[Frog]

OF STAR WARS?
I'd like to know what parts of the EXPANDED UNIVERSE you did or didn't like, as in, books and comics and some games.

[Buffy's Shadow]

This is all coming from the older EU, since I've heard the newer one is rather farce at the moment.

Like:

1. 1.) KOTOR 1 & 2, plus the KOTOR comics
   2.) Tales of the Jedi comics
   3.) Jedi Knight/Dark Forces Series
   4.) The Thrawn Trilogy and the Hand of Thrawn Duology
   5.) Knight Errant
   6.) Republic Commando
   7.) Mara Jade
   8.) All the OT works prior to the New Jedi Order Series. A simpler time in the galaxy.
   9.) The Dark Forces novels

Dislike:

1. 1.) The abundance of clone Emperors. The first time, the plotline was alright. It became too overused in later works.
   2.) The Revan novel/Old Republic MMO
   3.) Mara being killed by Jacen. Poor death, imo, and it really served no significant purpose other than to show that JACEN IS EVIL OMFG GUYS
   4.) Most of the material pertaining to the Clone Wars. The wars were much more intriguing when we didn't know all that much about them. Showing us every possible angle of the war made it lose it's luster.
   5.) The way that the later works of the EU really seemed to be getting poorer and poorer in quality. Legacy of the Force started out good, but lost it's steam by the end of it. Fate of the Jedi was alright, but it just got to a point it was hard to care any longer. A reboot was needed quite a bit, but not in the Purge like way Disney did it with.

[Buffy's Shadow]

Forgot to add this one as well to the dislike pile

6.) The way KOTOR 2 & Meetra Surik are given an absolute shaft in any material outside of the games. The Revan novel does a poor job of showing her character, as well as making it seem as if the second game wasn't important whatsoever. TOR adds more to this sadly.

[Thunderbird]

What I like: Everything related to Kyle Katarn.
What I did not like: The fact that Sidious' 'spirit' or existence would be back to life again after the events of episode 6. That makes Vader's sacrifice useless. This sacrifice is supposed to be the Ultimate one.

[MasterM]

I found it harder and harder to enjoy the books the further away from Episode 6 they were set. Like eventually there were all these places and characters that I really didn't care about anymore

[Lord Rikan]

Im just going to say what I liked

1) Timothy Zahn's book trilogy Heir to the Empire
2) Knights of the Old Republic 1,2
3) Darth Bane's novel
4) Revan's novel
5) Darth Plaguesis' novel

I was really facinated with the origins of the jedi and the sith, seeing the scale of their battles during their prime, thus 4000 years before the Battle of Yavin. I was never too much happy with what they had done with post jedi. To me most of the stories felt a tiny weeny bit cheesy and not to convincing, but i did love the Thrawn story line and Luke and Mara Jade. I do hope that they will soon introduce the concept of the Emperor's Hand.
Fine, ill say what i hated the most.........Darth Sidious cloning himself like what, a dozen times, then enslaving Luke turining him to the dark side before he rebels and kills him a once and for all.

[Falcon]

I really enjoyed the Jedi Apprentice books as a kid. As someone who generally isn't that big into reading they were really well done from what I remember. Of course, now that I'm an adult I might have a different opinion on their style but they were good reads for kids.

[John]

It's hard to say what I did and did not like without speaking about the authors.

Timothy Zahn is by far my favorite authors. Not a single book of his that I didn't like. The only issue I had with his writing is the over use of movies throw back quotes and references.

James Luceno is another one of my favorites. He wrote some really good books based directly around the movies that gave them good context. If you have not read Plagues, read it. Only book I've ever read that made Star Wars politics interesting. Some of his books have been kinda bleh for me though, like Tarkin and Millenium Falcon.

Michael Reaves was a much needed new perspective but too late for Star Wars. I would compare him with Zahn in that his stuff is original and brings in new characters and plots. His Coruscant Nights trilogy was amazing.

Michael A. Stackpole was another favorite author where I like every book he did. His X-Wing books were original and had a great alternative perspective and characters.

The problem with the star wars books for me is that they focus around too few characters. The authors needed to add new blood to the series and didn't. As a result the EU ended up with same few characters facing countless small crisis', and that got old pretty fast. Seriously, new super-weapons kept reemerging, jedi apprentices going bad, the Empire remnant coming up with schemes every once in a while. It's like the war ended the battles kept going. The solution attempted wasn't much better where they changed to bigger crisis's like the Yuuzhaan Vong war that comprised of like 20 books, Legacy of the Force series; another 9 books, Fate of the jedi series; another 9 books. Star Wars essentially became action-packed but uninteresting(I guess it belongs with Marvel in that regard). It's like is should have been more regulated by Lucas or a committee because some authors *cough*Aarron Allston*cough* clearly lost control of themselves. I thought it was rather distasteful to have the galaxy going full circle by the time of the Fate of the Jedi series with a tyrant(Daala) in control, the jedi having to go into hiding, the sith returning, and the balance of the force unbalancing.

