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There seems to be ALOT of Star Wars books out there, and there's no way that they're all good. Which ones are the bad apples and why? Let's talk about lovely Star Wars books!
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Feb 14, 2020 20:31
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Just about anything by Kevin J Anderson. Complete hack with no understanding of scale and a reliance on superweapon of the week plots.
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Feb 14, 2020 21:32
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I can only imagine. I once tried to read Darth Plagueis because I was told it was actually good so I figured I might give it a shot, and I had never read one of Star Wars books before (unless you count listening to the radio play which was essentially a dramatization based on the novelization of ANH) I had to put it away when I was reading multiple sentences about how a character was using Force Jump and Force Grab and Force Push, like it's a video game.
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Feb 14, 2020 21:35
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Anything by Troy Denning . Put him in any multi-author series and he's guaranteed to gently caress up the story beyond all recognition
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Feb 14, 2020 21:36
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Vernii posted:Just about anything by Kevin J Anderson. Complete hack with no understanding of scale and a reliance on superweapon of the week plots.
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Feb 15, 2020 13:30
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idgi we already have a stackpole thread
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Feb 15, 2020 13:50
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Captain Splendid posted:Anything by Troy Denning . Speaking of Denning, it's really funny that Disney got rid of the old EU so they could have a blank slate for the sequels, but kept the part where authors would feud and passive-aggressively derail and kill each other's plotlines and characters.
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Feb 15, 2020 14:38
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Wasn't there a series set during the Clone Wars about how the Mandalorians were brought in to train the clones and it was all about HONOR and BROTHERHOOD and the Jedi were depicted as callous and abusive towards the clones? It went full on Space Sparta with all the homoeroticism that implies because the author was clearly super into that. But then the Clone Wars TV show depicted Mandalore as a pacifist society trying to move forward from its violent past and all the Honorable Warriors were terrorists exiled to the moon and trying to Make Mandalore Great Again, and the author threw a huge hissy fit and quit Star Wars. I never read the books but I definitely remember them coming up in a previous bad Star Wars book thread.
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Feb 15, 2020 14:39
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Moon Slayer posted:Wasn't there a series set during the Clone Wars about how the Mandalorians were brought in to train the clones and it was all about HONOR and BROTHERHOOD and the Jedi were depicted as callous and abusive towards the clones? It went full on Space Sparta with all the homoeroticism that implies because the author was clearly super into that. But then the Clone Wars TV show depicted Mandalore as a pacifist society trying to move forward from its violent past and all the Honorable Warriors were terrorists exiled to the moon and trying to Make Mandalore Great Again, and the author threw a huge hissy fit and quit Star Wars. Karen Traviss with her totally not gears of War with a Star Wars label slapped on Republic Commando books? I haven't read em in ages but I remember her having a huge hard on for everything mandalorian.
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Feb 15, 2020 17:05
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Ctrl + F “Crystal Star” no results Shameful
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Feb 15, 2020 17:36
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Splinter minds eye something something
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Feb 15, 2020 19:08
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Moon Slayer posted:Wasn't there a series set during the Clone Wars about how the Mandalorians were brought in to train the clones and it was all about HONOR and BROTHERHOOD and the Jedi were depicted as callous and abusive towards the clones? It went full on Space Sparta with all the homoeroticism that implies because the author was clearly super into that. But then the Clone Wars TV show depicted Mandalore as a pacifist society trying to move forward from its violent past and all the Honorable Warriors were terrorists exiled to the moon and trying to Make Mandalore Great Again, and the author threw a huge hissy fit and quit Star Wars. Casu Marzu posted:Karen Traviss with her totally not gears of War with a Star Wars label slapped on Republic Commando books? I haven't read em in ages but I remember her having a huge hard on for everything mandalorian. Karen Traviss, yes. She has some kind of intense fetish for Gurkha-esque ethnic minority groups that are super-badass military commandos, because she's gone to lengths to crowbar them into both her Star Wars works (Mandalorians) and the Gears of War novels (Pesang hill-men), and if she hasn't continued to do so with her Halo books I will eat my hat. That's in addition to the general atmosphere of fascist military glorification that tends to soak her books, though I've never been certain whether that's her own viewpoints or a consequence of the various settings being that way to begin with. Amusingly, though, the first Republic Commando book was published 2 years before the first Gears game, so if anything, it's "Star Wars with a Gears label slapped on". But yeah, Traviss was also half of the Big EU Slap-Fight. Her and another author were contracted to write a series of New Jedi Order novels, and it quickly devolved into each book making GBS threads on and retconning any plot/character/setting details introduced by the other writer in the previous book. I only know about it second-hand, but my impression is that there are only two things people really remember about that shitshow: psychic bug orgies, and a constant stream of "nu-uh/yuh-huh" about Mandalorian culture. And then Lucasbooks had to step in and fire one of them. e: after looking at some of the posts immediately above mine, I'm gonna guess the other author was Troy Denning.
