Essential Bantam-era EU?

[Drooling Iguana]

I've recently decided to start reading the original, "Legends" EU, largely because since it's now non-canon it can no longer be fucked with (although as I understand it a lot of fuckery has already happened.) I bought the Heir to the Empire trilogy at a thrift store and am enjoying it so far (just completed the first book) but I'm wondering where I should go from there.

I've heard good things about Zahn's later, "Hand of Thrawn" duology, but as I understand it those books take place at the end of the Bantam era and basically function as a finale to that chapter of the EU, so I figure those shouldn't be my next stop. The X-Wing series also has a good reputation and there's quite a few of those, but I think they'd get repetitive if I read all of them in a row.

As I understand it, the next major storyline after the Thrawn trilogy is the Jedi Academy series, but those are by Kevin J. Anderson who doesn't exactly have a sterling reputation as an author. I've heard that Michael Stackpole's "I, Jedi" covers a lot of the same ground, though, and is better written. Could it function as a substitute for that series?

I've heard pretty much uniformly bad things about the Callista trilogy. Can it be skipped, or does it contain some plot-critical details? What about the Correlian Trilogy or Black Fleet Crisis? Are they worth reading?

Should I bother with the one-off stories like Truce at Bakura or The Courtship of Princess Leia? Is The Crystal Star batshit insane enough to be worth reading in a so-bad-it's-good sense?

[Elheru Aran]

The Hand of Thrawn is alright. Heir of the Empire trilogy is definitely a good one. The Jedi Academy books are... meh. I enjoyed them when I was much younger; I can't stand them anymore. I, Jedi is much better even if it's covered in Mary Sue jizz, and yeah, it'll be a pretty decent substitute. The only part of the Jedi Academy trilogy that I, Jedi misses out on is mostly the Ackbar treason subplot and Han/Kyp, but other than that, I'd rather read I, Jedi.

The Wraith Squadron books are a must read. The rest of the X-wing books aren't as great, but definitely read the Wraith Squadron books. Isard's Revenge isn't too bad, either.

Don't even bother with Crystal Star. Truce at Bakura was a 5/10... not great but not good but not bad. Courtship of Princess Leia is actually tolerable. I enjoyed the one Young Jedi Knights book that I read... but that was a very long time ago, and they're KJA's work.

If you want to go back further, the Lando Calrissian trilogy was alright; the Han Solo trilogy is similar.

Honestly... most of the Bantam era EU was decidedly mediocre. They're generally fine to read once, and after that, don't bother.

[RogueIce]

The Jedi Academy Trilogy is necessary in the sense that it sets up Luke's Jedi Academy thing, but otherwise is pretty meh. Well it also introduces Daala who shows up a couple more times but one of those is in another KJA book (which wasn't horrible but not great) and that one with the giant space bug or whatever that's utterly forgettable.

The only part of the Jedi Academy trilogy that I, Jedi misses out on is mostly the Ackbar treason subplot and Han/Kyp, but other than that, I'd rather read I, Jedi.

Come to think of it, neither of those plots actually has any impact afterwards, does it? I mean I can't even remember any times when Han and Kyp legitimately teamed up in the Bantam books (maybe later in NJO and beyond but I didn't read those so) and the Ackbar subplot, in addition to going nowhere, was already basically done by Zahn (in regards to "Ackbar betrayed the NR oh noes!") only better. Really in light of TTT that just came across stupid.

So yeah, you're better off with I, Jedi overall.

The X-Wing series also has a good reputation and there's quite a few of those, but I think they'd get repetitive if I read all of them in a row.

The X-Wing books are really more like two series (Rogue Squadron, 1-4; Wraith Squadron, 5-7) and two standalones (8,9). Book 5 does directly follow on from Book 4, and technically the justification for the new squadron is the events of the past book, but you don't really need to know the details to understand it. They're pretty much their own things. I personally have no issue reading them all straight through, but that's just me and I love the series. I even like Corran Horn despite his hate brigade out there.

