Star Wars, Geek Culture, and Power Converters
One of the most popular responses, Winter Celchu
There’s no getting around it. It’s been another slow news spell and really, things have been dry since the Internet’s Bad Star Wars-Themed Pun Day. Which is why we decided to crowdsource blog content to you. Again.
This week’s Twitter List asked you to tell us your favorite non-Force sensitive Star Wars Expanded Universe characters because we firmly believe you don’t need a connection to the Force to be a badass. To the jump!
In this week’s batch of endnotes, author Jason Fry talks stormtroopers and women among their ranks.
A Female Stormtrooper Remembers: The femtroopers you see at cons are serious fans and work as hard on their costumes as anyone else does. Check out the work of Sith Vixen: Yes, she looks amazing in femtrooper gear, but she also looks great as Maul or a Kaleesh warrior, costumes that demanded an enormous amount of work.
That said, midriff-baring stormtrooper armor always struck me as a bit unlikely in-universe — I figured the Empire had female troopers, but I was pretty sure they weren’t wearing armor that looked like that. With this in mind, “female stormtroopers” was one of the first things I wrote down when beginning to work on the outline for Warfare.
This batch of notes has a lot of great material about stormtroopers in general. For more, head on over to Jason Fry’s Tumblr.
The hosts kick off by highlighting what’s new on the blog since our last audio check-in. Emily wrote a column looking into why Star Wars needs women more than ever. Nanci discussed why we love Star Wars, and as hard as it is to believe, it’s more than just the lightsabers and explosions. Shane started up his retro review of Kevin J. Anderson’s Daarksaber. We asked you for your Star Wars Avengers. Finally, Brian checked in with his latest column that investigates how The Legend of Korra is taking down gender stereotypes and the lessons Star Wars can draw from it.
Over in Fixer’s Flash, both Nanci and Brian have seen the Avengers (Brian several times now). Both the hosts now want some shawarma as a result. Nani has been reading through the Mageworld series, and from the sounds of it, she recommends it highly. She also has been working on her original novel and is posting excerpts over at her blog. Brian has finally gotten around to reading Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor. Of course, he’s still reading Marvel comics and trying to catch up with his friends, but he took some time out to see Dark Shadows. It’s exactly what you should expect from a Tim Burton movie that’s remaking a 70s soap opera about a vampire.
Meet Korra. She’s awesome.
I honestly hadn’t planned to chime in on this.
By now I imagine most of you are aware of the Great Gender Kerfluffle of 2012 that cropped up in the Star Wars fandom over the last few weeks with much being said about the need for more well-developed female characters in this franchise. Emily chimed in last week and eloquently put things into perspective. Frankly, people far more knowledgeable and better with wordy-like-thingamawhatsits than I am said what needed to be said. Still, as I was reading through things on the sidelines, I ran into one comment in the Club Jade post that got my gears turning. I can’t even remember what exactly it was or who posted it, but it set off a bit of something in my head that needed to be addressed. Well. Three things, specifically. A trio of arguments that I’ve seen recycled numerous times during the recent dustup and over the years.
While I was turning these arguments over in my head, another thought hit me. There’s a television show, a current one, that has addressed these points that were troubling me. Then it all clicked.
Star Wars has a lot to learn from The Legend of Korra.
Welcome to another edition of Trope Tuesday, where we hit up the black hole of productivity and investigate a literary theme or device that helps our favorite entertainment chug along. This week, we’re hitting on one that many Expanded Universe fans are intimately familiar with: Retroactive Continuities, or Retcons.
Reframing past events to serve a current plot need. When the inserted events work with what was previously stated, it’s a Revision; when they outright replace it, it’s a Rewrite. The ideal retcon clarifies a question alluded to without adding excessive new questions. In its most basic form, this is any plot point that was not intended from the beginning. The most preferred use is where it contradicts nothing, even though it was changed later on.