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Feb 15, 2020 19:19
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The Glove of Darth Vader is often said to be the worst. On the other hand without it we could not bid us all Dark Greetings on our Mofferences, nor would we learn of Palpatine's three-eyed son Trioculus, who was actually an impostor of Sheev's real three-eyed son, Triclops.
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Feb 15, 2020 19:42
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Mooey Cow posted:The Glove of Darth Vader is often said to be the worst. Triclops is canon again thanks to Rey “Prince Ken” Palpatine.
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Feb 15, 2020 20:19
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I haven’t read her Star Wars novels specifically but Traviss’s writing in general is very fanfiction-y even by the standards of licensed video game tie-ins. Characters and organizations she likes are given center stage and made into super badass heroes and all the other characters talk nonstop about how great they are, while those she doesn’t like are poo poo on and made miserable and nothing good ever happens to them and the other characters all talk about how much of a shithead they are.
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Feb 15, 2020 20:24
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MonsieurChoc posted:Triclops is canon again thanks to Rey “Prince Ken” Palpatine. Good. I'm glad of it!
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Feb 15, 2020 20:31
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Mooey Cow posted:Good. I'm glad of it!
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Feb 15, 2020 20:50
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The Crystal Star by Vonda Mcintyre
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Feb 15, 2020 21:16
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Mooey Cow posted:The Glove of Darth Vader is often said to be the worst. Glove of Darth Vader is fun bad, so was Splinter of the Mind's Eye iirc. The Crystal Star was just straight up bad. No one ever remembers them, but the Goosebumps, but Star Wars books were really bad. Like, bad enough that 12 year old me thought they sucked and I really loved the Young Jedi Knights series. So was Children of the Jedi with the whole plotline where Luke wants to gently caress a ship computer cuz she's a Jedi Ghost stuck in a hard drive but then she escapes cuz Luke's student died and she transported herself into that body. So dumb and boring. On the other hand, that did bring up Darksaber and that was another fun terrible book. Edit: The Star Wars Goosebumps books were the Galaxy of Fear series.
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Feb 15, 2020 23:26
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Darksaber's climactic firing of the weapon was so funny bad.
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Feb 16, 2020 00:37
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loving Darksaber. Pretty sure that was a KJA book. I remember that the only thing of any significance that happened in it was Crix Madine getting killed off. Otherwise the villainous plot basically wrapped itself up because the Hutts were too cheap to pay for quality control. Also the Hutt running the Darksaber project had a Dr. Evil style command center where his minions all worked at stations that could kill them via remote control. I kinda wonder now if that was supposed to be a play on ST: TNG's exploding bridge consoles.
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Feb 16, 2020 05:08
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It's definitely Crystal Star because nothing happens in Crystal Star that is worth repeating or remembering. Darksaber meanwhile is legitimately funny to summarize.
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Feb 16, 2020 05:10
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Darksaber also has the hilarious Daala subplot where she once agains owns herself.
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Feb 16, 2020 06:07
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She's hilarious in general because it's very obviously KJA going "Mara Jade is popular and Thrawn is popular, I'll combine them and make one character who is twice as popular!"
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Feb 16, 2020 07:03
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Up Circle posted:The Crystal Star by Vonda Mcintyre Thank You
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Feb 16, 2020 07:21
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We shall summon a mofferance to Mount Yoda to determine the true nadir of the EU
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Feb 16, 2020 07:38
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nobody better post a Dash Rendar book. they all loving suck but they aren't the worst!
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Feb 16, 2020 18:38
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Feb 16, 2020 20:41
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nah it's actually good because the wraith squadron books cribbed off the backstory
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Feb 16, 2020 21:05
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Up Circle posted:nah it's actually good because the wraith squadron books cribbed off the backstory It also brought us the greatest song in Star Wars Threepio posted:Han Solo,
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Feb 17, 2020 00:18
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Casu Marzu posted:
The other Hambly book, Planet of Twilight, was pretty awful too.
