The rule of five.
Creative Staff:
Story: Charles Soule
Art: Giuseppe Camanucoli, Daniele Orlandini
Colors: David Curiel
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna
What They Say:
An expensive bounty has been put on Vader’s head! Who would dare try to challenge the Dark Lord’s place in the Empire?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Charles Soule delivered a lot of good stuff with the Jocasta storyline that wrapped up as we got to see how the Clone Troopers are handling the rise of the Empire as well as seeing some of what the Emperor is up to in orchestrating events on Coruscant. It’s an intriguing period to work with in showing who Vader is at this stage and Soule is well paired with Camanucoli and Orlandini for the series, something this installment reinforces nicely with fun action sequences, a car chase, and some creative weaponry usage. It’s the kind of work that “feels” Star Wars and has plenty of little nods to future works – Rebels comes to mind a few times – while also giving us that early period for the Inquisitors, which is definitely something that evolved to what we get later.
The start of this arc is one that’s interesting as we get Vader off with the Ninth Sister on another world to investigate where a Jedi was supposedly seen. The Sister makes it clear that Vader shouldn’t even be there as everyone is seeing Jedi everywhere at the moment and it’s usually nothing. But there’s something more to this that has Vader there, which leads to the intriguing dialogue we get from the Sister about how his tapping into the Dark Side has heightened his emotional abilities to sense what others are really feeling. It’s not a toss away line but his understanding in reading Vader is that Vader is looking to kill Jedi but also to face his own end. A kernel within him that’s covered in guilt for what he did and in some way hoping to find a Jedi powerful enough to take him down as he can’t not fight to his utmost because of the pride that the Dark Side feeds on.
What becomes interesting about this mission, however, is that it’s all a setup as a bounty hunter family (mom, dad, adultish daughter) are all in on taking down Vader for an unknown client. It’s a great action sequence that pushes Vader to using his abilities in good ways to survive it and while it does lead to a chase sequence it looks great (reminiscent of Rebels chases) and puts Vader on the path of figuring out who ordered the hit. That in itself isn’t much of a surprise as we know that a good chunk of this series is about the Emperor testing him, but I really loved how Soule brought this family to life by doing some hard and fast bargaining to ensure their daughter lives. While there’s an opening for that to change, it’s a strong sequence when they’re all there on the highway with Vader in total control and getting what he wants.
In Summary:
Though some aspects of the run in the first arc were a bit shaky for me, Charles Soule has found firmer footing as it has progressed and as he’s dug into the lore more and more. There’s a lot of intriguing fleshing out elements going on here as we get Vader from a period that’s being covered new in the reset expanded side and I’m thoroughly enjoying how it’s building a lot of neat things together and drawing on the future works to establish more continuity pieces. This issue digs into some really good stuff and I love how the team made the bounty hunters come alive in a way that they wouldn’t in most other books all while setting the stakes for what’s to come. This arc has a lot of potential and knowing how Vader has been tested by the Emperor up until his end, including what we saw in the previous post-ANH Vader series, there’s a lot more to come.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: February 14th, 2018
MSRP: $4.99
