I was thinking about the sequel trilogy, you know, the last three movies of the nine-part series which would show a 50-year-old Luke Skywalker passing the torch on to a new hero Obi Wan-style. The movies Lucas says he'll never do now, much like how he'll never release the OOT on DVD. But anyway. I have read a little bit about what was originally planned for the sequel trilogy (ST). Two major elements according to what I had read were to be:
* The introduction of Luke's sister.
* A final confrontation with the Emperor.
As we all know, these two things were done in RotJ. So I was stymied for what to do in the ST. That and it would be difficult to introduce a whole new enemy at that point since it would need to tie into and somehow outdo the enemies that had gone before.
(I know of the New Jedi Order novels, but have never read any of them, so I don't know what's in them or if they're any good. Again, i'm sticking to what I know: the movies. In either case, I don't think I want to use the Solos. Why? Because, uh... Because they're dead. Yeah. They died of... mmm.. botulism. Yes. C3PO made them some bad Shrimp Louis and they all died horribly. "Oh, curse my metal body! Why didn't I read the experation date?" )
This, BTW, is one of the problems I had with the actual PT. It outdid the OT (original or SE) in several ways. Star Wars has a history of each episode outdoing the previous one, to show us something new and to up the ante. But the PT are supposed to be seen before the OT. So it doesn't quite work right. Things such as the double dong lightsabre and flying R2D2 and the martial arts swordfighting and especially General Grevious. I do like how Grevious foreshadows Darth Vader, but the CGI robot goy with four arms outdoes the tall guy dressed in all black.
However, while I think the PT should try not to outdo the OT, this is perfectly accceptible and even expected in the ST. Even the CGI would work, as far as I'm concerned. This means that I could use the double dong lightsabre and flying R2D2 and the martial arts swordfighting and, yes, even General Grevious in the ST.
But, this doesn't change that we have no villian left for the ST. Vader and the Emperor are dead. All that is left are some leftover Empire dudes, who are really too weak to make into a threat for a ST. It has to build. After confronting the Emperor of the Galaxy, a handfull of insurrectionist would be a let down.
However, as you may guess since I'm writing this post, inspiration came today. I actually don't have a nearly complete story arc worked out for this, unlike the PT above. Only a handful of ideas. Some of them may be good. But they do build on my PT ideas above. Maybe not so much as to not work with the actual PT, but a few names will pop up here and it might confuse those who don't realise that I'm also rewriting the PT. In any case, the ideas, starting with the big one:
An aging Luke has a young apprentice. I'm leaning towards a female apprentice, but I'm kind of working on an original idea like that, so maybe not. In either case, the apprentice is supposed to be the star of the show with Luke as a supporting character this time around. In any case, Luke gets separated from his apprentice at some point (This allows us the chance to see a young, unready Jedi rise to the occasion) and he is captured by the Lords of the Sith. It turns out the Sith were not ousted from power many years ago when the Republic was formed, but were actually the architects of the Republic. They had decided that it was better to be the power behind the throne and had been running things in the background all this time. When a Sith named Palpatine decided to seize power and bring back the glory days of the Sith Empire, the Sith sent the Cloan Armada (or Mandalorian Clone Armada?) to stop him. When that failed, they helped form the Rebel Alliance and eventually brought Palpatine down, restored the Republic, and went back to enjoying their position of manipulating things from behind the scenes.
This builds. In the OT, Palpatine was the face of ultimate evil, but here we learn he was just small potatoes compared to these guys. Especially their leader, Tyrranus (see? reusing names) who insists on calling Luke the Son of Vader, to his chagrin. It also ties all three trilogies together as it turns out the Sith were a present and active force, albeit unseen, in all 9 movies.
Luke's apprentice, meanwhile, gets involved in his (her?) own adventures and meets up with a man who calls himself Qui Gon Jin. This Qui Gon turns out to be like Don Quiote. That is, he's completely nuts and thinks he's a Jedi Knight. Qui Gon is followed by an alien whose life Qui Gon had save and now the alien owes him a life debt and basically has to keep chasing Qui gon around to keep him out of trouble. And that alien's name is... wait for it... Jar Jar Binks.
Yes, I actually would use Jar Jar. Call me crazy. But, keep in mind, this is not the same Jar Jar we all know and loathe. The actual jar jar was supposed to be comedy relief but he did little besides bumbling around and he got to add farting to the Star Wars cannon. This Jar Jar gets his humor from the interplay with the insane Qui Gon, which I think is more befitting Star Wars and likely to just be funny for a change. But then, if anyone could make Jar Jar Bink likable in any way, it would be a miracle.
The last idea I have may not fit the ST and may be better for a TV series or something. Basically, the galaxy gets invaded by aliens from Outside. As in outside this dimension. As in they are not part of the Force. Although, come to think of it, this may have been done by an EU book, but I don't think I actually read it. In either case, I would see these being as like Lovecraftian Horror type stuff.
Whether or not an actual plot come out of this material remains to be seen.