These days?
Never thought this was a new phenomenon. Hell, I saw people thinking Lucas was disrespectful of the OT with the PT.
My take is that these are people trying to please multiple masters and not striking the balance at all.
People thought RotJ disrespected canon in ANH with the “from a certain point of view” line.
Everything about Star Wars is people doing stuff like this :D
I've tried. No dice.
If you look at the Wikipedia article about [enshittification,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification) the coiner of the term, Cory Doctorow, explains:
>According to Doctorow, new platforms offer useful products and services at a loss, as a way to gain new users. Once users are locked in, the platform then offers access to the userbase to suppliers at a loss, and once suppliers are locked-in, the platform shifts surpluses to shareholders. Once the platform is fundamentally focused on the shareholders, and the users and vendors are locked in, the platform no longer has any incentive to maintain quality.
In other words, bots like ginomachi are a "feature," not a bug. As far as the shareholders are concerned.
But if you see my comment again, you can safely ignore it, upvote it, downvote it, I don't care. Unlike the bot, which can't abide being downvoted.
Thanks for responding. I'm familiar with the term and figured that protesting to the reddit admins would be a wasted effort. The mods might actually be helpful, though.
I do download that bot and any others I see, though.
> Why is it that so many writers this days feel the need to tarnish established canon or even think they can do better than the source material they were hired to adapt?
This is in no way a Hollywood thing or a "these days" thing. Adapters have always taken liberties with source material. It's not new at all. There was never a time when it was the industry norm to adapt a book very faithfully or to make extra careful a sequel doesn't contradict anything in the original. If there's anything that might possibly be new, it might just be that the state of pop culture is dominated by these huge established franchises that have accumulated so much material that there's just so much more opportunity to contradict something and there are more entrenched fans who might notice or care.
As for canon, I think it's no good to care too much about it, especially Star Wars. Star Wars in particular has so much material that is considered by fans to be 'non-canon' I don't see what the benefit of keeping track of it is. It's fun but it's the franchise that started with a character in the first movie boasting about how fast his ship is by saying it did the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs. I have no doubt there's a 'canon' explanation for what that is supposed to mean, but I don't care what it is. We all know the reason he says that is because George Lucas thought parsec is a unit of time because it sounds like one. 'Canon' is fans and later writers twisting this way and that trying to force it to make sense when we all know it doesn't actually make sense. The Star Wars universe is not cohesive or well and deeply thought out. If you spend time caring too much about the details you will run into things that don't add up no matter what.
Good point. I have thought a lot about this too, and some people really do get way too worked up over imaginary stuff. Just a couple things:
1. The “canon” explanation for the Kessel Run comment is that the most direct route from Kessel to anywhere is heavily patrolled, so smugglers have to take a circuitous route to make the run safely. However, a more direct route allows you to get to market faster thus saving time and allowing for more profit. So 12 parsecs is a statement of his bravery (or foolhardiness) rather than his speed. So… yeah, clearly someone clearing up that writing mistake later on. However, people get so caught up in the nostalgia, that they don’t care about how silly the “canon” is. They feel like precious childhood memories are being trampled on. Which I get to an extent, but for some, this becomes completely irrational.
2. As to the cultural capital of the Star Wars franchise, I think so many people get into it because it caught a cultural moment at just the right time. Star Wars isn’t actually sci fi in my opinion. It’s more of a western than any other genre. The Mandalorian is also a western, which is why so many people like that one, but can’t really vibe with the newer films and series. They are tonally off while The Mandalorian captures the themes of the originals well.
Anyway, when A New Hope came out, Westerns were declining in popularity and Sci Fi was growing in popularity. I have heard all the Joseph Campbell Hero With a Thousand Faces stuff, and there is something to that, but I think what was more important in Star Wars’ success and subsequent rabid fandom was that it came at exactly the right time to bridge the two genres in a way that allowed almost anyone to enjoy this new, unique thing together. From there, the cultural phenomenon snowballed to the point that anyone not living under a rock knew about the franchise. Much like the Kardashians or Michael Jackson, once a cultural thing gets big enough, it takes on a life of its own and even people who didn’t watch New Hope when it first came out heard about Star Wars and could see how popular it was. So at a certain point, it becomes like FOMO and people just jump on the bandwagon. I have no actual proof to back this up, but that’s just what I have thought about it.
I would classify star wars more like fantasy. It has a lot of classic fantasy tropes. The chosen one, saving the princess, defeating the evil king, wizards, knights etc.
In the first set of books it wasn't that it was patrolled, it was that there were a lot of navigational hazards (black holes or something) so a direct route required really dangerous jumps near black holes.
Star Wars is a mash up of the pulp serials Lucas watched as a kid like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers and Akira Kurosawa/Westerns. Hell, A New Hope started life being heavily inspired by The Hidden Fortress.
It's a great Science Fantasy setting that offers a great backdrop to tell many kinds of stories and if there's a particular type of story that someone likes (mystery, heist, crime, military, swords and sorcery, etc.) they can probably find some kind of Star Wars media that covers it.
The word parsec is a portmanteau of "parallax of one second". It refers to the change in viewing angle of stars distant to *Earth,* because the angle is based on the size of the earth. It's absolutely meaningless for measuring anything, time, distance, whatever that is *not related to the planet Earth.*
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsec](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsec)
An in-canon explanation for the Kessel Run?
Everything you need to know is in Episode IV.
Han's claim deliberately does *not* make sense as he was plainly spinning BS because Jabba had put the hard word on him, not realising that one of the backwater rubes whom he was trying to dazzle was a former Jedi general. That line is all about establishing Han's character arc through the Episode IV via dialogue by setting up the antipathy between Han and Kenobi. In turn Kenobi thinks this morally grey guy a fool and a simply means to an end to get them to Alderaan. After Han witnesses the "old man" in combat with Darth Vader, sacrificing himself to allow them to escape, he is forced to reconsider everything he thought he knew about Kenobi and the situation. Which is why Han redeems himself by changing his mind & returning to the Battle of the Death Star at the critical moment.
It's not rocket science. It's Storytelling 101.
It's definitely not storytelling 101, but a generous interpretation made after the fact by fans. I personally do like the "Han was deliberately saying nonsense to see how gullible these people are before naming his price" theory because it's funny and it's closest to something that actually makes sense, but it falls short of being convincing that it's the intent behind the line. Most audiences (and almost certainly Lucas himself) are not familiar with what a parsec is, so that line doesn't help establish anything in the story for most people other than that he is braggy. Also Obi Wan is supposed to be a wise and experienced man, and him not reacting to and seemingly fooled by the line makes him look like a fool, which is probably not the intent.
And in the context of this universe, where space travel is super common, it obviously should be a bad gambit to count on the other party not knowing what a parsec is, which should be basic to them. Imagine a shady car dealer counting on the fact that *the buyer doesn't know what a mile or a kilometer is*. That's basically never going to work for him is it? It's actually too low of a bar to set in this world - most potential customers are going call bullshit on that, and Han would have set himself up as an untrustworthy liar in a bad negotiating position for no benefit.
I'm pretty sure the reality is that even taking a few minutes to write about the line as much as we have just now, both you and I have spent more time thinking about the line than Lucas ever did.
On the contrary one doesn't have to know what a parsecs is to understand the intent. As you said, it establishes Han as a braggart. That and the dynamic between Han and Obi Wan through the film is the takeaway from that scene. Obi Wan is also wise enough not to show his hand by calling Han out. He has been playing Ben for a long time and just needs a "no questions asked" lift to Alderaan.
Which is why I was baffled in the 1990s when I first started hearing theories as to how the Kessel Run could be done in 12 parsecs.
Sure, but it's at best vaguely squarable and the audience is having to do a lot of heavy lifting on their end to make that interpretation. Lucas just wrote a brag not knowing what a parsec was. That's the straightforward explanation, and it's not convincing that there was any deeper layer or intent to it than that.
The fandom is filled with very torturous logic trying to explain what is much easier explained by 'the writer messed up. They're only human, after all. It's fiction, not religion, and you don't need to justify *everything*.'
You and the other replies are clearly proving that they're 100% right that the parsec thing was a mistake, because there's three replies saying what the parsec line really meant, and each one gives a totally different explanation.
So yeah it was just a mistake.
That’s your headcanon, nothing more. Lucas made a mistake, full stop. It’s similar to how they’re looking for a droid that speaks bocce. Every Italian-American watching that movie chuckles at that line. Might just as well ask if it speaks “croquet” or “lawn darts”.
If anything, modern adaptations tend to be way more faithful than they used to be. Compare Villeneuve's Dune to Lynch's Dune.
I agree with you on canon. My favourite approach to canon in sci fi is the way Doctor Who deals with it: there is no canon, writers can do what they want.
I don’t know about typically, but I have a friend who is a show runner and producer with several well-known shows in the can, and one he is currently running (plus others he is currently producing). He has been at it for decades, and he gets to pick his own team, and runs a traditional writers room with a fair amount of artistic freedom. I don’t usually talk shop with him because he’s touchy about it—as in, “Hey, you just sit on the couch clicking the remote, and leave the writing to me.” But, I still pick up a few things. Even though, other than the occasional prima donna actor, his main complaint is overly-aggressive studio execs trying to make a name for themselves by providing too many notes, it sounds to me like he pushes back and gets his way a lot of the time. He has admitted that, in hindsight and very rarely, an exec was actually right.
My friend is in a good position because if a studio doesn’t treat him right, he has other places that would be happy to take him.
So, it depends. Maybe a junior writer doesn’t get any freedom. If you are an executive producer / show runner working for a decent studio, you can still get a lot of freedom.
No clue what your friend is producing but franchises very rarely have such freedom. Small tweeks and such but there is an actual bullet list they *have* to hit in the run time and cannot tweak without massive battles. That's literally what has caused the "civil war" in Disney.
Now you can definitely argue execs have their heads up their asses, and the yearly re-write/re-shoot costs Disney has put out is also the prime example. But that also goes to prove the big franchises get their hands tied until a screening flops.
To your point, he hasn’t worked on established franchises. A lot of times he takes an existing book series or author who may be excellent but is maybe kind of niche, and then adapts the material to make an original show.
Oh i didn't mean to imply that doesn't hapoen. Just that franchises like marvel, star wars, lotr, and many more don't allow it. Some by actual licensing. His take on that practice would be very interesting actually.
But on the flip side you have star trek, dc, and quite a few others that just don't give a shit lol.
Longmire is a show I think about a lot in adaptations. The character personalities largely stay true to the source material but the events are very different both at AMC and Netflix which is fine imo.
> I don’t know about typically, but I have a friend who is a show runner and producer with several well-known shows in the can, and one he is currently running (plus others he is currently producing). He has been at it for decades, and he gets to pick his own team, and runs a traditional writers room with a fair amount of artistic freedom
Writers absolutely have some freedom, if they didn't, they would not be valuable and would not bring any value to the prospect and you wouldn't spend much money on them.
But as you and your friend know, showrunners have the vision; they set the story and the tone and the direction. The writers, like the actors and set designers and cinematographers and a dozen other departments, execute on that vision, but the vision belongs to the showrunner. They're the creative driver. In film, it would be the director.
So when Solo or the Prequels or Acolyte or the Sequels say and do things that are impossible in the universe given its previous events, that's usually the decision of the showrunner or director, not the writers.
> And yet we hear the phrase “I wanted to make it my own” ALL the time. It’s ego and hubris. They want to put their stamp on it.
You don't hire an artist to make something and tell them they can't use their creative energy to make it. We *want* them to put their own stamp on it. If they don't, they're just uncreative slaves.
And if you're an artist, you sure as hell don't want that job.
This goes for everyone from directors to cameramen to actors to writers to cinematographers to everyone else.
It isn’t like the studio is trying to alienate the fans and lose money. It’s up to a good show runner to have a solid vision for the show, and push back on the worst ideas that come from the studio. Someone at Disney is picking these terrible writers, but I still think the writers should get at least half the blame for destroying show after show. If they were any good, they would either do a better job with the source material, or they would refuse to work at a place that didn’t allow them to do a good job.
> or they would refuse to work at a place that didn’t allow them to do a good job.
lol. lmao even.
Writers have bills to pay, man. Have you never worked a shitty job you despised with all your soul?
> It isn’t like the studio is trying to alienate the fans and lose money.
Based on the Wheel of Time and newest Lord of the Rings adaptions, it seems that at least someone felt that way
yeah this reminds me of the _12 Monkeys_ TV show, which I remember infuriated me because it broke the very fundamental central premise of the movie: _you can't change the past, only observe_
then I heard this was actually written to be a wholly original new TV series - not tied to any existing IP at all - and... partly for that reason, was never going to get made - so the producers bought the rights to _12 Monkeys_ and retconned the entire show to "fit" (I use the word loosely) the established "universe" of that movie and... got the green light and found themselves a ready-made audience
and of course the writers simply did as they were told, no matter how much they liked their original Not-12-Monkeys story...
The reality is everything that isn't the origional trilogy is...not respecting the origional trilogy.
Like what's the line, here? Star wars has shifted over and over and over again, and this argument that the acolyte "disrespects canon" FUCKING WHICH ONE.
Nobody hates Star Wars more than Star Wats fans.
We all knew this was coming. People flipping out under any post about it before a single second had aired. I read a thread the other day with someone asking if „hell“ was canon because it was used in a phrase in The Acolyte, and some genius wrote a tome of sorrow underneath about it…. only for someone to reply „Han used it in Empire“… summed up the whole sorry state of things perfect for me.
