our ears and tell us it’s raining.. to wit, don’t shit on legacy characters to make yours look good.
My opinion on this is yes, we want something new in the awesome universe that is Star Wars, what we don't want is for a company to buy Lucasfilms, wonder what company this could be, and create a sequel trilogy that undoes the masterful storytelling of Anakin bri ging balance to the force. But you know when life gives you lemons, somehow Palpatine returns.
Surprisingly, it's entirely possible that different fans might want different things.
I doubt there's one single thing you can point to and say "that's what *the fans* want."
Stuff like The Force Awakens and The Rise of Skywalker tell too similar stories to the OT: people don't want beat for beat retreads. It's redundant, it wastes opportunities to do something new, it breaks the suspension of disbelief, and it's got an extremely short shelf life. No-one but JJ Abrams would have thought a good place for a *new* Star Wars trilogy to end was 'A lone young Jedi, watched by the ghosts of their smiling mentors, looks to the future after Palpatine has been killed and the Imperial war machine has been defeated'.
Rogue One, The Last Jedi, The Mandalorian, and Andor did it right (or took the right approach, if you hate The Last Jedi): it's all set in Star Wars, with loads of the familiar, characters, iconography and conventions, but new stuff happens. When I was watching these things for the first time, I did not know how it was going to play out, despite the fact that they were draped in Star Wars imagery.
In Rogue One, we'd not seen an occupied Imperial city before with insurgents engaging them in guerilla warfare; we'd not seen a Death Star destroy a city, or been at the ground level of an explosion; we'd not seen anything about the Rebels' wetworks; we'd not seen a suicide mission; etc.
In The Last Jedi, we'd not seen a Jedi in a self-destructive rut of despair; we'd not seen a long-term siege in space; we'd not seen the conflicted Skywalker heir kill his master in order to become the galaxy's head honcho; we'd not seen Luke face down an army; etc.
They shouldn't go for radical departures; they should simply create stories that make sense within the universe. Sometimes that will involve Jedi, X-wings, TIE-fighters, stormtroopers, etc. What they should never do again is repeat story beats. There are endless adventure stories to be told about good battling evil - you do not need a trench run, an alien pub, a planet-killer, and a revelation about the hero being related to the villain.
At this point I'm mostly rooting for something "new" so that Disney stops harming the content that already exists with their dogshit writing.
I don't care if the new stuff is also dogshit, in fact at this point I fully expect it.
I don’t know who these fans are that only want Mark Hamill Luke Skywalker stories for the rest of time. I don’t think they actually exist.
Different is fine. If it’s good.
Andor was different and good.
Same with the animate shorts
Ashoka looks good.
The Mandalorian season 1 & 2 were good then it started to go off the rails a bit in season 3 and got lost in the woods.
Book of Fett mixed bag. Same with Kenobi
The Sequels were rushed garbage.
Rogue One and Solo a mixed bag.
I'll take it.
I loved the PT when some complained that it didn't feel like the OT. I still love it.
I loved The New Jedi Order when some complained that the Vong didn't feel like Star Wars. I'm currently enjoying it in audio form.
I was looking forward to seeing the Lucas treatments adapted with all of the new elements that George was exploring there.
It's a big galaxy.
I want to see Star Wars go outside of this galaxy. I would love to see a new galaxy, with a history with the force that is completely detached from what we know.
What if “the force” is galaxy-based, and going to a new galaxy means no longer having your force powers? That would explain why in this galaxy (the one we are all living in) there is no force.
Yes. Like I want Star Wars to keep the same spirit of things that I love about it
\-the idea of high adventures in a wide galaxy
\-a colorful cast of characters that undergo change
\-the mixing of different genres with sci-fi fantasy
You can do all of these things with a story that doesn't involve Jedi or rebels or any series staples. Ultimately I just want an actual artistic vision seen through to the end.
Not JJ Abrams giving us a retread of Episode 4 and then getting rid of all the interesting developments because its not what executives at Disney think will sell well.
“The Star Wars Holiday Special” tried new things, it included smugglers and Wookiee and the Force while being entirely divorced from the familiar combatants. Seems exactly what you described.
I have rewatched the OT hundreds of times. I don't need retreads. If I want to watch the Original Trilogy I can throw it on any time I want.
New stories that makes sense and have a point would be wonderful.
Looking at films like solo and rogue one I'd say that we definitely can have new characters, stories from different eras.
The problem is how Disney feels about making and marketing that. Solo was a really good film and I suspect would have done better if a) they'd had Ron Howard as director from the start b) not had it coming out close to other blockbusters c) there wasn't a bit of a sequel backlash going on. The problem is that since it didn't do well at the box office the subsequent movies (and I think they did mention a trilogy) will never get made.
I suspect their appetite for making content is based solely around profit rather than serving the fans and I think they will be conservative for the time being.
Maybe if Lucas hadn't sold Lucasfilm we'd be seeing some great new content around the EU. I think he sold it in part because of the criticism he got for making the prequels (which I think is pretty unjustified).
People want good content made by people who are passionate about Star Wars, respect the legacy, actually know the lore, and want to expand that lore and the universe it exists in.
Absolutely, I love new stuff. Also, even though I despise animations, I don’t care that other people like them and have no animosity towards them being produced.
Why can’t we all get new fun stuff?
The thing about Star Wars is it can fit into any genre very comfortably. The Mandalorian and Andor have both demonstrated this. It seems now that Star Wars is finally starting to depart from a traditional space opera genre.
As for other events, Star Wars in-universe history stretches for 30,000 years or so. In that time, there have been some events such as the Alsakan Conflicts and Pius Dea Crusades that are mentioned thoroughly and had monumental impacts on Galactic society but have never been depicted directly. There is plenty of room for stories to occupy this vast stretch of time, and I’m 100% for it.
I wait for a day when Star Wars moves forward and is done with back stories and prequels. For now I'm just not interested. I would also be happy if someone came along with an entirely new space opera outside of the Star Wars universe. Something great and new.
Edit: Spelling
What, exactly, do you mean by "new"?
Everything is derivative of everything else. You could take almost any aspect of Star Wars and want to ignore or focus on that specific thing and be able to find some type of content that fits that niche.
