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S01E11: Hygiene with the High Republic!
49 Plays1 year ago
The Acolyte is set during the time period of the High Republic... so what does THAT mean? Join Bob as he talks with his friend Paul Finley about this new/old time period in Star Wars history.
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Transcript
Introduction and Acolyte Overview
00:00:08
Speaker
Welcome back to the Star Wars Cleaning Crew. You know, we are in a good time for Star Wars fans. We are right in the middle of the Acolyte, the new show on Disney Plus, which as we said a couple of times before, it's set in the period of the High Republic, which is a timeline a couple hundred years before any of the movies that we've seen before. The High Republic was mostly appearing in books and comic books that Lucasfilm has released over the last couple of years.
Understanding the High Republic Context
00:00:35
Speaker
But what do you need to know about the High Republic in order to enjoy the Acolyte? Well, you don't really need to know anything. You can go into this and not know anything about the period. But if you are interested, if it's intriguing you, if you're wondering what is this deal with the Star Wars where
00:00:54
Speaker
The Jedi wear these gold tunics and there's no sight of any storm troopers or anything. Where do you begin to explore? So I called my friend Paul Finley, who probably knows more about the Star Wars book scene than any of my other friends to come and give us a little bit of a briefing of what could you know? It's not what you need to know, but what could you know about the High Republic to get a little bit more out of that acolyte? So here's my conversation with Paul. Really, what I wanted to talk about was the new hotness in books and publishing, which is the High Republic. yeah It's hot. Right. And because the Acolyte, the current show that is playing on Disney Plus, is set in the area era of the High Republic, I thought that our listeners who might not be so familiar with the story might need a little bit of a briefing. So ah what what can you tell us about the High Republic? what Set up the story for us for somebody who is just getting into the Acolyte?
00:01:50
Speaker
well for For one thing, the acolyte is filling a gap in the Star Wars timeline that has hardly been touched before. ah It's the gap of about 350 years before the Battle of Yavin to 120 years, I think, is where the acolyte falls.
Star Wars Timeline: BBY and ABY Explained
00:02:11
Speaker
ah And before the Battle of Yavin is before the first Star Wars episode. Yeah, BBY is before the first Star Wars. It's like the birth of Christ in the Star Wars timeline. And this is this is something that even Disney has carried on ah that was developed unofficially by fans back in the 90s, the dating of the movies and the stories. ABY after the Battle of Yavin and BBY, BBY meaning before the Battle of Yavin.
00:02:41
Speaker
very ah hilarious to me that you know something that the fans created has carried on. um Other things too like the the name of Coruscant I think came out of a West End game manual. Oh it was it was Timothy Zahn. Oh yeah but I know that Lucas when he was making episode one he wanted to call it something different. And you know, I, I don't know. I doubt it was Kathleen Kennedy. Somebody, I know somebody in his inner circle was like, George, if you don't call it Coruscant, they're not going to accept it. That's going too far. And so he, you
Lucasfilm's Timeline Control
00:03:18
Speaker
know, he went with that. Okay. I guess we'll call it Coruscant.
00:03:20
Speaker
So Lucasfilm has always retained a certain control over what parts of the timeline are fair game for writing about. And for the longest time before the prequels came out, ah the the period between 20 BBY and the original trilogy was off limits because he wanted complete freedom to be able to write the backstory without being constrained by any or very much third party material that had cropped up. And then since the ah prequel trilogy came out, he's obviously gone and
00:03:57
Speaker
Just filled that time period with the clone wars and rebels and it Disney Disney did that too so that time period now is very dense storytelling between revenge of the Sith and A new hope which right, you know, we got two additional movies in that time period hold on the solo Star Wars movie and Rogue One um and Delray, Bantam and Delray publishing companies went later in the timeline because they had free reign. Like there's nothing happening after Star Wars Return of the jedi after Jedi. And up until a certain point, Lucas was like, there are going to be no more movies.
00:04:36
Speaker
It was going to be six six and done right even though he started out Back in the the late 70s early 80s saying in his mind. It was a trilogy of trilogies, right? So I think he always had a future story after return of the jedi but Essentially once return of the jedi finished that was the culmination of the skywalker story arc from you know beginning to end um of six movies that told the rise and fall and rise again of a resurrection of Anakin Skywalker who brought balance to
Jedi at Their Peak in the High Republic
00:05:08
Speaker
the force. But um no, I think it's great now that that Disney is filling in this black hole on the Star Wars storyline of that period hundreds of years before A New Hope because there's a lot of questions like how did the Jedi become so enmeshed with the the Republic Senate and basically acting as the
00:05:32
Speaker
the enforcers slash representatives of the government. and Because in the time of the High Republic, the the Jedi are at their peak. yeah There's peace in the galaxy. you know People are happy. Sith are nowhere to be seen, which is what's interesting about the Acolyte, right? if You've got a red lightsaber in the Acolyte. and so That's like, what is going on? That's a big deal, which will crack the mystery of, I assume.
High Republic: Fan Reactions and Storytelling
00:05:58
Speaker
and And what we're seeing is the acolyte now, the high republic materials, mostly novels and comic books have been coming out for like the last two years now. And ah it's common over the years, Lucasfilm through their publishing branches have done long extended storytelling arcs, most significantly in the early 2000s, it was the New Jedi Order.
00:06:23
Speaker
And the New Jedi Order was the story set farthest out at that time in the storyline. And, you know, it was the most intermeshed storytelling across all mediums to date and still some of the best significant storytelling that exists. But ah so they're kind of replicating that, I think, with the High Republic. And I don't know, I think fan feedback to it has been tepid in that we're talking about a complete new cast of characters. yeah So anytime you're it you know it's not the big big three plus the cast of a supportive characters, there's no familiar characters in the High Republic.
