Before you freak out on Pablo for having a sense of humor, here’s what he said later: “Theorize all you want! It’s cool! Just keep it out of my timeline.”The ‘Your Snoke Theory Sucks’ sticker by the Steele Wars podcast seems to be quite the hit out of London last weekend, spotted in the hands of both Pablo Hidalgo and Rian Johnson. Steele Saunders even talked to Inverse about them, and why they proved to be so popular. Not at the con? You can still get your own in both sticker and t-shirt form.
→ IGN’s Daniel Krupa takes a look at the 6 classic movies that Episode VIII director Rian Johnson encouraged his cast and crew to watch, and how they might influence the upcoming film.
The novel begins “with his first encounter with the Empire,” and ends just before his Rebels debut, Zahn says. (A new take on Outbound Flight, maybe?)
Zahn also reveals just how much he’s seen of the Rebels appearance (about as much as we did) and whether we can expect anything from his Legends books.
Grand Admiral Thrawn was revealed as a villain in Star Wars Rebels S3, and that’s not even the whole of it. Timothy Zahn – who gave his blessing to the Rebels version via video – is writing a canon Thrawn novel that’ll be out in April 2017.
The Rebels Thrawn is being voiced by Lars Mikkelsen, Mads Mikkelsen’s brother.
Thrawn, who originated in Zahn’s Heir to the Empire in 1991, is the first Legends character to make the jump to the new canon.
When asked if Mara Jade could be next, Filoni was fairly straightforward: “No, not likely.” (I am, for the record, more than okay with that.) Filoni also said that the ysalamiri aren’t making the leap to canon, although there are some visual nods to them in the production design of Thrawn’s introduction.
On his Facebook, Zahn said he’s just turned in the first draft of the novel.
The trailer also featured Wedge Antilles and a Force sensitive character named Bendu, who’s being voiced by Fourth Doctor Tom Baker. For more on everything else about Rebels S3, head to StarWars.com.
Two episodes were show (but not livestreamed) and you can read one review, with some spoilers, over at io9.
Filoni and Lucasfilm’s Kiri Hart talk about how the show makes Thrawn work on Sunday, comparing him to Vader as a villain: “We want to treat him like a big time villain, as much as Darth Vader,” Filoni said. “But on the strategic, military side of things.”
Making Star Wars is reporting that a big – and actually surprising – cameo is on the way for Rebels season 3. It’s so big and surprising that I’m actually going to a cut to discuss it.
On the latest Full of Sith, Bryan Young caught up with Timothy Zahn at Origins this weekend, and got him to pronounce some of the names from his Star Wars books.
It’s not too long an episode, for various reasons – Our condolences go out to co-host Mike Pilot and family for the loss of their dog last week.
I would certainly be interested in writing more Star Wars. I presume LFL wouldn’t simply give me carte blanche, but would want something specific (a spin-off from Ep 7, maybe, or some backstory filler).
If they really let me do whatever I wanted, I have a couple of ideas (all right: 20-30) in mind. But all of that depends on them.
I wasn’t going to address this topic. But since so many of you have asked:
What the “non-canon” announcement by LFL means is that they aren’t going to be bound by the Expanded Universe books, comics, and games as they plan their new movies. Realistically, that’s something they had to do — the EU is just too big, complicated, and occasionally contradictory for them to have to deal with.
However, I’m guessing that EU stories that aren’t referenced (or contradicted) by the sequel movies will still be considered sort-of alive, in the same way that most Clone Wars-era stories (like Outbound Flight) were mostly unaffected, with the exception being all of the previous material on Boba Fett’s backstory.
Alternatively, if the new movies do contradict my books in some way, I can probably come up with some hand-waving story that will explain the apparent discrepancy. If there’s one thing we authors are good at, it’s hand-waving.
Not only was I given no input to Mara’s fate, I wasn’t even told about it until a couple of months before publication.
If I had been offered a say, though, I’d have argued against it. My vision of Star Wars is good vs evil, with the heroes struggling to win, and the major characters making it through. (Otherwise, either Lando or Wedge would have died inside the second Death Star.)
For the record, this isn’t just because Mara was my creation. I’d have argued against killing Chewbacca for the same reason.
Yuletide, the annual rare-fandoms fanfic gift exchange, had a rule change this year that suddenly made it relevant to our interests – they allowed requests from lesser-ficed parts of large fandoms like Star Wars. So, for the first time, we’re seeing Star Wars fanfics among the offerings. 32 of them, in fact, including a whooping 13 X-Wing fics. Other requests included the Thrawn trilogy and The Old Republic.
EU-based fanfic has never been exactly rare, but it does tend to focus on the big ‘ships (ahem) so if you’ve been looking for something a little different, check out the listings. The authors are all currently anonymous, but will be revealed on January 1st, per Yuletide tradition.
Fan art. Lucasfilm may not have revealed what (most) of the Rebels character design will look like yet, ENGELHA5T on DeviantArt has created several OT-era characters in the style of The Clone Wars. Of particular interest to us would be Mara Jade, but there’s also Han and Chewie, Thrawn and Pellaeon, a teen Leia and even a Luke, may of them with cardbacks as well. You can check out his full gallery, but be warned it does contain some more adult works, though they do seem to be hidden if you’re not logged in to DA.
Del Rey. We actually heard about it way back at Celebration, but now Del Rey has officially announced their Star Wars Action Team. It’s not quite up and running yet, but the general gist is that you “spread the word” and get points. Please don’t break down any doors. On that note, here’s some of the swag they’ll have at SDCC.
A small thing that I never would have anticipated, and never even knew before I was invited to a Star Wars convention in Munich: The “thr” combination apparently doesn’t exist in German, or so I was told. German Star Wars fans therefore have terrific difficulty pronouncing Thrawn’s name.
Pronunciation issues are fairly common in these books, even in English: Is it Mar-uh or Mare-ah? (Trust me: It’s Mar-uh.) How do you say C’baoth? Fey’lya? Damn apostrophes.
Heir to the Empire: 20th Anniversary Edition will be out in hardcover June 28.
StarWars.com has revealed that the Heir to the Empire anniversary edition will feature annotations and an exclusive short story featuring Grand Admiral Thrawn. (Naturally.)
Grand Admiral Thrawn was revealed as a villain in Star Wars Rebels S3, and that’s not even the whole of it. Timothy Zahn – who gave his blessing to the Rebels version via video – is writing a canon Thrawn novel that’ll be out in April 2017.
Although 
Fan art. Lucasfilm may not have revealed what (