Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens is fast approaching so it’s time to brush up on some important plot points.
We all know (hopefully) how ‘Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi’ ends, Luke and friends defeat the Empire, destroy the Death Star and Anakin(Darth Vader) is redeemed with his last living act to kill the emperor and save Luke. Leia reveals Luke is her brother and smooches Han Solo. Obi-Wan and Yoda look down from the heavens in happiness.
Episode VII is set thirty years after the final events of the original saga. Not much is known of the plot for the new release and the question of what happens in those thirty intervening years is also standing? Is it a time of unprecedented peace in the galaxy? Or was there still much to be done? A new novel and comic may just answer everything.
Chuck Wendig is releasing his novel Star Wars: Aftermath while Greg Rucka and Marco Checchetto are dropping their comic Star Wars: Shattered Empire. These are the first stories to take place after Return of the Jedi and may very well hint strongly at what is to come in The Force Awakens.
It seems that the war doesn’t exactly end with the emperor’s death. While the novel and comics will tell different stories it appears that the landscape will be quite similar: warfare. The three decades of missing time will be filled to the brim of fighting between the Rebel Alliance and the Imperial Forces because neither force really has the inclination to back down. In Shattered Empire Han Solo discovers some intelligence that indicates the fighting won’t end any time soon. Aftermath is broken into multiple one-off stories that show celebrations interrupted by forces still loyal to the departed Palpatine. Despite the head of the snake being cut off at the battle of Endor, the body is still doing a lot of damage with it’s constant flailing. In fact, it’s worse because neither Vader or the Emperor are around to give any direction to the chaos. Thus we have empire generals trying to take control and Kylo Ren, who claims to be a sith, attempting to launch himself into power.
These stories, and ‘The Force Awakens’, look to give a more rounded view of the conflict, humanising the empire forces like never before. Many of the people fighting for the empire were just doing their job and didn’t necessarily agree with everything the empire was doing. This only serves to make the conflict more complex and intriguing.
Aftermath succeeds, consciously or unconsciously, to diversify the galaxy too. A new female, dark of skin, lead is introduced as well as a homosexual character. In Shattered Empire, the parents of Poe (played by Oscar Isaac in the upcoming film) are seen as perhaps Hispanic and both fought in the original war alongside Luke, showing that the battle for the galaxy was undertaken by both men and women, of many ethnicities.
Not much is known about the villains of ‘The Force Awakens’ but we get a titillating insight into what might be the return of Bobba Fett but not as we know him. A good guy who has anointed himself as a lawman finds Bobba’sarmour for sale on Tatooine and it seems like he might use it to dispense his own brand of justice, effectively resurrecting and envisioning the famous Fett in a new way.
For ‘The Force Awakens’ to exist then obviously things in the empire have to get worse then they were before. These new printed stories tell us that the rebel alliance and empire are replaced respectively by the Resistance and The First Order and the New Republic fails to create a democratically ruled galaxy. The fight for peace may have become even harder.
How do you see the new film playing out?