Does the Star Wars Disney Era Have a Continuity Lock-Out Problem?

[phantom000]

This is becoming something of an issue with the current MCU. The idea of different stories set in the same universe with characters that can cross paths with one another, does offer a lot of opportunities for telling larger stories but as a result the stories become less self-contained.

I honestly enjoyed Doctor Strange in The Multiverse of Madness but unless you have seen WandaVision you probably won't be able to understand a lot of the character motivations, especially for the main villain, as they are tied very much to the events of that series.

This is not a new problem with movies, a lot of franchises have films that aren't self contained. Look at The Lord of The Rings; each film does have a story structure (beginning, middle and end) but second and third films pick up right where the previous left off so if you haven't seen them Return of The King can feel like you started a film half way. This is one of the issue with the Rankin Bass version, that it feels like we missed half the story.

So far the MCU has managed to keep this to a minimum while still connecting the different films. One example is Ant-Man and The Wasp, which starts with the hero, Scott Lang, is under house arrest. Why he is under house arrest is because of what happened in another film, but what is important to this film is that Lang has to maintain the illusion of being at home while helping Pym and his daughter. The movie is not exactly self-contained but it is stand-alone, which makes it enjoyable on its own while also connecting it to the wider continuity.

A New Hope is another film that does this beautifully because it sees itself as fitting into a wider continuity while still telling a complete story; Leia says her father and Obi-won fought together in the Clone Wars, Han Solo having worked for Jabba, the recent victory by the Rebel Alliance. These are not vital to the plot itself because the details are unimportant but they do explains elements within the plot; Why does Leia ask Obi-won for help, why is Han so desperate to earn some money, why is the Empire going to such lengths to destroy the alliance?

Disney, sadly, seems to have learned the exact opposite lesson, rather than using little throw away details to build new stories or using small tie ins to explain details or plot holes they are designing large scale stories with plot holes in them so they will have an excuse just to make an entire film which they can market as 'the missing piece.'

[McAvoy]

Ehh the Sequel Trilogy just flat out had no plan. That is it.

If from the beginning there was a plan in some form of how each character would progress, we wouldn't be having this talk. Not even storyline wise, just showing each character having their story arc in the trilogy.

Even with the prequels as bad as the setup, the story and dialogue was, you could see there was a progression of the principle characters. Outside Padme of course. Lucas did drop the ball on her at least with the third film.

But Disney came in knowing full well there will be three movies for this story. Instead they did the opposite of making a coherent trilogy.

What should have been done was in the very beginning create a outline for the trilogy, character arcs, stories, world building, themes etc.

So no there isnt a Lock out.

You could argue there is a lock out for non Jedi versus Sith stories.

[Thebestoftherest]

One thing I have a problem with that the whole series outside of the trilogies revolved around the clone wars CGI cartoon except that show is kinda a mess.

[Winter]

One thing I have a problem with that the whole series outside of the trilogies revolved around the clone wars CGI cartoon except that show is kinda a mess.

I only partly agree with that as I would say that Season 1 is a bit tonally messy, season 1 is better but not by much and the first half of season 3 is a WHAT IS THIS TIMELINE?!?!

However, starting from the second half of season 3 the show gets a lot better and is easier to follow.

[hammerofglass]

That's what happens when you put the crew in charge of the Clone Wars cartoon in charge of every other series. They like their original characters and plotlines so they keep on using them.

[Thebestoftherest]

One thing I have a problem with that the whole series outside of the trilogies revolved around the clone wars CGI cartoon except that show is kinda a mess.

I only partly agree with that as I would say that Season 1 is a bit tonally messy, season 1 is better but not by much and the first half of season 3 is a WHAT IS THIS TIMELINE?!?!

However, starting from the second half of season 3 the show gets a lot better and is easier to follow.

Doesn't help that you need to do homework to know what going on because it anyone guess when the episodes take place in continuity to each other. I once saw an episode where two characters were having a debate both of whom I saw get murder earlier.

[Winter]

One thing I have a problem with that the whole series outside of the trilogies revolved around the clone wars CGI cartoon except that show is kinda a mess.

I only partly agree with that as I would say that Season 1 is a bit tonally messy, season 1 is better but not by much and the first half of season 3 is a WHAT IS THIS TIMELINE?!?!

However, starting from the second half of season 3 the show gets a lot better and is easier to follow.

Doesn't help that you need to do homework to know what going on because it anyone guess when the episodes take place in continuity to each other. I once saw an episode where two characters were having a debate both of whom I saw get murder earlier.

I can't fully agree on that, because even with the messed up order of the episodes in the first half of season 3, I could still follow what was going on in each episode as a standalone story. You don't need to see any episode in any order to understand what is happening. The problem is more when you're watching it altogether and the whole thing is this jumbled mess and it is so typical of the Lucas Era to try something like this.

And there in lies a strange positive for me, The Lucas Era was willing to do insane shit like this. You can have a jumbled mess in one part and have a coherent story with few to no confusing timeline within the same series. And yet still get several episodes that could stand on it's own.

[Meushell]

And there in lies a strange positive for me, The Lucas Era was willing to do insane shit like this. You can have a jumbled mess in one part and have a coherent story with few to no confusing timeline within the same series. And yet still get several episodes that could stand on it's own.

If they weren’t willing to do that, we wouldn’t have had a Domino Squad origin story. That alone is worth the episodes being out of order.

[Thebestoftherest]

And there in lies a strange positive for me, The Lucas Era was willing to do insane shit like this. You can have a jumbled mess in one part and have a coherent story with few to no confusing timeline within the same series. And yet still get several episodes that could stand on it's own.

If they weren’t willing to do that, we wouldn’t have had a Domino Squad origin story. That alone is worth the episodes being out of order.

Except wouldn't the story be better if we knew why they matter before showing one die.

[McAvoy]

Star Wars Clone Wars being used as a basis for storylines outside the ST doesn't bother me. I did watch the series long ago but never finished it at the time.

There was really nothing in Mandalorian where I was totally clueless about a character. You start off clueless with each new character anyway.

It wasnt until earlier this year I went through the whole series from start to finish.

Was there really any mention of the Clone Wars or Rebels in the Sequel Trilogy? I don't recall. Not watching the two shows doesn't take away anything from Boba Fett or the Mandalorian.