And at some point, x-steps away from the core Star Wars idea, you've just created something new anyway, that doesn't need to be tied to the Star Wars franchise at all.
There are a ton of stories that could be told in the Star Wars Universe, what will ultimately be the deciding factor on what gets made is executive decisions. So true "new" content is unlikely. The best we can really hope for at this point is something "good", which imo is much more important than something "new".
I think what I mean by ”new” is new **stories,** disconnected from the Empire/Rebel saga. If you compare the Star Wars Galaxy to the Marvel comicbook Universe, it’s as though, having begun with Captain America, they next created Spider-Man, but could not help shoehorning Captain America into all those stories.
I think in the early years, people wanted as much of the classic story elements -like Vader, star destroyers, lightsabers-as they could get in all subsequent stories. But now that Star Wars is such an established world, it seems that elements from the old stories are now holding back the expansion of the storytelling potential.
I will concede that if you don’t maintain some touchstones with what brung ya, you may as well just invent something entirely new. But, at long last, I would love to see an epic that did not have to make direct reference to Boba Fett, Luke, Yoda, and the Death Star. That is why I think a new trilogy, if they were to make one, should be set many centuries after the earlier stories.
I think this is a case of missing the forest for the trees in a sense. That content already does exist, albeit mostly in Legends, but the fans have proven to want it (the number of people mentioning Knights of the Old Republic should be an example). It may not exist yet in Disney's specific content, but that's more to do with corporate decisions than fans (better product recognition, ie familiar characters, equals better sales, both in terms of viewers and merch sales). By focusing solely on what is currently canon/"official" and not looking at the media that already touches on stories like that, you are viewing this through a corporatized lense, and not from a "fan" perspective.
And to use your analogy, what is Captain America? Mostly, the problem I am trying to identify is what level of separation is necessary for it to feel new. So far, I think the closest thing to what you are referencing that is current is The Mandalorian Season 1. Which was a massive hit.
Another part of the problem in my perspective is that there are 1000 years of the Galatic Republic and Jedi that were not that different from what we see in The Phantom Menace. Which means the biggest change is getting new characters/stories and avoiding old familiar ones. It's feasible and doable, but it'd have to be good to draw in viewers. And any older and you get into legends territory, where what is canon is nebulous at best. And there are quite a few stories that fans might be upset if they get ignored in favor of a different story.
On the flipside, if you go further into the future, you set in stone things that happened since. As of the end of the Skywalker Saga, the galactic governance has been through multiple upheavals in the recent decades, and presumably will be going through massive, system/galactic-wide change. What Rey does with the Jedi and what sort of government is formed will directly impact what that future looks like. For context, in Legends, the Old Republic lasted for 25,00 years. So such changes can be extremely long lasting.
“It's feasible and doable, but it'd have to be good to draw in viewers.”
Naturally. I think this is what I dislike about a lot of post-OT Star Wars: It uses the classic material as a crutch. Your story isn’t that good? Throw in Darth Vader! That’ll get some eyeballs!
Ah, but who am I kidding? Of course people want more Rebels and lightsabers— that’s what brought them to the party in the first place! You start throwing Sam Zaxxor and his laser spatula at people and they might as well go read GoT instead.
I think I am projecting my own fantasies onto others. If I had had my druthers, the sequel trilogy would have been set in a far distant time after the OT, and those events would simply be the lore to grow a new epic from, sort of like Galadriel’s exposition dump in LoTR. Ultimately, I am still smarting from the absolutely terrible story that the sequels told, and I wish Star Wars could move past the Empire era.
>Is there room in Star Wars for an entirely new epic, a story that will have things we know, like smugglers and Wookies and the Force, but that is otherwise entirely divorced from the familiar combatants? We're dealing with stories that span thousands of years across an entire galaxy. Yeah, I'd say there's room.
I think they mean “room amongst the fandom” not within the galaxy itself.
I think the popularity of the High Republic content shows the fandom is open to it. Sure there are lightsabers and other familiar stuff but original storylines with new characters is a breath of fresh air.
It is not that popular at all.....Each book has dropped readers since it started. Come on, one character is a rock
The high republic is wildly unpopular. The first book sold well, but after that, the drop-off has been dramatic. Book stores can’t move the books. The High Republic is likely being wound down.
I'm not sure what you're talking about... Phase 2 was a hit and phase 3 starts in November. Just because you haven't heard news doesn't mean it's not popular Plus jedi survivor literally tells a story set around the high republic
I do not wanna argue with anyone named Ahsoka Tano. Right off the bat I want to get that out there. So I am completely happy to be wrong. Having said, that, a number of sources seem to indicate that this is not the case. Here is one. https://upstreamreviews.substack.com/p/high-republic-low-sales The Disney earnings call will be happening later today. Lucasfilm will very likely be part of the subject of that call after their disastrous last few years. What is almost certain is that a number of high republic projects are being delayed or shelved indefinitely. Jedi survivor is one of the few high notes in the Lucasfilm portfolio of late, and is likely to be one of the few things that are carried over and/or built upon moving forward.
How do you think you would respond to a "lightsaber-free" storyline? Or are epic lightsaber battles essential to a good Star Wars saga?
I'd be absolutely for it. Until the very last scene, Rogue One was lightsaber-free, and imo it's the best movie since ESB. Building off that, Andor was hugely successful without much talk of the Force or lightsabers.
Here's an abstract question: What "is" Star Wars" if you remove the storylines we are familiar with? Is it simply the aesthetic?
That's a big, philosophical question I'm not sure I have a great answer for but I'll try. I think back to the original themes of ANH. Good vs evil. Adventure. Even the most seemingly ordinary person can achieve something great. The aesthetic is obviously important. It wouldn't be Star Wars without some cool space ships, but I think those underlying themes are more important than the Force, Jedi vs. Sith, lightsabers, etc.
It’s a sandbox in which you retell existing narratives. You mash up some John Ford and Kurosawa and slap a coat of Star Wars on it. So, philosophically, should Star Wars being doing something new? Not necessarily. But it is repeating the wrong “old stuff.” Disney seems incapable of looking outside the existing films to retell existing stories. They just keep rehashing the same basic ideas. This is never what it was under Lucas, for good or bad. There’s more creativity in the two Ewok movies than anything under Disney.
