A couple years back, Disney and Lucasfilm made a very controversial decision: they de-canonized all the non-film STAR WARS-related media. So all those books, comics, and video games generations of fans spent decades consuming became filler material in one fell swoop. This didn’t sit well with a lot of hardcore fans, who felt that their investment in this world had officially amounted to nothing. But the logic behind the move made sense. 

With all that material thrown to the wayside, Disney and Lucasfilm could do what they could to ensure that all future content maintained a strict continuity. This was something that was never done before, and as such, there were plenty of contradictions out there tangled in the monstrous pile of content. It also gave Disney an amazing opportunity. Yes, they could ignore all the STAR WARS content that came before them, but they could also cherrypick bits and pieces from it and use them in actual canon. So any previous canon out there is pretty much readily available for Lucasfilm to use at any time in the new continuity, if they saw fit.

Looks like they’d done just that with a fan-favorite villain, Grand Admiral Thrawn. In the trailer for STAR WARS REBELS season 3, Thrawn was revealed to be one of the big bads of the season.

Check out his reveal in the trailer below!

For those unfamiliar, Thrawn first made a splash in the 1991 Timothy Zahn novel HEIR TO THE EMPIRE. and continued on in the rest of the THRAWN TRILOGY. In the old STAR WARS expanded universe, Thrawn was the man to take control of the Empire in the wake of the Emperor’s death in RETURN OF THE JEDI. Thrawn’s rise to power was especially important, as he was the only non-human to rise in the ranks as much as he did. Given that STAR WARS REBELS takes place before the original trilogy, one has to wonder what sort of changes will be made to the character — though Lucasfilm wouldn’t dare throw away the character’s pragmatic and ruthless personality. Either way, it’s undoubtedly a joy to hardcore fans to see the character return to the series canon.

But those who were waiting for a real return to the character will also be happy to learn that Timothy Zahn, the man who created Thrawn, will be writing a new novel, simply entitled THRAWN. The book is due to get released in 2017, and will definitely inject some adrenaline into the new STAR WAR canon.

What did you think of the trailer, and what do you think of Thrawn officially getting canonized in the new STAR WARS continuity? Let us know your thoughts down below!

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SOURCE: Star Wars