While the term comes from comic books, dating to All-Star Squadron #18 in 1983 and shortened to “retcon” by the end of the decade, the technique is much older. Often, it’s used to serve a new plot by changing its context; however, it’s also done when the creators are caught writing a story that violates continuity and isn’t very plausible.
In Marvel Comics, the person who pointed out the problem and at the same time provided a plausible explanation was awarded a Genuine Marvel Comics No-Prize
by editor Stan Lee, a tradition that was kept alive by other editors after he became publisher.
See also Ass Pull, which is something that was not properly set up before it is sprung on the audience. It is related to Deus ex Machina. Some but not all retcons are Ass Pulls, and a good retcon can actually improve the current narrative. A good way to get away with a retcon is to reveal new implications or motivations for events that have already been established.
Where do you even start in Star Wars? This is a franchise that ties itself into knots trying to explain away any minor-to-major inconsistency that crops up whenever a new book accidentally invalidates something an older book said. Or when The Clone Wars television series simply steamrolls swaths of the Expanded Universe. The latter (among other things) got author Karen Traviss to ragequit right before she was scheduled to start writing the Fate of the Jedi series.
You know retcons are important to a franchise when they hire a guy to keep tabs on all of them. Hello, Leland Chee, the Keeper of the Holocron.
Granted, all sorts of series in all sorts of mediums have needed to resort to retcons to keep things straight. The Other Star Franchise, anyone? No one, however, seems to be in the same league as Star Wars when it comes to making sure anything and everything fits into a lone canon.
For those of you that have looked at my reviews in the past, you know that I have a propensity for hyperbole. And snark. Lots of snark. Kevin J. Anderson is a writer that I’ve thrown a lot of flak at in the past. Really, he’s been one of my favorite targets, and I’ll say this, he really does seem to bear a good bit of it. At a time not so far back, I’ve referred to him as being a kind of nemesis to me.
But to be honest, that was before I read some of the SWEU material that I was steered around the first time I was going through the Bantam/Spectra era books, which has been a long time ago. You know that the last review I did was for Children of the Jedi in a series of posts that went on for a bit too long. Barbara Hambly is likely not as bad a writer as she came across in that book, but it really seemed like she was pretty far outside her wheelhouse.
That book gave me a big dose of perspective for the concept of bad Star Wars. I had held that Anderson’s books were bad Star Wars up to a point, but something else has come to my attention. There’s a difference between bad Star Wars and not good Star Wars. Children of the Jedi was bad. Darksaber isn’t bad Star Wars; in fact it fits in with my usual prerequisites for being pretty good, but it has a pretty long list of bad features that throw it out of that.
I can say something good about Kevin J. Anderson up front. I swear, just watch. The Jedi Academy Trilogy established some very important aspects of the Expanded Universe at large. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the way it was written, but for anyone who is coming into the EU from the start of the Bantam/Spectra era, it’s pretty much required reading. For anybody who is wondering where the Academy came from, it’s important. Let’s be honest, if you’re looking at anything except the core of the New Republic Era, anything later pretty much encourages you to read it. The characters and concepts that get to be important later on have their sources there.
Now, you don’t want to read this; it isn’t the funny bit. Me talking about the stuff that’s wrong–that’s what you want. So, here’s where we stand, I’m going to break this down into just two parts, I’m not running a page by page analysis, you’re going to get the problems at large as I see them. For me, Darksaber has two fronts of problems. There’s the distinct storytelling issues and there’s the technical issues.
For today’s post, we’re going to focus on the latter of the two. Hit the jump to see the story elements of this book that crawl under my skin.
Another Monday, another set of notes from Jason Fry’s brilliant Essential Guide to Warfare.
The Academy System: Another fun section to tear into, and a place where I definitely wanted to roll up my sleeves and get dirty in hopes of straightening out some continuity snarls. I hope that the account of the Academy system here amounts to a “good” retcon. Yes, the nebulous nature of the intake system and repeated transfers is designed to paper over various contradictions. But it’s also meant to be interesting in its own right – you can imagine cadets lying awake agonizing over where they’ll be sent next, exchanging baroque conspiracy theories that purport to explain everything, and grumbling about undeserving recipients of direct appointments. The Imperial Exploration Academy is new, as is the Merchant Galactic. (Though the latter has real-world antecedents.)