You should keep in mind that while Books 1-7 do essentially follow on from each other, Books 8 and 9 are set at later dates. Book 8 is right after The Thrawn Trilogy (which you already read), ties up a loose end from Book 4 and also some stuff from the X-Wing comics, though it's not necessary to have read those to understand the book (I didn't). Book 9 is...somewhere during the Callista trilogy? Definitely after Darksaber at least. Spoiler alert: in the JAT Wedge hooks up with an alien chick who designed the Death Star and in Darksaber KJA is still trying to push that romance along; in X-Wing Book 9 Aaron Allston puts the kibosh on that. There, all you need to know about that abortion of an arc. You can now read Starfighters of Adumar in complete confidence.

I've heard pretty much uniformly bad things about the Callista trilogy. Can it be skipped, or does it contain some plot-critical details? What about the Correlian Trilogy or Black Fleet Crisis? Are they worth reading?

Darksaber is the middle of the Callista trilogy and it does have Pellaeon essentially take command of the Imperial Fleet. But it's pretty quick and almost literally a "You Are In Command Now" moment so you're not missing much - aside from knowing it happened.

The Corellian Trilogy does have Centerpoint Station which comes up again during the NJO, but I think most of it is basically forgettable. Black Fleet Crisis can be good if you want some military sci-fi in your Star Wars, as long as you essentially stick to the Leia plotline. The Luke and Lando plotlines are forgettable, meandering and I'm pretty sure an author indulgence that didn't really need to be there.

Should I bother with the one-off stories like Truce at Bakura or The Courtship of Princess Leia? Is The Crystal Star batshit insane enough to be worth reading in a so-bad-it's-good sense?

Out of all the books I ever read, The Crystal Star was the most boring in the sense that it was literally difficult for me to continue reading it. Even KJA was never that bad. I have never read it again and I would not recommend it to anybody.

Truce at Bakura and The Courtship of Princess Leia are both ok, though the Wraith Squadron trilogy within the X-Wing series does Zsinj way better.

If you want some grim and gritty bounty hunter action, there's the Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy. It may not be your cup of tea but it's different. Plus Boba Fett being a cold, merciless badass instead of Mando Jesus. Which is nice.

There's also the Han Solo Trilogy (the Bantam ones by A.C. Crispin, not the originals from back in the day; though I hear those are pretty great but I never read them) which are fun and a nice little prequel for Han.

I think that about covers most of the Bantam run?

[Adam Reynolds]

I would say there is nothing here that is essential, especially given the changes to canon that makes these stories impossible to reconcile with the new movies. The only thing I am personally sad to see go is the Wraith Squadron novels. While Zahn is a skilled writer and I enjoy reading his books, many of the ideas in them don't really fit with the overall saga very well.

Honestly... most of the Bantam era EU was decidedly mediocre. They're generally fine to read once, and after that, don't bother.

I would disagree for at least half of those works. I, Jedi and the X-wing novels were mediocre. The Crystal Star and Darksaber were terrible. They make one like Star Wars less by reading them.

Come to think of it, neither of those plots actually has any impact afterwards, does it? I mean I can't even remember any times when Han and Kyp legitimately teamed up in the Bantam books (maybe later in NJO and beyond but I didn't read those so) and the Ackbar subplot, in addition to going nowhere, was already basically done by Zahn (in regards to "Ackbar betrayed the NR oh noes!") only better. Really in light of TTT that just came across stupid.

Generally, this is one of the deeper problems with that era(though you could argue it was a feature. While the stories themselves were bad, they also had the problem that they were never mentioned again. Zahn in particular did this with his final dulogy, ignoring virtually everything that came before, except in minor elements. You could actually read The Last Command and Spectre of the Past back to back and not feel like you missed much of anything.

Darksaber is the middle of the Callista trilogy and it does have Pellaeon essentially take command of the Imperial Fleet. But it's pretty quick and almost literally a "You Are In Command Now" moment so you're not missing much - aside from knowing it happened.

