Creative Staff:
Story: Kieron Gillen
Art: Salvador Larroca
What They Say:
Vader continues his investigation into the Emperor’s secrets…Not everyone wants him to find out the truth. Who are Vader’s mysterious new rivals?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The first four issues have been an impressive tour of what’s going on with Darth Vader after the main thrust of elements from the first Star Wars film and it’s certainly colored certain things in how to view him. With him putting together his own team, and droid army, to ensure his position with the Emperor, it’s brought us a couple of truly crazy droids as well as the wonderful Aphra and what she represents. But it’s here that things take on a different tone as we begin to learn what it is that the Emperor is truly up to that had set Vader on this mission, things that in some sense you know must fall away based on the movie timeline, but also things that you have to wonder where they do end up because the concept could easily survive.
With the information gleaned from Cylo-IV previously, we now get Vader, Aphra and his ship arriving deep in the outer rim where there’s some really intriguing things going on with an alien lifeform as a base that has an entire city/facility built into it. There’s shades of the creatures from the first Avengers film here, but taken up several notches in scale and applied differently. What we get from it though is seeing Vader and his team make their way into it with smart moves and careful but confident planning that lets them dole out destruction where needed while searching for the truth. And that truth is to find out what it is the Emperor is up to out there with Vader’s supposed replacement. That it seems to be a pair of human kids with no Force sensitivity at all is baffling at first, but they do manage to put up a decent fight for a moment with the lightsabers they use.
What we discover is definitely surprising in a sense as the Emperor is using Cylo, now in his fifth body iteration, to create the next thing that the galaxy needs to survive and evolve. With the belief that the Force and the whole Jedi/Sith dynamic is outdated and falling away, there’s a mixture of something similar to Force sensitivity combined with mechanics here that has Cylo with a team that he believes could topple Vader easily if given a chance. The purpose is to turn Vader into a figurehead while this team, and future additions, would be the real “justice” of the galaxy going forward. We do get some familiar creatures here to be sure, and there’s a kind of thrill in seeing some of them in this souped up and powerful form, Having the Emperor show up here, knowing all that was going on all along, now ready to see what this group Cylo has put together is capable of, certainly pushes the book forward in one sense. It’s a little light on the meaty side, the gritty details of what Cylo is up to with them, but it presents a potentially fascinating group.
In Summary:
While the book doesn’t stumble here, it doesn’t feel quite as thrilling and exciting as it has been as the reveal of what Cylo is doing doesn’t really grab you. It has potential and I’m certainly curious, but it’s like a weaker than expected reveal that takes a bit of the wind out of the sails. The little bit we get with Aphra is certainly a saving grace and getting a look at the group Cylo has is definitely intriguing. Gillen does keep the book moving well and the mix of action, seriousness and proper humor is all spot on. Larocca continues to just nail the visual of the book, taking the standard templates and expanding on them, giving us familiar and new at the same time with some twists. I’m curious as to what will happen next and how far it will all really go, but there’s an uncertainty that’s off-putting and interesting at the same time.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 12+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: May 13th, 2015
MSRP: $3.99