The will of a Jedi.
Creative Staff:
Story: Charles Soule
Art: Marco Checchetto
Colors: Andres Mossa
What They Say:
Master and Padawan find themselves stranded on an unfamiliar world…a world of strange, primitive technology and dangerous natives. But even if they can save themselves…why were they called to this world?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The opening issue of this miniseries is one that I certainly liked for the visuals but felt a bit wary of in terms of story. The prequel era characters get their fair share of grief but coming off the Clone Wars TV series myself I’ve grown to love a lot of them and their stories. So getting essentially a story that takes place before that series showing us Obi-Wan taking Anakin out on a mission to discover what the source of the signal was on this strange world where there should be no life definitely has its appeal. And just like the first issue, a huge source of my job in this book is in Checchetto’s artwork as it just leaps off the page with its detail and dynamic design with the flow of panels. It certainly doesn’t hurt in the slightest that Andres Mossa is the perfect match in coloring it as the whole thing just has a certain richness to it because of it that a traditional coloring job wouldn’t do justice with.
The downside to this is that the people on this world aren’t terribly interesting as it goes back to the familiar old tale of two sides that have been at war for centuries. There’s a big Star Trek vibe to this as we get the Open side and the Closed side, both of which view the other as the cause for the downfall of their world and why nothing can be done to fix it. Both Obi-Wan and Anakin get a bit more enmeshed in it this time around, partially just due to trying to survive the situation, but you can see Obi-Wan wanting to just bop them on the head so they grow up. Even Anakin is easily frustrated. All of it serves to get the two of them working with the two women from Open and the male survivor from Closed, Grecker, to try and get to some relative safety after their weapons were destroyed by Anakin. Road trip!
Where this book does interest me a bit more is in the segue to the past as we see Anakin trying to master the Force to calm some animals that are attacking them. This takes us back to Coruscant where Anakin struggles with this there as well, but it leads us to him getting involved with Palpatine once again. The hooks were in Anakin early as a potential apprentice and seeing how he introduces him to the lower levels of the capital region while away from Obi-Wan is definitely fun to watch. Anakin has
In Summary:
While I’m not as enthralled with this as Soule’s last series, the really fun and engaging Lando work, this isn’t meant to be more of the same. There’s a different tone that comes from being in this era and it’s one that does take some work to reconnect with. The portrayal of the characters is spot on and I adore the visual design from top to bottom as it’s just so striking and unique. The world is definitely one I want to know more of and I love that Checchetto looks to be just having a blast with it. But the core story on that world is just too simple and too familiar at this stage, and a little too decompressed, which makes me glad for the brief Palpatine bit we get underway here.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: February 3rd, 2016
MSRP: $3.99