Frankly it follows better if you go with Pellaeon slowly taking over at the end of the Thrawn trilogy, even as he lost many supporters after Thrawn died. Thus you can combine the warlord threat mentioned in other books whilst ignoring KJA's contributions.

Truce at Bakura and The Courtship of Princess Leia are both ok, though the Wraith Squadron trilogy within the X-Wing series does Zsinj way better.

Courtship was downright stupid. None of the characters felt at all like those from the films with the primary plot involving Han kidnapping Leia after she considered marrying a prince from an anti-Imperial faction (of only 63 worlds) so that they would join the New Republic. A subplot features a lost tribe of Jedi(the author was Mormon). Though Courtship does serve as something of a sequel to Wraith Squadron as they share an antagonist(and without Courtship, he essentially gets away). Wraith Squadon also featured elements of the Han Solo plot done much better as it was purely his internal doubts as to his future with Leia. In that context it actually felt realistic.

Another random work from the old-EU I would recommend is the Darth Bane trilogy. It is interesting in that it is primarily told from the perspective of the titular Sith Lord as he rebuilt the Sith into the order that would culminate with Palpatine, with the story taking place a millenia before TPM in the conflict where the Sith were thought destroyed. In that context it gives a negative version of the traditional heroic arc of the SW mythos.

And in the prequel era James Luceno's books are rather good, though I wasn't much a fan of Darth Plagueis*. I also mostly liked Darth Maul Shadow Hunter(a retelling of Terminator and Shatterpoint(Apocalypse Now featuring Mace Windu). Yoda Dark Rendevous is somewhat interesting but also has something of an odd plot.

* It cheapened the story of TPM by making Palpatine kill Plagueis during the events of TPM. So that means Darth Maul, the Sith Lord the reignited Jedi interest in the Sith, wasn't really a Sith Lord. So Yoda was just saying bullshit with his line "Only two there are."

[Havok]

Go nowhere. Stop. Go get the original Han Solo Trilogy and the Lando Calrissian Adventures and actually enjoy yourself.

[lPeregrine]

not the originals from back in the day; though I hear those are pretty great but I never read them

They are great. There's no "yet another attempt to bring back the Empire" milking of the cash cow or awkward subplots thrown in just so that all of the major characters are present that made the rest of the EU such a boring mess. It's just Han being Han and having adventures, the kind of thing that made Star Wars fun.

And it's no coincidence that the other EU books I think are worth reading are also ones where the author doesn't recycle the same "the Empire is back, and Han/Luke/Leia are the only ones who can stop it" plot. The X-Wing books are worth it if you want to relive your childhood of flying your toy x-wings around, and I thought Scoundrels was a fun "heist film in space" story. The Thrawn books are the best of the rest, though I suspect some of that is because they were the first books of the era rather than their literary merits. Everything else is bland and forgettable at best, and borderline unreadable at worst. Skim the wiki summaries if you care about the plot, you won't be missing much.

[Adam Reynolds]

Go nowhere. Stop. Go get the original Han Solo Trilogy and the Lando Calrissian Adventures and actually enjoy yourself.

The Solo trilogy is great, but I thought the Lando books were too weird. They just didn't feel like proper Star Wars.

[Batman]

I can see why somebody would feel that way but I'd still rate the Lando trilogy above most of the Bantam crap.
Me- the Thrawn stuff, the original Han trilogy, the Lando trilogy, the Wraith books, I personally like 'Truce at Bakura' but unless you're going for universe coherence (which you're not going to get anyway) as I see it you can safely ignore the rest.

[lPeregrine]

The Solo trilogy is great, but I thought the Lando books were too weird. They just didn't feel like proper Star Wars.

I don't know, did it feel like "not Star Wars" or "not the EU"? Would it really have seemed so weird back in 1983, before the EU filled in all of the details of the setting and removed the opportunity for weird things off in some half-forgotten corner of the galaxy? IMO the Han Solo books are still quite a bit better, but I think some of the "this doesn't fit" comments directed at the oldest books are based more on conflicts with the "modern" EU than with the movies.

