Star Wars canon: Difference between revisions

The Star Wars canon refers to the collection of media considered officially part of the Star Wars canon. Details regarding characters and events reflect the official depictions of the Star Wars story-line throughout the franchise.

The official Star Wars canon consists of the six released Star Wars theatrical feature films, the Star Wars animated film and television series The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, and every other material released after April 25, 2014, unless otherwise stated. The upcoming feature film Star Wars: The Force Awakens (along with the untitled Episode VIII and Episode IX) will also be a part of the official canon.

On April 25, 2014, Lucasfilm officially revised and solidified the canon, stating that all previously released Expanded Universe works would be re-branded under the new Star Wars Legends banner and considered non-canon, in order to ensure a flowing timeline with the release of the Star Wars sequel trilogy. They also announced that future Star Wars stories will be considered on equal canon level with the films, with guidance coming from the Star Wars story group.

History

When the Star Wars saga began, there was no initial formal organization of canon. The films, novelizations, comic books, newspaper comic strips, radio dramas, and spin-off novels were produced, but no standards of canon were set by George Lucas or Lucasfilm, Ltd..

With the creation of new Star Wars novels in early 1991 with Timothy Zahn's Heir to the Empire, the publishing department at Lucas Licensing set out with a new publishing strategy. Instead of stand-alone books where the events of one did not influence another, the new novels would tie-in to a continuous storyline. In the words of Lucas Licensing's managing editor Sue Rostoni, "Our goal is to present a continuous and unified history of the Star Wars galaxy, insofar as that history does not conflict with, or undermine the meaning of Mr. Lucas's Star Wars saga of films and screenplays."

Over the years, many Star Wars fans have wondered whether these books and other materials were part of Lucas's Star Wars storyline, or were merely optional filler material. While there are disputes among fans about what is and isn't canon, Lucas Licensing has established an internal primary canon policy which consists of the six films and animated Star Wars series only.

Disney acquisition, canon revision and Star Wars Legends

On October 30, 2012, Lucasfilm was sold to The Walt Disney Company for $4.05 billion. After the acquisition, Disney and Lucasfilm established Lucasfilm Story Group, a committee whose job is to keep track of and define the "canon" in an effort to unify the films, comics, and other media with the existing canon.

On April 25, 2014, Lucasfilm and Disney removed all Expanded Universe works from the canon. They announced that the existing six films and The Clone Wars television series are the "immovable objects" of Star Wars storytelling. Previously published material has been relabeled under a "Legends" label, and future content will present a different vision of people, places and events after Return of the Jedi. They also announced that all future Star Wars stories will be connected and on equal canon level as the films, with guidance coming from the Star Wars story group. Additionally, it was announced that the films of the sequel trilogy will not follow the same story as that of the Expanded Universe works taking place after the events of Return of the Jedi.

The first official canon novel in the revised continuity was Star Wars: A New Dawn by John Jackson Miller, which is a prequel novel to Star Wars Rebels. It was released September 2, 2014.

Determining canonicity

The Star Wars canon was first defined in a 1994 interview with Lucas Licensing's Sue Rostoni and Allan Kausch in issue #23 of the Star Wars Insider:.

Gospel, or canon as we refer to it, includes the screenplays, the films, the radio dramas and the novelizations. These works spin out of George Lucas' original stories, the rest are written by other writers. However, between us, we've read everything, and much of it is taken into account in the overall continuity. The entire catalog of published works comprises a vast history—with many off-shoots, variations and tangents—like any other well-developed mythology.

This policy has been further refined and fleshed out over the years. The official Star Wars website has also detailed the role of canon, Expanded Universe, or "EU" sources, and how they fit into overall Star Wars continuity. In a 2001 "Ask the Jedi Council" response by Steve Sansweet (director of fan relations) and Chris Cerasi (an editor for Lucas Books at the time), it was stated that:

When it comes to absolute canon, the real story of Star Wars, you must turn to the films themselves—and only the films. Even novelizations are interpretations of the film, and while they are largely true to George Lucas' vision (he works quite closely with the novel authors), the method in which they are written does allow for some minor differences. The novelizations are written concurrently with the film's production, so variations in detail do creep in from time to time. Nonetheless, they should be regarded as very accurate depictions of the fictional Star Wars movies.

The further one branches away from the movies, the more interpretation and speculation come into play. LucasBooks works diligently to keep the continuing Star Wars expanded universe cohesive and uniform, but stylistically, there is always room for variation. Not all artists draw Luke Skywalker the same way. Not all writers define the character in the same fashion. The particular attributes of individual media also come into play. A comic book interpretation of an event will likely have less dialogue or different pacing than a novel version. A video game has to take an interactive approach that favors gameplay. So too must card and roleplaying games ascribe certain characteristics to characters and events in order to make them playable.

The analogy is that every piece of published Star Wars fiction is a window into the 'real' Star Wars universe. Some windows are a bit foggier than others. Some are decidedly abstract. But each contains a nugget of truth to them.

In a December 6, 2006 post on the official Star Wars forums, Leland Chee ("keeper" of the Holocron) made this comment in response to a question regarding whether Sansweet's "foggy window" was a window into the "real Star Wars Universe of the Films Only" or the "Star Wars Universe of the Films + EU continuity":

Film+EU continuity. Anything not in the current version of the films is irrelevant to Film only continuity.

