5 Reasons Disney's Star Wars Story Group Is A Good Thing (And 4 Reasons It's Not)

2. Retreading Old Ground

When the Story Group is done, big segments of the Star Wars timeline are likely going to be cleared out and ready for fresh stories. Fans that have already seen, read, or played through the events that follow Return Of The Jedi are going to have to find out all over again what happens after Return Of The Jedi. While this will hopefully lead to new and original material, the temptation will certainly be there for authors to put their own creative stamp on an existing story, the way J.J. Abrams took elements from The Wrath Of Khan to make Star Trek Into Darkness. While it is not being called a 'reboot' exactly, that is more or less what this new system will offer for new Star Wars authors. When Marvel launched the Ultimate Universe in the early 2000s, it was billed as a way for them to tell new stories free from the shackles of existing continuity. What we got instead was a universe populated by characters with minor differences from their original counterparts (Peter Parker works on the Daily Bugle Website), changes made just to grab headlines (Nick Fury is black now! He's also Sam Jackson, but that actually happened a little later), or Marvel taking a do-over on previous stories (I'm looking at you, Clone Saga). It took years before the Ultimate Universe began to get comfortable doing its own thing out from the shadow of its older brother. That is the trap that new Star Wars stories will have to struggle to avoid as Star Wars finds its direction for the future.