Fans of the Star Wars expanded universe — all those books, comics and video games telling stories not seen on film — got a rude awakening in 2014 when Disney, which bought the rights to the franchise, and Lucasfilm decided to get rid of all of it and rebranded the universe as "Star Wars Legends."
Suddenly, all those great stories, including Han Solo and Princess Leia going on to have twin Jedi children, were no longer considered canon. Instead, Disney took control of that universe and decided that moving forward, only new books, comics, video games and other media sanctioned by the company would serve as canon.
Disney and Lucasfilm held no ill will toward fans in their decision to get rid of the expanded universe: they created a team of storytellers to make sure that "Legends" wouldn't have any continuity issues or conflicting information.
However, the move angered a lot of fans, who felt that Disney and Lucasfilm threw away a lot of good stories to reboot the franchise. Now, with a new film opening this weekend, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, one group is threatening to ruin Star Wars for everyone if its demands of getting that expanded universe back aren't met.
The Alliance to Preserve the Expanded Universe set up a group up on Facebook with a mission "to get Disney/Lucasfilm to continue the (recently branded "Legends") Expanded Universe time line with new books, comics and games, even if it is as an alternate universe."
And they're serious, so much that they're asking their nearly 4,000 members to go see The Force Awakens when it opens in theaters and then hit as many social media sites as possible to spoil the entire movie for everyone unless Disney and Lucasfilm meet their demands of bringing back the expanded universe.
Of course, this will probably backfire and make a lot of fellow Star Wars fans angry, and it's likely that it's too late for Disney and Lucasfilm to make the changes the group requests: they've already released books, comics and other media in the official "Legends universe" and The Force Awakens already operates in that new universe, as do the other Star Wars films in production. It might be easy for Disney and Lucasfilm to just say that the expanded universe happened in an alternate time line, but as of yet, there hasn't been any hint in the series that alternate universes are even possible.
Fortunately, other Star Wars fan groups on Facebook are aware of this group and have warned other fans to avoid members of The Alliance to Preserve the Expanded Universe at all cost.
Meanwhile, other Facebook users are posting memes and threats to those who would spoil the new movie, so things on social media, at least for Star Wars fans, are tense at the moment.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens opens Dec. 18.
