What if Mara Jade would have defeated Jacen Solo?
Karen Traviss' novel "Legacy of the Force: Sacrifice" was released on May 29, 2007. In this book, there was the greatest loss in the whole Expanded Universe - one of the most fan-favorite Star Wars character of all times, Mara Jade Skywalker was killed by her own nephew, Jacen Solo. If you are a newbie at SW and wonder, why some fans care about her even eleven years after, please read this wonderful article by Dunc from Club Jade, it explains everything. Yeah, I'm definitely not from that generation gap, cause I watched SW for the first time only in 2010. So, in the language of the author of the article, I'm from The Clone Wars generation, therefore I must be the fan of Ahsoka (or, at least, Padme) as strong female character. But I'm not a fan of The Clone Wars... I'm a reader. My first SW book was "The New Essential Guide to Characters", and though there was a lot of interesting characters, the one who caught my attention was Mara. I decided to read more about her, and took both The Thrawn Trilogy and The Hand of Thrawn Duology by Timothy Zahn. And after I finished reading, Mara became my second most-favorite character of Star Wars (the first, as you can guess, is R2-D2). Later I knew from the Wookieepedia, that Traviss killed Mara in her novel, and it was really sad news, so I decided to skip Legacy of the Force series entirely, and still have not read it (because I promised not to). But I always wondered, what would happen, if Mara, not Jaina Solo, have defeated Jacen?
Eight years later. Because of Disney now all this staff is not a canon. :( But I'm still wondering - what if?
She was fighting to protect her son Ben, who was a friend, a cousin and Jedi apprentice of Jacen until Solo turned to the dark side. That's why when Jacen almost lost the duel, he created the illusion of Ben's face over his to distract Mara. She hesitated for a second, and it was enough time for Jacen to thrust a poisoned dart into her leg. It was a slow and painful death... only for this vile traitor to become Sith Lord. But what if he could not deceive her with his illusion? The galaxy would have been saved four books (!) earlier. And then in "Fate of the Jedi" no Chief of State would be able to send Luke into exile - definitely Mara would not let all this mess happen. xD And though this can lead to Luke and Ben would never travel to investigate Jacen's fall and would never meet the Lost Tribe of Sith (thus they never meet my third favorite character, Vestara Khai, a Sith apprentice), which in it's turn never meet Abeloth because Battle of Centerpoint Station, which awakened and helped her to escape, would never happened - I think this story is a way better. After all, who knows, maybe the rising of such powerful entity as Abeloth is a fixed point in time and something else would awaken her? :| Perhaps all these characters would still meet, just in another place and under other circumstances. And I'm sure that in that case Mara probably would help Vestara to become the first character in the whole EU, who was a Sith (not just "on the dark side" or "former Jedi or something", I mean really a Sith!) and turned to a Jedi - the thing that never ever has happened before.
The Doctor taught me that time can be rewritten. And as I'm not River Song in the Library, yes, I'm DARE to do it! =^_^= Let me introduce the alternative SW timeline, in which Mara successfully defeated Jacen!
By the way, I've been planning for many years a crossover between DW and SW, who explained all this Disney cancellation of EU as parallel world paradox. I'm not sure that I will ever have enough time and resources to implement this idea, but I really hope so. :) Maybe one day...
What if Mara Jade would have defeated Jacen Solo?
Karen Traviss' novel "Legacy of the Force: Sacrifice" was released on May 29, 2007. In this book, there was the greatest loss in the whole Expanded Universe - one of the most fan-favorite Star Wars character of all times, Mara Jade Skywalker was killed by her own nephew, Jacen Solo. If you are a newbie at SW and wonder, why some fans care about her even eleven years after, please read this wonderful article by Dunc from Club Jade, it explains everything. Yeah, I'm definitely not from that generation gap, cause I watched SW for the first time only in 2010. So, in the language of the author of the article, I'm from The Clone Wars generation, therefore I must be the fan of Ahsoka (or, at least, Padme) as strong female character. But I'm not a fan of The Clone Wars... I'm a reader. My first SW book was "The New Essential Guide to Characters", and though there was a lot of interesting characters, the one who caught my attention was Mara. I decided to read more about her, and took both The Thrawn Trilogy and The Hand of Thrawn Duology by Timothy Zahn. And after I finished reading, Mara became my second most-favorite character of Star Wars (the first, as you can guess, is R2-D2). Later I knew from the Wookieepedia, that Traviss killed Mara in her novel, and it was really sad news, so I decided to skip Legacy of the Force series entirely, and still have not read it (because I promised not to). But I always wondered, what would happen, if Mara, not Jaina Solo, have defeated Jacen?
Eight years later. Because of Disney now all this staff is not a canon. :( But I'm still wondering - what if?
She was fighting to protect her son Ben, who was a friend, a cousin and Jedi apprentice of Jacen until Solo turned to the dark side. That's why when Jacen almost lost the duel, he created the illusion of Ben's face over his to distract Mara. She hesitated for a second, and it was enough time for Jacen to thrust a poisoned dart into her leg. It was a slow and painful death... only for this vile traitor to become Sith Lord. But what if he could not deceive her with his illusion? The galaxy would have been saved four books (!) earlier. And then in "Fate of the Jedi" no Chief of State would be able to send Luke into exile - definitely Mara would not let all this mess happen. xD And though this can lead to Luke and Ben would never travel to investigate Jacen's fall and would never meet the Lost Tribe of Sith (thus they never meet my third favorite character, Vestara Khai, a Sith apprentice), which in it's turn never meet Abeloth because Battle of Centerpoint Station, which awakened and helped her to escape, would never happened - I think this story is a way better. After all, who knows, maybe the rising of such powerful entity as Abeloth is a fixed point in time and something else would awaken her? :| Perhaps all these characters would still meet, just in another place and under other circumstances. And I'm sure that in that case Mara probably would help Vestara to become the first character in the whole EU, who was a Sith (not just "on the dark side" or "former Jedi or something", I mean really a Sith!) and turned to a Jedi - the thing that never ever has happened before.
The Doctor taught me that time can be rewritten. And as I'm not River Song in the Library, yes, I'm DARE to do it! =^_^= Let me introduce the alternative SW timeline, in which Mara successfully defeated Jacen!
By the way, I've been planning for many years a crossover between DW and SW, who explained all this Disney cancellation of EU as parallel world paradox. I'm not sure that I will ever have enough time and resources to implement this idea, but I really hope so. :) Maybe one day...