HELLO THERE, General Kenobi would say.
Today is the REAL Star Wars day, May 25th. May the 4th should not be considered Star Wars day because it's based on a pun rather than a date relevant to Star Wars history. May 25th is the day Star Wars debuted and thus should be considered the real Star Wars day.
A quick shout-out to the 2 Star Wars films celebrating an anniversary this year; 15 years for Revenge of the Sith (May 19th), and 40 years for The Empire Strikes Back (May 21st). Along with birthday wishes to George Lucas (May 14th) and my cat Padmé (adopted May the 4th last year)
Brooke is away doing something else right now, so I am just going to make this announcement by myself.
I know it's been a while since I last updated this story, so if any of you are still interested, I promise you this story is still continuing.
I have just been a really hard time trying to get the story and the characters right (especially on the Ever After High side, I'm a little more confident on the Star Wars side).
Right as you can see I have taken down the preview chapter that I had last published because I am getting ready to publish the ACTUAL Chapter 5 SOON. That shouldn't be too difficult...I hope.
I definitely know where this story IS going and where it's going to end. I already know what roles the Ever After High characters will play in the events of Return of the Jedi and where they go after that; it's how they get there in the beginning I'm having a few troubles with.
I want this story to be the best it can be, and I will settle for nothing less. Plus, with Darth Real Life affecting all of us at the moment, now is as good a time as any to start updating stories. Please Pray to God that all this nonsense will end very soon, because we all want life to resume as it was normally before...preferably before Christmas this year...or sooner.
When I am writing this story I feel like I need make this accessible for all audiences. Since most people I know (outside of this community) are not familiar with Ever After High, but plenty familiar with Star Wars (The reverse can also be said, but that is an extreme minority), I have to find a balance that works for readers who have intimate and causal knowledge of both proprieties and for readers who don't.
A big shout out and thank you to Wookieepedia and Royal & Rebel Pedia along with the various Star Wars and Ever After High Books I have in my collection for research, to make my outline and ideas into a proper story.
In the last 3 years since I last updated this story much has changed for both Ever After High and Star Wars. So let's take a look at what's happened to both of them since then.
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Concerning Ever After High, I am so sad that it's gone.
Ever After High presented us with a great fractured fairy tale about destiny vs free will, filled with great characters, great stories, a great setting with a rich and imaginative mythology, great music, and great animation. Did mention that it was great, hat-tastic, wonderlandiful, and enchantingly magical? Not sure I did. All that from a franchise originally meant to sell toys to little girls.
This show had so much potential for so many more adventures and characters, but Mattel, in their boneheaded stupidity, canceled it way too early. At least Monster High had a good 6 year run before they prematurely rebooted that, and then cancelled that too. I didn't mind the reboot, but Mattel should given us the Ever After High crossover movie first, then initiated the reboot. Sure we also got that book, but it's not the same thing.
I think the main reason why the show got cancelled so suddenly is that Mattel saw that people were not buying the toys, and thus the company was losing money, so they decided to cut their losses and cut the show entirely because of that.
Well Mattel, it's not exactly difficult to lose money on the toys, when you, Mattel, didn't put any money into making the toys. The toys started off strong in the beginning back in 2013, but slowly declined in quality by early 2017 and then completely disappeared from store shelves after that. When Mattel cut back on the detail, sculpting, articulation, and variety of characters and the audience who buys your product disappeared after that. Plus, the doll design look way better in the cartoon and for some reason the dolls couldn't live up to the character designs of the show.
Personally, I do not collect the dolls (though I do have Crystal Winter on my shelf, and the books are much easier to collect), but I understand the dismay for for those who collect the dolls. I know that they are hurting that they are not being made anymore and they missing characters that never got officially produced in plastic. I will say that I am very impressed by fans who make their own custom dolls of the unproduced characters. Hat-tastic job to you people!
At least Ever After High had a good 3 and half year run, that gave us great stories and characters and we will always love this franchise for the wonderful time we had with it.
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I really wish the same could be said for Star Wars. (Long analysis/rant ahead)
Ever since Disney purchased Lucasfilm back in 2012, everything has proceeded as I have foreseen. 40 years of the greatest modern fairy tale has been laid to waste because of the incredible disaster that was and always will be the Sequel Trilogy.
I always knew that the very idea of a sequel trilogy was a bad idea from the start. The Saga ALREADY ended on high-note with Return of the Jedi so what was there more to say after that? Clearly not much. I know that the original Expanded Universe created a fascinating and exciting life, post ROTJ, for Luke, Leia, Han and the rest of gang that showed much they grew as heroes and as a family. Unfortunately they tossed those in the garbage for what can be easily summed up as shallow remakes of the Original Trilogy were all you favorite characters are shown to be absolute failures.