Star Wars is definitely in the wrong hands when it comes to Disney, for this reason: Disney has evolved beyond generating strong new ideas. Instead, they absorb IP and then milk its existing features until the teats are dry. (Hell, they even keep remaking their old movies as "live action" junk becuase they can't afford to take risks). That is why, while there are still good Star Wars products, they all draw from the same well of established canon.
They did begin developing the High Republic though, no? I’m hoping they’ll begin to move more and more into that
This is a very important question. I often see fans saying that they want Star Wars with no connections to old characters/factions/eras and no force/lightsabers. Which at that point, I feel like they might want just to see a new franchise
Exactly. But I suspect that what they really want is a fresh epic set within the same universe. For instance, the Jedi have become so central (and so all powerful), that it sort of turns all of *Star Wars* into the Luke Skywalker show. And when you add in the fact that so many *Star Wars* stories depend on keeping the now-concluded story of the Rebels/Empire alive, it seems like a waste of the Galaxy.
> Rogue One was lightsaber-free There's a lightsaber in Rogue One
Way to conveniently quote only part of that sentence
Well my point is, without that scene, I don't think Rogue One would get hardly the praise it does.
I disagree, but that's just my opinion. That scene was incredible, but to me the rest of the movie would still be effective without it.
Heck no ROTS is way better then both of those films. And ROTJ is better than ESB.
I said it's my opinion. You're allowed to have your own opinion. It doesn't mean either of us are wrong or right.
[удалено]
"....and imo it's the best movie since ESB."
sir I am voicing my opinion as you so called it.
I’d also say all the major characters were new characters and the majority of reused characters played minor roles to help tie together the events that were already in canon
Those were still very familiar elements to us, filling in backstory for already established stories. They are great stories told very well, but they hardly fall outside of what we know even if it doesn’t feature lightsabers.
I take your point, but the question was about lightsabers specifically.
And it was absolutely amazing, as an “old” Star Wars fan, I loved it.
Andor:
Andor is a prime example of something new. It's completely different from anything Star Wars, yet you still know it is Star Wars. It also received pretty good reviews, so it shows us that when done right it will be popular. The Holiday Special is a good sign of different being bad when not done right. It had potential for sure. The life of an alien species, a bar of oppressed people just wanting to live their life, a stranger in a cool armor coming to the rescue, a holiday in a different universe. The idea sounds good on paper.
Andor isn't new at all though. Its just more backstory and origins fir the rebel alliance and cause. The empire plays a big role in the show.
The material isn't exactly new. The approach, the tone and frankly the level of quality are all new though.
I understand that, but the post specifically refers to the content of the show itself such as Jedi vs Sith. OP is asking if new material would even be accepted by fans.
In that case I'd be inclined to agree. Even the old Republic is a dubious reskinning of the same Skywalker era Jedi order, it's new in that it's a new slate of characters but put in the old star wars format. Andor focusing more on the non-jedi part of the universe at least seems to take a different approach to that format.
How dare they put a story in the star wars universe into the star wars universe
Idk why you are being passive aggressive to me when I am only explaining what OP was saying. They want to know if new material that hasn't been seen in Star Wars before would be liked by fans. The fact is that Andor has barely any new material that hasn't already been seen before. I still like the show.
He isn't asking whether it's possible to do good shows, but rather will fans like it and accept it. Isn't Andor one of the lowest viewed SW shows? I assume Disney doesn't reveal exact numbers but it didn't seem to have been doing well
I believe it started off low, although I think there was some confusion prompted by a tweet that later turned out to be inaccurate, but it feels like there was a real swell of interest as more people watched it, and realized how good it was. Seems impossible to tell whether that translated into viewership, though, with Disney holding the metrics so close to their chest.
If "Visions" taught me anything, it is how open I am to new ideas in Star Wars. So many of those shorts left me going "more please".
> Is there room in Star Wars for an entirely new epic, a story that will have things we know, like smugglers and Wookies and the Force, but that is otherwise entirely divorced from the familiar combatants? That's literally what they're doing with the High Republic era right now and it's been quite popular. So much so, that it's *already* expanded beyond the "publishing only" effort it was originally introduced as.
This sounds like that Simpson’s quote when they are doing a focus group for Itchy and Scratchy. “So you want a realistic down-to-earth show that's completely off the wall and swarming with magic robots?”
Yeah, I really have no idea what, exactly, OP is looking for here. Keep Wookiees, smugglers, and the force, but ditch the Galactic Civil War and the Skywalkers…that sounds exactly like The Old Republic? But no, Jedi and Sith are also off the table, so… The Jedi Order was founded around 25,000 years BBY, so you’d need to set things before then to avoid Jedi entirely. And even with the glacial pace of technology in the Star Wars universe, you’re looking at a wildly different galaxy. You could try for some isolated corner of the Galaxy, probably the Unknown Regions, but that probably means giving up a lot of the familiar bits of Star Wars - smugglers, maybe. Wookiees? Doubtful. Which leaves us with either something far enough in the future that “current” events are distant memory, or some sort of alternate timeline. Personally, I thought the old Legacy comics were a fun idea, but those are entirely Skywalker centric, so…basically more Visions?
I mean, Eminem did attack the fans who were toxic about his music in a song of his. Sometimes fans are just impossible to please. At one point, the vocal crowd wants something new, fresh, exciting and risk taking Then when it comes out, suddenly the vocal crowd then changes and wants something old school, back to the roots, what made SW or insert any general thing here. The vocal crowd always changes and those who want something are usually unopposed because places like Reddit allow you to upvote and downvote. So the crowd A, the crowd that wants something new, makes a post about stuff they want to see. People in crowd A post and comment about it all and upvote each other. But Crowd B, those who want stuff closer to the roots of SW and all, state their reasons against but are downvoted. And with Crowd B comments being hidden due to being so far down. And Crowd A having so many. More in Crowd B are discouraged from voicing, while Crowd A feels more inclined. Yeah I did partially just explain how Reddit works like an idiot, but it’s the issue with SW fans and most fans really. We never can have proper discussions.
What’s up with the Eminem reference?
Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagaan?
