What do you LIKE about the EU? — Page 19

Anchorhead said:

Thank you, and I genuflect at your knowledge.  ;-)

DuracellEnergizer said:

captainsolo said:

I revisited TPM, and have now jumped back into my EU collection.

<img src="http://images.wikia.com/ru.starwars/images/2/21/Jedi_Apprentice_-_The_Rising_Force.jpg" width="199" height="292" />

Jedi Apprentice #1. This is the reason I don't despise the Prequels completely. The single best thing to come out of Ep. I-III. In this first book, 13 year old Obi-Wan is being thrown out of the Jedi Temple. He has reached the age where not being taken as an apprentice can no longer become a Jedi. He is to be a farmer.

Yes it's a kids book. It's better than most if not all the post Zahn adult EU. Still reads well today.

It works, it feels like Star Wars, the characters are well developed, and it only gets better. Book #2 pits Qui-Gon against his former apprentice who turned to the Dark side...these books really get darker as they go along, with surprising plot turns and virtually every bit of Obi-Wan's character is born then scrutinized then developed. Qui-Gon's past, war, turmoil, love interests, siege, genocide, depression, resignation, society, slavery and the list goes on...

And in the end of Book #1, Obi-Wan still has an uncertain future! Pre-OT tension? Yay!

Heck, I'm gonna re-read all 20. Damn well written, fun books. The first one has a different author than the other 19, so it's a bit rougher. 2-20 are exceptional.

10 training lightsabers out of 10 conniving Hutts, Togorian pirates and Yoda schemes.

 

I read most of these books back in the day, and really liked them. Most of them were written before the worst prequelisms from AOTC & ROTS were established, which adds to their appeal.

doubleofive said:

Anchorhead said:

Thank you, and I genuflect at your knowledge.  ;-)

Thanks. It was one of those surprising things that may have actually been planned out from the beginning, but ends up not really. Like Owen being Obi-wan's brother, still makes more sense to me than step-families in a galaxy far far away. Owen would be mad at Obi-wan for not only getting his friend Anakin killed (I think they would have been childhood friends), but pawns this baby off on him and disappears in the desert.

DuracellEnergizer said:

captainsolo said:

I revisited TPM, and have now jumped back into my EU collection.

Jedi Apprentice #1. This is the reason I don't despise the Prequels completely. The single best thing to come out of Ep. I-III. In this first book, 13 year old Obi-Wan is being thrown out of the Jedi Temple. He has reached the age where not being taken as an apprentice can no longer become a Jedi. He is to be a farmer.

Yes it's a kids book. It's better than most if not all the post Zahn adult EU. Still reads well today.

It works, it feels like Star Wars, the characters are well developed, and it only gets better. Book #2 pits Qui-Gon against his former apprentice who turned to the Dark side...these books really get darker as they go along, with surprising plot turns and virtually every bit of Obi-Wan's character is born then scrutinized then developed. Qui-Gon's past, war, turmoil, love interests, siege, genocide, depression, resignation, society, slavery and the list goes on...

And in the end of Book #1, Obi-Wan still has an uncertain future! Pre-OT tension? Yay!

Heck, I'm gonna re-read all 20. Damn well written, fun books. The first one has a different author than the other 19, so it's a bit rougher. 2-20 are exceptional.

10 training lightsabers out of 10 conniving Hutts, Togorian pirates and Yoda schemes.

 

I read most of these books back in the day, and really liked them. Most of them were written before the worst prequelisms from AOTC & ROTS were established, which adds to their appeal.

Yeah, these books were really underappreciated. Probably the young adult stigma, but they really go a long way towards making TPM-era Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon very interesting characters. They really changed the way I look at the characters now for the better.

Books 2 and 3 in the Jedi Apprentice series.

Book 2:

Qui-Gon Jinn's past is not at rest. How can he forge a bond with young Obi-Wan Kenobi while he is haunted by the betrayal of his first apprentice Xanatos? Xanatos was also a promising student, until the dark side of the Force intervened. Qui-Gon thought he was gone forever.
But now Xanatos is back. And he wants revenge.

Simple, brilliant story and great action. 4 dark former apprentices out of 4 boys not wanting to be farmers.

Book 3:

After Obi-Wan Kenobi and Qui-Gon Jinn are hijacked to the planet Phindar, they find themselves trapped in a world gone mad. The ruling Syndicat controls the people by erasing their memories. The planet's only hope lies with a band of thieving rebels.
Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are caught in a mind war. And if they're not careful, their own pasts will be wiped out forever.

Interconnects with Book 2, just as that book interconnected with the first book. Great plot device in the Jedi being hijacked to a planet in dire need of their help. Fantastic subplot about the Padawan birthday gift (Qui-Gon gives Obi-Wan something a little...unexpected) and the villain weapon of the human memory wipe is great writing.

4 "Not so's" out of 4 "maybe I lie's"

As others have said these books give much needed depth to the Prequel setting and characters.

I've taken a break and randomly jumped into The Truce at Bakura.

Aayla Secura.

Quick, I need a sock!

The newest fate of the jedi book was even worse than the last one, ascension is a giant pile of horse crap..

Cannot wait to see how Troy screws up the ending in the last book apocalypse.

This book series was so bad it makes the NJO, the bug trilogy and legacy of the force tolerable by comparison, if you forget they killed off so many characters in those books.

Traviss may have not been my favorite writer but at least she could write star wars. Her replacement does not fit star wars well at all, after all Christie Golden is a star trek writer.

She wrote one good book out of 3 not bad for a newcomer, for Allston to write 2 out of 3 bad ones is inexcusable and he did so in this 9 book series.

