What are the main differences between Lucas Skywalker in Star Wars narrative of canons and legends? Since 1991, large interconnected networks Star Wars stories existed off the big screen. These stories come in the form of books, comics, video games, TV shows and more – all spanning the Star Wars Expanded Universe, or EU.
That was until 2014, when the Star Wars the canon was redefined – and the EU became known as “Legends”. Since then, the new Star Wars Canon’s expanded universe has begun, featuring new stories that influence all new live-action projects. Due to this, Luke Skywalker’s characterization is different in the new timeline compared to the old one, but also still similar in other ways..
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Legends Luke Skywalker had more students who fell to the dark side
Skywalker’s fallen students
Canon’s Jedi Master, Luke Skywalker, is well known for his role in his nephew, Ben Solo’s, fall to the dark side. This is a central and defining plot point of the sequel trilogy, and it also happened in Star Wars Legends. Jacen Solo, one of Han and Leia’s children in Legends, becomes a Sith Lord. Jacen, however, wasn’t the only case of this for one of Luke’s students in Legends.
Kyp Durron, a student of Kevin J Anderson Jedi Academy trilogy, falls to the dark side due to the manipulation of the Sith spirit, in one of the first cases. Desann do Jedi Knight games was another of Luke’s students, just like the evil Kueller from Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s film The New Rebellion. In addition to these, there are even more examples of this, as the idea of a student of Lucas falling to the dark side was and is a common story in Star Wars.
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Canon Luke Skywalker built his first temple on Ossus
The Old World of the Jedi Library
In both timelines, Luke Skywalker established a Jedi Academy where he could begin to reform the Jedi Order. In canon, Luke settles on the planet Ossus, an ancient Jedi library world since the time of the Old Republic. This is where Luke discovers several of the Sacred Jedi Texts, but he also bears a distinct resemblance to Luke of Legends in another way.
In Legends, Luke Skywalker’s second central Jedi Temple was built on Ossus, but an Ossus that looks very different from how it appears in canon. In canon, Ossus is a lush jungle environment, whereas it was a desolate, rocky wasteland in Legends. However, like the Ossus Jedi Temple in canon, Luke’s first temple in Legends also meets a fiery end.
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Legends Luke Skywalker built his first temple on Yavin 4
The Original Jedi Praxeum
The legends The answer to the location of Luke’s Jedi Temple took fans to a much more familiar world – and probably on purpose. Yavin 4, the forested moon of a large gas giant and the former site of the Rebel Alliance headquarters, was where Luke established his Jedi Academy.or, Praxeum. This was also a simpler feat, considering that Luke only used the temples that already existed there.
The Massassi Temples have their origins in the ancient Sith Lord Naga Sadow, who built them in his honor. Luke used these temples as the basis for his Praxeum, as seen in the Jedi Academy Kevin J Anderson trilogy. After more than 10 years of success, the Praxeum was destroyed by the extragalactic invaders known as the Yuuzhan Vong, and a new temple was established on Ossus.
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Canon Luke Skywalker had a yellow lightsaber before the green one
The Jedi Temple Guard’s Lightsaber
Luke Skywalker first wielded his father’s blue lightsaber before losing it in Cloud City. After that, he built a new green lightsaber as seen in Return of the Jedi. Both facts are true in both canon and legend, but in canon, before building his green lightsaber, Luke needed an intermediate weapon and chose a yellow lightsaber he discovered on a Force-guided journey.
Venturing into a Jedi Temple outpost on the stormy world of Tempes, Luke finds half of a yellow-bladed Jedi Temple Guard lightsaber shortly afterward. The Empire Strikes Back. The saber was guarded by the specter of the Grand Inquisitor, who was formerly a Temple Guard. before earning his position in the Inquisitorius. Luke wore it for the rest of the year leading up to Return of the Jedibefore making a green-bladed saber for his final confrontation with Vader and the Emperor.
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Legends Luke Skywalker fell to the dark side and Palpatine
Star Wars: Dark Empire (1991)
Everyone knows that Emperor Palpatine returned from the dead in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalkerbut few know that this actually happened in Legends also. In the famous Dark Empire comics by Tom Veitch and Cam Kennedy, a cloned, undead emperor attacks the New Republic. Thinking he can resist the urge, Luke Skywalker joins the Emperor’s side to fight him from within.
