u/Imaginary_Golf548

In Revenge of the Sith, Lucas had planned the creation of the Rebel Alliance itself extremely early in the timeline (19 BBY, and not 2 BBY) with several deleted scenes. The first shows us the creation of the Alliance:

>81 INT. CORUSCANT-BAIL ORGANA’S OFFICE-DAY PADME, BAIL ORGANA, and SENATORS MON MOTHMA, FANG ZAR, TERR TANEEL, and GIDDEAN DANU sit in Senator Organa ‘s office.

>BAIL ORGANA
Now that he has control of
the Jedi Council, the Chancellor
has appointed Governors to
oversee all star systems in
the Republic.

>FANG ZAR
When did this happen?

>BAIL ORGANA
The decree was posted this morning.

>PADME
Do you think he will
dismantle the Senate?

>MON MOTHMA
Why bother? As a practical matter,
the Senate no longer exists.

>GIDDEAN DANU
The constitution is in shreds.
Amendment after amendment…
executive directives, sometimes
a dozen in one day.

>BAIL ORGANA
We can’t let a thousand
years of democracy disappear
without a fight.

>EVERYONE looks at each other, a little worried at the implications of what was just said.

>TERR TANEEL
What are you suggesting?

>BAIL ORGANA
I apologize. I didn’t mean to
sound like a Separatist.

>MON MOTHMA
We are not Separatists trying to
leave the Republic. We are loyalists,
trying to preserve democracy
in the Republic.

>BAIL ORGANA
It has become increasingly clear
to many of us that the Chancellor
has become an enemy
of democracy.

>PADME
I can’t believe it has come to this!
Chancellor Palpatine is one of my
oldest advisors. He served as my
Ambassador when I was Queen.

>GlDDEAN DANU
Senator, I fear you underestimate
the amount of corruption that has
taken hold in the Senate.

>MON MOTHMA
The Chancellor has played the
Senators well. They know where the
power lies, and they will do whatever
it takes to share in it. Palpatine has
become a dictator and we have
helped him to do it.

>BAIL ORGANA
We can’t sit around debating any
longer, we have decided to do what
we can to stop it. Senator Mon Mothma
and I are putting together
an organization…

>PADME
Say no more, Senator Organa.
I understand. At this point, it’s
better to leave some things unsaid.

>BAIL ORGANA
Yes. I agree and we must
not discuss this with anyone,
without everyone in this
group agreeing.

>MON MOTHMA
That means those closest to you…
even family… no one can be told.

>They ALL nod their heads. PADME considers this for a moment.

>PADME
Agreed.

Afterwards, the senators discuss a diplomatic alternative before using their Rebel Alliance and triggering the start of the Galactic Civil War of the OT:

>95 INT. CORUSCANT-PADME’S APARTMENT-DAY
PADME, MON MOTHMA, and five other Senators (BANA BREEMU, FANG ZAR. CHI EEKWAY, GIDDEAN DANU, BAIL ORGANA) sit in Padme’s living room. C-3PO serves drinks to the guests.

>PADME
We cannot let this turn into another war.

>BAIL ORGANA
Absolutely, that is the last
thing we want.

>MON MOTHMA
We are hoping to form an
alliance in the Senate to stop
the Chancellor from further
subverting the constitution,
that’s all.

>PADME
I know a Jedi I feel it
would be wise to consult.

>BANA BREEMU
That would be dangerous.

>MON MOTHMA
We don’t know where the
Jedi stand in all this.

>PADME
I only wish to discuss this
with one… one I trust.

>GIDDEAN DANU
Going against the Chancellor
without the support of the
Jedi is risky.

>PADME
The Jedi aren’t any happier
with the situation than we are…

>CHI EEKWAY
Patience, Senator.

>FANG ZAR
We have so many Senators
on our side, surely that will
persuade the Chancellor.

>BANA BREEMU
When you present the
“petition of the two thousand”
to the Chancellor, things
may change.

>BAIL ORGANA
Let us see what we can
accomplish in the Senate,
before we include the Jedi.

>PADME takes a deep breath in frustration and disappointment.

I'll spare you the last scene which just shows the failure of this Delegation of 2000. Both the original Expanded Universe and the Disney canon ignored this aspect, postponing the creation of the Alliance to a few years before A New Hope, believing that Revenge of the Sith set the scene too early (especially since these are only deleted scenes). I remind you that for Lucas, these scenes clearly depict the creation of the Rebel Alliance, stating in the ROTS audio commentary:

>There are some scenes that were cut out where from this point on we begin to see Padmé become involved in the Rebel Alliance and there is scenes with her and Mon Mothma and Bail Organa where they begin to start the Rebel Alliance which is really a way for them forming a group in the Senate to counter what is going on with the Chancellor.

In the EU, the creation of the Rebel Alliance was ultimately depicted primarily in The Force Unleashed, approved by Lucas (even though there's the plot hole of Bail Organa becoming a known rebel before A New Hope). With Disney, it was Rebels that showed it, followed by Andor.

Do you think Lucas's idea worked? Was it too soon? What do you think it would have meant? What would it have implied for the lore and in relation to A New Hope if the Alliance had already been active for 19 years? Does it work within the framework of the six movies (at least, one might argue, it allows for the creation of the Alliance to be shown in the main 6 movies, and not off-screen between them)?