The Sequels are basically feminist remakes of the Original Trilogy with more flash, way less substance, even less logic, more holes in the plot than the planet Utapau, the original heroes that everyone loves are all either discredited as worthless failures (especially Anakin and Luke) or ignored as background elements. The new characters (some having more potential than others) are completely wasted, and the central character is a MaRey Sue who bypassed Jedi training, never fails at anything, is pretty much flawless in every way, and turned out to be the grandspawn of the ultimate evil in the entire universe and who proceeds to steal the properties, accomplishments, and the very identities and legacies of the ACTUAL Skywalkers of the saga and stands in alone in the end as the sole victor.
Rey Skywalker? My thermal exhaust port!
I always knew that they were going to disrespect and discredit the Prequel Trilogy, but I had never thought that the beloved Original Trilogy would be so severely disrespected and discredited too.
The Sequel Trilogy Era has been nothing but a disaster whose legacy will be that of third wave feminism, historical revisionism, and desecration of George Lucas' magnum opus.
In case you might be thinking "Well isn't that just your opinion? The sequels were actually very successful"
No actually, these are actually facts and can be proven. Just because the films were a financial success doesn't mean that fans (hardcore and casual) actually liked them. Movies can be critical disasters and still make money, and movies can also be financial disasters and still receive critical praise, and vice versa.
Unlike the previous times when the angry ungrateful "fans" cried foul because of the Special Editions and the Prequel Trilogy, the failure of thecsrequels can actually be proven with facts and figures. The Special Editions and the Prequel Trilogy added to the Star Wars mythos, created legions of new fans, and increased merchandise sales. The Sequel Trilogy has had the opposite effect; it's subtracted from the mythos, turned away legions of old fans and potential new fans, and seriously damaged merchandise sales.
The blame for this disaster can be easily pointed to at least 5 villains responsible for this atrocity. (I highly recommend that you google thesenames for more in-depth information about each person)
1. The "fans" who for way too long constantly criticized, hated on, and sent death threats (that seriously happened) George Lucas everything he's done to the franchise since 1983. The hatred got so bad that this pushed him to retire and sell Lucasfilm to Disney. You idiots wanted him out and now look where we are.
2. Bob Iger, the president and CEO of the Walt Disney Company. He was good friends with George for years and had promised to use the treatments he bought from Lucas for the sequel trilogy...only to lie him and threw those away because he wanted Star Wars scripts "that inherently felt like Star Wars" (Hollywood speak for: copying the Original Trilogy, because we are too afraid of originality)
When you look at Iger's track record it clear that he is not a creator, only a collector who buys out franchises and whole companies and has no real idea what to do with them.
3. Kathleen Kennedy, the president of Lucasfilm. She was a longtime producer and friend of George Lucas who collaborated with him and Steven Spielberg on the Indiana Jones series (among other films). She was his appointed successor at Lucasfilm and had promised to protect his characters and to make sure that they continue to live in the way that George had created them...and lied straight to his face by doing the exact opposite.
Her unspoken (but certainly written on a t-shirt) mantra is that "The Force is Female"; meaning that she adheres to a creed of making women powerful by making men weak. She's a typical extremely bitter third wave feminist. Nobody likes people like that.
She is especially hated by the fans of the original Star Wars Expanded Universe (1978-2014) for discrediting that continuity to make room for the Sequel Trilogy...and then having the audacity to say "There is no source material. We don't have comic books. We don't have 800 page novels" when asked the question of "How do you write a Star Wars movie" from Rolling Stone magazine in 2019.
4. J.J. Abrams, the director of The Force Awakens and The Rise of Skywalker. J.J Abrams, while very entertaining, is notorious for his lack of originality. He his so devoid of originality that he is content to copy and rip-off work from far more competent and talented filmmakers and passing it off as his own.
He is also greatly obsessed with mystery boxes that ask questions but provide no real answer as he shown to start projects but leaves then to someone else to finish.
Perhaps one of his most heinous crime is that he had the extremely rare privilege of working with Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, and Carrie Fisher...and NEVER giving them one scene where all 3 of their characters reunited.
5. Rian Johnson the writer and director of The Last Jedi. Probably the more heinous of the 2 directors, because of his obsession of "subverting expectations" which is an overly pretentious way of saying that he likes do the unexpected for the hell of it without any real good reason why.
His most despised "contribution" to Star Wars is the complete and total character assassination of Luke Skywalker.