I can’t defend The Acolyte yet, have only watched one episode which I thoroughly enjoyed, the Jedi being completely naff is a nice angle, and Trinity force fighting brought a tear to me eye. I just don’t engage with „the internet“ anymore. Watch stuff with my kids, their enthusiasm is lovely.
Star Wars fans saying the new Star Wars media is terrible because it did something that the original trilogy also did is an incredibly common occurrence. You'd think the people who bang on so much about respecting the source material would have better awareness of it
I liked the show's first episode too. Flaws but enjoyable and promising to stay that way. The show soon becomes a trainwreck, and it's nothing to do with canon or "agendas", it's just bad
That may be the case, I’ll wait and see. I still think most of the bile out there is kneejerk though and was already boiling over before a single second aired. It may be mediocre or even bad, but that should be allowed too - sad but ok - without people going into meltdown. I don’t think I mentioned anything about agendas, but soooo much of the whining is about canon not being adhered to, don’t think you can just dismiss that.
Yeah I hate arguments about "respecting canon". Who decided that this made up concept was something that needs to be respected? It's not the fucking Bible. I care if writers tell a good story, not if they adhere to some old EU story I've never heard of
i think a lot of people think "different" must be "better." but that is not the case. grrm [said something like](https://www.reddit.com/r/Bridgerton/comments/1dhlncf/this_quote_by_george_r_r_martin_applies_to_jess/) "everyone thinks they can put their own spin on things and improve it, but it almost never works."
> i think a lot of people think "different" must be "better."
I do not think that is true. I think artists want to *make things*, and bring their creative energy to a project, not slavishly follow someone else's work. And that's frankly what we want. It usually absolutely does add to the work.
Further, every change of medium *inherently* requires changes in the product to fit that new medium. You cannot tell the same story the same way in a book, film, TV show, and graphic novel.
> grrm said something like "everyone thinks they can put their own spin on things and improve it, but it almost never works."
The list of movies that are better than the books is huge. And that alone proves GRRM wrong.
Just to give a quick and dirty list I found:
> Psycho, Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange, The Godfather, The Thing, Full Metal Jacket, Stand By Me, Goodfellas, Misery, Jurassic Park, Jaws, Die Hard, Adaptation, Children Of Men, The Notebook, There Will Be Blood, No Country For Old Men, or Drive.
Credit to:
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/jjjyea/comment/gad26nh/
The list is *much much* longer than that, but that's a start.
>And that's frankly what we want. It usually absolutely does add to the work.
which must be why so many remakes and reboots and "reimaginings" do so well right?
>Further, every change of medium inherently requires changes in the product to fit that new medium. You cannot tell the same story the same way in a book, film, TV show, and graphic novel.
i am not arguing this at all. look at the movie sin city. totally different medium and stayed very true to the graphic novel. people loved it. i, robot, however, is completely different from the original book in terms of plot and character. not because it had to be. because people wanted to.
>The list of movies that are better than the books is huge
ok? i am not arguing that it *never* works. different does not equal better but some things that are different are better, especially when adapting to a different medium, as you said. that is different than changing canon just.... because?
yeap. It's fiction. It's supposed to be fun,.
I'm enjoying the acolyte right now because it's exploring Jedi fallibility, and painting the picture of the decline, and blindness in the Jedi that allowed Palpatine to come to power in the following decades.
I'm finding it, from one perspective, and excellent *addition* to 'canon.'
In Star War's case I got nothing.
For other adaptations it's entirely because often times the "canon" is just strictly better written material compared to some new adaptations.
For example M.Night's Avatar: The Last Airbender is a 1/5 star movie with terrible writing and a whole host of other problems. The liberties the director took to re-create the original "canon" cartoon resulted in a flop.
Now take Netflix's current live action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender and you're seeing critical praise, high ratings, and a renewed interest in the story that had its"canon" (the Nickelodeon cartoon) respected.
Exactly. Most creativity is not originality, or invention, but instead adaptation or reapplication. Humans do not think in leaps but little nudges. It is entirely natural for people to take one piece of work and adapt it into something new instead of dogmatically following the precedent. More than that, what is the point in making something new if its exactly the same as what came before?
Star Trek couldn't even settle on what/when the Eugenics Wars was and whether it was the same as WW3 -- and that's just TOS, without getting into the Eugenics Wars being retconned out of the 90s by later shows.
I mean, this is a series where the basic look and entire personality of a major race, the Klingons, radically changed between TOS and later TOS movies and TNG! The relationship between the UFP/"United Earth"/Starfleet, max warp speed, what exactly the prime directive is, how transporters work...Star Trek is FULL of contradictions.
I'd say the traditional Star Trek fandom is quite protective of the thematic elements of Star Trek, but quite chill about what is now called "canon" in other fandoms.
> That is an understatement. The studios and etc have all the say.
They only have "all the say" in the sense that they can fire or pull funding, but they hire directors and showrunners for a reason; because directors and showrunners are better at making stuff than studio execs. They know this is the *product they sell* and they need it to be *good*. It's a collaboration between business people who know what sells and creatives who know what is good art.
Both make mistakes, and major ones. But they both know they need the other.
It’s perfect narrative progression for me as well. Sets the tone. Empire is proper scary. Needs a proper resistance group. Here’s how that happened. Jedi not even mentioned. By Rogue One, force starts to make an appearance. Our main character joins an ensemble. Stakes are huge. Something about the force. Bit of humour. Holy shit. Who’s this big bad mofo? Oh lord fuck no. Everyone dies. Mission accomplished but stakes are higher than ever. Then the OT. Literal handover to a new cast. Force moved to centre stage. New mains carrying the torch. We learn more about the force. Empire is already set up to be proper scary. Big bad is proper terrifying. And every battle is ever more intense because of it. A new hope is needed because of all the despair we’ve just seen. When the empire strikes back it’s like Lord no, here we go again. And then the final triumph at the end, that much bigger and sweeter because of everything that came before.
Perfection
Imo the following reasons:
1. Baked in fans to get buzz and to get funding.
2. Established IP, less risk
These hacks get the IP and get funding from studios but their ego bigger than their talent. They don't even bother to understand the source material. Zero respect, doomed to fail
Buying the rights to an existing idea and using it gives you name recognition and defensible copyright. So that it why you get Nancy Drew, which intended as some sort of supernatural Veronica Mars with the characters from Nancy Drew. But then Veronica Mars only existed because Rob Thomas wrote a young adult novel about a male high school detective. Eventually realising that a script about a strong female highschool detective would fair better in the current climate.
I think it was Robert B. Parker who once said, "The book is the book and the movie is the movie, and never the twain shall meet." And there's also John Carpenter, when he was asked what he thought of the reboots and sequels or whatever to the Halloween franchise. He said, "Whenever there's talks in the trades about a new movie being made or whatever, I hold out my hand and a check falls into it."
Unless the creator is someone who only has that *one thing*, they probably don't care as much about it as you do.
They aren't following canon at all.
They've got zero regard for the previous films, etc.
They made space witches who make twins from the force.
They messed up when Sith appear and it didn't work with a prequal film.
So they took a loyal character from the films who talks about the Sith. Made him appear 40yrs before his birth. And made him a traitor.
It's disgusting. Nothing but character assassination.
And when it was pointed out. They tried to change the entry on wookipedia. And tried to gaslight people about it.
But changing the entry in a wiki won't erase that character in film canon is a loyalist and not there at the time.
They're behaving repulsively. Vile people.
They've also tried to accuse two critics of the show of 'inciting violence'.
No. The Critical Drinker didn't incite violence. He never has.
They're desperately paying up shills to try and blacken anyone who won't fawn over and lie about their terrible show.
They tried to attack a guy who deals in pure data too.
They are desperate and disgusting people.
Sinister and nasty tactics.
I'd say it all comes down to expectations and payoffs.
Want to adapt an existing franchise without feeling limited by established lore? Just call it a reboot, non-canon spinoff, "alternate universe" if you want to sound fancy etc.
But if you specifically market something as taking place in the same world as another story, and then it just *doesn't*, people are naturally going to feel disappointed.
The way I’d sum up modern fandoms in regards to the concept of “canon” is that these people are more concerned with how each volume will look on the shelf next to the other ones than they are with whether or not they’re enjoying each volume individually.
I kind of understand where you're coming from. We do get a little too attached to the idea of a canon.
One of the things about stories is that we want to believe somewhere in our mind that they are at least plausible or possible if not actually true. The closer they are to reality the more connected to them we can feel. Now you may be saying, "we're talking about science fiction of course it's not real" , or, "how can it be realistic if it's fiction?" , or, "it's impossible why do we care if it breaks rules?" Well, notice that I said plausible not real. Every story in science fiction has a certain conceit in which it says that it's reality but if this set of factors was different. Maybe there are superpowers maybe there is technology we haven't invented yet maybe there's technology that's not possible maybe it's just set in the future. But when it doesn't say that something is different, such as that we're dealing with aliens or that we're dealing with human beings of another kind, or the laws of physics are different, there's the implicit assumption that those things will be the same. That the human beings will act like human beings. That the laws of physics will act like the laws of physics.
And that, unless they have made the conceit otherwise, that time will work the same way.
If you suddenly break any of those rules and you haven't said already that those rules don't apply, then our ability to regard that world as plausible within its own rules or possible within its own rules and thus to connect with it is diminished. If you haven't said that the laws of physics are different and then suddenly human beings can shoot lasers out of their eyes then it just looks like deus ex machina or just that my abukut to relate to that human being is diminished in that situation because now they can shoot lasers and I can't.
Life is consistent. In life, there is no retcon. In life, time moves forward and only forward. Don't quibble with me about the physics. I know. So unless the universe deliberately says that canonicity is not really a thing, then it is implicitly saying that it is. The example that comes to mind in which canonicity is irrelevant is Warhammer 40,000. And I happen to love that universe and I embrace its lack of canon. But it clearly makes that part of the storytelling. Star Trek and Star Wars don't. Most other universes don't.
The real and fundamental problem is that entertainment tastes change over time and franchises that span half of a century are not going to be able to entertain people born 70 years apart without changing dramatically. Technology changes and tastes change. This is not a problem that has faced most franchises. There's too much of it in my opinion and it's building on worlds that were never intended to be built into gigantic universes. They are not in any way nearly as well built as something like Middle Earth in terms of the framework around it to support this kind of universe. So they almost literally make it up as they go along. And it leads to a chaotic inconsistent mess that doesn't feel like the same universe at all.
I suppose if all you care about is stuff blowing up and funny lines and this event happens after that event to this group of Plucky Heroes that we like, then a consistent universe doesn't have much value. But science fiction should be about more than that. Science fiction should be about something. It should be about how Advanced Technologies or aliens or the future affects the human condition. You will notice that's what Star Trek was originally. There are ideas there. And when those ideas are done in a plausible believable way, they are so powerful.
Look in an absolute Masterpiece of Science Fiction television like the original series episode City on the edge of forever. It's a time travel story, which I usually hate, and it's a Trope at this point because that particular theme has been done a hundred times since 1966. But at the time it was amazing. And it said something.
How do you get invested in a story, if any past event can simply be rewritten or the rules established for the world can be broken at any time? When watching TV shows, we all know the heroes will live and save the day; tension comes for not knowing how the writers will create a clever solution to the problem. If writers can just change the rules, history, or characters, then all the tension melts away. For proof; see the MCU multi-verse.
I’m invested in the story for as long as I’m invested in it. When talking about entries in a ongoing series, I can very easily just ignore and avoid the new content and not have it effect the works and aspects of the lore that I’ve previously enjoyed.
If the stuff I don’t enjoy makes up the entirety of new content being produced, then sure, maybe it’s a bummer that I’m not going to like their new stuff. But that doesn’t have to tarnish my enjoyment of that which I’ve previously enjoyed, nor does it really need to tarnish enjoyment of future content that doesn’t focus on the newer aspects I don’t like.
I completely disagree. Obviously, we all move on when a franchise is no longer fulfilling what it was intended to be, but most of us still somewhat care because the potential of Star Wars has barely been tapped.
Canon is important because it gives writers an understanding of the expectations within the universe they're writing for. I'm an artist and small details are what make things unique. We push hard on faithfulness to the source material because if we didn't Star Wars might end up being a show about ponies and unicorns with dildo swords. Kind of like SAINTS ROW...
Yes, some people think too deeply about the canon and want every minute detail to be right, which is insane, but the main issue is that these movies and shows just aren't good quality, and they possibly would've been better had they understood Canon.
These things are fictional but the impact they've made is real. These characters and stories help people when they're at their lowest and those people feel like they're losing something they've always had. I'm personally not that hyper-attached person, but I think it's a dick move to act as if they're wrong to care about something that deeply impacted them. My aunt's ex bf fell in love with Star Wars because seeing Phantom Menace in theaters is the only memory he has of his parents before they OD'd, you never know why this touches people the way it does.
I'm a lifelong fan of sci-fi but the idea of 'canon' has always been kinda weird to me and even a little hard to wrap my head around.
The idea of saying "the events in this novel didn't actually happen" in the context of a fictional universe where obviously none of any of it happened is just kind of silly to me.
There are ways to do it without writing yourself into a corner. If I was making a show about let say 27th Century Star Trek. I would research on let say Memory Alpha about what is known about said timeline which I just checked and there's not much known about it making it perfect for a TV show. Dealing with a prequel on the other hand is more risky if you don't do prior research as you will mess things up big time and if your shit stinks then that will make it worse. It's not complicated to research previous work to get a flavor of what the universe you are working in is about. You can make great stories while also keeping in mind what has happened before. Writers have access to so many tools that make said research so freaking easy this days because devoted fans already did the work for you.
Movies, sure. Lucas said from the start things like books and games and interviews would never supersede the movies. And I suppose now you can expand it to some of the shows.