00:07:09
Speaker
apart from Yoda. you know Think back, who's who should be alive in the time period of 250 to 100 years before Star Wars? Well, Yoda is around at that time, but so far he hasn't been developed in his role and in the hasn't been developed hugely but he's there yaddle also but they're using this blank slate to introduce a lot of new characters and as you already pointed out showcasing the Jedi at the height of their grandeur the high republic this is an extended era of peace because the the Sith were largely defeated
00:07:52
Speaker
uh around a thousand years before Battle of Yavin and so like a long long time without any Sith around has we're you're gonna see the what that results in um the Jedi are a little bit overly confident um they're at the height of their power but do they um Are they getting lacks in their concerns for the rise of evil in the in the galaxy? And obviously we know that ah Darth Plagueis is out there somewhere around the hundred year before battle of Yavin Mark. He was Darth Sidious's master. And so ah there are the there's always two there are, you know, master and apprentice in the Sith line. That was how the Sith survived for a thousand years.
00:08:41
Speaker
after the Knights of the Old Republic era, which was 1,000 years before Battle of Yavin, that they eliminated they the Great Sith War, and they eliminated the Sith as a race of people. And ah significantly, the Jedi thought they destroyed the dark side of the force or the dark users. But the Sith went into hiding. They went underground by maintaining this tentative power balance of master and apprentice. but obviously the acolyte is now the first hint that there are there's some sinister evil force out there and the Jedi are gonna have to come to grips with this like what does this mean but then you look ahead to uh episode one and when Qui-Gon tells the Jedi council that they encountered a Sith Mace Windu is like
00:09:30
Speaker
There are no Sith like they blows it off. He's like, no, clearly you must be mistaken. This is they can't believe it. And and that says a lot of how they were so blind to the rise of Darth Sidious that yeah he did under the radar because they were, ah you know, they let their guard down for hundreds of years. They became overconfident and they became pawns of the Senate rather than their own moral, independent agents. So I think and the acolyte being the first visual medium in a live action medium set in the high republic era is going to drive a lot of new readers to the high republic books and comics which I think is good because
00:10:14
Speaker
If you watched the Acolyte this week and you're like, whoa, this is cool. Yeah.
Exploring the High Republic: Books and Comics
00:10:19
Speaker
All of a sudden, you don't have to wait months and months between each new book or comic book to come out. There's already about 20 books and and comic arcs that are in that era. You could go to and read immediately and fill yourself in. um So lots of new characters, you know, the same structures are there the Galactic Senate is there Coruscant the Jedi Temple and the Jedi. All right, visually identifiable as Jedi, but you see a lot of new stylistic. Yeah, robes, gold tunics. They're using that an acolyte, you notice that in the lightsabers a lot more colors, different colors. yeah you know, and, and a lot more flourish, at least in the books, there's a lot more cross guards and fancy sabers and all of that kind of stuff. So we're starting to see that. If you think about it, in the height of like the Renaissance era, when you know, the age of knights was kind of fading out, a lot of ah medieval armor became much more ceremonial, it was less functional and more about appearance.
00:11:27
Speaker
Even to the point where the United States Marines to this day are issued what piece of a saber. Yeah. But we don't really expect them to go into battle wielding sabers, you know, a more elegant weapon for a more elegant time.
A Renaissance in the High Republic Era
00:11:44
Speaker
Yeah. But there's, there's something beautiful about the. Yeah. the elegance of the era and the and the the weaponry. Yeah. So there you go. It's a brief introduction to the High Republic. If you're interested in getting started, the story starts with the book Light of the Jedi by Charles Soule. And Charles Soule is actually a really great writer. He had a great run on the Star Wars Darth Vader comic book series.
00:12:14
Speaker
And he's also a lawyer. like That's his full-time job. He writes books on the side as a hobby. So he makes me jealous. I hate him. I hate him and I love him. But anyway, ah Light of the Jedi by Charles Soule. Like I said, i I've kind of had a hard time getting into these books. i I don't know for what reason. i I think it's because there are a lot of characters that I have to learn. And usually when I'm reading fiction, I can only read a little bit at a time. So I have to, I have to remember who everybody is when I come back to it. But I've picked up light of the Jedi again. I'm reading it again because the acolyte has made me interested. It's really good stuff. So we are getting close to the halfway point on the acolyte.
The Force as the Thread in Acolyte
00:12:56
Speaker
spoiler alert if you haven't watched up through episode three of the echolite you might want to turn this off right now okay all right now I assume that you have watched this so on the last episode we saw the backstory we saw the flashback to OSHA and May when they were little girls
00:13:14
Speaker
We saw the first version, I think, of the story of what actually happened when they were little girls. So the mystery is continuing to unfold. <unk> We're starting to hear more about the Force, too, and a different perspective on the Force. The girls' mothers call it not the Force, but the Thread. And it's a little bit of a different take on the mythology around the force. So it brings up a lot of interesting questions. I'm really enjoying the show. I hope you're enjoying it too. I think that next week, what we will probably do is we will be at the halfway point for the
Looking Forward: Acolyte Deep Dive and Engagement
00:13:51
Speaker
series. So I think we'll do, we'll spend the whole show doing a little bit of a debrief on, on what we've seen so far in the acolyte and what we can expect in the future.
00:14:00
Speaker
So come back for that one next week. In the meantime, hope you got your kitchen clean. Hope you got interested a little bit in the High Republic and we do hope that you'll come back next week. Make sure you like, make sure you subscribe, make sure you write reviews, and make sure you tell your friends. We'll see you next time on the Star Wars Cleaning Crew. Until then, may the force be with you. Keep your kitchens clean.
00:14:29
Speaker
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