OMG...George Lucas made SW up as he went along!!!!!!!!

[may_child]

On TheForce.net's (joke of a) message board, some moronic basher -- pardon the redundancy -- evidently thought that this SHOCKA was important enough to start a thread about. His proof was Lucas's (IMO very gracious) letter to the creators of Lost, who have thought nothing of taking very nasty swipes at him and All The Star Wars Films That Aren't

Comments

[may_child]

Thanks for your reply. I can see your point...TV series, particularly those that are built around a gimmick, can go on forever, seemingly, getting more disjointed and self-contradictory each episode. On the other hand, it is difficult for a TV show's creator to have a strict outline in mind when he or she doesn't even know if the show will be picked up...the pilot usually has to be as "generally appealing" as possible to maximize the chances.

Yes, Lucas has tried to have it both ways to a certain extent, hinting that this was planned but that wasn't, etc. (He's done the same with regards to the EUwwwwwwwwwww...on the one hand, saying it's not part of his story and goes on without him, but also refusing to flat-out declare it AU.) In any case, there was an outline of sorts for the saga: the Journal of the Whills "excerpt" that is featured in the novelization for the original movie. As it turns out, Lucas followed that outline surprisingly closely...though to be fair, it doesn't go into much detail and is overall very general.

The architects, if you can call them that, of the EUwwwwwwwwwwwww have claimed that the more recent story arcs had outlines that were closely followed. Not that that made the books any better, but anyway...my view is that they set about to follow the outlines closely, but when certain things caused great outrage, either from the readers or from higher-ups at LFL, they shifted gears.

For instance, despite Del Rey's adamant denials, I believe they intended for Han and Leia's separation in the NJO to be permanent (with Luke and that hideous gorgon he married taking over as primary couple). I believe that "Balance Point" was originally titled "Breaking Point," and the subsequent duology of novels that Del Rey later claimed would further explore their reunion were in fact going to further explore their divorce. However, someone higher-up at LFL, perhaps even Lucas himself, stepped in and absolutely FORBADE them to divorce Han and Leia. So a hasty re-write and re-naming of the book followed, along with a cancellation of the aforementioned duology of novels. The reason for their cancellation: "They were too dark." Say wha-? What could possibly be "too dark" for a series rife with death, torture, and misery? I'm not buying it.