It's pretty unbearable how this guy has gradually hijacked the franchise as a vehicle for his fan fictions. He has absolutely no respect for Star Wars; it just seems like a platform for him to spread his very own personal stories.

I want to remind everyone that he has introduced literal magic, time travel, interdimensional travel, Force gods, and space whales with hyperdrives in their butts (!), magical resurrections.

It's always interesting to identify all his recurrent and weird obsessions. First off, there are the hats (Cad Bane, Embo), the wolves (Commander Wolf, Embo's wolves, Lothal's wolves who can both master the Force AND speak AND travel between space and time, the names of Baylan and the other girl, the aesthetic of the WBW), Wicca (the witches of Dathomir and all that stuff, because his wife is a nutcase who's into that stuff), graffiti (first on the clones' equipment, then we had the Ghost crew, Sabine, the Chimaera, and loads of others), the disregard for any form of authority (the heroes are always the ones who don't obey the rules, like Ahsoka, Hera, Sabine).

Then there are so many retcons and oddities in his shows that you can't even really say it's the same universe as the movies anymore, I think. The guy has no idea what Balance in the Force is, forced a personality on the clones (against what AOTC tells us), created the inhibitor chips, adopted the absurd idea of ​​the character of Ahsoka (who is not mentioned in either PT or OT despite her prominent place), the incoherent duels (Obi-Wan fighting Grievous and Obi-Wan and Ankin fighting Dooku before ROTS), completely reinterpreted what the CIS was (with the commercial organizations which, contrary to what we see in AOTC and ROTS, are not really separatist?!), made lightsabers into some kind of magic wands with the new lore of the crystals (whereas, in the films, the characters lose and change lightsabers constantly without it posing a metaphysical problem, just a practical one), changed the Jedi into vile scum etc.

I'm not even mentioning all his plagiarisms from the EU, which he doesn't always admit to (the Siege of Kamino, the Battle of Mon Cala with Kit Fisto, Obi-Wan's fake death, a virus in the Naboo system, the design of Darth Maul in TCW seasons 4-5, etc.). In fact, whenever he takes things from the EU and reworks them in his own style, it's consistently worse (do you prefer Filoni's Thrawn or Zahn's?).

The problem is that Disney made the 'Filoni-Verse' the foundation of its new canon as early as 2014, and all other works have revolved around it to varying degrees ever since (even if Filoni doesn't much like others playing with his toys). I feel I can say this because I know the old Expanded Universe well and how different the atmosphere is in it: the quality of the stories certainly varies a lot, but overall they were much more careful to stay true to the atmosphere and concepts of the films without bending or retconning them. The main problem with the old Expanded Universe doesn't stem, as with Filoni, from a tradition of disdain for other authors' work and the retcons of the movies, but from the fact that these works were often created simultaneously, and many were made even before the prequels had started or finished.

Now, what we have are no longer stories before this Star Wars movie, after this Star Wars movie, or between these Star Wars movies, but stories by Filoni before this Filoni show, after this Filoni show, and between these Filoni shows. I'm sure his hope is that we could watch his series coherently without ever having seen the 6 Lucas's movies (like season 7 of TCW, which became a substitute for ROTS in the Filoni-Verse, or the end of season 4 of Rebels, which directly spoils the end of the Original Trilogy, etc.).

Anyway, sorry for the rant.

I was having fun reading the different versions of the A New Hope script and I came across a funny little detail in the draft from 1975.

We tend to think of the 1981 Audio Drama as the first to offer an explanation for the stealing of the plans during the Battle of Toprawa. But that's not quite right. Lucas had considered it a bit, but simply cut the details from the scripts or the edits of the Original Trilogy movies. In the 1975 script for A New Hope (so not yet the final 1977 version), we can read:

"LEIA

The plans and specifications to a battle station with enough fire power to destroy an entire system...

Our only hope in destroying it is to find its weakness, which we will determine from the data I stored in Artoo.

LEIA (CONT'D)

We captured the plans in a raid on the Imperial shipyards, but we fell under attack before I could get the data to safety, so I hid it in this Artoo unites and sends him off."

The original Return of the Jedi script, in a passage that was cut, we can even read more:

"BEN (continuing his narrative)

When your father left, he didn't know your mother was pregnant. Your mother and I knew he would find out eventually, but we wanted to keep you both as safe as possible, for as long as possible. So I took you to live with my brother Owen on Tatooine... and your mother took Leia to live as the daughter of Senator Organa, on Alderaan.

Luke turns, and settles near Ben to hear the tale.

BEN (attempting to give solace with his words)

The Organa household was high-born and politically quite powerful in that system. Leia became a princess by virtue of lineage... no one knew she'd been adopted, of course. But it was a title without real power, since Alderaan had long been a democracy. Even so, the family continued to be politically powerful, and Leia, following in her foster father's path, became a senator as well. That's not all she became, of course... she became the leader of her cell in the Alliance against the corrupt Empire. And because she had diplomatic immunity, she was a vital link for getting information to the Rebel cause. That's what she was doing when her path crossed yours... for her foster parents had always told her to contact me on Tatooine, if her troubles became desperate."

There you go, I just find it funny to see that this was Lucas' original interpretation of this major event in mythology, especially taking into account all the other stories that have claimed to tell about the Rebel operation.