The Star Wars Expanded Universe has been rebooted. Almost every Star Wars book, comic, or other non-movie story that has come out in the past 37 years, was declared non-canon. Instead, these stories are grouped (and some of them reprinted) under the imprint “Star Wars Legends”. As of now, only the Star Wars movies, Clone Wars tv series, newer books and Marvel comics are considered Star Wars canon.

And there’s nothing we can do about it.

Or is there?

I’ve been thinking what to do with the collection of books & comics I have built up over the years. My bookshelf suddenly seems a lot less interesting, because of the contents not being part of official Star Wars Canon any more. “There must be a way for these works to have a more jusified reason for existence” I thought by myself. The idea that the existing stories aren’t dumped, but instead labelled as “Legends” inspired me. A few ideas to retcon the already published stories sprang to mind. The first one can be read here. And below is the second one.

An in-universe existence of “Star Wars Legends”

Imagine you’re living in the Star Wars universe, around the time when the Original Trilogy happened, or after that. The main characters of the Rebellion are heroes. Their story, as well as the rise of the Empire (as depicted in the movies) are common knowledge and therefore popular stories.

Because of this, people in the Star Wars Universe all want to know about the events surrounding the stories of Luke, Leia, Anakin, the Emperor, et cetera. Smart writers in all corners of the galaxy notice this, and they begin to write fiction about the events surrounding what has actually happened. And thus come up with stories like “Heir To The Empire”, “Darth Plagueis”, “The New Jedi Order”, “Knights Of The Old Republic”, and “Legacy”.

Sounds farfetched? Then what about the fantasy stories that exist in our own universe? There are numerous stories that depict alternate realities, an otherworldly past, and possible futures. So it could be entirely possible that these concepts and the need for those stories would also exist there.

This way, even a story like “Dark Empire” (about a cloned Emperor Palpatine) could exist as part of the official Star Wars continuity, even though the events that will be shown in Episode VII are going to point out “Dark Empire” could never have happened. It would simply seem that the idea of a cloned Emperor was something a writer in the Star Wars universe came up with. Who knows, maybe writers were just as famous as certain smugglers, pilots, or Jedi in the Star Wars universe…