In Johnson's completely subverted and perverted view we had no time to see Luke built up as a symbol of hope and valor, a wise and powerful Jedi Master, and use his green lightsaber in battle...but we certainly had time to see Luke reduced to be a bitter and defeated old fart who wants the Jedi to end, as he sucks green breast milk from an alien sea cow. *slapping facepalm*
It's no wonder that Mark Hamill has repeatedly said in interviews that he fundamentally disagreed with him on everything about his character, to the point where he had to think of Luke as a different character altogether.
"I almost had to think of Luke as a different character. Maybe he's Jake Skywalker. He's not my Luke Skywalker." - Mark Hamill
He is also notorious for creating the arrogant, incompetent, and insufferable Vice Admiral "Gender Studies" Holdo and the naive, idiotic, and inconsequential token asian female Rose Tico. These characters that have actually become more hated and despised than Jar Jar Binks ever was!
Unlike previous Star Wars directors who have maintained good relations with the fans, even in the face of constant criticism, He's proven to be a narcissistic man child and an absolute crybaby. He and the mindless drones that follow him on Twitter have created this toxic culture around Star Wars more than there was before. If you're not with them, you are against them. If you disliked TLJ, you are public enemy #1. They will throw around every buzzword insult they can think of to shame you for not liking their precious movie. If you hate his film then you a "racist", "sexist, "whatever-phobic" because EVERYTHING today equates to being racist, sexist, and whatever-phobic, even if your criticisms are completely valid.
The Sequel Trilogy Era has been nothing but a disaster whose legacy will be that of third wave feminism, historical revisionism, and desecration of George Lucas' magnum opus.
It also doesn't help the fact that isn't even the REAL sequel trilogy. George Lucas had actually written out treatments for this trilogy...that where immediately thrown in the garbage by Kennedy and Iger in favor of a sequel trilogy that had NO plan or outline aside from copying the Original Trilogy, and doing a much worse version of it. So if this "trilogy" feels like a disjointed mess that contradicts the original 6 films and the sequels themselves, that's because it is.
Star Wars right now is at best, barely on life support, at worst, it's corpse. The effect of the sequels on the Star Wars universe are here and it is permanent. The people in charge of the franchise still deny that The Last Jedi was a disaster. The Rise of Skywalker brings back Palpatine, a bad idea even during the time of the EU. The Skywalker/Solo family is wiped out. The last "Skywalker" is actually a Mary Sue Palpatine pretender. Disney undid the OT just to make a worse version. TFA is A New Hope with updated graphics, and banatha poodoo mystery boxes with no real answers. TLJ is just Rian giving a giant middle finger to everyone who cared about Star Wars, Luke Skywalker in particular. TROS is a last minute attempt to fix the franchise by pandering to everyone at the same time (which ended up pleasing no one). Even at this point, more retcons are being introduced to fix TROS, and they keep getting WORSE every time one if introduced.
...and that is only a small fraction of how damaged Star Wars has become.
For much more intelligent and in depth analysis of the failures of the Star Wars sequel trilogy and the mismanagement of Lucasfilm, I recommended to you check up on the reddit subthread called SaltierThanCrait, the website BoundingIntoComics, and pretty everywhere on YouTube.
That's not to say that everything Disney has done with Star Wars has been bad; there has been a lot of good things done under the Disney/Lucasfilm banner too.
Star Wars Rebels was a great show, Rogue One was a great movie, Solo was entertaining (Rogue One was better), I quite liked the Forces of Destiny animated shorts, LEGO sets are still going strong, most of the Marvel comics are pretty good (I highly recommend the Darth Vader books and The Age of Republic/Rebellion series) and while I haven't seen The Mandolorian or played Jedi Fallen Order I do hear high praise for them.
But all of that good stuff is not enough to make up for the absolute sith-show and permanently damaging effects that the Sequel Trilogy has done.
Again, I repeat: I NEVER wanted a sequel trilogy, because I knew that there was nothing good to be had from it.
What I mainly feel now from Star Wars (at least in its present state) is apathy and justification. Apathy, because almost nothing excites me about Star Wars beyond the content that honors original 6 films. Since all of Star Wars ends with a Palpatine destroying all the Jedi and stealing the identity and legacy of the Skywalker family, what is there left to be excited about?
Justification because for far too long, the so called "fans" constantly crapped on George Lucas for everything he has done for Star Wars and never gave him his due respect for creating the thing that they loved in the first place.
You never saw Marvel fans do the same to Stan Lee, nor Disney fans to Walt, or even Trek fans to Rodeneberry. But for some reason George has received an unspeakable amount of hate and vitriol for altering his own movies (I don't care who shot first in the cantina, no one should) and the Prequel Trilogy (which is as perfect as the Original Trilogy), and while I understand disagreeing with George, I do not tolerate such hate for that wonderful man. There is a distinction between disagreement and hate, but unfortunately those idiots made it difficult to tell the difference.
