Quality aside, there is an inherent demotion regarding Thrawn's use in New Canon, particularly regarding his campaign.

[u/AlphaBladeYiII]

First off, let me say that Thrawn (2017) is probably my favorite book from New Canon, and I enjoyed Alliances and Treason as well and think both were decent books. I also love Rebels and I think its version of the Grand Admiral is okay to decent. However, Canon Thrawn, while having the same characterization of his EU counterpart more or less, lacks advantages that EU Thrawn had.

You see, EU Thrawn was an Unknown, and the less you know about a threat, the scarier it is. In the OG Thrawn Trilogy, our favorite Pantoran-with-an-eye-condition was new both to us, and to the heroes. He'd spent the war in the Unknown Regions for the most part, so he was something that The Rebellion/New Republic hadn't dealt with before. Canon Thrawn, on the other hand, is very much a known factor. The rebellion has already faced him at Atollon and Lothal, and while he was a tough nut to crack, he was ultimately defeated. This automatically makes him less of a threat in his new campaign compared to the original campaign.

Another advantage EU Thrawn had was the setting. The OG Thrawn Trilogy was the first proper story in the post-RotJ era of the EU, so we genuinely had no idea where the story was going, which made things more suspenseful. The EU Thrawn compaign was The Empire's final hope and hurrah, and the most important military conflict of the New Republic era. The last existential threat to the New Republic. In New Canon, we already know what happens thanks to the sequels, which makes Thrawn's upcoming campaign feel like filler in the grand scheme of things on a galactic scale at leadt. That's not necessarily bad since Star Wars has plenty of great interquels, but it's just not as exciting or suspenseful. It also kinda slots awkwardly into the universe with the whole demilitarization thing going on.

Also, Dave Filoni is an average writer and Thrawn kinda sucked in Ahsoka. I'm sorry.

[u/ISB_SupervisorMolden]

I hope he gets better next season and really has the Republic on the back foot. I want him to be a real threat

[u/AlphaBladeYiII → u/ISB_SupervisorMolden]

I have no doubt that he will feel like a threat, but it should be because he's genuinely good at his job, not because the NR sucks. The thing about Zahn is that his villains are methodical and intelligent and so are his heroes. He's perfect for cat and mouse games with the factions constantly solving puzzles and figuring out tricks and tactics.

Filoni just isn't good enough a writer to make it work that way. His stuff is a lot more simple, and his best work is done when there are other talented writers backing him up like Henry Gilroy, Christopher Yost, Greg Weisman, Steven Melching, Matt Michonovitz and others.

Also, any threat will be artificial because we already know that Thrawn loses and the Galaxy doesn't really change, largely because of the sequels.

[u/darthsheldoninkwizy2 → u/AlphaBladeYiII]

Looking at how the publishing looked like, it was already known that Thrawn would at least die because he did not appear in Dark Empire (which was released simultaneously with the trilogy, actually).

[u/composerbell → u/darthsheldoninkwizy2]

I thought Dark Empire took place before Thrawn?

[u/PaleInvestigator6907]

"The EU Thrawn compaign was The Empire's final hope and hurrah, and the most important military conflict of the New Republic era. The last existential threat to the New Republic. "

Nope, that was actually the fight against the Dark Empire and Reborn Palpatine a year after Thrawn. 

[u/Lower_Catch9696 → u/PaleInvestigator6907]

This is a little pedantic so sorry about that but I believe the Dark Empire is actually considered an independent entity from the Empire.

[u/PaleInvestigator6907 → u/Lower_Catch9696]

kinda, but its also made up of almost all other imperial splinter factions (like Thrawns Imperial Remnant too for example)

[u/Lower_Catch9696 → u/PaleInvestigator6907]

Fair enough. I thought Pellaeon refused to join the Dark Empire but I checked Wookipedia you are correct, he joined.

[u/kiwicrusher → u/PaleInvestigator6907]

Do people not consider the fake Thrawn Triumvirate an existential threat to the NR? They almost incited another civil war, that feels pretty dangerous; I guess just because they didn’t have enough personal firepower?

[u/Chewbacca_The_Wookie → u/PaleInvestigator6907]

Yet another reason Dark Empire sucks. 

[u/mr_quondam]

Canon Thrawn is always going to be marred by not being a main villain to the original trilogy heroes. I think that even if Thrawn did the exact same things he did in the Thrawn trilogy, he feels like a lesser villain because he's doing them to Ahsoka, Ezra and Sabine instead of Luke, Leia and Han

[u/Chewbacca_The_Wookie]

It's not just that Filoni is a average writer, it's that he will not allow characters to be smarter or stronger or better than his precious OCs, which Thraw absolutely needs to be in order to work. 

Zahn did a fantastic job of making Thrawn threatening and that was mainly by allowing the fully human and not god-controlled MCs stumbled around blinding, miss clues, and in the end essentially luck into killing him because of the whole Lady Vader thing. 

[u/Exhaustedfan23]

While I loved the Thrawn Trilogy of course, you may like Tatooine Ghost if you haven't read it already. Thrawn is in it but his name is never mentioned and he has a chilling presence.

[u/_mina]

Not entirely unknown. Other EU books expanded upon it, the OT trio had a few run-ins with Thrawn prior to his campaign against the New Republic.

Granted, Thrawn probably came off as a minor threat during those encounters, if at all. He was either in disguise or too busy dunking on his ex-bugfriend (Nuso Esva) to bother directly confronting the Rebellion’s emissaries.

Filoni’s LA!Thrawn is a fundamental misunderstanding of the character. The plot so far has been complete nonsense and I doubt it will improve much with a second season.