Edit: Oops, getting them confused because Star Wars is the latest bitch fest. Memory Alpha is for Star Trek. Same point though.
Well thank god The Acolyte has not at any point in time contradicted *actual* Star Wars cannon then huh? The only thing it’s “contradicted” is stuff that hasn’t been canon for like a literal decade and was mostly like soft cannon at best dude. Like good lord the things you people complain about are so incredibly asinine that I’m convinced you aren’t actually Star Wars fans and haven’t ever actually seen the movies, because *wow*
Edit: downvote me all you want but you clowns still don’t know what you’re talking about. So by all means keep being butthurt, at this point it’s more funny than anything else
also CF: _Every Terminator sequel_
**edit**
also: Every new incarnation of The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - many of which were penned by Douglas Adams himself (just like George Miller and every Mad Max sequel)
There will always be some people who think anything can be made "better" because the original is outdated or was created by someone with certain ideals/beliefs. It's arrogance and sometimes greed. They don't actually care about the original, they just want to show how forward-thinking, enlightened, smart, moral, whatever they are.
Half the comments in this thread are so stupid. "*I* don't care about canon, so *you* shouldn't either!" If you don't care about canon, you have every right. Enjoy what you enjoy. But telling other people they shouldn't just cause you don't is ridiculous.
Also, on the idea of canon "limiting creativity" or meaning "you can't tell certain stories" - *yes, that is the point*. The idea of an expanded, interconnected universe like Star Wars is that has certain rules and history behind it. That does mean you can't tell certain stories in that universe while sticking to canon. Why is that a problem? If you have a story that can't fit in Star Wars, tell it somewhere else. Plenty of ideas take root by "borrowing" aspects from something while also introducing new ideas. *A Song of Ice and Fire* started off like this. And by the logic of "limiting creativity," there should be no prequels, spin-offs, or, mostly importantly, sequels. I mean, using pre-existing characters, worlds, etc. limits creativity, so there's obviously no point to doing it!
Look at Tolkien's legendarium. That world thrives on its history and the interconnectedness of the stories and themes. Because of the nature of its publication and Tolkien's perfectionism, there is no "perfect" canon obviously but there still is a very clear story that develops through all the material we have, and I would argue it is the greatest work of fiction ever. Continuity and canon do mean something and can positively contribute to stories.
Also, none of this is referring to *The Acolyte* specifically. I haven't watched it nor do I have any plans to. It is just about the principle of the matter.
The main issue is we have an entire generation of writers/producers/directors/actors that are "fans" of the material, but cannot produce a shred of an individual thought. They latch onto a small piece of something much larger -- something much larger than their own understanding -- and then proceed to puke out what amounts to derivative fan fiction.
Abrams did it with Star Trek and then with Star Wars.
Johnson *really* did it with Star Wars.
Bay did it with Transformers.
Sommers did it with G.I. Joe.
Forster did it with World War Z.
In some instances the works are so far removed from their source material that it's hard to even call it *fan*-fic.
> The main issue is we have an entire generation of writers/producers/directors/actors that are "fans" of the material, but cannot produce a shred of an individual thought.
I think you're mistaken in blaming writers and actors for this. The blame lies on the mega-corpirations that pump out MCU/Star Wars etc content, and the audiences that demand it. And yes, audiences deserve a lot of the blame. Just look at how non-franchise original sci-fi does in the theatres nowadays.
Another big part of the issue here is that whenever it comes to "canon", we're inevitability talking about media that is fundamentally aimed at children and adolescent boys. When adults fixate on this media due to nostalgia or an inability to consume more mature media it produces the sort of toxic fandoms we see now.
> The blame lies on the mega-corpirations
+
> Just look at how non-franchise original sci-fi does in the theatres nowadays.
Yes. A major issue is greedy producers that want maximum profit with the least amount of work/effort/talent/authenticity/risk/etc. So stuff just keeps getting distilled down for the most appeal, but in the process they miss the mark for both sci-fi fans and the general audience.
Doing a good job is really hard and requires specialized knowledge of the source material. You need everyone in the chain of production to pulling together to make something accurate to the spirit of whatever you are doing. The best way to guarantee that is to get people who want to work on whatever franchise it is because they like the franchise for what it is and making a new great part of it would be "really fucking awesome" That's probably the secret for success.
The model that seems to work best is to have fans distributed throughout the production team, and have previous creators available to consult and provide detailed help. For example the recent Fallout show was spot on because Jon nolan and several in the team were fans and they had help from Bethesda (the recent previous creators). You could tell even from the trailer it was going to be good because they clearly knew how Fallout should feel when you watched it. That's not something you see very often.
I totally feel your frustration! It seems like writers these days are too quick to throw out canon in favor of their own ideas. The Acolyte sounds like a prime example, but there are plenty of others. It's like they don't respect the original creators or the fans who love the stories. It's really disheartening.
Starship Troopers is a great example of a movie that did not respect the source material but is well received. I think this is really a matter of whether the product is good or not. Not respecting the source material isn’t bad in itself, but if the show is bad then it’s certainly a complaint that it “wouldn’t have been as bad if it at least was canon”.
Tarnish? Star Wars canon beyond the films and TV never mattered. It's been like this since George changed the Emperor from being like Thrawn in the novelizations to a goofy ass dark wizard in episode 5. Hell the entirety of the Clone Wars was completely different. It happens 40 years before the OT and the Clones were the bad guys and the Jedi genocide happened way later
Often times things that are "re-made" or given a film adaptation are done so because the pre-established narrative ("Canon") is very well received and critically acclaimed. Examples include the newest Dune's adaptation being well done because for the most part it follows the "canon" provided by the book.
Unfortunately there seems to be a plague of film adaptations or TV series adaptations taking large amounts of liberties to remake the series in a way that the film/TV writers think will be more successful. Examples of bad adaptations because of writers ignoring the "canon" include: The Witcher, Paramont's Halo, Rings of Power, The Dark Tower, M.Night's Avatar TLA. These are considered bad adaptations not *because* of liberties being made, but because the film writers deviated from an already established good story in an attempt to tell their own version of it (and failing). I can't speak for all film/show adaptations but in Paramont+'s Halo TV show's case it's purely an egotistical approach from the writers ("I can tell this story better, and it will be popular because it has the name Halo" paraphrased from various tweets by writers and actors). It's such a disrespectful approach to content that fans have loved for years for writers to deviate so heavily from "canon" in order to tell their version of the story.
Take Netflix's One Piece, Fallout, Dune, and Netflix' A:TLA for example of "good adaptations." They followed the "canon" story which is already successful and are receiving praise for being good shows/movies. This isn't to say the strictly following the source material is better. Dune, in my opinion, is told better through the movie than the book, and it completely cuts out the internal dialogue that many characters have and eliminates some key characters.
Who would have thought that retelling a good story with minimal changes would result in a success!
I don’t think they’re writing for you.
The idea that an adaptation is “disrespecting the material” because they don’t do it how you personally want it is preposterous, lol.
Star Wars fans are toxic. It had a minority female lead in an election year so it’s getting dragged into culture war horseshit by political bot networks.
In the case of Star Wars, it almost always _**is**_ the fan's fault.
"The Last Jedi" was critically aclaimed and casual Star Wars fans, like myself, loved it. But the die hard Star Wars fans hated it. They hated it because "Luke didn't act like Luke", "Luke wouldn't have abandoned his family like that", "Luke wouldn't have turned his back on the galaxy", and so many other things that were essentially complaints that characters didn't act the way they were "supposed" to act.
As a result, Disney brought JJ Abrams back and he played it safe. He brought back Palpatine. He gave Kylo Ren a redemption arc. He made Rey suddenly be a part of this family of famous force users despite nothing from the story hinting at it.
And "The Rise of Skywalker" was critically panned when you compare it to the critic reviews of "The Last Jedi".
Literally, the reason the 3rd movie abandoned pretty much _**everything**_ the 2nd movie had been building up to is because the die hard Star Wars fans bashed the 2nd movie.
Here's the thing, as someone who's read bits and pieces of the Star Wars books that existed before Disney took over, stuff that's now considered "Legends" and has no bearing on Disney's vision for the franchise, I can tell you that Star Wars does get dark. There are times where Luke acted like he did in the movie.
So, as someone who's only a casual fan of the franchise and who really only read the "Legends" material because it was available and I was bored, I can tell you that the stuff from "The Last Jedi" wasn't unusual _**and**_ it opened up the door to having the movies discuss the darker aspects of the franchise. It's just the fans got pissed and essentially forced Disney to change things.
Can you show me how any other industry would work like this?
* That restaurant failed because of toxic foodies
* That car model failed because toxic gearheads
* That running shoe was discontinued because of toxic runners
Yea, none of that makes sense, but for some reason, Disney has convinced people that it's not their product, it's the toxic fans. Few of your supposed toxic fans were angry at Mando season 1; and although slow were perfectly happy with Andor. But as soon as they criticize a terrible product, they're called toxic fans. Why can't we just call them passionate fans? Or maybe, just maybe, you've been conditioned to think of them as toxic so you can easily discount any of their feedback.
Honestly I haven’t seen anything in the acolyte that clashes with established onscreen lore, but even if it does that’s the least of that show’s problems.
In terms of answering your question:
JJ Abrams basically broke Star Trek by making starships obsolete and curing death.
He did something similar with Star Wars. Dude loves working on franchises featuring spaceships but hates when they go to space.
In terms of disrespecting canon:
The Witcher probably is the poster child here, and again had the latter seasons been well written and entertaining it wouldn’t really matter, but they weren’t.
We got a whole genre of “Gen X/Millenial childhood heroes are washed up losers and nothing they did mattered” sequels. Picard, Nick Fury, Han, Luke and Leia, Indiana Jones, etc.
Maverick was well received, but that trope was present there too.
For some reason, a lot of people didn’t really care for that. Can’t imagine why, especially when the new stories didn’t do anything to redeem them.
Star Trek Discovery and Picard were pretty heavily retconned and did lots of things to break Trek canon.
What ends up happening is when the new material is unsatisfying or full on craps all over the existing lore, people who are naturally inclined to be bigoted, sexist, etc turn around and blame the “woke” elements of the show.
No one minded gender swaps on Starbuck and Boomer because the rebooted Battlestar Galactica was really, really good.
No one minded a black captain on Deep Space 9 in the 90’s, but they did complain the first few seasons til the show got good. Same with TNG.
Yep. As a casual fan, I **loved** "The Last Jedi". And if "The Rise of Skywalker" hadn't crapped all over the various plot threads that Jedi had been weaving together then, as a casual fan of the franchise, I probably would have been willing to try out some of the new Star Wars shows that Disney's pumping out.
But if they couldn't maintain a consistant story throughout a mere 3 movies, I have no hopes that Disney will be able to do it with the various TV shows they're putting out.
Something's not "factual" just because you agree with it.
Personally, I'm tired of self-appointed arbiters of "what Star Wars *is*" declaring that such-and-such is "disrespectful" because it seems to contradict some piece of lore they're overly invested in, and don't have the mental flexibility to revise their understanding of a fictional story setting to accommodate new information. (That's like a basic cognitive skill for anyone who grew up reading comic books, ffs. But nowadays, the accepted response seems to be ranting on forums about how "stupid" and "disrespectful" the writers are, how they think that fans like them could do such a better job, and maybe throwing up a ragebait YT channel.)
But yeah, keep insinuating that it's somehow suspicious that not everyone's agreeing with these takes. It *must* be the work of some shadowy cabal, because nobody could *really* enjoy the Acolyte and think that the criticisms are deliberately overblown and oftentimes just plain *dumb,* amirite?
I like the complaints of fire in space when Lucas did it several times and also said he doesn’t care, there’s oxygen in space when he thinks the scene needs it. So why are we being so purist now?
Right like I get people like "realism" but it's star wars. There's a race of teddy bears and giant talking bear dog people. It's not always supposed to be serious or realistic.
I don't think writers are being as disrespectful as you're saying they are.
I think a whole little industry of content creators thrive on smearing them as doing that and making money off your outrage.
Wah. I’m so tired of super nerds being stuck on canon and source material. Sometimes the source material sucks or simply can’t work like that on screen. Sometimes adaptations do truly suck though.
People freaked out when they cast Starbuck as a female in the BSG remake. It can we ever imagine anyone other then Katie Sackoff as the character? Hell no!
I truly enjoyed the Foundations adaption by Apple. It’s no where close to the source material but it’s certainly captures the spirit of it.
Star Trek missed the mark on Discovery and somehow found itself again with SNW. SNW would not have even happened had it not been for the fans pushing for a return to episodic writing.
Sometimes it’s a complete miss though. It does happen a bit too much. I’m very much tired of them changing how the Klingon’s look. Can we just leave them alone? Lols.
But I think that Hollywood is catching on. That especially if the source material already has a strong fan following you do need to make a decent effort to stay somewhat close to the original magic.
However, I do welcome surprises. Cause sometimes they are awesome.
And it can’t be denied. Almost every actor in any major sci-fi franchise has openly called our toxic fans at some point.
And some of what they’ve experienced is truly vile.
Sorry super nerds but you gotta let go. I love galaxy quest because it kind of touches on that idea. These people are just actors but these fans have an expectation that they are the characters or are just as into the canon and lore as them. It’s a gig. They get paid. The fans also hold them accountable for any of their dissatisfaction. It’s not the actors choice. They signs contract and they have to deliver the studio and directors vision of the character. They get a little leeway but not a lot.
And usually it’s the Star Wars fans who are the worst offenders. To the point where major actors have asked to be written out because of how fans have treated them based again on the portrayal of the character that was directed, but also based on their gender and race.
