With Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker finally concluding the Skywalker saga, I imagine that the creative and continuity teams at Lucasfilm are breathing a sigh of relief. There were 67 years between The Phantom Menace and The Rise of Skywalker and that time period has gotten pretty damn cramped when it came to storytelling. Within that, we’ve seen the Clone Wars, the Jedi purge, the rise and fall of the Galactic Empire and the First Order. Every plausible major event within this timeframe has been covered in exhaustive detail over eleven movies, four TV shows and innumerable books and comics.
Now, with the final season of The Clone Wars set to air this Friday, Disney Plus have released an updated Star Wars timeline so viewers know what’s going on. As you can see below though, for those paying attention to the franchise, this doesn’t contain any major surprises.
The story of the pre-Vader Anakin Skywalker obviously cannot continue beyond Revenge of the Sith, so that’s a hard stopping point for any adventures featuring him. However, this might prove useful in reminding more casual viewers of when The Clone Wars takes place. Though jumping in at the final few episodes definitely isn’t the best way to experience the show.
Considering that Star Wars is run on a “New Unified Canon,” in which every comic, film, video game and book ‘happened,’ avoiding contradictions and plot holes within these 67 years must be a nightmare for the story group. All of which is why I’m betting that Lucasfilm are eager to get started on Project Luminous.
Rumor has it that this is the codename for stories set within the High Republic, hundreds of years before The Phantom Menace. It’s a new setting full of unexplored planets, political strife and lots of Jedi. So basically, a blank canvas for creative teams to tell stories that don’t revolve around one unusually important family from Tatooine. Sounds good to us.
Published: Feb 19, 2020 09:35 am