Even on second watching and not in 3D Tarkin was distracting because I was intentionally looking for shit that tips you off that he was CGI animation as well as camera tricks to try and disguise the fact.

Sucks knowing that Cushing had been long dead -takes you out of the movie.

The more I think about it, doing SotE would just seem doing a rehash like Ep VII did to Ep IV.

Dash's importance in the Shadows realm was 1) Rogue group pilot taking down AT-ATs 2) tracking Boba Fett (and taking down IG-88), getting the DS-2 plans from the Suprosa (which whitewashes the efforts of the Bothans. Check your privilege shitlords) and then 4) rescuing Leia from Coruscant.

There's no real need to revist Hoth.. nobody gives a shit who IG-88 is.. and the Suprosa gambit would just be a spaceborne version of the raid on Scarif.

EDIT: Also, the big bad in SotE is an alien crimelord with irresistible sex pheromones who has a blonde bimbo sexbot as his hatchet man. As much as the Black Sun was a good foil for the good guys in the expanded universe.. it doesn't match the 'tone' of the latest releases of media.. think back to how the Hutts were handled in Clone Wars. Criminal organizations = dark comic relief, not a serious villain.

I disagree.

If anything, it took me deeper into the Star Wars universe.

It made me think the character was the character.

Seeing someone else playing Tarkin would have had the opposite effect. It would have immediately made me think that Peter Cushing was dead instead of focusing on the movie.

MAI IMMERSION

That's a video game.

Dash Rendar is barely in the book. The book is about Luke and Xizor and Vader, and those two competing for the Emperor's good graces. Xixor is trying to kill Luke the whole book because he hates Vader so much.

There are no Hoth scenes, Boba Fett or IG-88, no mention of the Death Star.

WTF was the point of a concerted multimedia content project if shit wasn't consistent from medium to medium?

Makes no sense.

Cash grab for Lucasarts obviously.

The book was really good.

The book was superb, and set a benchmark for what was to be expected of EU material.

Gonna go ahead and say Zahn did that well before SotE was a thing -and I never read a Zahn book.

In the grand scheme of things, the Zahn stuff is my least favorite.

God damn that looks amazing. What a beautiful film.

http://imgur.com/a/HQd9C

http://i.imgur.com/SLjgrtf.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/Od22nBt.jpg?1

After sitting on it for a few hours I am convinced. This is the best Star Wars movie. The slow build, the perfect character development, the amazing battle, and finally, the fantastic lead into ANH.

Vader got to be Vader. That was the best part.

The space battle was PERFECT.

The close ups of the star destroyers were epic. Gave me a great sense of scale.

No. ESB remains #1

I have learned, over time, that ANH is the best of them all.