Split: Star Wars canon policy revisited

For all your discussion of canon policies, evidentiary standards, and other meta-debate issues.

Discussion is to remain cordial at all times.
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Mr. Oragahn
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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Sun Mar 11, 2007 3:40 pm

Cock_Knocker wrote:
GStone wrote:Which doesn't require posting. What is it about this place that drives you to post?
Probably the same thing that many of you get out of posting at SD.net.
Which is?

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Post by GStone » Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:41 pm

Cpl Kendall wrote:
GStone wrote:Which doesn't require posting. What is it about this place that drives you to post?
None of your business.
Fine. No pressure.

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Post by Praeothmin » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:06 pm

Cpl Kendall wrote:
Frankly I find that simple and concise
To be honest, so do I.
The movies and anything directly from George Lucas is G canon, while everything else (including the ICS books) is a lower C canon.

Which brings us, IMO, to this point here:
Frankly there's more than enough to defeat the trekkie side of the debate in the movies alone
This is where most debaters here disagree, myself included.
Although to reiterate my position in the clearest possible way, I do believe the Empire would win in a war against the Federation, due to its greater industrial capacity, and the nice "little" piece of technology called "The Deathstar"... :)

The part I disagree with, that puts me in the Pro-Trek debaters, is that I don't believe, based on the highest power showings I've seen in the movies and series (for both franchises), that an ISD could whip a Galaxy Classes' a** in a fight.
It might win, I'm really not decided yet, but it wouldn't be easy.

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Post by 2046 » Thu Mar 15, 2007 2:57 am

Crap, I'm always gone for the good stuff.

So Cpl Kendall, let me make sure I understand you . . . to you, the Chee thing is basically irrelevant since, even if two continuities exist, the film events occur in both.

Or in other words, the highest canon is the highest canon in both, so (I presume) you feel there wouldn't really be differences?

Is that an accurate description of your position? If not, please feel perfectly free to correct it.

Sorry if I'm putting you on the spot, I'm just trying to get an EU Completist to explain their present reasoning to me.

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Post by Dragoon » Thu Mar 15, 2007 3:37 pm

One would think the "parallel universe" quote would be enough to show that the movie universe and the EU+movie universes are different.

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Post by Cpl Kendall » Thu Mar 15, 2007 5:12 pm

2046 wrote:Crap, I'm always gone for the good stuff.

So Cpl Kendall, let me make sure I understand you . . . to you, the Chee thing is basically irrelevant since, even if two continuities exist, the film events occur in both.

Or in other words, the highest canon is the highest canon in both, so (I presume) you feel there wouldn't really be differences?

Is that an accurate description of your position? If not, please feel perfectly free to correct it.

Sorry if I'm putting you on the spot, I'm just trying to get an EU Completist to explain their present reasoning to me.
Yes that is my position.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu Mar 15, 2007 6:07 pm

How couldn't there by any difference since Chee clearly talks about two official policies, and defines one of them as being about films only (for purists)?

Are you denying the existence of this official purist policy?

Those positions, anyway, are called to be blurred a bit more in the future.

Not only because purists often include the novelisations and even the radio dramas (and then you fall back to Sansweet's tackle at explaining how these sources are somehow safely close to the films), but there are those two TV shows, one being an anime and the other with live actors. Next to that, you have Force Unleashed, to which Lucas participates considerably, apparently.

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Post by Cpl Kendall » Thu Mar 15, 2007 7:41 pm

I essentially don't give two shits about what goes on in the EU. It sucks, it blows donkey balls, it's garbage ok. The ICS and the few reference books are the only good things to come out of the EU. But we don't need them to demolish Trek, never did.

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Post by coyote » Fri Mar 16, 2007 1:05 am

This is the thing that I'm trying to explain in another thread-- I, and I believe Cpl. Kendall, don't necessarily subscribe to one "canon" that meets "ideological purity" on any one web board or another.

In fact, I'm kind of a "buffet table canon" type myself. I personally pick & choose what I like. I like the Timothy Zahn EU books; the Vonda McIntyre stuff I won't even mention in the same breath as "Star Wars". I like ICS, but dislike the WEG roleplaying game.

So expecting people like me to be tireless defenders of some "Wongian Manifesto"... it's just not the way it is.

