Shadows of the (Disney) Empire: A Lament for the Star Wars Expanded Universe

It's no secret that I am a lifelong fan of the Galaxy Far, Far Away. I was born in 1976 and around a year later George Lucas changed the world with his landmark piece of cinema. A large chunk of my early childhood memories revolved around Star Wars in some way. One of the most disappointing of those memories was in 1980 when a four-year-old me was denied permission to go see the Empire Strikes Back because my mom though Darth Vader would scare me. I remember in 1983 shortly before going to watch Return of the Jedi as a 7-year-old, I had lost my glasses and could only see blurry representations of what was, at the time (and in my opinion still is) the conclusion to the Skywalker saga. I remember watching the Droids and Ewoks cartoons on Saturday mornings and, of course I remember collecting every bit of Start Wars merchandise I could. I even literally devoured Star Wars (man, I thought C3PO's were just the best cereal ever). 

But then something happened somewhere in the mid-80s. Star Wars began to fall out of the public consciousness. Of course, the films left an indelible mark on North American culture but a few years after the final movie was released, the world (including myself) began to forget about Star Wars and moved their attention to the adventures of Indiana Jones, G.I. Joe, the Transformers and others. I know it may be hard for some younger readers to understand, but there was a time before the Prequels were released that the world kind of forgot about Star Wars. 

The good folks down at Lucasfilm saw this as well and sought to keep Star Wars in the cultural forefront. Since Lucas was a prolific producer at the time, as well as the head of a major studio and several SFX companies, he didn't have the time to continue writing adventures for Luke, Han and Leia. So, the powers that be turned to licensing as a way to keep Star Wars fresh in people's minds. First of all, they hired numerous well-known sci-fi authors to write novels set within the universe. Some of these were about the main characters from the movies, while others focused on secondary or background characters. To go along with these new adventures, Lucasfilm also worked out a deal with game publisher West End Games to produce a pen and paper role-playing game, which would allow fans to have their own Star Wars adventures. They called it the Star Wars Expanded Universe (EU).

I first became exposed to the EU in the ninth grade. I was starting high school in a new town and I was a shy an nerdy guy who didn't know anybody. By this point, I already had a growing interest in RPGs, having played D&D, as well as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness, and I was lucky enough to find a group of kindred spirits who also were fans of the hobby. One of the games that they liked to play was the aforementioned Star Wars game. I had no idea at the time that such a thing existed but when I found out I was super excited. The game allowed me to create my own character within the Star Wars universe, and this rekindled my love of Star Wars. Unfortunately, my association with that gaming group didn't last too long but I was able to secure many of the books for the game and played it for many years with other groups. I just loved how the game opened up the universe beyond what was shown in the movies. Through that game, I found out so many things about Star Wars that I wouldn't have otherwise known. There are Star Wars fans and then there are really hardcore Star Wars fans that can tell you what corporation manufacturers TIE Fighters (it's Sienar fleet Systems, by the way) or what the Jedi code is, or that Wookies have retractable climbing claws. That's me, I'm the second guy. 

My experience with that game is what led me to the novels, which expanded the Star Wars universe even further. Now, I'll be the first to admit that not all of these (and I haven't read anywhere close to all of them) were good books. However, that doesn't mean that there were a lot of great reads led by Timothy Zaun's classic Thrawn Trilogy, which introduced the series best and most interesting villain. Good or bad, I enjoyed reading all of those books because they gave me more of what I was looking for and that was more Star Wars.

When Disney purchased the property from George Lucas all those years ago, I was originally excited. I mean, they did a great job with Marvel and I thought that maybe Lucas had become too interested in the technology of movie-making rather than the story. I was excited about the rumor that they would bring the original cast back for the next movie and I was hopeful that maybe they'd adapt part of Zaun's Thrawn books. But then, then I heard that Disney effectively canceled the EU, saying that only events from the movies and from whatever supplemental media they chose to release after the fact would be considered canon. They would, however, continue to publish the old novels under the name Star Wars Legends (because, money). As far as the RPG goes, West End Games had long ago folded and the IP was sold to another company that made a vastly inferior game. So that was it. In one fell swoop, the Mouse House had destroyed much of what I had known about Star Wars. 

I might not have been so bad if the new trilogy resonated with me better (it did not). Fortunately for me, I still have most of my old Star Wars novels and many of my RPG supplements, so I can retreat to the warm safety of Truce at Bukura, Platt's Guide to Smugglers or any number of the dozens of EU books and materials. I don't blame Disney, though, it wanted to forge its own path with the property an I get that. I still can't help but be disappointed, though.