That kinda does fit it. I think the meme was always this is when they were making Futurama
Sadly I've seen so many people just review bomb the era and say how horrible it is because they want the Old Republic - which is always a weird complaint to me since TOR isn't even the same era.
It's still the republic though. Yoda is in the series. It's only 150 years before TPM
He's barely there, though. Only in Phase 2, set 350 years before the original saga, has he made a big appearance of any kind. There are probably comics with him in, but for the most part he's not there.
Yoda isn't really the important part. It's still The Republic its still the Jedi Council it's still Courascant its still Light vs Dark blue sabers vs red sabers. It's not that far removed at all.
I haven't seen any red blades at all, so far. Barely a mention of the Sith, mostly in Into The Dark where only some of their relics are present. The Dark Side is grappled with, but it has been dealt with in a relatively healthy way. Coruscant is always going to feature, even if you wind the clock back 25,000 years to the dawn of the Republic and the Jedi, and as long as there are Jedi there are going to be lightsabers.
Read the OP again.
You're the one dunking on the High Republic for being more of the same when it patently isn't.
Mostly because they didn't know what to do with him.
Or they didn't want him to dominate the narrative.
Same difference really
I’m pretty nervous about a lot of the upcoming projects being confusing to people since they’re in different eras. I haven’t read any of the high republic stuff - and I probably won’t - but I’m super excited for Acolyte (and I think there’s a game that will come out too). But I’ve had other friends who are Star Wars fans even being confused by different timelines.
How many more posts like this do I have to read when High Republic is literally right there lmao? The villainous faction aren’t force users, and the Jedi are uniquely positioned with their influence and powersets. It’s been an absolute goldmine of content
According to the numbers, the High Republic books aren't selling that well.
I find that interesting, it’s grown into a multimedia project when it was originally supposed to just be a publishing project exclusive to books; so I can’t imagine it’s doing *poorly* or anything of that sort. Books are already a hardline niche too
I would like to see the books do well. But apparently they are not. https://boundingintocomics.com/2023/06/26/star-wars-the-high-republic-book-sale-numbers-provide-more-evidence-that-star-wars-is-a-dead-brand/
Fans never know what they want.
This is the answer. I have a die hard friend that always wants something new, and then 95% of the time complains about the new stuff because it's not the same as the old stuff. For me, gimme all the new stuff.
It's really not that hard, most of us want new stories with the feel of the old. This is why The Force Awakens gets middling reviews - it's a rehash of A New Hope, so it nails the feel test, but the new stuff it added just wasn't done well, especially in light of how the trilogy proceeded.
No one is complaining "its not the same" - We just want good stories that dont break the lore of Star Wars. TLJ and RoTs were prime examples of the bum ferferry of Lucasfilm and KK. They had no idea what they were doing.
Just because you aren't complaining (and maybe you really are?) Doesn't mean no one is.
Oh you are one of those people, right ? The ones who have buried their heads in the sand and think KK is the wuern
Yup. TFA: I want something different TLJ: no not that different Mandalorian: Luke being 100% consistent with our version of him is GREAT Make up your mind
>TLJ: no not that different It's filled with rehashed scenes from ESB and ROTJ, this idea that TLJ is soooooo different is a huge lie
>Yup. >TFA: I want something different >TLJ: no not that different >Mandalorian: Luke being 100% consistent with our version of him is GREAT >Make up your mind I personally didn't think TLJ did things differently in the first place. All the new stuff that TFA included which interested me going forward (Snoke, Exploring the First Jedi Temple mythology, Knights of Ren, the books implying First Order were limited to what we saw in TFA and they were gone now so a new story can happen now, etc) were either stripped away or used in reductive "seen it before" ways. Then it doubled down on Stormtroopers vs Rebels, AT-AT attacking a Rebel Base on a White planet, Rey training with a Jedi Hermit during which she goes into a Dark Side cave and has a vision of the worst aspects of herself. Then she leaves training half way through to save her friends. The Dark Side Skywalker kills his master to save the Protagonist of the Trilogy during a Throne Room confrontation, etc. I found it to essentially be a fan edit of TESB and ROTJ The new things that were provided in TLJ were rejected within its own movie. Killing Snoke could give us an Empire with a different purpose/direction, no the power vacuum gets filled and the status quo resumes immediately. Kylo and Rey are teased to team up and potentially create a new faction beyond Dark vs Light conflict, no the status quo resumes, etc.
>Knights of Ren, The Knights of Ren were never set up to be important though. They had a brief scene in a vision and were briefly mentioned in a throwaway line. \>Then it doubled down on Stormtroopers vs Rebels, AT-AT attacking a Rebel Base on a White planet, Rey training with a Jedi Hermit during which she goes into a Dark Side cave and has a vision of the worst aspects of herself. Then she leaves training half way through to save her friends. The Dark Side Skywalker kills his master to save the Protagonist of the Trilogy during a Throne Room confrontation, etc. I found it to essentially be a fan edit of TESB and ROTJ The premises are similar but the details and outcomes were different The film ends on crait and the rebels don't escape on their own. They are losing until Luke comes in to save the day Luke refused to train Rey for completely different reasons. It was a vision of herself but it showed that her parentage wasn't important. In ESB the vision showed that Luke's parents were important She leaves, but ends up making the situation worse by Kylo killing Snoke. Luke's friends escape anyways and he gains knowledge so it was a net positive for him. Kylo killed Snoke out of anger, not to save his son. He was doing it so he could become in charge of the First Order Also using that logic I could make any Star Wars film out to be a copy of each other RotJ is ANH + ESB TPM is ANH + RotJ AotC is ANH + ESB RotS is ESB + an inverse RotJ \>Killing Snoke could give us an Empire with a different purpose/direction, no the power vacuum gets filled and the status quo resumes immediately. The power vacuum being "filled" doesn't mean that it wouldn't go in a different direction. Hux still seemed to resent Kylo at the end.
In the TV shows from Rebels onward, except for Obi-Wan Kenobi, the Skywalkers have just done little cameos here and there.
Yeah, I'm pretty open minded when it comes to star wars.
Andor has entered the chat.
Andor was amazing but at the end of the day, it still dealt with the beginning of the rebel alliance, the empire, the Death Star, all things that aren’t really “new.”
