Everyone is talking about the Disney purchase of Lucasfilm since the news was revealed yesterday but one question that we have on our minds is what will happen to the Expanded Universe now that this buyout has taken place?
It’s far too early to say for certain so all anyone can do is speculate but this does bring up some important questions. A sequel trilogy would cause an upheaval in the galaxy far, far away for sure. It may disturb the continuity that has been part of the community for a very long time now. There are fans of all types and all age ranges out there who have spent their time in a post-Return of the Jedi atmosphere that could very well be turned on its heels.
While we don’t know any more than the fact that there will be another movie, we cannot begin to guess what this new movie will mean to the community. We don’t know how severely it will shake things up when we don’t yet know anything about it.
But what about the other industries and stories built around the franchise? What about the books and comics, for example, that so many of us fans enjoy? From what we can tell (at least so far), Disney is not going to change the way Lucasfilm is ran and we have no indication otherwise at this time that Lucasfilm won’t still have a say in what happens. We can expect that Lucasbooks will stay as a guiding hand in this process, unless some news is revealed that says otherwise.
But then what about Del Rey? It would appear that their license would still be in place so we shouldn’t see any changes in that department. While Disney has publishing properties that include Marvel and others, they don’t really have any experience in adult science fiction and fantasy so some might worry that the comics and books would not be the same if Disney took over this department as well. So far it looks like most licenses are safe to stay in place. One who stands the most to lose is Dark Horse, since Disney owns Marvel.
Dark Horse president Mike Richardson told Newsarama:
“Dark Horse and LucasFilm have a strong partnership which spans over 20 years, and has produced multiple characters and story lines which are now part of the Star Wars lore. Star Wars will be with us for the near future. Obviously, this deal changes the landscape, so we’ll all have to see what it means for the future.”
That pretty much sums it up really. We could speculate all day but when it comes to this, we all have to wait and see what it means for the future.
How do you think this deal will affect the Expanded Universe?
