None Of The EU Is Canon For Future STAR WARS Films

Since Star Wars Episode VII will be taking place 30 years after the events of Return of the Jedi, it was clear that anything covered during that time period in the Expanded Universe (books, comics, video games, etc.) would be rendered non-canon. Fair enough. However, the EU encompasses more than just the post-ROTJ events. It’s got everything from Clone Wars adventures, tales of the Old Republic and even the formation of the Jedi Order.

For the future films, however, the EU events are out of the official timeline, according to producer Simon Kinberg.

You know, it’s not off-limits, and it’s certainly inspiring. I’m working on an animated show for [Lucasfilm] as well, Star Wars: Rebels, that will take inspiration from everywhere, but I know for the movies, the canon is the canon, and the canon is the six films that exist.

Kinberg also spoke about the Star Wars spinoff films in development, one of which is rumored to be a Boba Fett movie. He wouldn’t confirm whether Boba Fett was in development, though he did express his admiration of the character.

I’m definitely not allowed to talk about the content of the Star Wars stuff,” Kinberg said. “I can say that I’m a ridiculously huge fan, I love Boba Fett and I love, obviously, all of the characters in that world. For me, and I know it was true for J.J, and Larry Kasdan and Kathy Kennedy and Michael Arndt, it was all about honoring the original movies, and yet wanting to take a step forward, too, and tell a new story

Not following the EU would be understandable back when the prequel films were in production. At that point, aside from the Original Trilogy, the only EU materials were the Shadow of the Empire, the Thrawn trilogy and some other post-ROTJ books and comics. Drawing on the films is all they needed to do; but this isn’t the late 1990s anymore. The amount of stories in other media has skyrocketed, most notably the six-year Star Wars: The Clone Wars series and the upcoming Star Wars Rebels.

The last thing we would want is for these movies to be slaves to random books, video games or comics, but it’s not necessary to toss out all of the EU at once. Unless…maybe Disney is deliberately trying to destroy the legacy of the pre-Disney Star Wars EU so that they can replace it with their own EU. Those calculating bastards!

SOURCE: IGN