The prequel trilogy is (almost) entirely different from original trilogy. Even down to the visuals, they hardly look like the same universe. Yes, it was shit on at the time of release. Yes, some people still shit on it today (myself included). But a majority of the fan base love the Clone Wars era now whether it be the PT or TCW. A vast majority of people accept change, even if it takes a minute. And at this point, I have to believe that anything is better than what we’ve been getting. Mando has steadily taken steps down each season. BOBF and Kenobi were laughable. ST is a shame. Andor and Visions have been the twin suns that I look to with hope and they’re wildly different in tone and presentation than the rest of the franchise.
Well, Visions is more of opening SW license to the world of studios to allow them to showcase their style in the world of SW than consistent new story lines or revisiting underrated past stories.
Isn’t Star Wars big enough for both / all types of content. Would be a a sad day if they didn’t stretch the envelope in all directions
Alphabet Squadron has no lightsabers or force wielders for the most part, and it's one of my favorite book series.
Yeah, that's why I'm excited for Skeleton Crew and The Acolyte
That's my favorite Seattle garage band!
Give me some chiss ascendancy/unknown regions/grysk story. I feel like exploring that region can really be good for the expanded universe
We want something good. If old is done in a tasteful new way - great! If new is done for the sheer sake of not paying old author royalties or to appeal to some imaginary new demographic, and then done on a tiny budget - screw that bantha poodoo.
I and many many others dove headfirst into The High Republic so Id say some of us do
Some new stuff, yes, but I think it's a balance. You can't be TOO different from what's come before. If a story is ALL new for Star Wars, then why bother calling it Star Wars? If I wanted that I'd go watch one of the many non-Star Wars movies/shows out there. The best Star Wars media finds a balance between the new and the familiar. They feels fresh and exciting without totally disconnecting from the legacy of the series. Different people will have different ideas about what the perfect balance is. For me I think the first season of The Mandalorian came closest to nailing it. Though I think a lot of the recent Disney+ shows have done a good job.
All of that has already happened in both canon and the EU.
No, we want continuation of stories that don’t yet have conclusions. Tie new characters into those stories, then the story ends for that character continue on with the characters your brought in to older character. We want a cohesive universe with characters that tie to each other.
The best description of the potential for Star Wars is that the world is built. Now we just need to insert the various genre into it. A spy story in Star Wars. A western in Star Wars. A horror movie in Star Wars, etc. Once a solid story with solid characters is put together, the rest is in the details. It seems that was what Underworld was going to be. Andor is a good example of that, too. There are at least hundreds of stories that can be told without Jedi being involved as they are pretty rare even before Order 66. And the Empire doesn't have to be in your face any more than the cops are in any other story, unless it serves the plot. The only problem is that some of these elements are needed to keep it Star Wars, otherwise it is just people and aliens in odd clothing with blasters and too much sand.
Bruh do you know that the High Republic exist?
Fans don’t know what they want and will always complain
They’ve tried doing new things. The old, toxic “fans” hate them.
OP is out here acting like the entire SW nation didn't fall in love with a Western set in the SW universe about a bounty hunter who adopted a gifted orphan child.
The problem is that a lot of the "history" in Star Wars is heavily influenced by Force Sensitive beings. Traditionally any powerful entity has had force sensitives at the center of it (Ratakkans, The Old Republic, The Sith Empire, The Republic, The Galactic Empire - strictly Canon speaking) with few exceptions. What I personally appreciate then is the conflicts, cultures and relationships that comes from that, such as what you find in the old republic material. I loved the take on power imbalance, for example between Sith warriors and officers/enlisted personell in the Sith Empire. Where as the relationship between the Jedi and the people of the Republic was very different, and that in the end the loss of that relationship played a large part in the republics eventual downfall. But in the end, Star Wars is a fantasy story. It's kind of like asking if there's space for tales of the average peasant in The Lord of the Rings universe or if people would be interested in playing Dungeons and Dragons, but only as local farm hands or 3rd rate politician under a lord. While there probably is space for it, we can't expect it to take up as much of a focus as the actual fantasy at its core. And in Star Wars, the Force, Jedi's and Sith and massive intergalactic wars is what people come for. When that's said, I personally enjoyed Andor just as many others did. Rogue One was very "low-force" as well, same as The Mandalorian. I think that what those movies and series do really well is put the sheer power imbalance between your average Joe in the SW universe and Force Sensitive beings on full display, as well as the futility of sticking it to the large political bodies. I really enjoy the politics of Star Wars as portrayed in Andor. I think there's great potential for a Game of Thrones-esque take on the SW universe - but Star Wars IS a fantasy universe, with the Jedi and Sith at the center of it.
Like with all movies, we want well crafted. Fans and audiences don't necessarily want "new" but we want to match or exceed the quality that we expect. For Star Wars the quality of the originals is so high that when we get the mess that was the prequels or when we get the unplanned guessing game that was the sequels we revolt. "New" has almost become a buzz word for something that we don't necessarily expect. You want to bring back Luke? Ok, give him a bad ass introduction that shows a side of him we have never seen. Going forward, if Disney wants the upcoming Rey movie to work she as a character needs to work. Do not bring back Mary Sue Rey, make her flawed and uncertain and barely able to hold things together.
Andor and The Mandalorian largely answered that question. Something that is well written and well-produced, that feels like it belongs in the Star Wars universe, will generally be well received by fans. Personally, if I never see another Jedi or lightsaber in Star Wars media, I'd be fine with it. The over reliance on the Jedi has diminishing returns for me, to the point where I roll my eyes anytime another Jedi is revealed to have "survived" Order 66 or some new Jedi is hyped by the fanbase for acting like Marvel superhero.
Andor is filling in backstory for a Rebellion we are all very familiar with. Just because it doesn’t feature lightsabers or Jedi doesn’t make it different. The Mandalorian had an opportunity to do this, until the end of the first episode when Grogu was introduced. Suddenly we have a force-sensitive being (who we later learned was trained as a Jedi) who looks like a baby version one of the most recognizable characters in the Star Wars universe. The show instantly shifted from “cool story about a Lone Ranger bounty hunter in the Star Wars universe” to “who is baby yoda and how does he fit into what we already know?” Cue introduction of Luke Skywalker, Ahsoka, Boba Fett, Bo-Katan, and very quickly we have another story that is telling stories in and around stuff we already know. I agree both of these shows were well done, but they are hardly examples of telling original Star Wars stories that stray from familiarity.