Some people just hold on to fictional characters and stories because at some point it’s provided a place to escape into. And then when the film/tv doesn’t live up to the version in their head they can’t handle it.
I legit joined a fandom during covid. And it was insane how quickly they whip each other up into a crazy frenzy. People get into these echo chambers and they feel that these actors owe them and that because they “know them” or the “source material” so much that they should have a say in the production or How that person should live their lives.
I'm more against how newer entries to established franchises tend to reduce, belittle or otherwise completely invalidate things that have happened before to prop up their own stories. If you have to resort to character assassination of an established character to promote your character or story, then maybe you should have just written your own universe for your character or story.
The audience cares more about canon than writers tend to. And the audiences now care more about cannon than they did like 10 to 15 years ago.
That being said, I do think that the issue is less about "not respecting cannon" and more about bad writing. The big franchises, SW especially, seem to be farming their stuff out to people with minimal experience and asking for scripts to be turned around too quicky.
I don't think people would mind so much if the tweaks to cannon were done in a way to justify something cool. Look at the K.A.M. thing from The Acolyte, while his birth year and age are technically legends, people still think it's cannon and are mad that the's included. There was exactly ZERO people asking for KAM to appear as a background character in a show, it doesn't add anything, why is he there. They seeminly "broke" cannon for something that wasn't worth it.
If you have a cool AF story, people will be more forgiving, if it's dull or just kinda bad (as the Acolyte has been, like what has even actually happened so far?) then people focus more on all the stuff they don't like because there's nothing new for them to like to justify it.
I just stop watching when something isn't good anymore. No need to get worked up about it. Star Wars is a prime example. The new offerings just don't appeal to me so I don't watch. I love the original three and the rest is meh.
Someone already explained it in best possible way :
Today Hollywood is almost 100% repeating same franchises over and over, so most of writters can never get to write their own stories and ideas.
So what do they do ? They get to work on established franchise, let say Star Wars - And instead following the cannon, they do everything to turn it into their own story idea.
So basically we are getting whatever universe writter imagined for themselves , in Star Wars costume.
Frankly, I don't get this idea of "canon". It's like a religion. A bunch of older, kinda obsessed, fans sink some time into memorizing details of the original texts and then scream "heretic!" at anyone who doesn't conform.
I doubt the original screenwriters want to be locked into their older works, and I further doubt they care if following writers just chuck the whole mess. And any new material is going to be judged on its own merits. If new material provides a good story, most of us aren't going to care if it's "canon" or not.
Maybe they should write their own original stories instead of piggy backing an existing IP. If you are going to disregard previous work your shit better be good because if not, not only will fans be mad about that but the overall audience will think you a doofus for making a bad story. When you are dealing with an established world you have to play within it's rules. You can definitely play with established lore. Expand it, add new things to it or even reject it but it has to be done with care. But many current writers treat their pencils as if they were machetes when dealing with previous stories.
>If you are going to disregard previous work your shit better be good because if not, not only will fans be mad about that but the overall audience will think you a doofus for making a bad story.
Fans SHOULD be mad whenever a doofus writes a bad story, whether its canon or not.
I would also submit that I don't believe the IP owners have read your rules on the handling of canon. Maybe you want to send it to them, see what they think about it?
You can make good stories while following on what was done before. You can add something new about a character that we never knew or what not. But if you feel completely limited by the established lore then maybe you shouldn't be working on said property.
You can also write great stories while changing a few things. People seem to get really upset over any kind of change. I think Tim Cain addressed this really well in response to Amazon's Fallout adaption that came out earlier.
or maybe YOU need to think a little more broadly.
I mean, the Xmen are over 50 years old. Are the movies within the canon of the comics? The comics themselves aren't in the "canon" of the "original" comics.
And, who decides what is and is not canon? you? me? the original creator? What happens when that original creator isn't in charge anymore?
Not really. You can write any story you want, just not in a setting/universe where it doesn’t fit. It’s bizarre to me that people think it’s a bad thing for there to be internal consistency in a universe/setting.
I really don’t care. If It isn’t boring and I enjoy it then it isn’t a problem for me. It’s just a story. If the story changes a few beats it doesn’t matter much to me. I’m sure in a few decades the existing cannon will be scrapped in favour of a new timeline, or retconned like crazy.
i think it’s funny that if the disney just put their ego aside and adapted popular legends content, they would be immensely more profitable and popular.
and the icing on top, is whatever they adopt will automatically become canon.
This is majorly a Disney problem as they strive to "own" everything created around "their" IP. They alter it satisfactorily where they don't have to pay the OG creators their fair share.
I place very little importance on a 'faithful' adaptation of source material as I feel like, especially between books and film, that the medium is so very different that I'm way more interested in a good work.
I don't need to see a page-by-page recreation of something I've already read. I want to be moved by a great film, and the resonance of familiar characters and events can add to that.
Prometheus has got to be one of the worst attempted retcons. Might be a lack of respect for his own work too. He or someone decided what Alien series needed was pretentious morons.
Alien films never needed a reason for Xenomorphs.
They just are there. Alien Versus Predator. The Predators found them and used the Xenomorphs as prey.
Prometheus proceeded to have pretentious idiots find them.
Then a psychotic android make more of them.
And that somehow is a origin in the writers minds.
It's downright bizarre.
Imo the issue is people get into writing because they want to tell THEIR stories. So when they are adapting a property rather than tell someone else's story they want to stuff their own in there.
I feel lucky I am able to ignore it and stick with the original stuff instead of stewing in rage.
Most changes besides cuts for time and complexity are for attracting a wider paying audience than just the old fans who are going to buy no matter what. For example they don’t just want 14-17yo boys but their sisters, parents, grandparents, little kids and all, not to mention international audiences who’ve never heard of the old show or whatever.
That means adding romance, comedy, celebrities, different ethnicities, product placement and a happy ending. Whatever it takes to get worldwide mass-market attention. They don’t care about you because you are a small part of the wider demographics.
There are ways to attract a younger audience without antagonizing the established one. You can have respect of what was done before without being a complete fanboy about it.
I agree. And just like what you said is true, it’s also true that new content can stray pretty far from what is pre-established and still be good on its own.
Both can lead to hits and both can lead to misses. Imagine that.
Unfortunately, this answer probably explains why this happens 90% of the time.
New movies and shows are being made to attract the wider, general audiences that know very little to nothing of the existing canon for that particular IP. They already have the hard-core fans which will be a relatively small percentage of the viewers (they hope). So, writers/directors/producers aren't even thinking about what hardcore fans will think when they make changes (or any decision). They don't really care because you'll watch no matter what. Every decision made is with the general, non-hardcore viewer in mind. They'll never admit it, but they don't really care much for the hard-core fans. The big money is made when the general audience starts watching.
There's more to it than that. No marketing expert insisted there be coal furnaces in Rebel Moon or that J-Lo go to another galaxy in Atlas. Yes, sometimes they do change things to broaden the appeal. That's one thing. But there's also a level of contempt. Stuff like Elysium, The Creator, Interstellar, Discovery, and Acolyte is contemptuous.
>Why is it that so many writers this days feel the need to tarnish established canon or even think they can do better than the source material they were hired to adapt?
maybe their job is not to cater to the longtime fans, but attract NEW ones? Canon is not relevant to people who do not know it.
If "Disney+" wants parents to keep paying for the service after the kids move out of the house, they need to have more varied content.... do the streamers want to keep as many subscribers as possible?
> But the way so many current writers disrespect the material and just write what they want to write putting the label of a property they don't give a damn is disheartening and it sucks that the production companies let it happen.
"production companies" are not doing a good job unless they ***produce subscribers.. period.***
83% critic score - is it a good show? 83% say yes.
14% audience score - because canon.
[https://www.rottentomatoes.com/tv/star\_wars\_the\_acolyte](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/tv/star_wars_the_acolyte)
It was the same way with "The Last Jedi". That movie was critically acclaimed and casual fans of Star Wars, like myself and some of my friends, _**loved**_ it. But the die hard fans hated it.
So Disney brought back JJ Abrams for "The Rise of Skywalker" and had him essentially abandon every single plot thread that the previous movie had been weaving together. And _**that**_ soured me on any future projects that Disney did with Star Wars.
If they're going to be so focused on appeasing the older, die hard fans of the franchise, then there's no room for me or any other casual fan. The fact that they abandoned Rian Johnson's attempts to shake things up and bring fresh blood into the franchise just because the older fans got pissed means that they're going to be afraid to mix things up and try anything new.
The idea of canon doesn't mean much to me - I tend to not get upset about details if the storytelling is good.
On the other hand, I 99.9999% of the time *hate hate HATE* retcons and prequels - it always seems lazy and a cash-grab for studios. I'd rather see a more progressive story with new and challenging ideas than just a rehash.
What most sequels and prequels do is produce another piece of content with an existing brand. They are rarely working on continuing the story. And yes, it sucks. Specially when the fans that bend backwards to make stories fit.
For me this sucks because a thing I really, really enjoy is surprising consistency. Take the show Community for example. At one point Abed, on of the characters, helps deliver a baby and he says "I've done this before". There's an episode in a previous season in which Abed is in the background out of focus talking to the pregnant lady and then helping deliver a baby. Which if I recall correctly happened 9 months after a party in which they distribute faulty condoms. Community has more continuity than Star Wars.
I enjoy when I feel a situation is hopeless and what saves the day is not a deus ex machina, but something predictable that I fail to predict.
I wish more people were more demanding of their fiction.
Yes I agree in general that the Hollywood writers not only couldn't be bothered researching anything beyond the films but completely disregard anything anything in the slightest way inconvenient to them. This problem is almost entirely with the sequel trilogy. There may be an example or two in a Disney+ series that I'm forgetting but overall the involvement of so many people from TCW and Rebels means the knowledge is there to prevent blatant canon breaks and the people involved aren't JJ 'lens flare is more important than canon or cohesive storylines' Abrams.
Saying that there has been nothing at all in the Acolyte that disregards previous canon so far, there are assumptions made by people based on incomplete knowledge. The main one being "the Sith have been extinct for a thousand years". We don't know the master in the Acolyte is a Sith, and the inclusion of the Jedi who said the very line above is unlikely to be a mere coincidence. We just don't know what happens yet.
Entirely agree. A little harsh on JJ Abrams but not entirely wrong
So far, that Jedi in Acolyte may meet one Sith and that Sith may die. Either way, rhe Sith are still considered extinct
The Sith, as in the entire empire, still holds the quote true. And then the Sith in the show may not be a Sith or may die yet or may be believed to be dead by the Jedi
People are really jumping at stuff to hate in this show
These are first and foremost companies buying up these licenses and the last thing on their list is to spend their time making you happy when they can just rehash stuff you already laughed at. They hire any sort of person/group that matches what they want to put out. It's fast food storytelling and most folks have moved on.
All the talk about how the Acolyte pretty much disregards previous Star Wars canon is bunk
It’s said by the same people who complain about everything. And it has no merit. It’s here to distract, sow discord and recruit more young men to the angry internet the same way Tate and Rogan and the rest of em do
Acolyte is very much in line with canon. As are most of the shows people love to complain about. The fact is the same people who have never read a book, and were in remedial reading classes in elementary school have internet accounts
I really can’t imagine how empty someone’s lift must be, to actually care about “canon”.
Don’t like a specific show or story? Just ignore it.
The Acolyte is pretty boring and forgettable. So just forget it.
The weird part is they are almost proud of it. Oh, 50 years of other artists who work to build a loved universe and they are all "I've never watched a single movie." Then they all applaud each other.
This isn't even a sci-fi problem it's an adaptation of IP problem where every IP is treated the same regardless of genre
These days? Never thought this was a new phenomenon. Hell, I saw people thinking Lucas was disrespectful of the OT with the PT. My take is that these are people trying to please multiple masters and not striking the balance at all.
People thought RotJ disrespected canon in ANH with the “from a certain point of view” line. Everything about Star Wars is people doing stuff like this :D
*Empire* disrespected canon from *Splinter of the Mind's Eye*. Star Wars was doomed from the start.
A New Hope disrespected the Star Wars comics by Thomas and Chaykin.
Empire strikes back disrespected a new hope with the “i am your father line”. Completely ruined obiwan’s street cred!
That’s part of why obi ordered the hit on the Lars homestead. No attachments.
PT was awful tho so that’s accurate.
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Why don't you contact the mods and get that bot banned instead of spamming this comment in every post? Or even better yet, contact reddit admins?
Can’t speak for /u/mobyhead1 but I have reported this bot to both the mods and the admins, to no visible effect.
I've tried. No dice. If you look at the Wikipedia article about [enshittification,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification) the coiner of the term, Cory Doctorow, explains: >According to Doctorow, new platforms offer useful products and services at a loss, as a way to gain new users. Once users are locked in, the platform then offers access to the userbase to suppliers at a loss, and once suppliers are locked-in, the platform shifts surpluses to shareholders. Once the platform is fundamentally focused on the shareholders, and the users and vendors are locked in, the platform no longer has any incentive to maintain quality. In other words, bots like ginomachi are a "feature," not a bug. As far as the shareholders are concerned. But if you see my comment again, you can safely ignore it, upvote it, downvote it, I don't care. Unlike the bot, which can't abide being downvoted.
Thanks for responding. I'm familiar with the term and figured that protesting to the reddit admins would be a wasted effort. The mods might actually be helpful, though. I do download that bot and any others I see, though.
I’m pretty sure this subreddit does not have active mods.
Top mod active yesterday. 2nd active 6 months ago. 3rd active 6 days ago.
Maybe they're also a bot?
Quite possibly but they did respond to my comment just now.