However, this doesn’t completely work, as Skywalker falls victim to the same promises that the dark side always offers. It corrupts and cannot be used without impacting their lives. Despite fighting him like a powerful Jedi, Luke eventually falls to the dark side, obediently serving Palpatine.. Fortunately, he ends up being taken out of this situation by Leia, and the two defeat the Emperor together, for now.
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Canon Luke Skywalker followed more previous Jedi rules
The legends did not follow the legacy of the ancient Jedi order
The distinction between the New Jedi Order in Legends and canon clearly falls along one line: how much Luke adheres to the rules of the prequel trilogy’s Jedi Order. Today’s fans don’t always remember that, before the prequels, the ways of the Jedi Order weren’t established solely based on the original films. Many rules, like those surrounding attachment and training age, were completely new in the prequels.
This meant that Luke’s New Jedi Order, established in the early 1990s before the prequels, was run in a completely different way. It was created by authors with no knowledge of the Jedi prequel and therefore Luke Skywalker trained his Jedi students in a completely new way in Legends. On the other hand, in canon, Luke Skywalker has a much firmer understanding of how the order worked before Order 66 and implements these teaching methods immediately.
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Legends Luke Skywalker trained adult students (and more students)
Fastest Generations of Jedi Knights
Another difference arising from the lack of knowledge about the Jedi prequel before the films’ release is the age of Legends Luke’s students. Luke, in the previous timeline, accepted students of all ages, rather than starting young as the old Order did. This led to teenagers like Kyp Durron being recruited into Luke’s first class, alongside those the age of Streen, an older, gray-haired man at the time he began his training.
This had another effect on Luke’s New Jedi Order, which was the speed of progression and an increase in the number of Jedi. Since training for the Cavalry was not a 20-year commitment, Luke recruited more and more students who eventually trained his own students, causing the Legends Jedi Order under Luke to grow much faster than in canon..
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Canon Luke Skywalker studied the history of the Ancient Jedi further
Jocasta Nu’s Holocrons
For reasons similar to Legends Luke training older students without issue, Canon’s Luke Skywalker ran his Jedi Order in a very similar way to the prequels in general. Much of this was probably due to how much Canon Lucas knew about the ancient Order. He had many holocrons, a large part of the Jedi Archives thanks to Jocasta Nu, and did a lot of investigative work studying the order – significantly more than Legends Luke.
Again, a lot of this is because all of the canon works were created and released post-prequels. Therefore, Luke can know these Jedi traditions and defend them. However, this sparked some criticism from fans, as it changed Legends’ idea that Luke heavily reformed the Jedi Order – because he had more knowledge of the past.
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Legends Luke Skywalker married Mara Jade and had a son
Mara Jade Skywalker and Ben Skywalker
One of the biggest changes between Legends and the Luke Skywalker canon, however, is in the name Mara Jade. Mara Jade, later Mara Jade Skywalker, was an assassin of the Emperor, who gradually reformed and ended up becoming the companion, and later wife, of Luke Skywalker. During this time, Mara and Luke matured, and she eventually became a Jedi and Master at her new academy.
In addition to Mara, Luke also had a distinct family lineage that went back centuries after the original trilogy. This started with Mara and Luke’s son, Ben Skywalker, who became a valuable part of the New Jedi Order. as well, playing a large role in the conflict against the fallen Jacen Solo. In canon, Luke Skywalker actually had love interests, but after the sequel trilogy, it’s impossible for Luke to have had a wife or child in the canon timeline.
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Luke Skywalker’s death was shown in Canon… but never told in Legends
The Ghost of Skywalker Vs The Last Jedi
Until the end, Luke Skywalker’s canon life was very different from his life in Legends. Contrary to canon, Legends Luke never dies in a story, with the more advanced romance, Crucible by Troy Denning, featuring Luke as an older Jedi master. Beyond Luke’s life, similarities to the canon really start to appear. iconic 2006 Star Wars Legacy comics by Jan Duursema and John Ostrander take place more than 130 years later Return of the Jediand depicts Luke’s Force ghost appearing to his ancestor, Cade Skywalker.
Likewise, in The Rise of Skywalkeryoung Jedi Knight Rey is visited by Luke’s ghost on Ahch-To. There, he offers her advice in the same way he gave Cade. In the previous film, Star Wars: The Last JediCanon does something Legends never did and killed Luke Skywalker. He dies in a way that is incredibly reminiscent of the original Star Wars film, where Obi-Wan sacrificed himself to distract Vader so the younger heroes could escape in the Millennium Falcon – exactly what Luke Skywalker did, but with the entire First Order army.