Star Wars, Geek Culture, and Power Converters
What are the ethics involved in humanizing the Empire? Does Star Wars need to be a more nuanced universe, or are the black-and-white morals of the original and prequel trilogies preferable? And is now the right moment for that nuance? These were the questions that plagued me as I listened to the latest Star Wars novel: Christie Golden’s Battlefront II tie-in, Inferno Squad.
Season 4 of the ThrawnCast continues! This week Amanda, Matthew, and Sho continue their discussion of Kathy Tyers’s The Truce at Bakura. Why is Leia so out-of-character in these chapters? Who has a bigger Force Crush, Luke or Dev? And when, oh when, will authors stop comparing people’s features to food? We’re covering chapters 5-8 this episode, so strap in and hit play!
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Amanda: @mandatheginger
Matthew: @mrbowers
Sho: @ryorin
Tosche Station: @tosche_station
Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Song: “Rynos Theme”
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
The ThrawnCast is a part of the Tosche Station Radio network. Be sure to subscribe to the ThrawnCast on iTunes or Google Play. You can also subscribe to the Tosche Station Radio Mega Feed in iTunes or Google Play for more great shows from our podcast network.
This podcast was brought to you by Her Universe and your support on Patreon.
We’re back! Amanda, Matthew, and Sho have returned with your favorite Expanded Universe book club! This week we’re looking at the first four chapters of Kathy Tyers’ The Truce at Bakura, the first Star Wars novel published following Timothy Zahn’s The Last Command and billed as taking place literally the day after Return of the Jedi.
Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Song: “Rynos Theme”
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
The ThrawnCast is a part of the Tosche Station Radio network. Be sure to subscribe to the ThrawnCast on iTunes or Google Play. You can also subscribe to the Tosche Station Radio Mega Feed in iTunes or Google Play for more great shows from our podcast network.
This podcast was brought to you by Her Universe and your support on Patreon.
Beth Revis had a tough job in writing Rebel Rising, the YA novel chronicling the life of Jyn Erso prior to the main narrative of Rogue One. She not only needed to craft an engaging and exciting story, one that fit into the ever-widening new canon of the Star Wars universe, but she also needed to create a character arc for Jyn herself which both ended with Jyn being an angry, sullen, bitter person who wanted nothing to do with the Rebel Alliance (or, really, anyone or anything), but which at the same time was narratively satisfying. How do you craft a character arc that ends with the Jyn Erso we meet at the beginning of Rogue One and not have the entire thing feel like a let-down and a bummer, or like anything more than an extended prologue to the film? Can you even do such a thing?
If you’ve listened to the Thrawncast, you know that I’m a big fan both of the character Thrawn and of Timothy Zahn’s writing in general. It was like Christmas when it was announced that not only would Thrawn be coming to Rebels, but that Timothy Zahn would be returning to the world of Star Wars literature to write a new novel featuring everyone’s favorite Chiss.
It’s a year later now, and, here at Tosche Station, at least, we’ve all been pretty happy with Thrawn’s portrayal on-screen in Rebels. How, then, does Timothy Zahn’s new novel Thrawn hold up? Is the magic still there? Is Zahn’s re-introduction of Thrawn to the Star Wars canon awkward, or hindered by trying to fit him into existing continuity? And how does the audiobook — narrated by Mark Thompson, the same performer who recorded the first unabridged audiobooks of the original Thrawn trilogy — represent Zahn’s characters and story? Continue reading
Slow news week in the lead-up to Celebration; we’ve got one bit of convention news, and one HUGE piece of publishing news!
The convention news is: Forest “SAVE THE DREAM!” Whitaker will be at Star Wars Celebration! He will be signing autographs at the Star Wars Celebration Autograph Hall. Please scream-whisper your best crazy Saw impressions at him for me. (source)
The other piece of news is a huge deal: As part of the Star Wars 40th Anniversary, Del Rey has announced From A Certain Point of View, an anthology of 40 Star Wars short stories by a murderer’s row of talent — ranging from old Star Wars hands like Jason Fry and Christie Golden, to newcomers like Meg Cabot and Paul Dini, to podcast darlings Ben Acker & Blacker and Griffith McElroy. The project sounds like the Tales From … anthologies published way back in the Bantam days, as it concerns itself with the characters filling out the background in A New Hope. The anthology is due to be published in October, and you can see a partial list of the contributing authors at the (source).
via StarWars.com
That’s it for now! Enjoy those Rogue One Blu-rays, enjoy Celebration, and we’ll see you back here in two weeks!
Only a few items of note this week, so let’s get to them!
Michael Kenneth Williams, perhaps best known as Omar on The Wire, has joined the as-yet-untitled Han Solo spinoff film! That’s literally all we know; no character hints whatsoever. Seems like LFL is at least starting to get the “wow, that’s a lot of white folks” memo, though. Faster than Marvel is, at any rate. (Source)
via StarWars.com
At long last, the trilogy that began with Aftermath, the flagship title in Lucasfilm’s Journey to Star Wars: The Force Awakens publishing endeavor (man, remember that?) has come to its conclusion. By now, no doubt many of you have already voraciously consumed Chuck Wendig’s novel Empire’s End, but for those of you waiting to hear what the audiobook version narrated by Marc Thompson has on offer, I’ve got you covered.
When I saw the teaser for “Through Imperial Eyes,” featuring the POV shot of Agent Kallus waking up, I was momentarily thrilled. Was Rebels going to do an entire episode from Kallus’ point of view? Would they be so bold?
Then I remembered that (a) this is a kid’s show, and (b) TV shows of any stripe tend not to get experimental until their 6th or 7th seasons and they’re hurting for ideas (see: the one-shot experiment in The X-Files’ 6th season episode “Triangle,” or the live episode in The West Wing’s 7th season). And indeed, the shot in the teaser was the only POV shot in the entire episode.
Lots of news this week! New books! New The Last Jedi details! New hair! Let’s dive right in, shall we?
Though rumored as early as December 2015, it’s now official; following the death of original Star Wars actor Kenny Baker, going forward (beginning with this December’s The Last Jedi) the adorable astromech will be portrayed by Doctor Who veteran Jimmy Vee. I guess this makes him R2-D2-2. (source)
via OhSoSmall.com
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