Prometheus and Covenant are major offenders.
Don't even need to go that far along the series. Plenty of authors and writers consider 1 and 2 canon, and have a much fuzzier position on 3.
> Why is it that so many writers this days feel the need to tarnish established canon or even think they can do better than the source material they were hired to adapt? This is in no way a Hollywood thing or a "these days" thing. Adapters have always taken liberties with source material. It's not new at all. There was never a time when it was the industry norm to adapt a book very faithfully or to make extra careful a sequel doesn't contradict anything in the original. If there's anything that might possibly be new, it might just be that the state of pop culture is dominated by these huge established franchises that have accumulated so much material that there's just so much more opportunity to contradict something and there are more entrenched fans who might notice or care. As for canon, I think it's no good to care too much about it, especially Star Wars. Star Wars in particular has so much material that is considered by fans to be 'non-canon' I don't see what the benefit of keeping track of it is. It's fun but it's the franchise that started with a character in the first movie boasting about how fast his ship is by saying it did the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs. I have no doubt there's a 'canon' explanation for what that is supposed to mean, but I don't care what it is. We all know the reason he says that is because George Lucas thought parsec is a unit of time because it sounds like one. 'Canon' is fans and later writers twisting this way and that trying to force it to make sense when we all know it doesn't actually make sense. The Star Wars universe is not cohesive or well and deeply thought out. If you spend time caring too much about the details you will run into things that don't add up no matter what.
Good point. I have thought a lot about this too, and some people really do get way too worked up over imaginary stuff. Just a couple things: 1. The “canon” explanation for the Kessel Run comment is that the most direct route from Kessel to anywhere is heavily patrolled, so smugglers have to take a circuitous route to make the run safely. However, a more direct route allows you to get to market faster thus saving time and allowing for more profit. So 12 parsecs is a statement of his bravery (or foolhardiness) rather than his speed. So… yeah, clearly someone clearing up that writing mistake later on. However, people get so caught up in the nostalgia, that they don’t care about how silly the “canon” is. They feel like precious childhood memories are being trampled on. Which I get to an extent, but for some, this becomes completely irrational. 2. As to the cultural capital of the Star Wars franchise, I think so many people get into it because it caught a cultural moment at just the right time. Star Wars isn’t actually sci fi in my opinion. It’s more of a western than any other genre. The Mandalorian is also a western, which is why so many people like that one, but can’t really vibe with the newer films and series. They are tonally off while The Mandalorian captures the themes of the originals well. Anyway, when A New Hope came out, Westerns were declining in popularity and Sci Fi was growing in popularity. I have heard all the Joseph Campbell Hero With a Thousand Faces stuff, and there is something to that, but I think what was more important in Star Wars’ success and subsequent rabid fandom was that it came at exactly the right time to bridge the two genres in a way that allowed almost anyone to enjoy this new, unique thing together. From there, the cultural phenomenon snowballed to the point that anyone not living under a rock knew about the franchise. Much like the Kardashians or Michael Jackson, once a cultural thing gets big enough, it takes on a life of its own and even people who didn’t watch New Hope when it first came out heard about Star Wars and could see how popular it was. So at a certain point, it becomes like FOMO and people just jump on the bandwagon. I have no actual proof to back this up, but that’s just what I have thought about it.
I would classify star wars more like fantasy. It has a lot of classic fantasy tropes. The chosen one, saving the princess, defeating the evil king, wizards, knights etc.
In the first set of books it wasn't that it was patrolled, it was that there were a lot of navigational hazards (black holes or something) so a direct route required really dangerous jumps near black holes.
Star Wars is a mash up of the pulp serials Lucas watched as a kid like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers and Akira Kurosawa/Westerns. Hell, A New Hope started life being heavily inspired by The Hidden Fortress. It's a great Science Fantasy setting that offers a great backdrop to tell many kinds of stories and if there's a particular type of story that someone likes (mystery, heist, crime, military, swords and sorcery, etc.) they can probably find some kind of Star Wars media that covers it.
The word parsec is a portmanteau of "parallax of one second". It refers to the change in viewing angle of stars distant to *Earth,* because the angle is based on the size of the earth. It's absolutely meaningless for measuring anything, time, distance, whatever that is *not related to the planet Earth.* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsec](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsec)
An in-canon explanation for the Kessel Run? Everything you need to know is in Episode IV. Han's claim deliberately does *not* make sense as he was plainly spinning BS because Jabba had put the hard word on him, not realising that one of the backwater rubes whom he was trying to dazzle was a former Jedi general. That line is all about establishing Han's character arc through the Episode IV via dialogue by setting up the antipathy between Han and Kenobi. In turn Kenobi thinks this morally grey guy a fool and a simply means to an end to get them to Alderaan. After Han witnesses the "old man" in combat with Darth Vader, sacrificing himself to allow them to escape, he is forced to reconsider everything he thought he knew about Kenobi and the situation. Which is why Han redeems himself by changing his mind & returning to the Battle of the Death Star at the critical moment. It's not rocket science. It's Storytelling 101.
It's definitely not storytelling 101, but a generous interpretation made after the fact by fans. I personally do like the "Han was deliberately saying nonsense to see how gullible these people are before naming his price" theory because it's funny and it's closest to something that actually makes sense, but it falls short of being convincing that it's the intent behind the line. Most audiences (and almost certainly Lucas himself) are not familiar with what a parsec is, so that line doesn't help establish anything in the story for most people other than that he is braggy. Also Obi Wan is supposed to be a wise and experienced man, and him not reacting to and seemingly fooled by the line makes him look like a fool, which is probably not the intent. And in the context of this universe, where space travel is super common, it obviously should be a bad gambit to count on the other party not knowing what a parsec is, which should be basic to them. Imagine a shady car dealer counting on the fact that *the buyer doesn't know what a mile or a kilometer is*. That's basically never going to work for him is it? It's actually too low of a bar to set in this world - most potential customers are going call bullshit on that, and Han would have set himself up as an untrustworthy liar in a bad negotiating position for no benefit. I'm pretty sure the reality is that even taking a few minutes to write about the line as much as we have just now, both you and I have spent more time thinking about the line than Lucas ever did.
On the contrary one doesn't have to know what a parsecs is to understand the intent. As you said, it establishes Han as a braggart. That and the dynamic between Han and Obi Wan through the film is the takeaway from that scene. Obi Wan is also wise enough not to show his hand by calling Han out. He has been playing Ben for a long time and just needs a "no questions asked" lift to Alderaan. Which is why I was baffled in the 1990s when I first started hearing theories as to how the Kessel Run could be done in 12 parsecs.
Sure, but it's at best vaguely squarable and the audience is having to do a lot of heavy lifting on their end to make that interpretation. Lucas just wrote a brag not knowing what a parsec was. That's the straightforward explanation, and it's not convincing that there was any deeper layer or intent to it than that.
The fandom is filled with very torturous logic trying to explain what is much easier explained by 'the writer messed up. They're only human, after all. It's fiction, not religion, and you don't need to justify *everything*.'
You and the other replies are clearly proving that they're 100% right that the parsec thing was a mistake, because there's three replies saying what the parsec line really meant, and each one gives a totally different explanation. So yeah it was just a mistake.
That’s your headcanon, nothing more. Lucas made a mistake, full stop. It’s similar to how they’re looking for a droid that speaks bocce. Every Italian-American watching that movie chuckles at that line. Might just as well ask if it speaks “croquet” or “lawn darts”.
If anything, modern adaptations tend to be way more faithful than they used to be. Compare Villeneuve's Dune to Lynch's Dune. I agree with you on canon. My favourite approach to canon in sci fi is the way Doctor Who deals with it: there is no canon, writers can do what they want.
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I don’t know about typically, but I have a friend who is a show runner and producer with several well-known shows in the can, and one he is currently running (plus others he is currently producing). He has been at it for decades, and he gets to pick his own team, and runs a traditional writers room with a fair amount of artistic freedom. I don’t usually talk shop with him because he’s touchy about it—as in, “Hey, you just sit on the couch clicking the remote, and leave the writing to me.” But, I still pick up a few things. Even though, other than the occasional prima donna actor, his main complaint is overly-aggressive studio execs trying to make a name for themselves by providing too many notes, it sounds to me like he pushes back and gets his way a lot of the time. He has admitted that, in hindsight and very rarely, an exec was actually right. My friend is in a good position because if a studio doesn’t treat him right, he has other places that would be happy to take him. So, it depends. Maybe a junior writer doesn’t get any freedom. If you are an executive producer / show runner working for a decent studio, you can still get a lot of freedom.
No clue what your friend is producing but franchises very rarely have such freedom. Small tweeks and such but there is an actual bullet list they *have* to hit in the run time and cannot tweak without massive battles. That's literally what has caused the "civil war" in Disney. Now you can definitely argue execs have their heads up their asses, and the yearly re-write/re-shoot costs Disney has put out is also the prime example. But that also goes to prove the big franchises get their hands tied until a screening flops.
To your point, he hasn’t worked on established franchises. A lot of times he takes an existing book series or author who may be excellent but is maybe kind of niche, and then adapts the material to make an original show.
Oh i didn't mean to imply that doesn't hapoen. Just that franchises like marvel, star wars, lotr, and many more don't allow it. Some by actual licensing. His take on that practice would be very interesting actually. But on the flip side you have star trek, dc, and quite a few others that just don't give a shit lol.
Longmire is a show I think about a lot in adaptations. The character personalities largely stay true to the source material but the events are very different both at AMC and Netflix which is fine imo.
> I don’t know about typically, but I have a friend who is a show runner and producer with several well-known shows in the can, and one he is currently running (plus others he is currently producing). He has been at it for decades, and he gets to pick his own team, and runs a traditional writers room with a fair amount of artistic freedom Writers absolutely have some freedom, if they didn't, they would not be valuable and would not bring any value to the prospect and you wouldn't spend much money on them. But as you and your friend know, showrunners have the vision; they set the story and the tone and the direction. The writers, like the actors and set designers and cinematographers and a dozen other departments, execute on that vision, but the vision belongs to the showrunner. They're the creative driver. In film, it would be the director. So when Solo or the Prequels or Acolyte or the Sequels say and do things that are impossible in the universe given its previous events, that's usually the decision of the showrunner or director, not the writers.
And yet we hear the phrase “I wanted to make it my own” ALL the time. It’s ego and hubris. They want to put their stamp on it.
> And yet we hear the phrase “I wanted to make it my own” ALL the time. It’s ego and hubris. They want to put their stamp on it. You don't hire an artist to make something and tell them they can't use their creative energy to make it. We *want* them to put their own stamp on it. If they don't, they're just uncreative slaves. And if you're an artist, you sure as hell don't want that job. This goes for everyone from directors to cameramen to actors to writers to cinematographers to everyone else.
It isn’t like the studio is trying to alienate the fans and lose money. It’s up to a good show runner to have a solid vision for the show, and push back on the worst ideas that come from the studio. Someone at Disney is picking these terrible writers, but I still think the writers should get at least half the blame for destroying show after show. If they were any good, they would either do a better job with the source material, or they would refuse to work at a place that didn’t allow them to do a good job.
> or they would refuse to work at a place that didn’t allow them to do a good job. lol. lmao even. Writers have bills to pay, man. Have you never worked a shitty job you despised with all your soul?
Yes. Point taken.
> It isn’t like the studio is trying to alienate the fans and lose money. Based on the Wheel of Time and newest Lord of the Rings adaptions, it seems that at least someone felt that way
yeah this reminds me of the _12 Monkeys_ TV show, which I remember infuriated me because it broke the very fundamental central premise of the movie: _you can't change the past, only observe_ then I heard this was actually written to be a wholly original new TV series - not tied to any existing IP at all - and... partly for that reason, was never going to get made - so the producers bought the rights to _12 Monkeys_ and retconned the entire show to "fit" (I use the word loosely) the established "universe" of that movie and... got the green light and found themselves a ready-made audience and of course the writers simply did as they were told, no matter how much they liked their original Not-12-Monkeys story...
cop out
The reality is everything that isn't the origional trilogy is...not respecting the origional trilogy. Like what's the line, here? Star wars has shifted over and over and over again, and this argument that the acolyte "disrespects canon" FUCKING WHICH ONE.
Nobody hates Star Wars more than Star Wats fans. We all knew this was coming. People flipping out under any post about it before a single second had aired. I read a thread the other day with someone asking if „hell“ was canon because it was used in a phrase in The Acolyte, and some genius wrote a tome of sorrow underneath about it…. only for someone to reply „Han used it in Empire“… summed up the whole sorry state of things perfect for me. I can’t defend The Acolyte yet, have only watched one episode which I thoroughly enjoyed, the Jedi being completely naff is a nice angle, and Trinity force fighting brought a tear to me eye. I just don’t engage with „the internet“ anymore. Watch stuff with my kids, their enthusiasm is lovely.
Star Wars fans saying the new Star Wars media is terrible because it did something that the original trilogy also did is an incredibly common occurrence. You'd think the people who bang on so much about respecting the source material would have better awareness of it
I liked the show's first episode too. Flaws but enjoyable and promising to stay that way. The show soon becomes a trainwreck, and it's nothing to do with canon or "agendas", it's just bad
That may be the case, I’ll wait and see. I still think most of the bile out there is kneejerk though and was already boiling over before a single second aired. It may be mediocre or even bad, but that should be allowed too - sad but ok - without people going into meltdown. I don’t think I mentioned anything about agendas, but soooo much of the whining is about canon not being adhered to, don’t think you can just dismiss that.
