Splinter of the Mind’s Eye

Alan Dean Foster – 1978

The king of movie novelizations and the ghostwriter of “George Lucas’” Star Wars novel, Alan Dean Foster was commissioned to write a sequel to the hit film, but was advised that it had to be something that could be easily adapted into an inexpensive movie if the powers-that-be decided that Star Wars needed a sequel. Obviously, and thankfully, that plan was scrapped in favor of The Empire Strikes Back. Nevertheless, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye retains the distinction of being not only the first Star Wars sequel but the very first work of “expanded universe” building in the Star Wars fiction galaxy, a sub-genre all its own that has flooded the earth with seemingly innumerable comics, novels, TV shows, video games, etc. Yes, it even precedes the notorious Star Wars Holiday Special, which taught us about Life Day and introduced Boba Fett before he ever appeared in film. Foster’s novel, presumably crafted with input from Lucas, is pretty underwhelming. It feels like Foster barely got Star Wars, and in all fairness, hardly anyone at that time could conceive of what it would become. The plot has Luke and Leia, still before knowing of their own sibling connection, crash land on an industrial outpost planet and scramble to evade capture by the always pursuing Empire. Luke retains some of his youthful humility from the 1977 film (aka A New Hope), but Leia is more irritable and unlikeable than she previously was. The focus stays on them the entire time as they pass through a frontier mining town and witness injustice while trying to stay undercover. Eventually, late into the book, Darth Vader finally shows up to fight a duel with Luke, whose Force powers are magnified by his contact with a sacred crystal. It’s an interesting read, but it never gets past the TV-movie mentality that would later give us The Ewok Adventure, an economical detour into a somewhat Star Wars-y landscape. But all this restraint makes no sense because it’s a novel. Foster could have made it more epic and ambitious than any movie, but he was curtailed by the demand to keep it simple for the sake of a future B-movie budget that never even came to pass. Thus we see that, as early as 1978, Lucas was already bending his art over to accept the insertion of corporate demands, something that would only get progressively worse over the years, culminating in his sale of the whole beloved franchise to the Disney media conglomeration.