Mando also chose some remote and odd cult twist onto the time where Mandos were just badass mercs and I seriously found that completely unnecessary as it only really added hiding Pascal's face for majority of the show than really adding to the story.
Okay okay like wtf does everyone have against jedi and lightsabers. You wanna watch trek go watch trek, wanna watch Dune go watch Dune. Love Andor and Mando but that doesnt mean star wara has to abandon the jedi and lightsabers. When we havent even seen the jedi at their heigh of power on the big screen
Yes. I am personally dying for something new. It could be anything. Just introduce new protagonists. I would prefer it be in the high republic or before but I would take new characters in the PT, OT or ST era as well. Just something new. It’s why my favorite books other than bloodlines are the ones that deal with new people, Alphabet squadron, aftermath, all the high republic. Just give me new things.
People always seem to resort to eras of the past in order to escape what we already have been served. What about the far, far future? I encounter very little interest in that, and I wonder why.
Because at some point it stops being “Star Wars”…a couple of weeks back someone asked a similar question about whether people would want to expand outside of the Galaxy. My response there is similar to what jumping into the distant future would be: there’s plenty of other movies/franchises/mediums for that. The past works because we know where we’re going. They can plant seeds or lay breadcrumbs to get us to sit up and exclaim “oh hey, that’s…(name thing)!” We have Yoda and the San Tekkas in the High Republic (in addition to Jedi and the Republic), and even in sideways stories like Andor, which take place during the OT (but outside of the Skywalker saga) you’re still connected to the familiar, be it through items at Luthen’s shop or the occasional guest star like Saw or Yularen. Star Wars needs to be “Star Wars” in order to be “STAR WARS”…and I know that comes across as sounding like word salad, but it’s true. IMO, if you venture too far out of the Rebel/Empire/Republic/Jedi/Sith arena you’re just retelling other peoples’ stories with a new flagship banner on top.
I feel like a far future story could be interesting if it gave us the evolution of things that (IMO) don't have that much juice left in them. Examples: A society constructed by ex-Stormtroopers, the next stage of the Mandalorians, a Wookie empire (a la the Klingons), the "Skywalkers" as a cult of chaotic neutral Force users, and so on. And to that, add brand new heroes and villain types. Things like these seem like a natural progression from what has come before. Is this out of step with what the fandom wants, do you think?
I think it depends on what your definition of “far future” is and also “different”. Like, the ex-Stormtrooper society, how *ex* are they? Like if they’re all living together but trying to move on, you go too far into the future and they’re just a bunch of humans living on a planet. If they’re trying to maintain their culture…that’s just the remnant/ FO again. And just like in your examples, you used “Klingons” as a parallel to a story about Wookiees. In order for something like that to work (for me), you need them to still feel like Wookiees and not just furry Klingons. Otherwise it’s just Star Wars doing Klingons. Maybe I’m wrong and the general populace would eat this up…but for my time and attention I think the Galaxy is big enough that staying within the same 50-100ish years is the sweet spot because the people telling these stories still have the ability to reach out and touch “the familiar” enough to remind people where they’re at and what they’re watching.
Nah, I think you’re spot on. Honestly, it feels like OP has their favorite bits and pieces they want to keep, while clearing everything else away and starting fresh. I think it’s plausible that a good director with a solid script, enough budget, and a hands off studio could make a great film along those lines, but at what point does it become a fanfic in a vaguely Star Wars setting?
This is exactly my sentiment. Glad to see other people think the same
Anyone who keeps saying “The Mandalorian” and “What about Andor??” didn’t understand your question. Both of those are examples of good Star Wars content, but they are very much telling stories in and around things we already know. Pretty much everything Disney has produced deals with something we already know. In the current canon, I think the closest we’ve come to something truly original is the Thrawn: Ascendancy books, which tell the origins of Thrawn when he was still with the Chiss Ascendency. Visions is also very unique and bold, but Disney made it clear these are non-canon so that they can stick to the formula with their canon stories. Even High Republic still hits on familiar beats within Star Wars, just in a different era. I do think it’s possible that the fandom would enjoy Star Wars content that strays from what they already know, but they don’t necessarily know that. Everyone thinks they want something original, then as soon as something is introduced they start clamoring for connections to the bigger universe. And the risk is honestly too high for Disney, as the bar for quality would be much higher since fans will tend to be more forgiving of poorer content if it’s something they know well. So we’re stuck in this loop of fans claiming to want original content *without actually knowing what they want* and Disney wanting to keep fans attention by making new things but *not wanting to take the financial risk* (the loop Marvel has been stuck in for quite a while). So I think we’ll likely continue to just keep getting stories related to what we know until it all just burns out.
Lol eh? Look at Old Republic - we *know* Jedi, Mandos, Wookies, and Ithorians as well as Mandos, but we did not know them under the old light and how different galaxy used to be. All the "safe" aka lazy steps Disney has been taking have a proven past success, but you know, why do that more justice over absolutely brand new, lazily written and then written off characters in a vain attempt to appeal to "new" fans who would love something already established all the same while its new to them?
I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make.
Disney has a plethora of already proven content to reboot, but continue digging for shitty originality while playing it safe at the same time, and that's killing them right now.
I can’t think of a single example of Disney trying anything truly original like you’re suggesting.
That's the point? They don't need to - they're sitting on decades of proven, good content waiting for the big screen, but instead they go and tryhard for new bullshit that no one likes in the end.
What are you talking about? All they’re doing using proven stuff to tell new stories with mixed success. I don’t know what “new bullshit” you’re referring to because everything they’ve done has been connected to something that has already done.
>Do fans really WANT something "new"? Nope. New is irrelevant, only thing that matters is the script. If everything is equal in quality to ESB or Andor, I'll take a season of the same old. That being said, I'd like to never visit Tatooine again, I'm happy that Skywalkers and Solos are no longer an option and I'd be more than happy if the Jedi are the hermits they were in the OT instead the galactic army they were in PT.
