So what if Star Wars as we know it didn't exist, but instead the plot of the movies was being made up on the spot by players of a Tabletop Game?
Well, for one, the results might actually make a lot more sense, from an out-of-story point of view...
Darths & Droids
is a Campaign Comic created by The Comic Irregulars (David Morgan-Mar and seven of his friends from work), following the footsteps of DM of the Rings, which used a similar premise for The Lord of the Rings. However, while DOTR featured a railroading GM herding a bunch of bored Munchkin players with an iron fist, Darths & Droids has a more tolerant GM, who's willing to let the players get Off the Rails and contribute to the development of the setting, if that's what it takes to have a fun and interesting game. Indeed, the very plot of Star Wars, with all its inconsistencies and bizarre leaps of logic, comes about because the players constantly force the GM to improvise.
And that's not all; the Irregulars seem to be taking perverse pleasure in actually changing things from how they happen in the movies as much as they can while still being constrained by actual screencaps. This ranges from introducing the "Lost Orb" side-quest, all the way to Darth Maul being a hired bounty hunter who's, at worst, a Punch-Clock Villain. Even Palpatine seems like a good guy.
In the blurb for each comic, there are often links to This Very Wiki (one of its creators is a known troper), and there are even comics named after tropes, as well.
The comic is being translated into a variety of languages, including German and French. Notably, some of the translations are pure Gag Dub, including Pirate, poetry, Zero Wing-esque mangled English and tlhIngan Hol (Klingon). Nearly all strips from Episode I are available in German.
After completing the prequel and original trilogies, Darths and Droids waited until after the release of The Rise of Skywalker to cover the sequel trilogy, spending the interim covering campaigns for Rogue One, Solo, and of all things, the Star Wars episode of The Muppet Show. The creators have confirmed that the comic will be on hiatus once they're done with The Rise of Skywalker.
The first campaign, The Phantasmal Malevolence, got a licensed stage adaptation, which you can view here. A filmed adaptation of the stage adaptation is available to watch here.
The players from the original 3 movies correspond to the five basic RPG Player Archetypes, although Morgan-Mar claims it was unintentional.
- The Brain: Ben, playing Obi-Wan Kenobi during the prequel trilogy, and once he dies in Episode IV he takes over Chewbacca from the GM. He starts the sequels as Lor San Tekka before moving on to General Hux and Rose Tico. He prefers to think rationally before acting, comes up with sane plans, but is quick to resort to fast-talking the GM if nothing else works. Also points out the unlikelihood of situations they run into. At some point since Episode III he stopped coming to game sessions, but he eventually returns for Episode IV (as a result, he winds up missing the Rogue One campaign).
- The Real Man (though arguably with a side-order of The Loonie even stronger than Sally's): Jim, initially playing Qui-Gon Jinn, then, after the death of Qui-Gon, Padmé Amidala. In Episode IV, his early characters (including Captain Antilles) wound up being Mauve Shirts, until he settled in as "Han Solo".note Those "early characters" were apparently all in Rogue One, starting with "Kyle Katarn" (Saw Gererra) before picking up "Bria Tharen" (Jyn Erso) and Bail Organa from the GM. In the sequels, he's Poe Dameron. He's a gung-ho, enthusiastic player, often blindly rushing into danger. He's also prone to humorous misunderstandings of the setting, bizarre and obviously incorrect explanations, and creation of Plot Tumors. His insane plan regarding the pod race must be seen to be believed (yet he's also pursuing a Ph.D. in geophysics; in Pete's words, he relaxes by doing things that let him turn his brain off and surprises the other players when they realize that he's not as stupid as his play style suggests).
- The Loonie: Sally, playing Jar Jar Binks in Episode I. By the time the Episode II campaign started, she decided Jar Jar was stupid, and bounced around several characters before mainly settling on C-3PO and Yoda. She then played K-2SO in Rogue One and multiple characters in the sequels including Kylo Ren, Administrator Snoke, Maz Kanata, and Admiral Holdo. She's Ben's kid sister, who he once brought to a game session when their parents weren't home. As she's grown up, she's matured into a social activist. Many of the wacky elements of the setting, such as the Gungans (including her own character), Toydarians, and an elected 14-year-old queen, are products of her wild imagination; the GM seems to have largely left the task of designing settings and alien races to her, in acknowledgment of the fact that she is more creative with such things than he is. Sally is also pure awesome in a can, given that she was able to accomplish the flat-out impossible feat of making Jar Jar Binks likable.
- The Munchkin: Pete, playing R2-D2 in most campaigns, both Chirrut Îmwe and Baze Malbus in Rogue One, and Rey in the sequels. He joined after Jim told him about the game and designed his character in advance using Min-Maxing, resulting in a verbally-challenged non-humanoid robot with insane mechanic skills. He took the same approach for Rogue One, creating a blind monk and his deaf and mute familiar that both have an array of combat perks. He has something of a soft spot for Sally, which makes a lot more sense once she sticks with C-3PO for Episode IV.
- The Thespian: Annie, initially playing Shmi Skywalker but soon switched to Anakin rather than shoehorning Shmi into the adventuring party. As of Episode IV, she's Leia and Darth Vader. For Rogue One, she played Cassian Andor; and in the sequels she's Finn. Ben told her about the game in drama class. Her unfamiliarity with typical RPG player behavior results in amusing misunderstandings, such as her mistaking Qui-Gon for a robber when he attempts to search Shmi's house for loot. Her roleplaying tends to be filled with Hidden Depths and moral ambiguity, which sometimes screws with the more straightforward mindset of the other players. As a joke, she plays what is considered to be the worst acted character from the prequel trilogy.
- The Sixth Ranger: Corey, joining the group in Episode IV and playing Luke (named Luke Amidala in this case; with the aliases "Adam Lars" and Luke "Starkiller"). With Luke's disappearance in the sequel campaigns, his new character is BB-8. He's Pete's nephew, being just a little older than Sally. He got interested in the group after hearing Pete talk about it, but was stunned to find it wasn't a role-playing video game. Nonetheless, he seems to be getting the hang of things pretty quickly.
- The Game Master: No Name Given, playing everyone else; mostly NPCs but he also plays a part in the Episode IV adventuring party as Chewbacca until Ben takes over the role. He also plays major roles in Rogue One as Bodhi Rook and the original player for "Bria Tharen" (Jyn Erso). He too often sees his carefully written campaigns get shot to pieces by the players going Off the Rails, but knows better than to try Railroading and usually doesn't do any more than make a sarcastic comment in response. More often, he just rolls with whatever the players come up with. He also tends to differentiate NPCs with Just Some Stupid Accents, and he enjoys playing authority figures that get to call the PCs on their shenanigans.
Darths & Droids provides examples of:
And, of course, all Star Wars tropes apply whenever they spring up in the collaboratively developed story.