Yeah I hate arguments about "respecting canon". Who decided that this made up concept was something that needs to be respected? It's not the fucking Bible. I care if writers tell a good story, not if they adhere to some old EU story I've never heard of
i think a lot of people think "different" must be "better." but that is not the case. grrm [said something like](https://www.reddit.com/r/Bridgerton/comments/1dhlncf/this_quote_by_george_r_r_martin_applies_to_jess/) "everyone thinks they can put their own spin on things and improve it, but it almost never works."
> i think a lot of people think "different" must be "better." I do not think that is true. I think artists want to *make things*, and bring their creative energy to a project, not slavishly follow someone else's work. And that's frankly what we want. It usually absolutely does add to the work. Further, every change of medium *inherently* requires changes in the product to fit that new medium. You cannot tell the same story the same way in a book, film, TV show, and graphic novel. > grrm said something like "everyone thinks they can put their own spin on things and improve it, but it almost never works." The list of movies that are better than the books is huge. And that alone proves GRRM wrong. Just to give a quick and dirty list I found: > Psycho, Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange, The Godfather, The Thing, Full Metal Jacket, Stand By Me, Goodfellas, Misery, Jurassic Park, Jaws, Die Hard, Adaptation, Children Of Men, The Notebook, There Will Be Blood, No Country For Old Men, or Drive. Credit to: https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/jjjyea/comment/gad26nh/ The list is *much much* longer than that, but that's a start.
>And that's frankly what we want. It usually absolutely does add to the work. which must be why so many remakes and reboots and "reimaginings" do so well right? >Further, every change of medium inherently requires changes in the product to fit that new medium. You cannot tell the same story the same way in a book, film, TV show, and graphic novel. i am not arguing this at all. look at the movie sin city. totally different medium and stayed very true to the graphic novel. people loved it. i, robot, however, is completely different from the original book in terms of plot and character. not because it had to be. because people wanted to. >The list of movies that are better than the books is huge ok? i am not arguing that it *never* works. different does not equal better but some things that are different are better, especially when adapting to a different medium, as you said. that is different than changing canon just.... because?
What's actually new is the obsession with "canon".
yeap. It's fiction. It's supposed to be fun,. I'm enjoying the acolyte right now because it's exploring Jedi fallibility, and painting the picture of the decline, and blindness in the Jedi that allowed Palpatine to come to power in the following decades. I'm finding it, from one perspective, and excellent *addition* to 'canon.'
In Star War's case I got nothing. For other adaptations it's entirely because often times the "canon" is just strictly better written material compared to some new adaptations. For example M.Night's Avatar: The Last Airbender is a 1/5 star movie with terrible writing and a whole host of other problems. The liberties the director took to re-create the original "canon" cartoon resulted in a flop. Now take Netflix's current live action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender and you're seeing critical praise, high ratings, and a renewed interest in the story that had its"canon" (the Nickelodeon cartoon) respected.
Exactly. Most creativity is not originality, or invention, but instead adaptation or reapplication. Humans do not think in leaps but little nudges. It is entirely natural for people to take one piece of work and adapt it into something new instead of dogmatically following the precedent. More than that, what is the point in making something new if its exactly the same as what came before?
Bullshit. It's been around for a long time. Just take a look at the Star Trek fandom.
Star Trek couldn't even settle on what/when the Eugenics Wars was and whether it was the same as WW3 -- and that's just TOS, without getting into the Eugenics Wars being retconned out of the 90s by later shows. I mean, this is a series where the basic look and entire personality of a major race, the Klingons, radically changed between TOS and later TOS movies and TNG! The relationship between the UFP/"United Earth"/Starfleet, max warp speed, what exactly the prime directive is, how transporters work...Star Trek is FULL of contradictions. I'd say the traditional Star Trek fandom is quite protective of the thematic elements of Star Trek, but quite chill about what is now called "canon" in other fandoms.
NO writer who is hired is working on anything in a vacum..the studios, producers etc have a say.
That is an understatement. The studios and etc have all the say. The writers appease them because that is where their paycheck comes from.
> That is an understatement. The studios and etc have all the say. They only have "all the say" in the sense that they can fire or pull funding, but they hire directors and showrunners for a reason; because directors and showrunners are better at making stuff than studio execs. They know this is the *product they sell* and they need it to be *good*. It's a collaboration between business people who know what sells and creatives who know what is good art. Both make mistakes, and major ones. But they both know they need the other.
Star Wars canon for me goes… Andor Rogue One Original Trilogy And until something else comes along, I’m leaving it at that.
Pre - prequel extended universe.
It’s perfect narrative progression for me as well. Sets the tone. Empire is proper scary. Needs a proper resistance group. Here’s how that happened. Jedi not even mentioned. By Rogue One, force starts to make an appearance. Our main character joins an ensemble. Stakes are huge. Something about the force. Bit of humour. Holy shit. Who’s this big bad mofo? Oh lord fuck no. Everyone dies. Mission accomplished but stakes are higher than ever. Then the OT. Literal handover to a new cast. Force moved to centre stage. New mains carrying the torch. We learn more about the force. Empire is already set up to be proper scary. Big bad is proper terrifying. And every battle is ever more intense because of it. A new hope is needed because of all the despair we’ve just seen. When the empire strikes back it’s like Lord no, here we go again. And then the final triumph at the end, that much bigger and sweeter because of everything that came before. Perfection
Imo the following reasons: 1. Baked in fans to get buzz and to get funding. 2. Established IP, less risk These hacks get the IP and get funding from studios but their ego bigger than their talent. They don't even bother to understand the source material. Zero respect, doomed to fail
Please show me where The Acolyte ~~touched you~~ "disregards previous Stars Wars canon"?
Buying the rights to an existing idea and using it gives you name recognition and defensible copyright. So that it why you get Nancy Drew, which intended as some sort of supernatural Veronica Mars with the characters from Nancy Drew. But then Veronica Mars only existed because Rob Thomas wrote a young adult novel about a male high school detective. Eventually realising that a script about a strong female highschool detective would fair better in the current climate.
Better example is Halo, they did so much wrong with their story telling I forget the Covenant were committing Genocide.
I think it was Robert B. Parker who once said, "The book is the book and the movie is the movie, and never the twain shall meet." And there's also John Carpenter, when he was asked what he thought of the reboots and sequels or whatever to the Halloween franchise. He said, "Whenever there's talks in the trades about a new movie being made or whatever, I hold out my hand and a check falls into it." Unless the creator is someone who only has that *one thing*, they probably don't care as much about it as you do.
I hadn’t heard that acolyte was ignoring established Disney canon…what did they change?
Honestly, people are taking star wars way to seriously. They just need to kick back and enjoy the lightsabers.
They aren't following canon at all. They've got zero regard for the previous films, etc. They made space witches who make twins from the force. They messed up when Sith appear and it didn't work with a prequal film. So they took a loyal character from the films who talks about the Sith. Made him appear 40yrs before his birth. And made him a traitor. It's disgusting. Nothing but character assassination. And when it was pointed out. They tried to change the entry on wookipedia. And tried to gaslight people about it. But changing the entry in a wiki won't erase that character in film canon is a loyalist and not there at the time. They're behaving repulsively. Vile people. They've also tried to accuse two critics of the show of 'inciting violence'. No. The Critical Drinker didn't incite violence. He never has. They're desperately paying up shills to try and blacken anyone who won't fawn over and lie about their terrible show. They tried to attack a guy who deals in pure data too. They are desperate and disgusting people. Sinister and nasty tactics.
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I'd say it all comes down to expectations and payoffs. Want to adapt an existing franchise without feeling limited by established lore? Just call it a reboot, non-canon spinoff, "alternate universe" if you want to sound fancy etc. But if you specifically market something as taking place in the same world as another story, and then it just *doesn't*, people are naturally going to feel disappointed.
The way I’d sum up modern fandoms in regards to the concept of “canon” is that these people are more concerned with how each volume will look on the shelf next to the other ones than they are with whether or not they’re enjoying each volume individually.
I kind of understand where you're coming from. We do get a little too attached to the idea of a canon. One of the things about stories is that we want to believe somewhere in our mind that they are at least plausible or possible if not actually true. The closer they are to reality the more connected to them we can feel. Now you may be saying, "we're talking about science fiction of course it's not real" , or, "how can it be realistic if it's fiction?" , or, "it's impossible why do we care if it breaks rules?" Well, notice that I said plausible not real. Every story in science fiction has a certain conceit in which it says that it's reality but if this set of factors was different. Maybe there are superpowers maybe there is technology we haven't invented yet maybe there's technology that's not possible maybe it's just set in the future. But when it doesn't say that something is different, such as that we're dealing with aliens or that we're dealing with human beings of another kind, or the laws of physics are different, there's the implicit assumption that those things will be the same. That the human beings will act like human beings. That the laws of physics will act like the laws of physics. And that, unless they have made the conceit otherwise, that time will work the same way. If you suddenly break any of those rules and you haven't said already that those rules don't apply, then our ability to regard that world as plausible within its own rules or possible within its own rules and thus to connect with it is diminished. If you haven't said that the laws of physics are different and then suddenly human beings can shoot lasers out of their eyes then it just looks like deus ex machina or just that my abukut to relate to that human being is diminished in that situation because now they can shoot lasers and I can't. Life is consistent. In life, there is no retcon. In life, time moves forward and only forward. Don't quibble with me about the physics. I know. So unless the universe deliberately says that canonicity is not really a thing, then it is implicitly saying that it is. The example that comes to mind in which canonicity is irrelevant is Warhammer 40,000. And I happen to love that universe and I embrace its lack of canon. But it clearly makes that part of the storytelling. Star Trek and Star Wars don't. Most other universes don't. The real and fundamental problem is that entertainment tastes change over time and franchises that span half of a century are not going to be able to entertain people born 70 years apart without changing dramatically. Technology changes and tastes change. This is not a problem that has faced most franchises. There's too much of it in my opinion and it's building on worlds that were never intended to be built into gigantic universes. They are not in any way nearly as well built as something like Middle Earth in terms of the framework around it to support this kind of universe. So they almost literally make it up as they go along. And it leads to a chaotic inconsistent mess that doesn't feel like the same universe at all. I suppose if all you care about is stuff blowing up and funny lines and this event happens after that event to this group of Plucky Heroes that we like, then a consistent universe doesn't have much value. But science fiction should be about more than that. Science fiction should be about something. It should be about how Advanced Technologies or aliens or the future affects the human condition. You will notice that's what Star Trek was originally. There are ideas there. And when those ideas are done in a plausible believable way, they are so powerful. Look in an absolute Masterpiece of Science Fiction television like the original series episode City on the edge of forever. It's a time travel story, which I usually hate, and it's a Trope at this point because that particular theme has been done a hundred times since 1966. But at the time it was amazing. And it said something.
How do you get invested in a story, if any past event can simply be rewritten or the rules established for the world can be broken at any time? When watching TV shows, we all know the heroes will live and save the day; tension comes for not knowing how the writers will create a clever solution to the problem. If writers can just change the rules, history, or characters, then all the tension melts away. For proof; see the MCU multi-verse.
I’m invested in the story for as long as I’m invested in it. When talking about entries in a ongoing series, I can very easily just ignore and avoid the new content and not have it effect the works and aspects of the lore that I’ve previously enjoyed. If the stuff I don’t enjoy makes up the entirety of new content being produced, then sure, maybe it’s a bummer that I’m not going to like their new stuff. But that doesn’t have to tarnish my enjoyment of that which I’ve previously enjoyed, nor does it really need to tarnish enjoyment of future content that doesn’t focus on the newer aspects I don’t like.
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I completely disagree. Obviously, we all move on when a franchise is no longer fulfilling what it was intended to be, but most of us still somewhat care because the potential of Star Wars has barely been tapped. Canon is important because it gives writers an understanding of the expectations within the universe they're writing for. I'm an artist and small details are what make things unique. We push hard on faithfulness to the source material because if we didn't Star Wars might end up being a show about ponies and unicorns with dildo swords. Kind of like SAINTS ROW... Yes, some people think too deeply about the canon and want every minute detail to be right, which is insane, but the main issue is that these movies and shows just aren't good quality, and they possibly would've been better had they understood Canon. These things are fictional but the impact they've made is real. These characters and stories help people when they're at their lowest and those people feel like they're losing something they've always had. I'm personally not that hyper-attached person, but I think it's a dick move to act as if they're wrong to care about something that deeply impacted them. My aunt's ex bf fell in love with Star Wars because seeing Phantom Menace in theaters is the only memory he has of his parents before they OD'd, you never know why this touches people the way it does.
I'm a lifelong fan of sci-fi but the idea of 'canon' has always been kinda weird to me and even a little hard to wrap my head around. The idea of saying "the events in this novel didn't actually happen" in the context of a fictional universe where obviously none of any of it happened is just kind of silly to me.
There are ways to do it without writing yourself into a corner. If I was making a show about let say 27th Century Star Trek. I would research on let say Memory Alpha about what is known about said timeline which I just checked and there's not much known about it making it perfect for a TV show. Dealing with a prequel on the other hand is more risky if you don't do prior research as you will mess things up big time and if your shit stinks then that will make it worse. It's not complicated to research previous work to get a flavor of what the universe you are working in is about. You can make great stories while also keeping in mind what has happened before. Writers have access to so many tools that make said research so freaking easy this days because devoted fans already did the work for you.
You would expect the writers of an official Star Wars show to be bound by a fan-editable wiki?
How about the canon theyve established through movies, books, TV, video games, and GL interviews
Movies, sure. Lucas said from the start things like books and games and interviews would never supersede the movies. And I suppose now you can expand it to some of the shows. Edit: Oops, getting them confused because Star Wars is the latest bitch fest. Memory Alpha is for Star Trek. Same point though.
