Chuck Wendig’s incredible Aftermath trilogy comes to a close with Empire’s End, as the final instalment in the canon series bridging the gap between Return Of The Jedi and The Force Awakens is set to end with a bang.
We talked to the author of the Myriam Black series and Zer0es about what readers can expect from Empire’s End, his experiences writing the trilogy, and who he really wants to see get a solo spin-off movie…
How does it feel to have reached the end of this trilogy?
Extraordinary! Exciting! And sad. I’m thrilled to be able to conclude this tale – but also bummed that the ride, for now, is over. One small glimmer of awesome, though, is that with Star Wars, stories are never single-serving. The saga continues, and while some doors close, others open anew, and we might see old characters in unexpected places.
Can you tease a little of what readers can expect from Empire’s End?
Spoiler warning: the Empire ends. OR DOES IT?
More to the point, we’re going to spend a lot of time on Jakku, which means we’re going to find out what Rax is doing, and how the stage is set for the future of THE FORCE AWAKENS. We’ll see Sloane and Norra’s stories crash together once more. We’ll see some familiar faces in strange places. It’s politics and explosions and some characters won’t make it – and there’s the curious matter of the birth of a child…
Looking back on the three books, how did the experience of creating this story and working in this world compare to your expectations?
It exceeded my expectations in every way. It was a blast. The universe is my very favourite, and all the people involved in shepherding this universe forward are about as nice and as visionary as one could hope.
Did you have any apprehensiveness about taking Aftermath on?
Not really? I probably should have, but at the time I was just too damn happy to get to play in this sandbox. Still am. Great fun.
How have you found the fan response to the Aftermath trilogy?
Star Wars fans are some of the most passionate and invested out there, so it’s been a thrill. Even when there’ve been some challenging interactions, I know it’s due to that passion and that investment.
It must be pretty amazing to know that characters you created are officially part of the Star Wars story!
I get to own a tiny little postage stamp of real estate in this massive, historic, wonderful storyworld. ‘Amazing’ really doesn’t even cover it. I don’t think human words have yet been written to convey how cool it is to have these characters of mine given life inside the canon.
Is there another era of Star Wars that you’d be interested in writing about?
Given the dedication inside the front of EMPIRE’S END, I’d love to tackle Luke Skywalker’s time between RETURN OF THE JEDI and THE FORCE AWAKENS. One day, fingers crossed.
There’s so much discussion of the Han Solo movie at the moment, but if you could pick any character from the Star Wars universe and give them their own standalone film, who would you choose and why?
Hardest question ever. Can we give them all a standalone film? Is that allowed? Lando, I think, though he’ll be in the Han Solo film, will deserve his own tale. Yoda certainly has a long life we’ve not fully yet seen. Getting to see Ewan as Obi-Wan again would be – well, I’ll just say I’m sweating a little thinking about how awesome that would be. What about Wat Tambor? Max Rebo? TOM CRUISE AS THE SARLACC.
And for my own personal thrill, I think we all agree that Sinjir deserves a standalone something. A comic book, maybe.
What have you got coming up?
After EMPIRE’S END, I’ve got the next three Miriam Black books, and then a new book with Del Rey called EXEUNT in 2018. Exciting times!
Star Wars: Aftermath: Empire’s End by Chuck Wendig is published in hardback by Century on 23rd February, priced £19.99
Star Wars: Aftermath: Life Debt by Chuck Wendig is published in paperback by Arrow on 23rd March, priced £8.99
