Star Wars: The Force Awakens - 8 Compelling Theories About General Hux
2. He's A Genius Tactician Who Will Outsmart The Heroes
When it comes to the Expanded Universe, fan's typically heap praise on one villain more than any other - Grand Admiral Thrawn from Timothy Zahn's three Thrawn novels from the 1990s. With Disney ditching the EU, the ideas and concepts popularised by these books are now fair game as the inspiration for all-new foes in the sequel films. Thrawn is still so well-loved as a foil for the rebels that it would not be at all surprising for Abrams to pillage his character as the basis for First Order General Hux. With that inspiration in mind, what would Hux be like? In short, he'd be a genius tactician and master strategist who'd outsmart and outmanoeuvre the Resistance at every turn. He'd be the villain audiences loved to hate, purely because he was so good at his job. If Gleeson is a (sadly not blue) version of Thrawn, his General's brilliance would, at long last, give the heroes a truly capable enemy to fight. For once, audiences might actually worry about whether the good guys could win, even in a Star Wars film where the eventual victory of good is never truly in doubt.
Mike has lived in the UK, Japan and the USA. Currently, he is based in Iowa with his wife and 2 young children. After working for many years as a writer and editor for a large corporation, he is now a freelancer. He has been fortunate enough to contribute to many books on Doctor Who over the last 20 years and is now concentrating on original sci-fi & fantasy short stories, with recent sales including Flame Tree, Uffda, and The Martian Wave. Also, look for his contribution on Blake's 7 to "You and Who Else", a charity anthology to be released later this year.
You can find him on Tumblr at https://www.tumblr.com/blog/culttvmike
