Official and Canon

[The Dude]

Score another for the Dude:

http://www.starwars.com/community/askjc ... 10205.html

Q: In Episode IV, was Luke's X-wing call-sign Blue Five or Red Five?

A: In the film Star Wars: A New Hope, the comm-unit designation for Luke Skywalker's X-wing starfighter during the Battle of Yavin was Red Five. Some confusion arises because the novelization of the film, which was published six months before the movie opened and completed considerably before the film's final editing, had different designations for squadron member call-signs.

From the script:

WEDGE: Red Two standing by.

INTERIOR: LUKE'S X-WING FIGHTER -- COCKPIT.

RED ELEVEN: (over headset) Red Eleven standing by.

LUKE: Red Five standing by.

Script's got it right, novel's got it wrong.

[Lord Edam]

Most importantly, you have conspicuously declined to provide even a single example of where a novelization was correct and the corresponding script was not, in response to one example of the reverse and an example of the novelization being overridden by the EU.

And now that I can give page numbers, on to this one.

TPM, Sidious and Maul talking.

P143 HB novellisation "Darth Sidious stood high on a balcony overlooking Coruscant...disinterested in his apprentice Darth Maul who waited to one side"

film: shows same, where it is clear the both Sidious and Maul are there in person


script(p55 pb illustrated screenplay): ends the scene with "The hologram of Darth Maul fades off"


Clearly, the initial idea was for them to be holograms, but someone changed it for whatever reason. This change made its way into the novellisation, but not the script.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea Hobbie died in ESB from. There is nothing preventing Hobbie jumping from his skimmer before it hits, or even surviving the crash. Hobbie thinks he is dying before the crash - but that is never confirmed (and also note how hypocritical that is - the script overides the novellisation because it's higher level canon, yet the novellisation doesn't overide lower level canon?)

The copy of the ESB script I have (BTM CD-ROM, disk 2, scene ESB-43) also described Yoda as "a strange bluish creature, not more than two feet tall" - it is no more accurate than the novellisation in that regard.

Here's another one for you - in the script for ESB luke takes a landmine from around his neck and tosses it into the walker. In the novellisation, we don't know where Luke gets the mine from. In the film, he takes it from his belt. Which is closest to the truth?

But anyway, we can spend all week with example and counter example, the point was and is neither is inherently closer to the truth than the other.

We have a simple choice - either there officially is a hierarchy, or there is not.

now that I've disproven your notion that the published script must be closer to the true story (based entirely on assumption and a misunderstanding of how the novellisation is developed), all that remains to support your case is an appeal to authority - a description that you yourself admitted in unofficial. unofficial statements do not make official policy.

I see you continue to attempt to draw attention away from your lack of actual response by accusing me of commiting burden of proof/argument from ignorance fallacies (even though I've given specific reasons why that is not the case), and golden mean (even though that is clearly not true - there are only two choices, hierarchy or no. there is no inbetween that either of us can choose).

You have not dealt with a single point raised
You have not answered a single request for you to provide evidence supporting your claim
You have failed to explain why it is preferable to make canon and high EU blatantly wrong (whilst simultaneously needlessly contradicting canon with EU in your attempts to prove a canon hierarchy exists)

I thought you were willing to have a rational discussion on this subject, but you are clearly blinded to reason.

Let me know when you decide to stop doing the net equivalent of wearing the "lalala industries I'm not listening hat" and admit the published screenplays are not more authoritative than the published novellisations.

[The Dude]

The only hat I see around here is the ol' iron cranium resting squarely on your shoulders.

The Maul hologram thing is interesting, but the failure of the ESB novelization to even mention the location of Luke's mines hardly supports your case. However, I cheerfully concede on the example of blue Yoda.

Anyway:

In the original script and novelization of The Empire Strikes Back, Hobbie nobly sacrifices himself by plowing his snowspeeder into the head of General Veers' AT-AT walker. This scene is not in the final film, thus sparing Hobbie a fiery end.

This rather significant detail managed to find its way out of the film and the final script (http://www.filmscape.co.uk/features/scripts/esb.html), but not the novelization... hmmm.

As many fans know, when it comes to Star Wars knowledge, there are degrees of "canon."

In the film Star Wars: A New Hope, the comm-unit designation for Luke Skywalker's X-wing starfighter during the Battle of Yavin was Red Five. Some confusion arises because the novelization of the film, which was published six months before the movie opened and completed considerably before the film's final editing, had different designations for squadron member call-signs.

You continue to present a false dilemma by illogically combining "either the heirarchy exists or it does not" with "I, Lord Edam, supreme arbiter of what is and is not acceptable evidence, reject your source while presenting no evidence that the source is unreliable" into "either an official public statment exists or the heirarchy does not".

You continue to pretend that Nathan Butler is not a credible source, without any evidence.

You continue to pretend that the fact that the script is the work of George Lucas' own hands while the novelization is a 2nd party interpretation of his work is irrelevant - it isn't. You continue to pretend that the novelizations are as closely integrated with the making of the film as the scripts - which is plainly ludicrous (and clearly not consistent with Sansweet's statements above).

In short, we have a source that confirms that the accepted heirarchy is used by Lucasfilm itself - there is no source (more credible or otherwise) that contradicts this. Even if the 'official' heirarchy did not exist, it would still be more logical to accept the work of George Lucas' own hands as the more authoritative representation of his own vision.

[The Dude]

Poll added for curiosity. Cya next week.