[RogueIce]

I don't care what anyone says, the Silly Rabbit constellation is canon and always will be.

That stupid bunny from the Marvel Comics is not and I ignore any attempts to link the two, Wookieepedia.

[The_Saint]

Everyone's hashed over anything I could say about the usual Bantam-EU fare but one not mentioned so far are the Tales series: Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, Tales from Jabba's Palace and Tales of the Bounty Hunters. There were two others, Tales from the Empire and Tales from the New Republic but they were a touch more forgettable. Each is a compendium of short stories written by an assortment of authors and edited by Kevin J Anderson.
Tales from Mos Eisley Cantina was an attempt to give a story/backstory to many of the characters witnessed in (or nearby) the cantina scene from A New Hope, at approximately the same time.
Tales from Jabba's Palace is set during/just prior to the events there in Return of the Jedi.
Tales of the Bounty Hunters is based around the boutny hunters seen in one short scene in Empire Strikes Back aboard the Executer.

There are some weird and strange stories amongst them covering some weirder and stranger events that near border on Crystal Star level of oddball but also some interesting tales. By focusing on characters that are barely on screen for a few seconds with no speaking parts (with some exceptions) they avoid the "same heroes doing the same things" problems that most other books feature. They also cover all the daily minutiae that I feel helps develop fantasy worlds. Some of the stories, specifically all those featuring Boba Fett give what I feel is a much better viewpoint of the character than anything else in the EU (having read these years ago I now detest anything that even hints at the word Mandalorian).

[Adam Reynolds]

Everyone's hashed over anything I could say about the usual Bantam-EU fare but one not mentioned so far are the Tales series: Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, Tales from Jabba's Palace and Tales of the Bounty Hunters. There were two others, Tales from the Empire and Tales from the New Republic but they were a touch more forgettable. Each is a compendium of short stories written by an assortment of authors and edited by Kevin J Anderson.
Tales from Mos Eisley Cantina was an attempt to give a story/backstory to many of the characters witnessed in (or nearby) the cantina scene from A New Hope, at approximately the same time.
Tales from Jabba's Palace is set during/just prior to the events there in Return of the Jedi.
Tales of the Bounty Hunters is based around the boutny hunters seen in one short scene in Empire Strikes Back aboard the Executer.

There are some weird and strange stories amongst them covering some weirder and stranger events that near border on Crystal Star level of oddball but also some interesting tales. By focusing on characters that are barely on screen for a few seconds with no speaking parts (with some exceptions) they avoid the "same heroes doing the same things" problems that most other books feature. They also cover all the daily minutiae that I feel helps develop fantasy worlds. Some of the stories, specifically all those featuring Boba Fett give what I feel is a much better viewpoint of the character than anything else in the EU (having read these years ago I now detest anything that even hints at the word Mandalorian).

Those stories range from solidly entertaining to containing some of the worst stories in the entire EU. Notably, Bounty Hunters features IG-88's infamous Death Star story in which he successfully takes over the Second Death Star. Whatever the new EU creates I doubt they will create anything as bad as this. If they also manage to avoid reincarnating Palpatine, I would say that the new EU can't possibly be as bad as the old.

Personally I somewhat liked the various other short stories that made appearances. Those that dated back to the old adventure journals. They did a fairly good job at giving much smaller stories in the EU that had nothing to do with the OT main cast, rather than galactic threat of the week #245.

[Elheru Aran]

Pre-90s EU was mostly like that, yeah-- short stories that circulated in fan publications, a few novels like the Han Solo/Lando Calrissian Adventures and Splinter of the Mind's Eye, and the Marvel comics were about it. Heir of the Empire is what really set things rolling, and the fucking Dark Empire series came out not too long after.

Hopefully whomever is running the new EU has learned a few lessons...