The Holocron

Main article: Holocron

By 1996, Licensing kept an in-house bible of reference materials as the volume of publications, facts, and figures grew to such unwieldy proportions that it became difficult to know everything relevant to a particular project. They finally decided something had to be done to organize the increasingly large collection of media which chronicled the Star Wars universe. A system of canon was developed that organized the materials into what was and wasn't fit for the Star Wars story.

In 2000, Lucas Licensing appointed Leland Chee to create a continuity tracking database referred to as the "Holocron". As with every other aspect having to do with the overall story of Star Wars, the Holocron follows the canon policy that has been in effect for years.

The Holocron is divided into five levels (in order of precedence): G-canon, T-canon, C-canon, S-canon, and N-canon. These levels are no longer in use after April 25, 2014.

G-canon is George Lucas canon: Considered absolute canon, it includes Episodes I–VII (the most recently released versions), and any statements by George Lucas (including unpublished production notes from him or his production department that are never seen by the public). Elements originating with Lucas in the scripts, filmed deleted scenes, movie novelizations, reference books, radio plays, and other primary sources are also G-canon when not in contradiction with the released films. G-canon overrides the lower levels of canon when there is a contradiction.

T-canon is Television canon: refers to the canon level comprising only the animated film Star Wars: The Clone Wars and the television series Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Its precedence over C-Level canon was confirmed by Chee.

C-canon is Continuity canon: consisting of materials from the Expanded Universe including books, comics, and games bearing the label of Star Wars. Games and RPG sourcebooks are a special case; the stories and general background information are themselves fully C-canon, but the other elements such as character/item statistics and gameplay are, with few exceptions, N-canon.

S-canon is Secondary canon: covering the same medium as C-canon, it is immediately superseded by anything in higher levels of canon in any place where two elements contradict each other. The non-contradicting elements are still a canon part of the Star Wars universe. This includes certain elements of a few N-canon stories.

N-canon is Non-canon: "What-if" stories (such as stories published under the Star Wars: Infinities label), crossover appearances (such as the Star Wars character appearances in Soulcalibur IV), game statistics, and anything else directly contradicted by higher canon ends up here. N-canon is the only level that is not considered official canon by Lucasfilm. Any published material that contradicts things established in G-canon and T-canon is considered N-canon.

List of Star Wars canon

Included is a list of Star Wars canon as released by Kathleen Kennedy and the Star Wars Story Group. The new canon is streamlined in that it no longer creates confusion among fans. It has been stated that from here out, if content is released it is considered canon.

List of Star Wars canon
Release date	In-universe timeline	Title	Type of media
May 1999	32 BBY	The Phantom Menace	Movie
May 2002	22 BBY	Attack of the Clones	Movie
November 2003	20 BBY	Clone Wars	TV series
August 2008	20 BBY	The Clone Wars	Movie
October 2008	20 BBY	The Clone Wars	TV series
May 2005	19 BBY	Revenge of the Sith	Movie
July 2015	19 BBY	Dark Disciple	Young adult novel
April 2015	18 BBY	Kanan the Last Padawan	Comic
November 2014	14 BBY	Tarkin	Novel
April 2015	14 BBY	Lords of the Sith	Novel
October 2015	14 BBY	Rise of the Empire	Novel
September 2014	11 BBY	A New Dawn	Novel
December 2018	10 BBY	Unnamed Han Solo prequel	Movie
October 2014	5 BBY	Rebels	TV series
December 2016	1 BBY	Rogue One	Movie
May 1977	0 BBY	A New Hope	Movie
November 2015	1 ABY	Battlefront: Twilight Company	Novel
March 2015	1 ABY	Princess Leia	Comic
February 2015	1 ABY	Darth Vader	Comic
March 2015	1 ABY	Heir to the Jedi	Novel
January 2015	1 ABY	Marvel's Star Wars	Comic
October 2015	1 ABY	Chewbacca	Comic
November 2015	1 ABY	Vader Down	Comic
July 2015	1 ABY	Lando	Comic
September 2015	2 ABY	Weapon of the Jedi	Young adult novel
September 2015	2 ABY	Smuggler's Run	Young adult novel
May 1980	3 ABY	The Empire Strikes Back	Movie
May 1983	4 ABY	Return of the Jedi	Movie
December 2015	4 ABY	Uprising	Video game
September 2015	4 ABY	Moving Target	Young adult novel
September 2015	5 ABY	Lost Stars	Young adult novel
September 2015	5 ABY	Aftermath	Novel
September 2015	5 ABY	Shattered Empire	Comic
December 2015	34 ABY	The Force Awakens	Movie
December 2015	34 ABY	Battlefront	Video game
May 2017	35 ABY	Episode VIII	Movie
May 2019	36 ABY	Episode IX	Movie

External links

• "Continuity, Canon, and Apocrypha" at Curtis Saxton's Star Wars: Technical Commentaries
• "The Star Wars Canon: Overview" at CanonWars.com
• Star Wars Canon on the Wookieepedia