It is an interesting feature of most fiction that moving between time periods in a narrative is very hard to do. Usually it falls prey to the dreaded ‘summary of events’ paragraph where all the events that occurred in X time period are briefly skimmed over.

This leads to the odd state of affairs that a lot of fiction takes place in very short periods of time, for instance ‘24’ is the most obvious comparison in popular fiction in the last decade. However, this happens in the realm of Star Wars too, especially in stories where a lot happens in a very short period of time, such as Revenge of the Sith.
Interestingly there’s also a smaller yet still important collection of general and Star Wars fiction which takes place over a broad time period. Lord of the Rings springs to mind, as the epic covers over a year, whilst in Star Wars the Thrawn Trilogy took longer than any other Star Wars single story to reach its aim.

How does this relate to SWRP? Well, according to the official timeline, 2 or 3 years at most have passed in the site canon. Let us relate, in brief, what has happened in that time:
  • The End of the 400 Year Darkness, the rise and fall of OMNI, zombies and Akala.
  • 7 Sith Emperors, a Dark Council, a ‘Return to the Shadows’, a return from the shadows.
  • 5 Jedi Grandmasters, 4 different council configurations.
  • 4 Supreme Chancellors and 8 different Senate configurations.
  • The turning of Omega Pyre into the Protectorate and 3 different Protectors.
  • The flip-flopping of some characters back and forth through the revolving door of Light and Dark Side up to 4 times.
  • 20 different invasions, campaigns and wars.
(Nit-pickers beware, some of these numbers may be, shockingly, incorrect! I don’t care.)

I’ll admit, that’s quite impressive. I doubt even the most heady days in our history could match this.
So is it a problem? Yes…and no. On the one hand it doesn’t make sense, but on the other, people have already gotten around the problem by having their own personal inner timelines, ranging from the official 2.5 years to up to 15.

The biggest problem is ironically that extending the timeline would mean each event would have to be placed into a hole which would upset people’s own personal views of events. How can the paradox of too little time be resolved? Simple; by not enforcing a set timeline onto people.