[Adam Reynolds]

Pre-90s EU was mostly like that, yeah-- short stories that circulated in fan publications, a few novels like the Han Solo/Lando Calrissian Adventures and Splinter of the Mind's Eye, and the Marvel comics were about it. Heir of the Empire is what really set things rolling, and the fucking Dark Empire series came out not too long after.

Hopefully whomever is running the new EU has learned a few lessons...

The stories I was referring to were also 90s EU. They were just a different part than the main novels.

Anyway, on the point about Heir to the Empire, while Zahn is an excellent author, he started the negative trends of the EU. Minimalism. Jedi losing to creature/tech of the week. New adversary that is completely unknown and is yet a threat that rivals Palpatine.

All of the things people critisize in the later EU apply equally to Zahn's books, it's just that he was a good enough author that fewer are bothered by it. The only thing you couldn't say is that his books did not feature traditional superweapons. Though the clones were treated like one.

[Elheru Aran]

Yeah, Zahn mostly brought that trend to light, but it really started with the WEG source material and the atrocious nature of some early material like the Glove of Darth Vader books. Those didn't help, to say the least.

There are a few primary problems with the EU, namely:

--A lack of focus. First the Empire's the bad guy. OK. Then you pull out the Ssi-ruuk... and promptly forget about them. Black Fleet Crisis didn't quite suck... but it wasn't great, and the Yevetha weren't particularly different from the Empire, just xenophobic evil cliche aliens. New Rebellion was lame. So was Darksaber (god that was bad). The Empire temporarily returns in the Jedi Academy trilogy and (sort of) in Children of the Jedi (god another bad novel). Planet of Twilight was about a fucking plague, that somehow Luke Skywalker, Leia, and random Jedi chick of the week overcome. I mean, what the fuck. And the Yuuzhan Vong.

--Over-focusing on a small set of characters. Leia and Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, whoever the main character(s) of the novels they're in... and that's about it. Rogue Squadron books? Six or so main characters, with focus centering on Wedge and Corran. Wraith Squadron at least gave mostly equal treatment to its various characters-- Kell got a good bit of face-time compared to Wedge, for example. But overall the EU is mostly 'The Luke Skywalker/Leia/Han Story'. They're at the center of all the important shit happening in the universe. Major crisis? One of 'em is in the middle of it. Emperor returns? Luke's with him. Han Solo travels to Kessel, ends up on the Death Star prototype, escapes in a new Imperial superweapon and brings Admiral Daala running after him? You get the idea.

--Over-focusing on every single side character. That seems contradictory with the point above, but since most of these didn't get more than a single story or two, it's not as gross a violation. Still, it's highly absurd when Ice-Cream Machine Man gets a story. Never mind the IG-88 bollocks and all the other stuff.

--No clear-cut conclusion anywhere in sight, and a somewhat haphazard order to the books. If you walked into a bookstore in the mid 00's, you wouldn't have much idea where to start. There was an index in most of the later books at least detailing what book went where... but with no indication whatsoever of quality or relevance. The status quo was that the Rebellion grew into the New Republic, and slowly defeated the Empire, pushing the Imperial Remnant towards a stalemate with frequent setbacks. Then they threw the Yuuzhan Vong into the mix... and that ended with the Vong being defeated and a peace established. Then they decided to jump forward and fired up the Legacy of the Force series, and culminated in the Legacy comics set a pretty good distance in the future. Who knows how much they would've strung it out?

The fact of the matter is that while they did an absolutely sterling job with continuity-- one of the areas where the EU really stands out-- their planning sucked, badly, as did their focus (or high lack thereof).

[Adam Reynolds]

--No clear-cut conclusion anywhere in sight, and a somewhat haphazard order to the books. If you walked into a bookstore in the mid 00's, you wouldn't have much idea where to start. There was an index in most of the later books at least detailing what book went where... but with no indication whatsoever of quality or relevance. The status quo was that the Rebellion grew into the New Republic, and slowly defeated the Empire, pushing the Imperial Remnant towards a stalemate with frequent setbacks. Then they threw the Yuuzhan Vong into the mix... and that ended with the Vong being defeated and a peace established. Then they decided to jump forward and fired up the Legacy of the Force series, and culminated in the Legacy comics set a pretty good distance in the future. Who knows how much they would've strung it out?