We’ll get another look into the Academy system when we come to Han Solo’s career.
There’s a whole bunch of early Empire notes in this latest batch, so if that’s your thing, head on over to Jason Fry’s Tumblr.
Pablo Hidalgo is at work on an all new Essential Reader’s Companion, but he had the time to send an interesting behind the scenes note to Star Wars Books regarding an early premise for the New Jedi Order series.
The story arc was to very closely hew to the myth structure of the Hero’s Journey as outlined by Joseph Campbell, a huge influence on the creation of the Star Wars cinematic story. With that as its basic framework, the plot underwent much evolution and exploration. Its earliest descriptions had Luke Skywalker sending the three Solo children on an epic quest, upon which they encounter a new female character from the invading species sent to infiltrate the galaxy. This unnamed female corrupts Anakin, nearly turning him to the dark side, but she falls in love with him and Anakin instead redeems her. In a fit of intense sibling rivalry, Jacen and Jaina turn on Anakin, and in the resulting conflict, Jacen dies.
You know. I think I might have preferred this setup to what we got. The undercurrent of redemption plays much more true to the philosophy and tone of Star Wars, and this would have been a clear passing of the torch to the next generation.
There’s been a whole lot said in the last week or so about the need for better developed female characters in Star Wars and the Expanded universe. Over at Lightsaber Rattling, Pete Morrison decided to look at EU novels since 2006 and crunch some numbers.
Some figures Pete unearthed:
- Male Character Per Novel Average: 9.9
- Female Character Per Novel Average: 5.13
- Ratio of Male to Female Characters: 1.93 to 1.
It’s important to note that this isn’t a look at the quality of female characters written into these books (which is another topic entirely), just the quantity. However, it seems that even on the strict numbers front, fans asking for more to be done with female characters have a point. Female characters are nearly outnumbered 2-to-1 in the Expanded Universe since 2006.
In addition to breaking these numbers down further by year, Pete has also written a great editorial to go along with this piece. Go to the link above and read through his excellent post.
There’s a discussion going on in the Club Jade comments (as well as on Twitter) regarding why people read Star Wars books. I took exception to a comment that people don’t read Star Wars books for characterization, but rather for action, because that’s exactly why I started reading the EU. I was 11 years old and had just watched the Original Trilogy. I loved Luke Skywalker (actually all the characters, but Luke especially) and wanted to know what happened to them after the movies. Thankfully, right around that time Timothy Zahn’s Thrawn Trilogy was released. I learned what happened to these characters I loved, as well as got to know new characters, who are still some of my favorites (Mara and Karrde).
As far as action is concerned, I can take it or leave it. My judgment usually falls upon whether or not the action scene did something rather than just drive the plot forward. I’m thinking of the first scene of Rogue Squadron, introducing Corran Horn; any of the action scenes involving Luke in Shadows of Mindor; or the fight with C’baoth in The Last Command, to name a few. Mindless action in films and television don’t bother me as much, because it’s pretty (or it can be). But in a book, there is nothing that makes me fall asleep faster than action with no plot or character development included.
There’s nothing wrong with lightsaber fights, starfighter dogfights, or chase sequences. I love those, if done correctly. But even in the films, Star Wars has never been just about action. Let’s take a look at the film that started it all, A New Hope.
So there you have it. Does Star Wars, as a franchise, contain action elements? Yes. Is it an action franchise? I say no. There are elements of action, drama, romance, and humor, combined with a ton of character development. In my opinion, the best Expanded Universe novels are the ones that echo this tone. Too much action, and you bore me. Not enough , and it’s not exciting. And if your characters don’t drive the story (rather than characters acting stupid to fit the plot), then I’m not interested at all.
What do you say?