Possibly worse, is that these fools often tried to give credit to anyone but George Lucas for the creation and success of Star Wars. George Lucas CREATED Star Wars, not his producers, not his ex-wife, it was GEORGE AND ONLY GEORGE.
Now that the sequel trilogy is completed, all those who hounded him for decades can finally see what Star Wars is like without George at the helm: shallow, hollow, and meaningless.
For those of us, like me, who have alwsy loved and appreciated George Lucas, would not love Star Wars without him, we will be forever grateful; and for those who didn't love and appreciate George Lucas when he was in charge...they certainly do now!
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(Long analysis/rant over)
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So that is the current state of both franchises. Both have been killed and buried by their respective companies, just for different reasons.
The main difference is that Ever After High has been mercifully laid to rest, whereas Star Wars is now an undead corpse that barely resembles the glory of it's former self.
Is the still hope that both of these franchises to return to what they once were?
I believe anything is possible...but it shall certainly take a miracle for that to happen.
For now what we have is all the existing material that we still can enjoy, plus fan fiction and fan art.
Now that all of that is out of the way, I have a few more announcements to make then we can wrap this up.
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In the immortal of Uncle Sam from here in the good ol' U.S. of A.
I WANT YOU!
I want you, the reader's help to help introduce Original Characters to Ever After High!
I want some OC Ever After High students to be featured in both this story and my other story Cross and the Crown, which is a totally separate story and continuity than this one.
Below is the character guide for how to make your OC. it is also posted in my profile so that you can copy, paste, and fill in yourself, the details of your OC so that it can be featured in both my stories.
Be warned: I reserve the right to change ANYTHING I want about about your OC. So don't be too shocked if it doesn't come out EXACTLY like you created. I'll make sure that you still get credit for your character.
Name:
Fairy Tale Parent/Legacy:
Approximate Age:
Gender:
Species:
Body Type/Shape/Height :
Hair color/texture/style:
Eye color:
Skin Color:
Basic Outfit:
Accessories:
Personality:
Secret Heart's Desire:
Magic Touch:
Storybook Romance Status:
"Oh Curses!" Moment:
Favorite Subject:
Least Favorite Subject:
Best Friends Forever After:
Room Mate:
Other Talents/Skills:
10 Interesting Facts about this Character:
Please PRIVATE MESSAGE your OCs and they could be featured in my stories!
I will close on ten random POSITIVE things I have to say about the Sequel Trilogy
1. It gave the world new a found love and appreciation for George Lucas and the Prequel Trilogy and possibly the special editions.
2. The cast are more interesting as people than the characters they play. John Boyega in particular.
3. I like Old Luke's Jedi Grandmaster costume. Giving him Obi-Wan's beard and Anakin's haircut was nice touch too.
4. R2 had at least one scene where he alters the direction each film. I didn't hate BB-8, but R2 deserved better.
5. At least Lando survived in the end, but there was NO reason why he would have stayed on that desert planet. He would have gotten of that Force-forsaken desert planet and gone back to live in luxurious Cloud City and fathered several children with sverla diffrent women. Colt .45 gets every time.
6. It gives screenwriters and fanfic writers a great guide on how NOT to write stories and characters. True Story: The Last Jedi is being used in film schools as a model for how NOT to write screenplay.
8. John Williams and his soundtrack never disappoints.
9. The sequel trilogy planets make pretty fun rides on Star Tours.
10. The meta dialogue which can be used to criticize the films themselves
Lines such as:
"That's not how The Force works!"
"Let the past die, kill it if you have to."
"Tell us that we have a plan!"
"A good question for another time."
"Every word of what you just said was wrong." ,etc.
and I will also add 5 things I would have liked to have seen from Ever After High should the series have continued:
1. More characters from more male eccentric fairy tales such as Aladdin, The Three Musketeers, Peter Pan, King Arthur, etc.
2. More details on characters teased in the books such as Natahan Nutcracker, the various Charming cousins, and Briar Beauty's little brothers.
3. More adventures in other Fairy Tales worlds such as Never Land, Oz, etc.
4. The G1 Monster High crossover movie that Mattel should not have canceled.
5. A musical special similar to Monster High: Boo York, Boo York but with songs done by or similar to Alan Menken's Disney musicals.
That's all I got for now.
Thanks for sticking around this long
I hope you will stick around to see this story continue.
The End is Only the Beginning and MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU.