More Star Wars comics: Vader Down
This one is a crossover between Kieron Gillan's Darth Vader comics (issues 13 - 15), which I've reviewed here, and Jason Aaron's main Star Wars comics, which I haven't read at all, though still easy enough to follow what's going on. Still, the crossover aspect makes it less satisfying than the previous issues, to me, mainly for two reasons:
a) the fact we're in the time between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back means that nothing crucial and decisive can ever happen between Vader and Leia, Luke and Han,
and
b) the fan service aspect - heroic SW character meets evil counterpart, fighting ensues - is fun enough once, but doesn't invite for a reread, the way character scenes do. (I could have done without the Chewbacca duking it out with the Wookie merc for what felt like one and a half issues altogether. Han and Aphra acting literary in mirror fashion - they both get the same idea at the same time and thus cancel each other out - was more fun, ditto the droids and their evil counterparts, but again, a bit slapstick (which was always part of SW, but works better in motion than in a comic).
Now Aaron and Gillan try to get around the basic problem that none of the characters desires can be fulfilled - Vader won't get his hands on Luke, Leia won't be able to avenge herself on Vader, Luke won't find out anything at all - by two character related issues: Leia gets an emotional arc of dealing with the aftermath of losing Alderaan, her father and just about anyone she knew outside of the surviving rebels, something we didn't get to see in the movies. Good idea! Runs somewhat on predictable lines (while the news that Vader is currently isolated and thus defeatable on the plot device moon/planet - forgot which one - at first has Leia entirely focused on going after him and risking her friends, at one point Leia can either come to Luke and Han's aid or can deal a blow to Vader, and chooses friendship over revenge), but still, good idea. The one scene where Leia actually encounters Vader feels like a bit of a let down, though. He's already seeing her, as he will in ESB, as nothing more than a Luke-catching device, not, as in ANH, a threat in her own right, and they have an entirely standard "You're evil!" "You're dead!" type of brief conversation. (Not literal quotes, I'm paraphrasing.) I've yet to read the licensed tale that tackles the Vader and Leia relationship in an interesting way, whereas fanfiction usually comes through, taking into account that they've actually known each other pre-ANH and working with that.
The other character related issue our crossover writes come up with is that Vader minus Imperial backup, on his own running unexpectedly into an entire Rebel squadron gets to show he's still the best pilot in the galaxy (and also, being currently evil, can combine this with some Force use the movies didn't think of) and only is stopped from wiping out said squadron on his lonesome by Luke crashing into him. He then on ground with the rebel forces still in an absolute majority gets to show off more survival and fighting skills, turning the cliché of hero being pursued by many forces of evil around by being villain protagonist pursued by massive forces of good, in a way that underscores just why he's scary by himself in a way that completely ties him to his younger self. It's all those Jedi fighting scenes flipped around; Gillon is really good at providing that sense of Vader as a warped (and yet also more mature) version of Anakin.
(BTW: while Luke learns absolutely nothing in the abandoned Jedi temple that's part of the crossover location since he can't get news until ESB - Obi-Wan's not yet visualized by hearable ghost just tells him to get out of there - , Vader hears some echoes of the past which, if you pay attention, aren't his memories but Obi-Wans; they start with two statements made by Qui-Gon to Obi-Wan about Anakin, and then move on to three Obi-Wan statements made to Anakin. Obi-Wan's Force Ghost hanging around Vader is a plot idea that has occasionally been used in fanfic, but never entirely to my satisfaction. Obi-Wan bombarding Vader with pointed memories - they end with "you've become the very thing you swore to destroy!" - without revealing himself, otoh, is just the passive-aggressive thing I can see him do. )
Now I'm looking forward to the next installment when we're back to non-crossover territory, because I want more Aphra (aka the character whose fate isn't predetermined by the movies) than could be provided when our OT heroes take the spotlight.
This entry was originally posted at http://selenak.dreamwidth.org/1182548.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.
a) the fact we're in the time between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back means that nothing crucial and decisive can ever happen between Vader and Leia, Luke and Han,
and
b) the fan service aspect - heroic SW character meets evil counterpart, fighting ensues - is fun enough once, but doesn't invite for a reread, the way character scenes do. (I could have done without the Chewbacca duking it out with the Wookie merc for what felt like one and a half issues altogether. Han and Aphra acting literary in mirror fashion - they both get the same idea at the same time and thus cancel each other out - was more fun, ditto the droids and their evil counterparts, but again, a bit slapstick (which was always part of SW, but works better in motion than in a comic).
Now Aaron and Gillan try to get around the basic problem that none of the characters desires can be fulfilled - Vader won't get his hands on Luke, Leia won't be able to avenge herself on Vader, Luke won't find out anything at all - by two character related issues: Leia gets an emotional arc of dealing with the aftermath of losing Alderaan, her father and just about anyone she knew outside of the surviving rebels, something we didn't get to see in the movies. Good idea! Runs somewhat on predictable lines (while the news that Vader is currently isolated and thus defeatable on the plot device moon/planet - forgot which one - at first has Leia entirely focused on going after him and risking her friends, at one point Leia can either come to Luke and Han's aid or can deal a blow to Vader, and chooses friendship over revenge), but still, good idea. The one scene where Leia actually encounters Vader feels like a bit of a let down, though. He's already seeing her, as he will in ESB, as nothing more than a Luke-catching device, not, as in ANH, a threat in her own right, and they have an entirely standard "You're evil!" "You're dead!" type of brief conversation. (Not literal quotes, I'm paraphrasing.) I've yet to read the licensed tale that tackles the Vader and Leia relationship in an interesting way, whereas fanfiction usually comes through, taking into account that they've actually known each other pre-ANH and working with that.
The other character related issue our crossover writes come up with is that Vader minus Imperial backup, on his own running unexpectedly into an entire Rebel squadron gets to show he's still the best pilot in the galaxy (and also, being currently evil, can combine this with some Force use the movies didn't think of) and only is stopped from wiping out said squadron on his lonesome by Luke crashing into him. He then on ground with the rebel forces still in an absolute majority gets to show off more survival and fighting skills, turning the cliché of hero being pursued by many forces of evil around by being villain protagonist pursued by massive forces of good, in a way that underscores just why he's scary by himself in a way that completely ties him to his younger self. It's all those Jedi fighting scenes flipped around; Gillon is really good at providing that sense of Vader as a warped (and yet also more mature) version of Anakin.
(BTW: while Luke learns absolutely nothing in the abandoned Jedi temple that's part of the crossover location since he can't get news until ESB - Obi-Wan's not yet visualized by hearable ghost just tells him to get out of there - , Vader hears some echoes of the past which, if you pay attention, aren't his memories but Obi-Wans; they start with two statements made by Qui-Gon to Obi-Wan about Anakin, and then move on to three Obi-Wan statements made to Anakin. Obi-Wan's Force Ghost hanging around Vader is a plot idea that has occasionally been used in fanfic, but never entirely to my satisfaction. Obi-Wan bombarding Vader with pointed memories - they end with "you've become the very thing you swore to destroy!" - without revealing himself, otoh, is just the passive-aggressive thing I can see him do. )
Now I'm looking forward to the next installment when we're back to non-crossover territory, because I want more Aphra (aka the character whose fate isn't predetermined by the movies) than could be provided when our OT heroes take the spotlight.
This entry was originally posted at http://selenak.dreamwidth.org/1182548.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.