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Has the Star Wars universe caught up to our time?


Star Wars is set "a long time ago", but I know there have been an expanded universe. Has that universe's time caught up to our time line yet?



Answer



The only answer I can find is what I call a Lucasism. In other words, it's a situation that was developed to fit, as one person called it, The Rule of Cool, without regard for fact or science. Once it's been created and fit into official canon, then there's a lot of rationalization to explain it, so, in the long run you end up with more explanation than cool. In the end, I feel like there's a lot of contradictory facts, but then again, this is the Lucasverse.


(I'm not going to focus on what has already been stated or proven in other questions on SE:SF&F, but I will summarize.)





  • Star Wars takes place (everybody say it with me), "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away." The problem with "long time ago" and "far, far away" is that these are loose terms. Any other galaxy is far, far away to us and even 500 years ago, to humans, is a long time ago.




  • E.T. and Star Wars are in the same universe. Either there is parallel evolution for two species (humans and Brodo Asogi) or E.T. comes from the Star Wars universe. Since this has been established in several ways we'll take it as fact.




  • Elliot meeting E.T. was a result of Senator Grebleips (spell it backwards!) of Brodo Asogi obtaining funding for an expedition to another galaxy. This was in 22 BBY, which is pretty close to Luke Skywalker's birth.




  • We don't know how fast the Brodo Asogi expedition could cross the interstellar void, but the ship isn't big enough to be a generation ship, which leads to the assumption that it could reach its destination and return within the lifespan of the Brodo Asogi.Brodo Asogi ship from E.T.





  • There's no indication the Brodo Asogi are exceptionally long-lived and even in the long timeline of the Star Wars universe, 100,000 years is so a long time that it makes no sense planning on anything that far out. So there's no reason to assume a long life for the species or factoring in time-dilation or anything else that would indicate the expedition would take more than a time measured in decades.




  • We also see an excellent argument that the light from the Star Wars universe has not reached us yet.




By putting the Brodo Asogi onscreen in The Phantom Menace, Lucas linked the two worlds. When the expedition was included, that not only establishes the two as being in the same universe, but since that expedition was intended the one that reached Earth, it joins Earth in the 1980s with Star Wars, no matter how long ago or far away it supposedly took place.


So allowing for a lifespan of, say, somewhere under 200 years for the Brodo Asogi, by putting them on screen, Lucas has essentially given us a connection to say that 22 BBY was less than a few hundred years ago.



While this may not seem to be "a long time ago," if we accept the Star Wars references to the Brodo Asogi, then, while the light from the Star Wars galaxy may not reach us for millions of years, a ship on an expedition planned before the birth of Luke Skywalker already has reached us about 30 years ago.


Which would lead to the conclusion that Luke Skywalker was born less then a few hundred years ago. That would put the time line, which currently ends approximately 140 BBY recent enough to be concurrent with recorded human history.


It's also possible that, since the expedition left and might take a couple hundred years, that the Star Wars timeline has not quite caught up to the time when that expedition reaches Earth, but it's certainly a lot closer than it feels when we think of "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away."


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