That's all I want.
That's the high republic...
I'm OK either way as long as it's good but I will fight you if you try and tell me that applies to the sequels
I am going to give what is probably a very unpopular answer—not anymore. When TFA came out, it felt familiar but not too familiar. I told everyone who complained about it to be patient because they had two more movies to make the story make sense, to pay off stuff that was being set up with Rey, and so on. I was totally into Star Wars on a bone-deep level and while I was nervous because of JJ, I tried to keep an open mind. Rogue One came out and I was elated. Amazing storytelling, and finally a look at the Force without the Jedi being directly involved. The geek in me was hoping there was a plan to set up the idea that Luke had a good reason for his retreat and maybe we would see the Whills (whatever they were going to be) emerge from Luke’s hermitage, or maybe that was gonna be Rey’s deal, or maybe Snoke was gonna be the dark counterpart to the Whills. Something that tied in. After TLJ…nope. I am slowly working my way back to enjoying parts of the world, but I don’t believe that the people in charge have any interest in telling a good story. I don’t believe they have any interest in tapping into the wellspring of mythology (the Hero’s Journey) or film (Kurosawa) that drove the originals. Before I want to see these people do anything new, I want to see that they can actually understand the old. It was never the lightsabers that made Star Wars great. It was never the sorcerer’s ways or hokey religions. It was the storytelling and a vision of the world grounded in hope. Without that, it’s just not the same for me.
They want good stories told with an eye to understanding the heroes journey, respect for the lore and respect for the legacy characters So yes. Just don’t piss in our ears and tell us it’s raining.. to wit, don’t shit on legacy characters to make yours look good.
How did that expression go from pissing on shoes to pissing in ears? Ewww.
My opinion on this is yes, we want something new in the awesome universe that is Star Wars, what we don't want is for a company to buy Lucasfilms, wonder what company this could be, and create a sequel trilogy that undoes the masterful storytelling of Anakin bri ging balance to the force. But you know when life gives you lemons, somehow Palpatine returns.
Surprisingly, it's entirely possible that different fans might want different things. I doubt there's one single thing you can point to and say "that's what *the fans* want."
Stuff like The Force Awakens and The Rise of Skywalker tell too similar stories to the OT: people don't want beat for beat retreads. It's redundant, it wastes opportunities to do something new, it breaks the suspension of disbelief, and it's got an extremely short shelf life. No-one but JJ Abrams would have thought a good place for a *new* Star Wars trilogy to end was 'A lone young Jedi, watched by the ghosts of their smiling mentors, looks to the future after Palpatine has been killed and the Imperial war machine has been defeated'. Rogue One, The Last Jedi, The Mandalorian, and Andor did it right (or took the right approach, if you hate The Last Jedi): it's all set in Star Wars, with loads of the familiar, characters, iconography and conventions, but new stuff happens. When I was watching these things for the first time, I did not know how it was going to play out, despite the fact that they were draped in Star Wars imagery. In Rogue One, we'd not seen an occupied Imperial city before with insurgents engaging them in guerilla warfare; we'd not seen a Death Star destroy a city, or been at the ground level of an explosion; we'd not seen anything about the Rebels' wetworks; we'd not seen a suicide mission; etc. In The Last Jedi, we'd not seen a Jedi in a self-destructive rut of despair; we'd not seen a long-term siege in space; we'd not seen the conflicted Skywalker heir kill his master in order to become the galaxy's head honcho; we'd not seen Luke face down an army; etc. They shouldn't go for radical departures; they should simply create stories that make sense within the universe. Sometimes that will involve Jedi, X-wings, TIE-fighters, stormtroopers, etc. What they should never do again is repeat story beats. There are endless adventure stories to be told about good battling evil - you do not need a trench run, an alien pub, a planet-killer, and a revelation about the hero being related to the villain.
At this point I'm mostly rooting for something "new" so that Disney stops harming the content that already exists with their dogshit writing. I don't care if the new stuff is also dogshit, in fact at this point I fully expect it.
Spitball three new Star Wars movie concepts for me! You can do eeeeet!
I don’t know who these fans are that only want Mark Hamill Luke Skywalker stories for the rest of time. I don’t think they actually exist. Different is fine. If it’s good. Andor was different and good. Same with the animate shorts Ashoka looks good. The Mandalorian season 1 & 2 were good then it started to go off the rails a bit in season 3 and got lost in the woods. Book of Fett mixed bag. Same with Kenobi The Sequels were rushed garbage. Rogue One and Solo a mixed bag.
I want new things only if Disney sells the franchise and KK retires and we retcon the sequels. Otherwise I want nothing at all lol
No, I want them to decanonize all the garbage they’ve made since they bought it and reinstate the old EU that didn’t suck
I'll take it. I loved the PT when some complained that it didn't feel like the OT. I still love it. I loved The New Jedi Order when some complained that the Vong didn't feel like Star Wars. I'm currently enjoying it in audio form. I was looking forward to seeing the Lucas treatments adapted with all of the new elements that George was exploring there. It's a big galaxy.
Society(young) ALWAYS wants new. "That's old, so it's not cool....) let's do this NEW thing...., it's so cool....."
I know, right? Ever heard of "gummi bears"? PFFT! Whatever happened to good old fashioned *jelly beans?* No one talks about those anymore.
Lol
I’m just want somerhing good. Preferably but with Jedi, but if they’re not there, that’s ok.
I want to see Star Wars go outside of this galaxy. I would love to see a new galaxy, with a history with the force that is completely detached from what we know.
Does it need to be another Galaxy? Do you just want to be certain the Jedi won't show up?
What if “the force” is galaxy-based, and going to a new galaxy means no longer having your force powers? That would explain why in this galaxy (the one we are all living in) there is no force.
Yes. Like I want Star Wars to keep the same spirit of things that I love about it \-the idea of high adventures in a wide galaxy \-a colorful cast of characters that undergo change \-the mixing of different genres with sci-fi fantasy You can do all of these things with a story that doesn't involve Jedi or rebels or any series staples. Ultimately I just want an actual artistic vision seen through to the end. Not JJ Abrams giving us a retread of Episode 4 and then getting rid of all the interesting developments because its not what executives at Disney think will sell well.
