LogFAQs > #973592168

masterpug53 posted...

Yeah, I've long felt this was one of the fundamental problems with the franchise. The original Death Star is, right out of the gate, one of the coolest, most iconic, deadliest / most intimidating villainous threats that can be reasonably conceived...and it already gets blown up by the end of the first movie. Moving forward with the franchise, where the hell can you go from there in terms of establishing a new threat? Build another one? Build a bigger one? Attach a bunch of Death-Star rays to a fleet of starships? Will we reach a point where elite stormtroopers are marching around with Death-Star cannons on their shoulders?

Empire was thankfully able to skirt this dilemma by being the middle child of the trilogy, and thus wasn't yet burdened with the need to produce a big bad threat for the heroes to overcome and cap off the story.

Thats what the Extended Universe books got right. After they finished mopping up the Empire they moved on to a new threat. Alien empire from an unexplored part of galaxy invaded. They used evolutionary manipulation for their technology like their spaceships were space whales. Instead of repeating rebels in hiding versus oppressive government it was the New Republic being England trying to hold on as Germany was actively conquering every one else. The established Jedi Order struggled and debated with how much violence and aggression are they allowed to use while avoiding the dark side. It was different and it built on what original trilogy did. That was TFAs biggest problem. We started the new series by erasing every single accomplishment of original series instead of moving on to new threats. Smoke was place holder Palpatine cause JJ could literally think of nothing else. TLJ for all its problems at least tried to do something new.