What I liked. The books that were done really well and contributed to Star Wars and the plot for peace. I liked how characters developed through the books like seeing Luke go from Jedi wannabee to Grand Master of the the new jedi order, Han Solo going respectful, Mara Jade turning her back on her past. I liked the introduction of new characters that became "season regulars" like Mara Jade, Thrawn, Pelleon, Bel Iblis, Karrde, and Corran Horn.

[Jato]

Yuuzhaan Vang. 'Nough said, happy for the reboot

[Mandalorian]

Yuuzhaan Vang. 'Nough said, happy for the reboot

Just to make sure everyone is clear on this, only Thrawn was canonized for the moment. It is remained to be seen if Dave Filoni will bring them back or not. Knowing Filoni, it has a good chance .

Kinda on topic here, but the great thing about Dave Filoni, is he knows when to bring what into the canon. He knows complaining about the new canon isn't going to fix stuff, but only working with the new canon will. He very brilliantly implements what the fans like of the EXPANDED UNIVERSE, and does it in his own creative way.

Honestly, when I first started to watch Rebels, it was a typical child's animation show...until it got a ton better. Now, I honestly say Ezra's character has a more believable pull from the darkside and more interesting, while remaining true to his character, than Anakin Skywalker did. Filoni's decisions and plans make sense. He is a genius, and I am sure whatever is majorit...ly(?) favourited by fans, will be brought back in some form or another in its own creative and good way.

[Buffy's Shadow]

I have respect for Rebels purely because it seems they're working to make KOTOR canon again.

Which makes me a happy boy

[Mandalorian]

Which reminds me, during the scene with Thrawn's reveal in the trailer, the one where he is looking at the art, (I can't find the picture but) someone made a deep analysis of the pictures and what they show. Sure enough they do deal with our main cast, but when more focus is placed in that one Mandalorian art in the back, you can see that it is an image of Mandalore the Ultimate.

For those who don't know, Mandalore the Ultimate was the leader of the Mandalorians during the Mandalore Wars, and was ultimately slain by Darth Revan, right before he allowed his general to use the Mass Shadow Generator.

And during an episode of Rebels, the crew meet Mandalorians, who apparently went back to their honourable ways and once again followed the mandalorian code. The current Mandalore of that sect offered the Rebels some tea, saying it came from the Cassus tree.

Now this doesn't in itself canonize much, other than a name of a tree, but you can see that they have some reason to call the tree such, considering it is considered to make strong enriching tea. (Which if you do believe Cassus himself is canonized, considering the Fett clan exists, then you could argue that Taris and the Rakghoul disease exists as well, considering how his story ties in with that).

About them canonizing Malachor, but having a different look and etc., I believe that Malachor V still exists, with all this new evidence and such. The planet that Ezra and the crew landed on was Malachor I. The Malachor system is home to a couple planets; ofc the only known onces (iirc) are Malachor (Rebels), Malachor III (SWTOR), and Malachor V (KotOR 2). So I think it does exist, but they were on a different planet in the Malachor system.

People really underestimate Rebels for what it really is, and when analyzed properly is really, really interesting. Little hints and easter eggs lead to a TON of expanded universe stuff to be canonized, and this is another brilliant method of Filoni; he drops these hints and stuff to not officially bring stuff into canon, but make us make the connections and believe it is canon, and he kinda keeps it in a cage where Disney can't do much about it due to his story writing.

____________________________________________________________________

TL;DR?

Mandalore the Ultimate is canon-ish (just needs to be properly addressed since he is only seen in art), Cassus Fett is canon-ish (through assumption due to the Fett clan existing and due to the Cassus Tree being called such considering its strong tea), and Malachor could be Malachor I and not Malachor V.

[Buffy's Shadow]

Based upon the older canon, there are three Malachor planets that we KNOW of, so that's not saying there can't be more. The ones that were in place were Malachor II, Malachor III, and Malachor V. V is obviously destroyed by the reactivation of the Mass Shadow Generator, so that gets rid of the idea that the planet is still around in anything more sizable/inhabitable than the Peragus Astroid Field.