For timelines, I agree. That sounds like a lost cause, one best resolved with Chronologies.

For the rest, argument C is the most convincing. If there is a whole legal whoptidoo to wade through just for the sake of changing a few details, I can see that possibility staying unused. Though a 25. anniversary sounds like sufficient cause to do so, if there ever was any...

That is a darn shame. That in practice means the OT novelizations cannot be taken seriously as proof on their own, not because they are particularly inaccurate, but because you cannot know what to believe and what not to. Makes research difficult. I guess I'll just have to mentally overwrite anything they say if it has been contradicted by a newer source. It annoys me that this is the best solution available for something as essential as these novels.

well, there's two different ways of looking at canon and continuity: the holocrons canon levels and george lucas' three pillars of star wars. if u look at canon from the three pillars perspective, the clone wars novelization will be part of the highest pillar: the lucas pillar, which is lucas' vision of star wars.

Again, it's impractical to reprint all of these materials in edited, retconned form, so it is our responsibility as readers to recognize those retcons and take them into account while reading and trying to understand it all.

Oh? Impractical? How do you figure?

The only impracticality I can see to doing so would be the extra work involved. I have read several times of how authors of novels promise to go back and fix errors -continuity and otherwise- in later editions, and comic book writers saying "We'll fix it in the TPB", so obviously correcting things isn't too impractical then. And those sources are far less quoted, and have far less status among fans and readers then the OT novelizations do.

It all goes back to the comments Leland has made constantly about issues being dealt with on a case-by-case basis.

If a novelization has G-Canon elements from Lucas, and some C-Canon elements from the writer, but then those C-Canon elements (or sometimes even G-Canon as in the case of Boba Fett, but that's a whole different issue) contradict other C-Canon elements, they are dealt with on a case-by-case basis. If something is contradictory in the original novelizations, in most cases, they have been dealt with by now in the form of retcons.

Again, it's impractical to reprint all of these materials in edited, retconned form, so it is our responsibility as readers to recognize those retcons and take them into account while reading and trying to understand it all.

The movie novelisations for Episodes I-VI are indeed G-canon; however, the new Clone Wars movie is not G-canon but T-canon (as per page 118 of this thread, seventh post). In that regard, the Clone Wars movie novelisations could be T-canon if they follow the same pattern as the G-canon movie novelisations - Mr. Chee will have to confirm that though.

EDIT: Darn, Nathan beat me to it - that'll teach me to write these posts slowly while doing other things!

*was always under the impression (I could be wrong) that all the movie novelisations were G-canon.
If that's the case, and 'The Clone Wars' movie is also G-canon, then is 'The Clone Wars' novelisation also G-canon?
Which would make a lot of the EU stuff that KT stuck in there G-canon too, right? *

Remember, it's not by story anymore, it's by element. If a fruit is created by Lucas for AOTC, but then the name of the fruit is created by another author, without Lucas' input, then the existence of the fruit is G-Canon and the name of the fruit is C-Canon. It isn't whole stories anymore once you really get down to it.

In that sense, the novelizations, radio dramas, etc. that are based on Lucas' vision are G-Canon only in the sense that they are expressing his creations. That which does not, which is simply added in by an EU writer, is C-Canon. We refer to novelizations as G-Canon often because they are mostly G-Canon, but the Holocron database is much more specific than the story-by-story list that used to make such distinctions over a decade ago.

As for The Clone Wars, as you may recall, The Clone Wars is not G-Canon, nor C-Canon. It is the first item to be produced in the new T-Canon level. In theory, that means that whatever Traviss included that is from the actual T-Canon source material would be T-Canon, but anything she added herself to her adaptation of the T-Canon source would be C-Canon . . . and that would include the EU references.

Even then, even if we were to incorrectly assume the EU references that are C-Canon instead of T-Canon, the fact that something is referenced does not bring all material from that reference into another level. For example, Obi-Wan discusses Saleucami and Boz Pity conflicts in ROTS, which is G-Canon. That does not move the events of Obsession or Siege at Saleucami into G-Canon from C-Canon. It just codifies that the planet names themselves are G-Canon.

I was always under the impression (I could be wrong) that all the movie novelisations were G-canon.
If that's the case, and 'The Clone Wars' movie is also G-canon, then is 'The Clone Wars' novelisation also G-canon?
Which would make a lot of the EU stuff that KT stuck in there G-canon too, right?

Now, let's say the Rodian is reading the issue from 14:2:12. He's informed that the incident in the Taldot sector ended "today." It would make no sense if this event was compressed along with the rest of the timeline, since the Rodian then would read that the incident ended today, when it "actually" ended days/weeks/months earlier. If the Star Wars newsnet can't keep track of the dates of the battles in an intergalactic war... well, that makes no sense. See what I mean?

*Nathan, I have the greatest respect for what you are doing and trying to do, but isn't the SW universe getting too big to fit everything into one single chronology? It's expanding and expanding and it will always be. I think that someday there will even be more stories than time *

At this point, honestly, if it weren't so confusing to many less informed fans, I would certainly have loved to have seen a continuity that includes G-Canon and C-Canon without T-Canon, then another that includes G-Canon and T-Canon without C-Canon. Alas, that's not what we have.

It all goes back to what I've said for years regarding SW canon: It is not our job to decide what various levels of canon will be, nor what will or won't be considered in-continuity. It is our job, if we are being intellectually honest, to simply recognize what the official word is on the subject, and respect that.

Not because it is more important or official than any other source, but because it is written from an "in-universe" perspective. In the Star Wars universe, the NEC is written by Voren Na'al, Archivist Emeritus of the Historical Council of the Galactic Federation of Free Alliances. See what I mean? That work is a piece of continuity in itself. If the timeline is compressed, then (nearly) all of Na'al's data and research would be erroneous. We would then need a retcon for why the poor historian got his work messed up so badly.

Not necessarily.

Consider: Let's say that in a story set in the year of ANH, someone refers back to the events of something set between AOTC and ROTS. Let's say they're referring to Anakin's knighting after Jedi Trial, since that's an easy date to remember (2.5 years after AOTC). Ignoring the difference in the months of AOTC and ROTS (month 5) versus ANH (month 3), let's say that someone says "Yeah, Vader became a Jedi Knight officially nineteen and a half years ago."

If that knighting is shifted back to more like 0.5 years after Geonosis, then he SHOULD have said "Yeah, Vader became a Jedi Knight officially twenty-one and a half years ago." Do we retcon that date? Not overtly.

We mentally fix the date because we know that the date has changed but the writer of the original material didn't. Whether you let that mental fix be that someone is mistaken, or the "historical record" that the writer wrote is mistaken, or perhaps you just replace the numbers in your head with the correct ones as you read. Either way, there's no need (nor would there ever be time) to fix every single in-continuity date reference. Once an event is moved, the rest just comes naturally as a byproduct.

With the NEC, frankly, we don't even need to do that. The NEC itself, in its explanation of how it has grown since the EC, provides its own explanation, wherein it writes off inaccuracies of the EC as being based on new research, new information, etc. Such could certainly be said for what has been "researched" since the NEC was "released" after the Dark Nest Trilogy.