5 Things From ‘Star Wars’ Legends That Made Their Way Into Canon
After over a decade of Disney owning Star Wars, fans of the series familiar with Legends had several different opinions. Some loved the sequels. Others hated them. Some thought it was okay, but overall were just happy to have more Star Wars material. A common wish was that they had taken stuff from Legends. As I wrote earlier, Disney had plenty of options but felt it was a better business decision to do more accessible things for general audiences. Something a lot of people don’t know is that Legends material was worked into a lot of stories. Here, we will discuss five plot points in both continuities.
It’s Like The Death Star, But Bigger
Everyone loves the Death Star. Okay, the Death Stars. When Starkiller Base was added in The Force Awakens, everyone could see the connection to the previous superweapon. However, something that isn’t noted is that several similar weapons appeared in Legends. The first of these was the Galaxy Gun, yet another weapon that could still be used to destroy entire planets. It had just the Death Star’s laser but couldn’t be used as a giant base. The trade-off was the much lower cost, allowing the Empire to build dozens of larger Star Destroyers, which were large enough to be considered superweapons.
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This was different because it was used to destroy many planets before its destruction. The second weapon was called the Sun Crusher, which took things to the absolute next level as it could, as you’ve likely guessed, destroy entire stars. Years later, when tensions had cooled between the Empire and our heroes, Han Solo calls out the Empire’s obsession with building giant weapons as they team up to fight other threats. He even jokingly suggested that they would have called it the Nostril of Palpatine. However, Starkiller Base wasn’t the only thing to be recycled for The Force Awakens.
Han And Leia’s Son Joins The Dark Side
Although he came around long after any of the above superweapons were destroyed, Jacen Solo became the Sith lord Darth Caedus, a name interestingly given to him via a fan contest. Although the characters and their reasons for falling differ, the surface-level similarities are undeniable. Ben Solo joined the dark side, motivated by revenge on his uncle Luke. On the other hand, Jacen is tricked into falling by Luke’s ex-girlfriend Lumiya, kills Luke’s wife Mara Jade, and tries to turn Luke’s son Ben (also named after Obi-Wan) to the dark side, but fails. Oh, he also had a twin sister named Jaina, who defeats him (and has some surface-level similarities to Rey), and a brother named Anakin. Okay, maybe we can debate how similar they are in their different universes, just like the next guy on this list.
The Character Of Grand Admiral Thrawn Is A Major Part Of The Empire
In the early 90s, science fiction and military author Timothy Zhan wrote a trilogy of books where a character named Thrawn takes the mantle of the Empire. Even though he has enough honour to make him semi-sympathetic and not having force powers really gives trouble to Luke and the gang with his tactical prowess and ability to reverse engineer our hero’s plans and counter them perfectly. These books were well received and were popular enough to re-ignite George Lucas’s interest in creating Star Wars content, leading to the creation of the prequels. In canon, Dave Filoni brought back the character of Thrawn as a villain in his TV series Star Wars Rebels. However, those who don’t watch the cartoons are oblivious of the character’s return until Ahsoka mentions him in her appearance in The Mandalorian. Given he’s confirmed to be in the upcoming Ahsoka series, he’s rumoured to be a Thanos-type villain for small-screen Star Wars. Do you think they would ever bring back another villain, though?
Palpatine Coming Back After Death
Image Source: Screenrant
“Holy Sheev!” you’re likely thinking. Yes, they did this. Soon after the defeat of Thrawn, our heroes discover that Palpatine is back. Just like in The Rise of Skywalker, they can quickly figure out how he did this: somehow. Then it’s found he had a bunch of cloned bodies in a lab somewhere and used dark side techniques to create a bubble around him, allowing him to live through the destruction of the Death Star, meaning that eventually, it turned out to be dark science, cloning, and secrets only the sith knew. Things, however, were different; he managed to turn Luke Skywalker to the dark side. Okay, Luke turned willingly in an attempt to sabotage the Empire from within but became trapped by the dark side until he was redeemed by his sister Leia. Yeah, bringing back dead villains doesn’t work so often. Please say there’s a version out there that makes sense.
Boba Fett Escapes The Sarlacc
Okay, Boba was never exactly ‘killed’ in either continuity, but he does come back after being defeated. In canon, he was given his own show in The Book of Boba Fett, where he becomes the new crime lord of Tatooine, taking the title from Bib Fortuna. In Legends, he returns to his Mandalorian roots and even allies himself with the good guys in many stories. This one is probably the least interesting, but he leads Mandalore and trains Jaina Solo in combat techniques so she can defeat her brother, as I mentioned earlier in this article. Neat.
While people may prefer either Legends or Canon, I feel it’s important to not act mean towards fans of the other. Regardless of which one you like, there’s an entire galaxy of content for you, so it’s best to just enjoy what you like and allow others to do the same.
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Source(s): Wookieepeida