Can The Old Republic fill the timeline gap?

Screen Rant recently posted an article detailing how there is about a 25,000-year gap in Star Wars storytelling. Since Disney took over the franchise from a galaxy far, far away, Star Wars fans have been blessed (or cursed, depending on how you feel) with tons of content to fill in nearly all the gaps that existed between the Skywalker Saga of movies. Pre-The Phantom Menace, however, is essentially unexplored.

With the introduction of The High Republic toward the end of 2020, we are slowly starting to get stories from a time before Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Sheev Palpatine. Only another 350 years or so, though. While three and a half centuries is quite a long time, it’s a drop in the bucket compared to the 25,000 years back James Mangold’s new Star Wars film will be set in.

So we’re left with a huge gap in time, and one conveniently “Legends-shaped” piece of storytelling to fill in the puzzle.

Enter: The Old Republic.

Star Wars diehards are well aware of The Old Republic era. Whether you like the video games or the books, the stories have had a major lasting effect on fans. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was the first appearance of this side of Star Wars, set many millennia before the events of the Skywalker Saga. The video game successfully ushered in a different era for the beloved franchise, spawning multiple sequels and expansions.

A remake of the 2003 cult classic game was announced in 2021, with the plans of being a PlayStation 5 exclusive. Unfortunately, though, there has been little-to-no progress, and whether or not this game actually ends up being remade is severely in question.

As far as books go, there are four main novels that were published from 2010 to 2012, all under the shared title umbrella of The Old Republic. Labeled as “Legends,” they are not part of the official Star Wars canon. The novels, titled Fatal Alliance, Deceived, Revan, and Annihilation, are not direct sequels of each other but are tie-ins to the video game. Many of the characters seen in the video games are also written into the pages of these stellar books. Four fantastic stories were full of Jedi, Sith, Assassin Droids, Commando Troopers, different planets, and more. These four novels are some of my personal favorite pieces of Star Wars storytelling.

There are amazing characters introduced in the stories from both the video games and the novels that deserve to be seen on the grandest stage. One character in particular, Revan, is an absolute must to be brought into live action. Without going into specific details, this former Jedi and former Sith (yes, you read that correctly) has one of the more riveting character arcs in all Star Wars.

Whether it’s a Knights of the Old Republic adaptation or bringing one of the four Old Republic novels to the big screen, there are plenty of directions Star Wars can go to fill in the timeline gap. Regardless of that direction, getting more Star Wars content in an era that we have yet to see canonically will be wonderfully refreshing. I will leave readers with my last note: there are some absolutely amazing cinematic trailers and cut scenes for the Knights of the Old Republic video games you can watch on YouTube. I suggest you immediately search for them and watch if you haven’t seen them yet.