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Most of these kept the spirit and style of the original film, and were generally regarded as well-done expansions by fans in general. When Timothy Zahn's trilogy came out in 1991-1993, it was similar: most who read them really enjoyed them, and felt they remained faithful to the films, more or less. I mean this thing was huge, it was a smash hit, and it stayed on the New York Times Bestseller list for weeks and weeks--i dont think any EU novel has managed that since.
It was only in the mid and late 90's when the volume of material grew rapidly that a splintering of acceptance emerged. By 1995 there was like two dozen novels and an equal amount of simultaneously-running comic series. When it was just three or four novels things could remain faithful to the film and not seem tired--but by the mid-90's, the material within the EU was building its own exclusive universe that was slowly having less and less relation to the one portrayed in the movies. On top of that, while Lucasfilm was lucky in that the pre-1992 EU was generally decently-written, with the massive growth afterward the quality began to splinter again--some was well-done, much was adequet, and some of it was, frankly, horrible. It simply inevitable that these things would happen, its just a matter of numbers really. So thats where the EU splintering stems from. The PT was an extension of this, and of course the PT EU extended things even further. It has now resulted in a fictional universe that is often of a nature and style that is totally opposed to the original films, and so many people disregard it.
Personally, i love SOTME and the Zahn trilogy--SOTME is inconsistent with the original trilogy overall but it really does feel like a sequel to Star Wars, to the original film; this of course is because it was written as such, before any of the sequels were made. Similarly, Zahn's trilogy was written after the OT--it was the first post-ROTJ fiction and it really does capture the feel and style of the OT, and its expansions and elaborations feel like natural continuations of where ROTJ left off. Some of the EU afterwards is okay, but the vast majority of it is unappealing and poorly written, and the sheer quantity has now built a world that is totally unfamiliar to me.
