Star Wars’ Old Republic era gave the series the freedom it deserves

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Star Wars? It’s pretty cool. That’s true for a lot of people, because whether or not you’re into the franchise’s current direction, it’s been around for so goddamn long that there is almost certainly an era, a comic, and/or a series of books or video games that speaks to your individual taste in genre fiction. Laser swords, starfighters, and space wizards are all things that you can’t object to on principle. It’s when you get You can find out more about specifics by clicking here.Arguments can occur. Today, my specific argument (and I reserve the right to have a different one tomorrow) is that Star Wars’ Old Republic era kicks ass, and I’m a little bummed it’s mostly been abandoned.

Driven by Ahsoka’s revisitation of old Star Wars Legends-timeline stories I’m fond of, I’ve been tooling around with a bunch of stories set in the Old Republic, a no-longer-canon Star Wars era ranging anywhere during the roughly 30,000 years prior to The Phantom Menace. What’s interesting about this Star Wars setting isn’t just the absolutely massive span of time — which naturally allows for stories wildly different from the films — but that ideas on what an Old Republic story could be varied a lot before an aesthetic became codified in BioWare’s classic RPG Knights of the Old Republic.

Prior to The KOTORComics that you will enjoy Jedi vs. SithImagine a Star Wars full of fantasy. Jedi Knights would be knights dressed in armor with lightsabers and the ships were giant galleys. Compare that to the current Star Wars story, with its strict brand guidelines, and I feel like I’m talking about a mythical city like El Dorado, a place where kooky writers and artists could just think of anything and call it Star Wars.

Frankly, there aren’t a lot of Star Wars stories like this — Tales of the Jedi is the most prominent series of books and comics to explore this era in this way — but even with its more on-brand aesthetic, the appeal of the Old Republic post-The KOTOR It’s the same. It’s a Star Wars setting that the team at BioWare were given the freedom to make their own, a setting that other creators saw potential in — from Obsidian Entertainment, who made Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, to writers like John Jackson Miller and the many artists who told parallel stories in Dark Horse’s Knights of the Old Republic comics. Marvel has published a reprint of the comics. Old Republic Vols. 1-3.)

The Old Republic is at its best when it feels like an environment that emerges from stories of people. The KOTORIt is best known for creating a brand new myth about Darth Revan, the mysterious Jedi. The Knights of the Old RepublicComics began with an intriguing story about Zayne, a Padawan who is on the run because he thinks the Jedi Masters are responsible for his murder. Darth Bane was the subject of several comics and books that explored his motivation and what he did to change Sith villainy for centuries.

This stands in contrast to a lot of Disney-The era efforts to expand the canon — namely The High Republic era, This feels like the setting was created first and then stories were added. That doesn’t mean they’re The same goes for the badThis doesn’t necessarily mean they are harder to buy into, but that the High Republic series spends a great deal of time exploring what the galaxy is like and how this differs with the more familiar Star Wars stories. These are architectural marvels, Star Wars in the MCU age.

As someone who likes a lot of Star Wars but has always stopped shy of being a Star Wars obsessive, I’ve always appreciated the breadth of what’s out there, and how fun it can be when you become canon-agnostic and stop worrying about whether something fits into Disney’s Star Wars master plan. Frankly, Star Wars is a big business — staggeringly big, almost too big to feel personal in any kind of way. Some people did it for a time. Maybe, with luck, they’ll do it again.