Timothy Zahn in Star Wars

In honor of the big news of this day, overshadowing even the aftermath of "Sandy," that the Borg assimilated the Empire, or that Disney bought Lucas, I thought I'd bring up what I consider the best works in the Star Wars Universe setting. I mean, of course, Timothy's Zahn novels starring, or containing, Grand Admiral Thrawn.

We first meet Thrawn in the opening of Zahn's classic (by now) New Star Wars Trilogy. The trilogy is set five years after the defeat of the Emperor at Endor (which BTW was inhabited by Disneyfied creatures, but I digress). The New Republic rules from Coruscant, and is experiencing growing pains. What's left of the Empire is a nuisance, and has taken a back seat to political squables and persistent problems like insufficient shipping capacity. But now, at the opening of "Heir to the Empire," an old Imperial Star Destroyer capatain by the name of Pellaon sees a new hope for the Empire, in the person of a blue-skinned alien with glowing red eyes and a taste for art, of all things, named Thrawn.

We first see Thrawn sitting in his dimly-lit ready room, surrounded by holograms of sculptures adn other works of art. He's half-meditating, half-looking at the holograms. This surprises Pellaeon who goes to deliver information about an information raid. Thrawn explains the way to understand a species is through their art. This features prominently throughout the trilogy, with many mentions of different styles of art, and some mention of artists as well.

Over the course of the trilogy we get to know and admire Thrawn, even though he's the bad guy and is successfuly gainign ground against the New Republic and the good guys. Overall he is portrayed as an evil but not too evil man. In one scene he has a tractor beam operator executed on the spot for failing to hold on to a fleeing starfighter. This is extreme, even if the starfighter he let go carried Luke Skywalker inside. In another scene he casually refers to destroying a world.

What's amazing is that one tends to want to overlook such things.

Why? Because Thrawn is competent, creative, innovative and a first-magnitude military genius.

When I re-read the books, I tend to skip most scenes with Luke, Han, Leia and Lando, and focus rather on scenes with Thrawn and, of course, the other two new characters who display a great deal of competence, creativity, innovationa dn first-magnitude genius in their own fields. A smuggler chief and his second in command: Talon Karrde and Mara Jade.

The latter is particualrly interesting, even if she's obsessed with killing Luke Skywalker to avenge the dead Emperor...

You know, I haven't read the original Thrawn trilogy since my first read, which was....16 years ago? Sweet fancy Moses I'm getting old.

I have been meaning to get up to speed on the EU. I've read almost all of the Bantam series - that was the first series of EU novels, starting with Zahn and finishing about 1999. But I've heard the New Jedi Order series (the next chronologically) is for shit, and the Legacy of the Force series (the next following that) is actually okay, so maybe I'll start with those. Regardless, I seem to have lost my passion for reading. Damn Internet...

In any case, the new movies have 0% chance of being any more than loosely based on any existing EU stories, as this article brings to light. It's a shame really, Zahn was great at writing Star Wars. Except for Allegiance. That book sucked.

Quote: AcesAndEights

I have been meaning to get up to speed on the EU. I've read almost all of the Bantam series - that was the first series of EU novels, starting with Zahn and finishing about 1999.

You've lost me :)

I'm not that interested in Star Wars, but I like Zahn and his characters. So all I've read is his trilogy, the Hand of Thrawn Duology, Outbound Flight, Survivor's Quest and Choices of One. The last was rather pointless, really.

You, on the other hand, would seem to be the person to ask "What species was Yoda"? :)

Anyway, let's put in some structure. The Thrawn Trilogy titles are:

Heir to the Empire
Dark Force Rising
The Last Command

In the first we get introduced to the major players. We get reacquianted with Luke, Han, Leia and Lando, too. Honestly, most of their scenes and stories are bland. There's politics, diplomacy and adventure, but things mostly happen to them. By far the most interesting is Lando, who now runs a mining operation on a superhot planet; not entirely unlike Mercury. Once, and once only, do the good guys take the initiative, and even then it's rather tedious.

Thrawn is rebuidling the Empire's fighting capacity while also carving up the New Republic. To this end, he finds the Emperor's storehouse in an out of the way planet. He finds some equipment and technological advances to help. He also finds a "Dark" Jedi (the term "Sith" wasn't popular or known then), whose help he needs in his campaign. To secure his help, he offers him Luke, Leia and the twins she's rpegnant with. So this puts our heroes perpetualy being chased by the Empire on top of fighting a war.

Curiously this does not make their actions much more exciting.

Well, I won't spell everythign out. This is not a synopsis or even a review, but merely an endorsement of Zahn's books.

And we can also discuss the Borg's latest assimilation.

Quote: Nareed

You've lost me :)

I'm not that interested in Star Wars, but I like Zahn and his characters. So all I've read is his trilogy, the Hand of Thrawn Duology, Outbound Flight, Survivor's Quest and Choices of One. The last was rather pointless, really.

I've read all of those except Survivor's Quest (own it, on the shelf) and Choices of One (never heard of it before now). I might give Choices of One a shot, however I wasn't impressed with Allegiance (as I mentioned before), and this one looks like its set just after that. And I have a lot to catch up on, as noted.

Quote: Nareed

You, on the other hand, would seem to be the person to ask "What species was Yoda"? :)

There is definitely a continuum of Stars Wars fans. At the bottom you have a casual fan who watches and enjoys the movies, but isn't a trivia buff and knows very little about the EU. Just above that you might have someone who still doesn't know much about the EU, but who has watched the movies dozens of times and probably has multiple editions (VHS/DVD, original theatrical/special edition, etc). My girlfriend actually falls into this category.

Then you get into the EU stuff, the novels, RP games, card games, video games. The EU canon really starts to explode with those last 3. Sounds like you might fall into the "mild EU experience" category.

On this continuum, I rank somewhere at the top, yes. But, I can't tell you Yoda's species without looking it up on Wookiepedia. Did they ever give them a name?

The European Union??

If you want "Choices fo One," I'll trade it to you for a favor PM me for the details.

As to Yoda, once in another board the question was aaksed,a nd someone answered it. The original questioner agreed with it. I don't recall what it was.

I've seen the live action movies. I saw the Clone Wars shorts before the 3rd prequel came out. I haven't seen more thana few eps of the animated Clone Wars series. And I've read Zahn's novels. Allegiance isn't a short story? Survivor's Quest is so-so. It's about the finding of the remains of Outbound Flight.

Quote: Nareed

The European Union??

Expanded Universe :).

Quote:

As to Yoda, once in another board the question was aaksed,a nd someone answered it. The original questioner agreed with it. I don't recall what it was.

I was correct, they haven't specified it. Yoda's Species at Wookiepedia.

Quote:

I've seen the live action movies. I saw the Clone Wars shorts before the 3rd prequel came out. I haven't seen more thana few eps of the animated Clone Wars series. And I've read Zahn's novels. Allegiance isn't a short story? Survivor's Quest is so-so. It's about the finding of the remains of Outbound Flight.

Allegiance - it's a full-length novel set just before Choices of One (i.e. between episodes IV and V).

Quote: AcesAndEights

Allegiance - it's a full-length novel set just before Choices of One (i.e. between episodes IV and V).

Right. That would explain why Luke and Han are on friendly terms with renegade Stormtroopers in "Choices"

I realized I did this really abdly and left out important info. besides, talking about the second book kind of spils the first, or renders the whole thing meaningless. Also, this kind fo degenerated into a private discussion between the, apperntly, only two literate SW "fans" here.

Over the weekend, though, some cable channel ran the SW movies. They showed the prequels Saturday and the other three movies on Sunday. I was amazed by how many odd scenes and really bad dialogue there is. I know SW dialogue is infamous for being bad, but some thigns I hadn't noticed. Like Vader's dying words, but then he was dying of a non-fatal injury and... something (like his wife did!), so he would be upset and not thinking clearly, I guess.

The strange scene: 1) Leia is murdering Jabba (Java??) in a ship full of his underlings and no one lifts a finger to help the old tyrant. 2) Luke, a prisoner on the Death Star, is dragging an injured (and mysteriously dying) Darth Vader all over the Empire's Premiere Fully Operational Battle Station, he actually goes past Imperial troops, and no one stops him or even tries to help the old tyrant (Vader, not Luke).

Of course, it could be that both sets of lackeys were just as gald to see the tyrants gone...