I just picked up Jedi Search yesterday and I ended up reading half the book in one sitting.  Minus Lando's excursion to the blob races, I think it's pretty kick ass.  This will be the first EU book I've read minus the graphic novel adaptation of the Thrawn Trilogy.

After I finish Jedi Academy and go back and read the regular Thrawn Trilogy, I was thinking about skipping on ahead to Hand of Thrawn.  Are there any other books in between that people would recommend or are they pretty much all crap as I've heard?

TV's Frink said:

Darth Bizarro said:

Lando's excursion to the blob races

What?

Get ready for this...

Wookieepedia said:

A blob race was a bizarre contest of speed between protoplasmic, gelatinous Umgullian blobs through a course of obstacles—from fine mesh screens to a bed of nails. It was a major betting sport in Umgul City on the planet Umgul. The syrupy masses, usually grayish green but laced with bright hues, rolled, slithered, and oozed their way through. Cheating on the races was punishable by death.

and

Wookieepedia said:

The typical blob was a base color of sickly green. Most, however, were patterned with vivid spots and stripes. There were many subspecies of blob, some bred for racing, some bred as domestic pets and some even for medicinal purposes. All, however, consisted almost solely of a large mass of jelly-like fluid encased in a thin membrane. This membrane was thin enough to let the moisture of Umgul's foggy atmosphere to pass through. This skin also had the ability to break and then reform instantly. This allowed the blob to split into two new blobs. These new blobs would behave exactly like the original blob until, at any point, they were able to re-merge into one. This was also how the blobs reproduced; when a blob grew to the appropriate size, it would divide into two equal, smaller blobs, like giant amoebae

and finally...

Wookieepdia said:

Along with C-3PO and R2-D2, [Lando] was led to the Umgullian Blob races in search of the possible Force-sensitive. The individual they were searching for, Dack (also known as Tymmo), turned out to be a cheater on the blob races instead of a Force-sensitive, and Calrissian helped expose him. When Calrissian went to confront Tymmo at the blob stables, he found that the man had planted something on one of the blobs. Tymmo did not take kindly to being discovered and a short firefight at the corral ensued before security forces arrived to subdue him. Rather than suffer the usual death penalty for cheating, Tymmo was returned to his wife Mistal, the Duchess of Dargul. As a reward for Calrissian's help in returning her husband, Mistal gave him one million credits.

So... now you know.

timdiggerm said:

TV's Frink said:

Darth Bizarro said:

Lando's excursion to the blob races

What?

Get ready for this...

Wookieepedia said:

A blob race was a bizarre contest of speed between protoplasmic, gelatinous Umgullian blobs through a course of obstacles—from fine mesh screens to a bed of nails. It was a major betting sport in Umgul City on the planet Umgul. The syrupy masses, usually grayish green but laced with bright hues, rolled, slithered, and oozed their way through. Cheating on the races was punishable by death.

and

Wookieepedia said:

The typical blob was a base color of sickly green. Most, however, were patterned with vivid spots and stripes. There were many subspecies of blob, some bred for racing, some bred as domestic pets and some even for medicinal purposes. All, however, consisted almost solely of a large mass of jelly-like fluid encased in a thin membrane. This membrane was thin enough to let the moisture of Umgul's foggy atmosphere to pass through. This skin also had the ability to break and then reform instantly. This allowed the blob to split into two new blobs. These new blobs would behave exactly like the original blob until, at any point, they were able to re-merge into one. This was also how the blobs reproduced; when a blob grew to the appropriate size, it would divide into two equal, smaller blobs, like giant amoebae

and finally...

Wookieepdia said:

Along with C-3PO and R2-D2, [Lando] was led to the Umgullian Blob races in search of the possible Force-sensitive. The individual they were searching for, Dack (also known as Tymmo), turned out to be a cheater on the blob races instead of a Force-sensitive, and Calrissian helped expose him. When Calrissian went to confront Tymmo at the blob stables, he found that the man had planted something on one of the blobs. Tymmo did not take kindly to being discovered and a short firefight at the corral ensued before security forces arrived to subdue him. Rather than suffer the usual death penalty for cheating, Tymmo was returned to his wife Mistal, the Duchess of Dargul. As a reward for Calrissian's help in returning her husband, Mistal gave him one million credits.

So... now you know.

The whole time I was reading it, I kept thinking of playing Mercury on the PSP.

I'm surprised you read it, to be honest. I thought it was too long.

but sometimes disaster must be appreciated.

Darth Bizarro said:

I just picked up Jedi Search yesterday and I ended up reading half the book in one sitting.  Minus Lando's excursion to the blob races, I think it's pretty kick ass.  This will be the first EU book I've read minus the graphic novel adaptation of the Thrawn Trilogy.

After I finish Jedi Academy and go back and read the regular Thrawn Trilogy, I was thinking about skipping on ahead to Hand of Thrawn.  Are there any other books in between that people would recommend or are they pretty much all crap as I've heard?

Are you reading the rest of the Jedi Search trilogy?  You sort of have to now...

The short answer to your question is 'no.'  The slightly longer answer- you can do worse than Children of the Jedi.  And the Black Fleet Crisis had some good moments.  But mostly bad. 

Not sure if I've posted in this thread before... *says "some of the video games" to make this post on-topic enough to post the internet gifs I've found for the quotes I'm quoting.*

theprequelsrule said:

Aayla Secura.

Quick, I need a sock!

TV's Frink said:

Not the Image of the Day

The problem is that I always get the mediocre ones mixed up.

I think that perhaps the best EU product is the video game KOTOR 2 ( despite the final 10% of the game being a rushed, unfinished mess). It has probably the best writing you will find in any Star Wars product, including the original films.