Personally I think this is the biggest sin. While all of the rest of the flaws made the execution poor, this made the entire concept terrible. It left one with the question of whether the actions of the OT were even for the better. On this site, that debate was far from settled.

[Batman]

Err-who ever argued the actions of the OT weren't for the better? Valen knows a lot of people here (me being among them) have argued the Empire would have been the lesser evil compared to the New Republic. The essentially useless New Republic we see in the EU is not the inevitable outcome of the Rebels winning in the OT.

[Elheru Aran]

Err-who ever argued the actions of the OT weren't for the better? Valen knows a lot of people here (me being among them) have argued the Empire would have been the lesser evil compared to the New Republic. The essentially useless New Republic we see in the EU is not the inevitable outcome of the Rebels winning in the OT.

Yeah, while the new sequels are going to shake things up a lot, at least they're definitely gonna gank the whole New Republic notion and start fresh. Hopefully not cacking it up as much this time.

[Abacus]

My advice: stick to everything Zahn and the Wraith Squadron series. The rest is just either mediocre or so maddeningly foolish as to make you want to Force choke something.

[Imperial Overlord]

I recommend Brian Daley's original Han Solo trilogy and Matt Stover's Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor. The Thrawn books I didn't like quite as much, but I still enjoyed.

[Eternal_Freedom]

A Zahn work that hasn't been brought up yet, I really enjoyed Outbound Flight and Survivor's Quest. The gist of the first story is mentioned by Thrawn in his trilogy but these books expand upon that and also flesh out Thrawn as a character while he still worked for the Chiss.

[RogueIce]

A Zahn work that hasn't been brought up yet, I really enjoyed Outbound Flight and Survivor's Quest. The gist of the first story is mentioned by Thrawn in his trilogy but these books expand upon that and also flesh out Thrawn as a character while he still worked for the Chiss.

Though I would recommend reading Survivor's Quest first since some of the mystery and plot twists will be spoiled otherwise - SQ was written before OF.

[Q99]

I liked all the X-wing books, Rogue and Wrath both.

[ray245]

Err-who ever argued the actions of the OT weren't for the better? Valen knows a lot of people here (me being among them) have argued the Empire would have been the lesser evil compared to the New Republic. The essentially useless New Republic we see in the EU is not the inevitable outcome of the Rebels winning in the OT.

Yeah, while the new sequels are going to shake things up a lot, at least they're definitely gonna gank the whole New Republic notion and start fresh. Hopefully not cacking it up as much this time.

I don't think so, especially if we follow what the new EU material is telling us so far. It seems that the New Republic was hit with an even bigger idiot bomb because they need to retell the story of the Rebels against the Empire once again.

Good EU should avoid writing about any major war for a half a century after ROTJ. You can have smaller conflict like the Naboo crisis if you want to have conflict in the GFFA.

[Crazedwraith]

Err-who ever argued the actions of the OT weren't for the better? Valen knows a lot of people here (me being among them) have argued the Empire would have been the lesser evil compared to the New Republic. The essentially useless New Republic we see in the EU is not the inevitable outcome of the Rebels winning in the OT.

Yeah, while the new sequels are going to shake things up a lot, at least they're definitely gonna gank the whole New Republic notion and start fresh. Hopefully not cacking it up as much this time.

I don't think so, especially if we follow what the new EU material is telling us so far. It seems that the New Republic was hit with an even bigger idiot bomb because they need to retell the story of the Rebels against the Empire once again.

Good EU should avoid writing about any major war for a half a century after ROTJ. You can have smaller conflict like the Naboo crisis if you want to have conflict in the GFFA.

A lot of Legends material did do that. Then they got slammed for minimalism and the dysfunctional of the NR.