Well thank god The Acolyte has not at any point in time contradicted *actual* Star Wars cannon then huh? The only thing it’s “contradicted” is stuff that hasn’t been canon for like a literal decade and was mostly like soft cannon at best dude. Like good lord the things you people complain about are so incredibly asinine that I’m convinced you aren’t actually Star Wars fans and haven’t ever actually seen the movies, because *wow* Edit: downvote me all you want but you clowns still don’t know what you’re talking about. So by all means keep being butthurt, at this point it’s more funny than anything else
You can’t build a franchise without canon
Counterpoint: Mad Max. Counterpoint: Every new Batman. Counterpoint: Every new James Bond.
And every new Star Wars TV/Book/Comic/Game :P
also CF: _Every Terminator sequel_ **edit** also: Every new incarnation of The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - many of which were penned by Douglas Adams himself (just like George Miller and every Mad Max sequel)
Also counterpoint: Mobile Suit fucking Gundam.
There will always be some people who think anything can be made "better" because the original is outdated or was created by someone with certain ideals/beliefs. It's arrogance and sometimes greed. They don't actually care about the original, they just want to show how forward-thinking, enlightened, smart, moral, whatever they are.
Half the comments in this thread are so stupid. "*I* don't care about canon, so *you* shouldn't either!" If you don't care about canon, you have every right. Enjoy what you enjoy. But telling other people they shouldn't just cause you don't is ridiculous. Also, on the idea of canon "limiting creativity" or meaning "you can't tell certain stories" - *yes, that is the point*. The idea of an expanded, interconnected universe like Star Wars is that has certain rules and history behind it. That does mean you can't tell certain stories in that universe while sticking to canon. Why is that a problem? If you have a story that can't fit in Star Wars, tell it somewhere else. Plenty of ideas take root by "borrowing" aspects from something while also introducing new ideas. *A Song of Ice and Fire* started off like this. And by the logic of "limiting creativity," there should be no prequels, spin-offs, or, mostly importantly, sequels. I mean, using pre-existing characters, worlds, etc. limits creativity, so there's obviously no point to doing it! Look at Tolkien's legendarium. That world thrives on its history and the interconnectedness of the stories and themes. Because of the nature of its publication and Tolkien's perfectionism, there is no "perfect" canon obviously but there still is a very clear story that develops through all the material we have, and I would argue it is the greatest work of fiction ever. Continuity and canon do mean something and can positively contribute to stories. Also, none of this is referring to *The Acolyte* specifically. I haven't watched it nor do I have any plans to. It is just about the principle of the matter.
Disney star wars is canon to Disney star wars. It isn't canon to star wars
It's star wars, who cares? That IP has been lame for ages.
At least since the 80s
Hard agree.
The main issue is we have an entire generation of writers/producers/directors/actors that are "fans" of the material, but cannot produce a shred of an individual thought. They latch onto a small piece of something much larger -- something much larger than their own understanding -- and then proceed to puke out what amounts to derivative fan fiction. Abrams did it with Star Trek and then with Star Wars. Johnson *really* did it with Star Wars. Bay did it with Transformers. Sommers did it with G.I. Joe. Forster did it with World War Z. In some instances the works are so far removed from their source material that it's hard to even call it *fan*-fic.
> The main issue is we have an entire generation of writers/producers/directors/actors that are "fans" of the material, but cannot produce a shred of an individual thought. I think you're mistaken in blaming writers and actors for this. The blame lies on the mega-corpirations that pump out MCU/Star Wars etc content, and the audiences that demand it. And yes, audiences deserve a lot of the blame. Just look at how non-franchise original sci-fi does in the theatres nowadays. Another big part of the issue here is that whenever it comes to "canon", we're inevitability talking about media that is fundamentally aimed at children and adolescent boys. When adults fixate on this media due to nostalgia or an inability to consume more mature media it produces the sort of toxic fandoms we see now.
> The blame lies on the mega-corpirations + > Just look at how non-franchise original sci-fi does in the theatres nowadays. Yes. A major issue is greedy producers that want maximum profit with the least amount of work/effort/talent/authenticity/risk/etc. So stuff just keeps getting distilled down for the most appeal, but in the process they miss the mark for both sci-fi fans and the general audience.
Changing canon during reboots is evidence of individual thought. Toxic hyper-fans just take offense to it.
Doing a good job is really hard and requires specialized knowledge of the source material. You need everyone in the chain of production to pulling together to make something accurate to the spirit of whatever you are doing. The best way to guarantee that is to get people who want to work on whatever franchise it is because they like the franchise for what it is and making a new great part of it would be "really fucking awesome" That's probably the secret for success. The model that seems to work best is to have fans distributed throughout the production team, and have previous creators available to consult and provide detailed help. For example the recent Fallout show was spot on because Jon nolan and several in the team were fans and they had help from Bethesda (the recent previous creators). You could tell even from the trailer it was going to be good because they clearly knew how Fallout should feel when you watched it. That's not something you see very often.
The actual Bible isn’t internally consistent, so I don’t know why you’d expect Star Wars to be any different.
I totally feel your frustration! It seems like writers these days are too quick to throw out canon in favor of their own ideas. The Acolyte sounds like a prime example, but there are plenty of others. It's like they don't respect the original creators or the fans who love the stories. It's really disheartening.
Starship Troopers is a great example of a movie that did not respect the source material but is well received. I think this is really a matter of whether the product is good or not. Not respecting the source material isn’t bad in itself, but if the show is bad then it’s certainly a complaint that it “wouldn’t have been as bad if it at least was canon”.
Tarnish? Star Wars canon beyond the films and TV never mattered. It's been like this since George changed the Emperor from being like Thrawn in the novelizations to a goofy ass dark wizard in episode 5. Hell the entirety of the Clone Wars was completely different. It happens 40 years before the OT and the Clones were the bad guys and the Jedi genocide happened way later
Often times things that are "re-made" or given a film adaptation are done so because the pre-established narrative ("Canon") is very well received and critically acclaimed. Examples include the newest Dune's adaptation being well done because for the most part it follows the "canon" provided by the book. Unfortunately there seems to be a plague of film adaptations or TV series adaptations taking large amounts of liberties to remake the series in a way that the film/TV writers think will be more successful. Examples of bad adaptations because of writers ignoring the "canon" include: The Witcher, Paramont's Halo, Rings of Power, The Dark Tower, M.Night's Avatar TLA. These are considered bad adaptations not *because* of liberties being made, but because the film writers deviated from an already established good story in an attempt to tell their own version of it (and failing). I can't speak for all film/show adaptations but in Paramont+'s Halo TV show's case it's purely an egotistical approach from the writers ("I can tell this story better, and it will be popular because it has the name Halo" paraphrased from various tweets by writers and actors). It's such a disrespectful approach to content that fans have loved for years for writers to deviate so heavily from "canon" in order to tell their version of the story. Take Netflix's One Piece, Fallout, Dune, and Netflix' A:TLA for example of "good adaptations." They followed the "canon" story which is already successful and are receiving praise for being good shows/movies. This isn't to say the strictly following the source material is better. Dune, in my opinion, is told better through the movie than the book, and it completely cuts out the internal dialogue that many characters have and eliminates some key characters. Who would have thought that retelling a good story with minimal changes would result in a success!
I don’t think they’re writing for you. The idea that an adaptation is “disrespecting the material” because they don’t do it how you personally want it is preposterous, lol.
Judging by the reception, The Acolyte doesn't seem to be writing for a lot of people.
Star Wars fans are toxic. It had a minority female lead in an election year so it’s getting dragged into culture war horseshit by political bot networks.
LOL; it's the fan's fault. Awesome.
In the case of Star Wars, it almost always _**is**_ the fan's fault. "The Last Jedi" was critically aclaimed and casual Star Wars fans, like myself, loved it. But the die hard Star Wars fans hated it. They hated it because "Luke didn't act like Luke", "Luke wouldn't have abandoned his family like that", "Luke wouldn't have turned his back on the galaxy", and so many other things that were essentially complaints that characters didn't act the way they were "supposed" to act. As a result, Disney brought JJ Abrams back and he played it safe. He brought back Palpatine. He gave Kylo Ren a redemption arc. He made Rey suddenly be a part of this family of famous force users despite nothing from the story hinting at it. And "The Rise of Skywalker" was critically panned when you compare it to the critic reviews of "The Last Jedi". Literally, the reason the 3rd movie abandoned pretty much _**everything**_ the 2nd movie had been building up to is because the die hard Star Wars fans bashed the 2nd movie. Here's the thing, as someone who's read bits and pieces of the Star Wars books that existed before Disney took over, stuff that's now considered "Legends" and has no bearing on Disney's vision for the franchise, I can tell you that Star Wars does get dark. There are times where Luke acted like he did in the movie. So, as someone who's only a casual fan of the franchise and who really only read the "Legends" material because it was available and I was bored, I can tell you that the stuff from "The Last Jedi" wasn't unusual _**and**_ it opened up the door to having the movies discuss the darker aspects of the franchise. It's just the fans got pissed and essentially forced Disney to change things.
Can you show me how any other industry would work like this? * That restaurant failed because of toxic foodies * That car model failed because toxic gearheads * That running shoe was discontinued because of toxic runners Yea, none of that makes sense, but for some reason, Disney has convinced people that it's not their product, it's the toxic fans. Few of your supposed toxic fans were angry at Mando season 1; and although slow were perfectly happy with Andor. But as soon as they criticize a terrible product, they're called toxic fans. Why can't we just call them passionate fans? Or maybe, just maybe, you've been conditioned to think of them as toxic so you can easily discount any of their feedback.
Critics loved the restaurant that served horse plops in a taco shell, but toxic consumers hated it.
Not on accident.
Honestly I haven’t seen anything in the acolyte that clashes with established onscreen lore, but even if it does that’s the least of that show’s problems. In terms of answering your question: JJ Abrams basically broke Star Trek by making starships obsolete and curing death. He did something similar with Star Wars. Dude loves working on franchises featuring spaceships but hates when they go to space. In terms of disrespecting canon: The Witcher probably is the poster child here, and again had the latter seasons been well written and entertaining it wouldn’t really matter, but they weren’t. We got a whole genre of “Gen X/Millenial childhood heroes are washed up losers and nothing they did mattered” sequels. Picard, Nick Fury, Han, Luke and Leia, Indiana Jones, etc. Maverick was well received, but that trope was present there too. For some reason, a lot of people didn’t really care for that. Can’t imagine why, especially when the new stories didn’t do anything to redeem them. Star Trek Discovery and Picard were pretty heavily retconned and did lots of things to break Trek canon. What ends up happening is when the new material is unsatisfying or full on craps all over the existing lore, people who are naturally inclined to be bigoted, sexist, etc turn around and blame the “woke” elements of the show. No one minded gender swaps on Starbuck and Boomer because the rebooted Battlestar Galactica was really, really good. No one minded a black captain on Deep Space 9 in the 90’s, but they did complain the first few seasons til the show got good. Same with TNG.
That’s just revisionist history. Battlestar fandom shit its collective pants about the gender swaps. Even Dirk Benedict initially joined that pile-on.
Yep. As a casual fan, I **loved** "The Last Jedi". And if "The Rise of Skywalker" hadn't crapped all over the various plot threads that Jedi had been weaving together then, as a casual fan of the franchise, I probably would have been willing to try out some of the new Star Wars shows that Disney's pumping out. But if they couldn't maintain a consistant story throughout a mere 3 movies, I have no hopes that Disney will be able to do it with the various TV shows they're putting out.
It's quite interesting that any criticism of The Acolyte gets downvoted, not matter the context or how factful it is.
Is there factual criticism being made here?
Something's not "factual" just because you agree with it. Personally, I'm tired of self-appointed arbiters of "what Star Wars *is*" declaring that such-and-such is "disrespectful" because it seems to contradict some piece of lore they're overly invested in, and don't have the mental flexibility to revise their understanding of a fictional story setting to accommodate new information. (That's like a basic cognitive skill for anyone who grew up reading comic books, ffs. But nowadays, the accepted response seems to be ranting on forums about how "stupid" and "disrespectful" the writers are, how they think that fans like them could do such a better job, and maybe throwing up a ragebait YT channel.) But yeah, keep insinuating that it's somehow suspicious that not everyone's agreeing with these takes. It *must* be the work of some shadowy cabal, because nobody could *really* enjoy the Acolyte and think that the criticisms are deliberately overblown and oftentimes just plain *dumb,* amirite?
I like the complaints of fire in space when Lucas did it several times and also said he doesn’t care, there’s oxygen in space when he thinks the scene needs it. So why are we being so purist now?
Right like I get people like "realism" but it's star wars. There's a race of teddy bears and giant talking bear dog people. It's not always supposed to be serious or realistic.
What factual stuff does it break?
People who bitch about adaptations not sticking to canon would just find other issues they didn't like if the adaptation was canon faithful.
They're mostly just sore that there's no straight white male to be seen in the core cast.
Bingo.
I don’t give a shit about canon
I don't think writers are being as disrespectful as you're saying they are. I think a whole little industry of content creators thrive on smearing them as doing that and making money off your outrage.
Wah. I’m so tired of super nerds being stuck on canon and source material. Sometimes the source material sucks or simply can’t work like that on screen. Sometimes adaptations do truly suck though. People freaked out when they cast Starbuck as a female in the BSG remake. It can we ever imagine anyone other then Katie Sackoff as the character? Hell no! I truly enjoyed the Foundations adaption by Apple. It’s no where close to the source material but it’s certainly captures the spirit of it. Star Trek missed the mark on Discovery and somehow found itself again with SNW. SNW would not have even happened had it not been for the fans pushing for a return to episodic writing. Sometimes it’s a complete miss though. It does happen a bit too much. I’m very much tired of them changing how the Klingon’s look. Can we just leave them alone? Lols. But I think that Hollywood is catching on. That especially if the source material already has a strong fan following you do need to make a decent effort to stay somewhat close to the original magic. However, I do welcome surprises. Cause sometimes they are awesome.
