User blog:Brandon Rhea/ASWS and TOR connection



By now, most of you have probably seen the Hope trailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic. If you haven’t, BEWARE SPOILERS THAT FOLLOW THIS SENTENCE&mdash;spoilers for BOTH The Old Republic AND the Alternative Saga! Basically, it shows the Battle of Alderaan during the Great Galactic War.

The reason I posted this was basically as a follow-up to an older blog posting of mine, The Name’s Starkiller, James Starkiller. In that blog posting I talked about the similarities between the canon and my Kane Starkiller, despite there being no inspiration from the former for the latter.

This time, I want to call attention to the image on the right. This is an image of the Sith Empire's invasion of Alderaan in the Hope cinematic trailer. It’s also now representing the Battle of Alderaan that has been scheduled to appear in my Star Wars: Episode IV in the Alternative Saga for years. Why? Well, because once again, it seems canon and I are on the same wavelength in regards to certain concepts.

This one doesn't have nearly the same connections as the Starkiller one, but I thought I'd mention it anyway. For starters, there's the storm; when I wrote the original draft of Episode IV back in 2006, it opened with a scene of Viceroy Bail Organa at the Aldera Palace overlooking Lake Aldera (which I still plan to use as the opening scene when I write that novel for real). He comments that, in his recent dreams, he can feel that a storm is (metaphorically) coming. He's basically been sensing trouble for awhile now. Sure enough, as a storm comes in that day, an Imperial fleet comes with it and attacks Alderaan.

After that scene with Organa, the Tantive IV would be being chased by the Avenger, the Star Destroyer commanded by Darth Vader and Kane Starkiller, the latter of whom is the Commander of the Guardians of Lettow. Their goal is to capture Viceroy Organa alive; to all personnel, it’s because Vader claims he’s gathered evidence that Alderaan, under the guidance of Organa, is stock piling weapons to take on the Empire&mdash;despite having signed a treaty ridding the planet of weapons in the early days of the Empire. Unknown to the fleet personnel, including Starkiller, is that the evidence is fabricated and he has a more sinister motive, part of his plot to capture Princess Leia Organa and turn her to the dark side of the Force.

The battle moves from a field outside of Aldera to the very streets of Aldera itself, where the planet is ultimately put under Imperial subjugation. The main connection between the two works is indeed the image itself. It’s like it came straight from my mind to their trailer. I had imagined as part of the battle multiple Star Destroyers flying overhead, with a group of starfighters moving towards an airbase&mdash;one containing civilian ships that Vader says are actually military vessels.

So yeah, most likely no one cares, but I figured I’d write this, if only for my own benefit.

- Brandon Rhea  (talk)