I’m about seventy pages into Jedi Eclipse. Now this is more like it.
I went into Jedi Eclipse with some trepidation, as I really didn’t get along with Hero’s Trial. Fortunately everything I didn’t like about the first book in this dualogy seems to have been addressed in the second. Characters are believable. It feels like a war is going on. The story is engaging. Han isn’t such an douche-bag. Fandom’s praise for Luceno is well deserved.
The contrast in my reactions to the books though are especially interesting, given the news that Lawrence Kasdan may be working on a spin-off movie and not Episode VIII. Hero’s Trial is about as close to a spin-off as you can get in Star Wars. Everyone except Han is reduced to cameo roles. Not even his wife gets more than a handful of scenes. Hero’s Trial is primarily a book about Han, as he grieves over the death of Chewbacca.
Yet, without The Force, the Republic, the Jedi, the Imperial fleet and all the other aspects that add up to a Star Wars adventure, it’s lacking. A large part of my issue with Hero‘s Trial is the terrible characterisation, but even if Han was written perfectly I wonder if I’d still be more interested in the war taking place that the fate of the galaxy rested upon?
Put another way, imagine what would have ensured if George Lucas had suddenly decided after The Empire Strikes back that Episode VI would have to wait a while, because he was going to make a spin-off adventure about Boba Fett. Star Wars is epic and grandiose. Spin-off movies doesn’t feel right.
Star Wars to me is about mystical Jedi, great space battles, thrilling lightsaber fights, good versus evil, morality, dashing rogues and feisty princesses. As I’ve said previously, characterisation is important. But I’m not sure that the parts of Star Wars are worth more than its sum.
That said, if this leads to a Mara Jade movie, then colour me convinced.
Delusions Of Grandeur 