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Post by Cpl Kendall » Fri Mar 16, 2007 1:11 am

coyote wrote:This is the thing that I'm trying to explain in another thread-- I, and I believe Cpl. Kendall, don't necessarily subscribe to one "canon" that meets "ideological purity" on any one web board or another.

In fact, I'm kind of a "buffet table canon" type myself. I personally pick & choose what I like. I like the Timothy Zahn EU books; the Vonda McIntyre stuff I won't even mention in the same breath as "Star Wars". I like ICS, but dislike the WEG roleplaying game.

So expecting people like me to be tireless defenders of some "Wongian Manifesto"... it's just not the way it is.
Exactly, I have the movies, the ICS and a few rare gems from the EU but as for the rest of it, you could burn most of the EU and I wouldn't care. Especially Travissity's crap and the RPG.

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Post by AnonymousRedShirtEnsign » Fri Mar 16, 2007 1:35 am

Honestly, that pick and choose mentality doesn't suprise me at all. I don't pick and choose what quilifies as canon based on what I like, if I did KotOR would be right behind TESB on my canon hierarchy. As it stands, I recognize that he EU+film is its own continuity, seperate from the film only continuity. I just choose to use the film only one because to me most of the EU isn't representative of Star Wars, and I save myself a lot of choosing between contradictory evidence.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Fri Mar 16, 2007 12:25 pm

The problem with the pick and choose mentality is that it's also used by people who want to hammer mercylessly the idea that if you use Star Wars, you use all of the EU period, while they stand by that double standard and hypocrit position that they also like to discount any material that is "too stupid" (KJA's work for example).

Besides, that pick n' choose would need to be specified in the beginning of each thread, so unless you start every thread about Star Wars vs something else, you're either going to use the by default rules, or the rules of the OP (which often remain unspecified, so it turns out that the by default canon policy is in use), which in both cases regarding the SB.com and SD.net, are defined by the all encompassing policiy.

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Post by Cpl Kendall » Fri Mar 16, 2007 4:05 pm

I don't debate Star Wars that much so it's not really a problem for me. And I can debate witin the framework of other canon policies if need be, usually I just don't debate canon issues because I'm sick of rehashing the same ground endlessly.

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Post by Sunburst » Fri Apr 20, 2007 5:35 pm

Star Wars like any fictional story is different to different people. Now that may be an obvious statement....it's obviously the problem when debating about fiction...and it makes all arguments utterly pointless until the fiction realities are uniform in everyone's mind...which is never.

I don't debate Star Wars vs Star Trek anymore, because my Star Wars story is basically the original trilogy plus the bantam EU...anything Del Ray I disregarded...and any material that can't call an ISD and Imperial Star Destroyer I disregard. Basically anything that takes away from the story, plot, and literary elements and memories I have of Star Wars isn't something I acknowledge....so my story is different from most. Hence debating others without the common ground is impossible.

Specifically, when I think of Star Wars I think of the theatrical releases of Star Wars through Jedi and the first 5 Zahn books.


Likewise with Trek my story is what I know, and it's far from official. I've seen TNG, all the movies, much of DS9, and some of Voyager, so those are my stories. Although I disregard the 70 year time that it’d take Voyager to cross part of the galaxy.


Numbers, power levels, speed, and whatever have always been literary elements that give a general setting and they aren't really to be taken literally. They really can't be; sci-fi is supposed to be a setting that's impossible to be fully understood and achieved with present day tech, science and mathematics. And the authors can't be trusted to even know what they're talking about.

Everyone perceives reality a little differently. Sure 2+2=4, arithmetic is what it is, but so is a story, and a Star Destroyer isn't a Star Destroyer to everyone…people can’t even agree on the name, class, and I suppose thusly, the function. Even laws meant to apply to everyone equally (except for the ones that right them of course) aren't; we have judges and lawyers constantly battling. Back to sci-fi....And these debates about which is better...which would win in a war will never end as long as there is any interest in the subject at all....two people won't agree unless they want to or need to. The difference in perceived realities make these debates happen, make them interesting, and ironically prevent their end.


So after that long shpeel…I suppose I should make a point:

Focus: The reality of any story is different from person to person based on preference and ignorance, regardless of what’s official Trying to regulate what the official story is allows for less to discuss which is what I thought the who point of the forum was. Although to make discussion more focused, I believe there should be a default set of guild lines for this site about what’s official which can be used or disregarded depending on the OP of any thread

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