We'll deal with many subjects here, including the reasons how the ICS books can accurately comment on things not easily seen in the movies.
First of all, the infamous quote from SWI# 68 Its been repeated all over the place as of late, so I won't reprint it here. The article was written by Dr. David West Reynolds, author of the SW Visual Dictionary, TPM Visual Dictionary, and the SW and TPM ICS. He has had unprecidented access to Lucasfilm archives over the years, and is a well known authority on SW. The article deals with his SW and TPM ICS books.
Desperate semantics bantering aside, The "SWI quote" at the beginning of the article, taken in context (as a preface to the article) reads as an informative blurb about the ICS legacy after they came out. So "would represent the most thorough research" speaks of the books' place in the scheme of things since their release.
The article begins on page 36 of SWI #68. Here's a few more interesting quotes.
Note here, that Reynolds had access to detail a movie viewer wouldn't. Just as Dr. Curtis Saxton did during the making of the AOTC ICS, as detailed at this link herepg. 36: To guide Jenssen and Chasemore, Lucy Wilson, Lucas Licensing's director of publishing, recommended me for the project in 1997, with the assignment of analyzing all preceding Star Wars references, resolving discrepancies, and generating new ideas to fill out the vehicles' detail like never before. Wilson wanted the books to be absolutely definitive. To do that would require access to Lucasfilm's photo library, unpublished set blueprints, filming models in the Lucasfilm Archives, and interviews with ILM artists.
This point is again brought home with Reynolds' research into the interior of the Jawa Sandcrawler.Friday 16th
Against all odds, Iain has managed to arrange clearance for us to visit ILM. We jump in the car and drive to ILM, whose anonymous, low-rise buildings give away no clues as to its importance as the world's most successful special effects company. At the reception, we receive passes and are whisked along corridors lined with movie posters, through busy work areas, crowded with computers, models, drawings, props, and miscellaneous other stuff. And right out the other side. Eventually, in another nondescript building (I'm sure they were deliberately disorientating us so we could never find our way around again), we reach the payoff - the room where the Episode II vehicle models have been laid out for us like priceless jewels. They are only a few inches tall, but are intricately made, showing all sorts of details like hatches and viewscreens which we couldn't get from anything else. The illustrators and author proceed to debate every last pen-drawn line and measure every length. For me, the important thing was that at last I found out what Curtis' green string was for: taking impromtu measurements. Ahh, of course.
At the top of page 43, the DK Library appears, which includes the covers to ALL the ICS and "Inside The Worlds Of" books to date. These are labeled Star Wars "nonfiction"pg. 41: The sandcrawler was another exciting blank canvas for us to fill. This would take unusual measures. To get the droids' locations in this "droid prison" would require the original set blueprints.
Locating all the droids therein, however, would take unconventional research. The one thing that would have that information was the Lost Cut, the earliest film version of Star Wars. The Lost Cut shows the interior of the sandcrawler in much more detail than we see in the final cut of the film. A look at this footage, with the help of then Lucasfilm film archivist Tim Fox, made the location of every droid crystal clear, including droids we don't see in the final cut of the film. Thanks to the unique views in the Lost Cut, I was able to provide an accurate sketch for Richard with the location of every droid.
Yet another quote about SW canon comes from the Los Angeles Times May 15th article on Star
Wars Galaxies: "Kill Darth Vader You May Not" May 15, 2003
By Alex Pham, Times Staff Writer
[snip]
What it won't allow them to do, though, is vanquish Darth Vader, destroy the Death Star or marry Princess Leia Organa. Or anything else that might somehow knock off course the scrupulously controlled story of the Skywalker bloodline.
[snip]
But that story is so guarded by Lucas that every creature and relationship in "Star Wars" - from the butterfly-like mynocks to the romance between Han Solo and Princess Leia - is canonized in the company's official 12,000-entry database to ensure consistency in the ever-expanding body of movies, novels, comic books and video games.