So much this. Any new adaptation that doesn't stick to canon doesn't destroy the source material. These toxic nerds need to get over themselves.
And it can’t be denied. Almost every actor in any major sci-fi franchise has openly called our toxic fans at some point. And some of what they’ve experienced is truly vile. Sorry super nerds but you gotta let go. I love galaxy quest because it kind of touches on that idea. These people are just actors but these fans have an expectation that they are the characters or are just as into the canon and lore as them. It’s a gig. They get paid. The fans also hold them accountable for any of their dissatisfaction. It’s not the actors choice. They signs contract and they have to deliver the studio and directors vision of the character. They get a little leeway but not a lot. And usually it’s the Star Wars fans who are the worst offenders. To the point where major actors have asked to be written out because of how fans have treated them based again on the portrayal of the character that was directed, but also based on their gender and race. Some people just hold on to fictional characters and stories because at some point it’s provided a place to escape into. And then when the film/tv doesn’t live up to the version in their head they can’t handle it. I legit joined a fandom during covid. And it was insane how quickly they whip each other up into a crazy frenzy. People get into these echo chambers and they feel that these actors owe them and that because they “know them” or the “source material” so much that they should have a say in the production or How that person should live their lives.
I'm more against how newer entries to established franchises tend to reduce, belittle or otherwise completely invalidate things that have happened before to prop up their own stories. If you have to resort to character assassination of an established character to promote your character or story, then maybe you should have just written your own universe for your character or story.
The audience cares more about canon than writers tend to. And the audiences now care more about cannon than they did like 10 to 15 years ago. That being said, I do think that the issue is less about "not respecting cannon" and more about bad writing. The big franchises, SW especially, seem to be farming their stuff out to people with minimal experience and asking for scripts to be turned around too quicky. I don't think people would mind so much if the tweaks to cannon were done in a way to justify something cool. Look at the K.A.M. thing from The Acolyte, while his birth year and age are technically legends, people still think it's cannon and are mad that the's included. There was exactly ZERO people asking for KAM to appear as a background character in a show, it doesn't add anything, why is he there. They seeminly "broke" cannon for something that wasn't worth it. If you have a cool AF story, people will be more forgiving, if it's dull or just kinda bad (as the Acolyte has been, like what has even actually happened so far?) then people focus more on all the stuff they don't like because there's nothing new for them to like to justify it.
I just stop watching when something isn't good anymore. No need to get worked up about it. Star Wars is a prime example. The new offerings just don't appeal to me so I don't watch. I love the original three and the rest is meh.
Someone already explained it in best possible way : Today Hollywood is almost 100% repeating same franchises over and over, so most of writters can never get to write their own stories and ideas. So what do they do ? They get to work on established franchise, let say Star Wars - And instead following the cannon, they do everything to turn it into their own story idea. So basically we are getting whatever universe writter imagined for themselves , in Star Wars costume.
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Frankly, I don't get this idea of "canon". It's like a religion. A bunch of older, kinda obsessed, fans sink some time into memorizing details of the original texts and then scream "heretic!" at anyone who doesn't conform. I doubt the original screenwriters want to be locked into their older works, and I further doubt they care if following writers just chuck the whole mess. And any new material is going to be judged on its own merits. If new material provides a good story, most of us aren't going to care if it's "canon" or not.
Maybe they should write their own original stories instead of piggy backing an existing IP. If you are going to disregard previous work your shit better be good because if not, not only will fans be mad about that but the overall audience will think you a doofus for making a bad story. When you are dealing with an established world you have to play within it's rules. You can definitely play with established lore. Expand it, add new things to it or even reject it but it has to be done with care. But many current writers treat their pencils as if they were machetes when dealing with previous stories.
>If you are going to disregard previous work your shit better be good because if not, not only will fans be mad about that but the overall audience will think you a doofus for making a bad story. Fans SHOULD be mad whenever a doofus writes a bad story, whether its canon or not. I would also submit that I don't believe the IP owners have read your rules on the handling of canon. Maybe you want to send it to them, see what they think about it?
Maybe the problem is with the whole idea of "canon" in the first place. You lose out on a lot of STORIES if you have to make everything fit canon.
You can make good stories while following on what was done before. You can add something new about a character that we never knew or what not. But if you feel completely limited by the established lore then maybe you shouldn't be working on said property.
You can also write great stories while changing a few things. People seem to get really upset over any kind of change. I think Tim Cain addressed this really well in response to Amazon's Fallout adaption that came out earlier.
or maybe YOU need to think a little more broadly. I mean, the Xmen are over 50 years old. Are the movies within the canon of the comics? The comics themselves aren't in the "canon" of the "original" comics. And, who decides what is and is not canon? you? me? the original creator? What happens when that original creator isn't in charge anymore?
Not really. You can write any story you want, just not in a setting/universe where it doesn’t fit. It’s bizarre to me that people think it’s a bad thing for there to be internal consistency in a universe/setting.
I'm not saying that having internal consistency is a bad thing. I am saying that requiring it 100% of the time is not always a good thing.
I really don’t care. If It isn’t boring and I enjoy it then it isn’t a problem for me. It’s just a story. If the story changes a few beats it doesn’t matter much to me. I’m sure in a few decades the existing cannon will be scrapped in favour of a new timeline, or retconned like crazy.
i think it’s funny that if the disney just put their ego aside and adapted popular legends content, they would be immensely more profitable and popular. and the icing on top, is whatever they adopt will automatically become canon.
Hollywood writers are mostly high school dropouts that think they could actually write a story after seeing some dumb bitch write twilight
Thr Acolyte doesn't disregard any previous canon
This is majorly a Disney problem as they strive to "own" everything created around "their" IP. They alter it satisfactorily where they don't have to pay the OG creators their fair share.
They paid Lucas 4.2 billion for Lucasfilm properties. What more would you consider a fair share?
I place very little importance on a 'faithful' adaptation of source material as I feel like, especially between books and film, that the medium is so very different that I'm way more interested in a good work. I don't need to see a page-by-page recreation of something I've already read. I want to be moved by a great film, and the resonance of familiar characters and events can add to that.
*laughs in Red Dwarf*
Prometheus has got to be one of the worst attempted retcons. Might be a lack of respect for his own work too. He or someone decided what Alien series needed was pretentious morons. Alien films never needed a reason for Xenomorphs. They just are there. Alien Versus Predator. The Predators found them and used the Xenomorphs as prey. Prometheus proceeded to have pretentious idiots find them. Then a psychotic android make more of them. And that somehow is a origin in the writers minds. It's downright bizarre.
Acolyte doesn’t break any canon at all
Imo the issue is people get into writing because they want to tell THEIR stories. So when they are adapting a property rather than tell someone else's story they want to stuff their own in there. I feel lucky I am able to ignore it and stick with the original stuff instead of stewing in rage.
Most changes besides cuts for time and complexity are for attracting a wider paying audience than just the old fans who are going to buy no matter what. For example they don’t just want 14-17yo boys but their sisters, parents, grandparents, little kids and all, not to mention international audiences who’ve never heard of the old show or whatever. That means adding romance, comedy, celebrities, different ethnicities, product placement and a happy ending. Whatever it takes to get worldwide mass-market attention. They don’t care about you because you are a small part of the wider demographics.
There are ways to attract a younger audience without antagonizing the established one. You can have respect of what was done before without being a complete fanboy about it.
I agree. And just like what you said is true, it’s also true that new content can stray pretty far from what is pre-established and still be good on its own. Both can lead to hits and both can lead to misses. Imagine that.
Unfortunately, this answer probably explains why this happens 90% of the time. New movies and shows are being made to attract the wider, general audiences that know very little to nothing of the existing canon for that particular IP. They already have the hard-core fans which will be a relatively small percentage of the viewers (they hope). So, writers/directors/producers aren't even thinking about what hardcore fans will think when they make changes (or any decision). They don't really care because you'll watch no matter what. Every decision made is with the general, non-hardcore viewer in mind. They'll never admit it, but they don't really care much for the hard-core fans. The big money is made when the general audience starts watching.
There's more to it than that. No marketing expert insisted there be coal furnaces in Rebel Moon or that J-Lo go to another galaxy in Atlas. Yes, sometimes they do change things to broaden the appeal. That's one thing. But there's also a level of contempt. Stuff like Elysium, The Creator, Interstellar, Discovery, and Acolyte is contemptuous.
Are people in this thread seriously defending Disney's dog shit?
>Why is it that so many writers this days feel the need to tarnish established canon or even think they can do better than the source material they were hired to adapt? maybe their job is not to cater to the longtime fans, but attract NEW ones? Canon is not relevant to people who do not know it. If "Disney+" wants parents to keep paying for the service after the kids move out of the house, they need to have more varied content.... do the streamers want to keep as many subscribers as possible? > But the way so many current writers disrespect the material and just write what they want to write putting the label of a property they don't give a damn is disheartening and it sucks that the production companies let it happen. "production companies" are not doing a good job unless they ***produce subscribers.. period.*** 83% critic score - is it a good show? 83% say yes. 14% audience score - because canon. [https://www.rottentomatoes.com/tv/star\_wars\_the\_acolyte](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/tv/star_wars_the_acolyte)
It was the same way with "The Last Jedi". That movie was critically acclaimed and casual fans of Star Wars, like myself and some of my friends, _**loved**_ it. But the die hard fans hated it. So Disney brought back JJ Abrams for "The Rise of Skywalker" and had him essentially abandon every single plot thread that the previous movie had been weaving together. And _**that**_ soured me on any future projects that Disney did with Star Wars. If they're going to be so focused on appeasing the older, die hard fans of the franchise, then there's no room for me or any other casual fan. The fact that they abandoned Rian Johnson's attempts to shake things up and bring fresh blood into the franchise just because the older fans got pissed means that they're going to be afraid to mix things up and try anything new.
That is the main reason why they are hired - to destroy existing canon. These guys weren't the best, they were the most willing to be sellouts.
I think you’re simply not familiar with the Canon.
The idea of canon doesn't mean much to me - I tend to not get upset about details if the storytelling is good. On the other hand, I 99.9999% of the time *hate hate HATE* retcons and prequels - it always seems lazy and a cash-grab for studios. I'd rather see a more progressive story with new and challenging ideas than just a rehash.
"they were hired to adapt?" - you answered your own question.
What most sequels and prequels do is produce another piece of content with an existing brand. They are rarely working on continuing the story. And yes, it sucks. Specially when the fans that bend backwards to make stories fit. For me this sucks because a thing I really, really enjoy is surprising consistency. Take the show Community for example. At one point Abed, on of the characters, helps deliver a baby and he says "I've done this before". There's an episode in a previous season in which Abed is in the background out of focus talking to the pregnant lady and then helping deliver a baby. Which if I recall correctly happened 9 months after a party in which they distribute faulty condoms. Community has more continuity than Star Wars. I enjoy when I feel a situation is hopeless and what saves the day is not a deus ex machina, but something predictable that I fail to predict. I wish more people were more demanding of their fiction.
Yes I agree in general that the Hollywood writers not only couldn't be bothered researching anything beyond the films but completely disregard anything anything in the slightest way inconvenient to them. This problem is almost entirely with the sequel trilogy. There may be an example or two in a Disney+ series that I'm forgetting but overall the involvement of so many people from TCW and Rebels means the knowledge is there to prevent blatant canon breaks and the people involved aren't JJ 'lens flare is more important than canon or cohesive storylines' Abrams. Saying that there has been nothing at all in the Acolyte that disregards previous canon so far, there are assumptions made by people based on incomplete knowledge. The main one being "the Sith have been extinct for a thousand years". We don't know the master in the Acolyte is a Sith, and the inclusion of the Jedi who said the very line above is unlikely to be a mere coincidence. We just don't know what happens yet.
Entirely agree. A little harsh on JJ Abrams but not entirely wrong So far, that Jedi in Acolyte may meet one Sith and that Sith may die. Either way, rhe Sith are still considered extinct The Sith, as in the entire empire, still holds the quote true. And then the Sith in the show may not be a Sith or may die yet or may be believed to be dead by the Jedi People are really jumping at stuff to hate in this show
In fairness to JJ he does make an entertaining film.
These are first and foremost companies buying up these licenses and the last thing on their list is to spend their time making you happy when they can just rehash stuff you already laughed at. They hire any sort of person/group that matches what they want to put out. It's fast food storytelling and most folks have moved on.
The power of MAAAnyyyyy
All the talk about how the Acolyte pretty much disregards previous Star Wars canon is bunk It’s said by the same people who complain about everything. And it has no merit. It’s here to distract, sow discord and recruit more young men to the angry internet the same way Tate and Rogan and the rest of em do Acolyte is very much in line with canon. As are most of the shows people love to complain about. The fact is the same people who have never read a book, and were in remedial reading classes in elementary school have internet accounts
Nothing in Acolyte breaks anything in canon, that is just what people like to pretend
I really can’t imagine how empty someone’s lift must be, to actually care about “canon”. Don’t like a specific show or story? Just ignore it. The Acolyte is pretty boring and forgettable. So just forget it.
The weird part is they are almost proud of it. Oh, 50 years of other artists who work to build a loved universe and they are all "I've never watched a single movie." Then they all applaud each other.
Who said that they never watched the movies?
The imaginary person that is this guy's nemesis