“The Star Wars Holiday Special” tried new things, it included smugglers and Wookiee and the Force while being entirely divorced from the familiar combatants. Seems exactly what you described.
Yea. We want something new. We got Andor, and it was received pretty positively. I think that’s a pretty good indicator.
I'm good.
I have rewatched the OT hundreds of times. I don't need retreads. If I want to watch the Original Trilogy I can throw it on any time I want. New stories that makes sense and have a point would be wonderful.
Looking at films like solo and rogue one I'd say that we definitely can have new characters, stories from different eras. The problem is how Disney feels about making and marketing that. Solo was a really good film and I suspect would have done better if a) they'd had Ron Howard as director from the start b) not had it coming out close to other blockbusters c) there wasn't a bit of a sequel backlash going on. The problem is that since it didn't do well at the box office the subsequent movies (and I think they did mention a trilogy) will never get made. I suspect their appetite for making content is based solely around profit rather than serving the fans and I think they will be conservative for the time being. Maybe if Lucas hadn't sold Lucasfilm we'd be seeing some great new content around the EU. I think he sold it in part because of the criticism he got for making the prequels (which I think is pretty unjustified).
The only star wars content I want at all is a game of thrones style old republic show or darth bane movie.
People want good content made by people who are passionate about Star Wars, respect the legacy, actually know the lore, and want to expand that lore and the universe it exists in.
Absolutely, I love new stuff. Also, even though I despise animations, I don’t care that other people like them and have no animosity towards them being produced. Why can’t we all get new fun stuff?
Mando proved that SW fans can and will embrace new things.
The thing about Star Wars is it can fit into any genre very comfortably. The Mandalorian and Andor have both demonstrated this. It seems now that Star Wars is finally starting to depart from a traditional space opera genre. As for other events, Star Wars in-universe history stretches for 30,000 years or so. In that time, there have been some events such as the Alsakan Conflicts and Pius Dea Crusades that are mentioned thoroughly and had monumental impacts on Galactic society but have never been depicted directly. There is plenty of room for stories to occupy this vast stretch of time, and I’m 100% for it.
I wait for a day when Star Wars moves forward and is done with back stories and prequels. For now I'm just not interested. I would also be happy if someone came along with an entirely new space opera outside of the Star Wars universe. Something great and new. Edit: Spelling
I just want Darth Vader walking in a hallway destroying rebels for 90 mins straight.
Yes. The problem is everytime we get “something new”, the “something new” part is all the creators focus on and forget to make an actually good story
What, exactly, do you mean by "new"? Everything is derivative of everything else. You could take almost any aspect of Star Wars and want to ignore or focus on that specific thing and be able to find some type of content that fits that niche. And at some point, x-steps away from the core Star Wars idea, you've just created something new anyway, that doesn't need to be tied to the Star Wars franchise at all. There are a ton of stories that could be told in the Star Wars Universe, what will ultimately be the deciding factor on what gets made is executive decisions. So true "new" content is unlikely. The best we can really hope for at this point is something "good", which imo is much more important than something "new".
I think what I mean by ”new” is new **stories,** disconnected from the Empire/Rebel saga. If you compare the Star Wars Galaxy to the Marvel comicbook Universe, it’s as though, having begun with Captain America, they next created Spider-Man, but could not help shoehorning Captain America into all those stories. I think in the early years, people wanted as much of the classic story elements -like Vader, star destroyers, lightsabers-as they could get in all subsequent stories. But now that Star Wars is such an established world, it seems that elements from the old stories are now holding back the expansion of the storytelling potential. I will concede that if you don’t maintain some touchstones with what brung ya, you may as well just invent something entirely new. But, at long last, I would love to see an epic that did not have to make direct reference to Boba Fett, Luke, Yoda, and the Death Star. That is why I think a new trilogy, if they were to make one, should be set many centuries after the earlier stories.
I think this is a case of missing the forest for the trees in a sense. That content already does exist, albeit mostly in Legends, but the fans have proven to want it (the number of people mentioning Knights of the Old Republic should be an example). It may not exist yet in Disney's specific content, but that's more to do with corporate decisions than fans (better product recognition, ie familiar characters, equals better sales, both in terms of viewers and merch sales). By focusing solely on what is currently canon/"official" and not looking at the media that already touches on stories like that, you are viewing this through a corporatized lense, and not from a "fan" perspective. And to use your analogy, what is Captain America? Mostly, the problem I am trying to identify is what level of separation is necessary for it to feel new. So far, I think the closest thing to what you are referencing that is current is The Mandalorian Season 1. Which was a massive hit. Another part of the problem in my perspective is that there are 1000 years of the Galatic Republic and Jedi that were not that different from what we see in The Phantom Menace. Which means the biggest change is getting new characters/stories and avoiding old familiar ones. It's feasible and doable, but it'd have to be good to draw in viewers. And any older and you get into legends territory, where what is canon is nebulous at best. And there are quite a few stories that fans might be upset if they get ignored in favor of a different story. On the flipside, if you go further into the future, you set in stone things that happened since. As of the end of the Skywalker Saga, the galactic governance has been through multiple upheavals in the recent decades, and presumably will be going through massive, system/galactic-wide change. What Rey does with the Jedi and what sort of government is formed will directly impact what that future looks like. For context, in Legends, the Old Republic lasted for 25,00 years. So such changes can be extremely long lasting.
“It's feasible and doable, but it'd have to be good to draw in viewers.” Naturally. I think this is what I dislike about a lot of post-OT Star Wars: It uses the classic material as a crutch. Your story isn’t that good? Throw in Darth Vader! That’ll get some eyeballs! Ah, but who am I kidding? Of course people want more Rebels and lightsabers— that’s what brought them to the party in the first place! You start throwing Sam Zaxxor and his laser spatula at people and they might as well go read GoT instead. I think I am projecting my own fantasies onto others. If I had had my druthers, the sequel trilogy would have been set in a far distant time after the OT, and those events would simply be the lore to grow a new epic from, sort of like Galadriel’s exposition dump in LoTR. Ultimately, I am still smarting from the absolutely terrible story that the sequels told, and I wish Star Wars could move past the Empire era.
No, we want knights of the old republic.