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Feb 17, 2020 02:01
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Casu Marzu posted:Glove of Darth Vader is fun bad, so was Splinter of the Mind's Eye iirc. The Crystal Star was just straight up bad. I had a similar experience with The Glove of Darth Vader at a similar young age. It was my first real experience with Bad Star Wars. Just that moment when the glass splinters in your brain and you go "Wow, this kinda sucks. And they wrote five more books of this stuff? What?" I had no understanding of the Star Wars Expanded Universe at that point so I thought they were the official continuation to the story the movies told and was like "God, I really hope they don't make any movies out this stuff" because I was super dumb. Then I heard about the other EU books and was relieved that the Jedi Prince Books weren't even considered canon inside the EU. Then I learned how bad the EU stuff actually was and laughed. Then I watched JJ Abrams make the Jedi Prince Books canon by remaking them and calling them Rise of Skywalker and now I'm sad again, because they did make a movie out of that dumb poo poo I read when I was 12 and hated.
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Feb 17, 2020 04:50
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Crystal Star is probably the worst. It's old, it's bizarre, it's entirely inconsequential, and everyone in it is dumb and bad and lame and really poorly executed. Also Splinter of the Mind's Eye has a lot of elements that Lucas wanted to use in ANH so everyone should have been well aware that a Lucas with nobody keeping him on track is pretty much guaranteed failure.
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Feb 17, 2020 04:57
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Gulping Again posted:Also Splinter of the Mind's Eye has a lot of elements that Lucas wanted to use in ANH so everyone should have been well aware that a Lucas with nobody keeping him on track is pretty much guaranteed failure. This is true beyond Star Wars too. 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back looked at the first book in the trilogy that served as the official sequel to Willow (until last month because lol Disney+), that was written based off George Lucas's outline for what he wanted to the story to explore in a second outting, and it begins with all the characters from the movie except for Willow and the two annoying fairies getting exploded out of existence, and then Willow changing his name for no reason, and spending the rest of the story surviving in an ashbound post-apocalyptic hellscape where he has to fight off mutated dogs and kick 12 year old boys' heads in in order to survive. Lucas Unchained is a fascinating horror to behold.
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Feb 17, 2020 05:09
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Casu Marzu posted:
one of those featured my man Dash prominently. ot was whichever one has some kids on a space cruise ship where the ship's AI goes full on Hal 9000. as it happens, Dash is aboard and bumbles along wtih them. Notably, the author couldn't be bothered to look up the name of Dash's ship so it is referred to throughout as The Outrunner (instead of the Outrider). To correct such a grievous error, the EU later claimed The Outrunner was a SECOND ship Dash owned.
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Feb 17, 2020 05:10
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Dash Rendar posted:To correct such a grievous error, the EU later claimed The Outrunner was a SECOND ship Dash owned. the man is dedicated to a theme
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Feb 17, 2020 05:11
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Dash Rendar posted:one of those featured my man Dash prominently. ot was whichever one has some kids on a space cruise ship where the ship's AI goes full on Hal 9000. as it happens, Dash is aboard and bumbles along wtih them. Notably, the author couldn't be bothered to look up the name of Dash's ship so it is referred to throughout as The Outrunner (instead of the Outrider). Part of me admires how there's no mistakes or contradictions in the old EU canon, there's always an explanation, even if it twists itself into a billion different shapes in order to join the splintered shards together.
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Feb 17, 2020 05:21
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Whichever one where Luke gets stranded on a dessert planet that isn't Tatooine and also Leia spends the whole book doing super boring poo poo.
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Feb 17, 2020 05:27
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The Outrunner was a sleek black starship that functioned as a small freighter. The ship was so streamlined that the Human boy Zak Arranda thought it resembled a missile about to be fired. The Outrunner's systems could be brought online quickly, allowing for quick getaways. The vessel was armed with multiple laser turrets—at least one of which was a turbolaser, which could be retracted into a hole in the ship's hull—and forward-facing proton torpedo launchers. The ship could be operated by a single pilot.[1]
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Feb 17, 2020 15:01
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Who What Now posted:Whichever one where Luke gets stranded on a dessert planet that isn't Tatooine and also Leia spends the whole book doing super boring poo poo. mmm, cake planet the icing is blue of course
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Feb 17, 2020 15:04
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