“Exegol”
Creative Staff:
Story: Greg Pak
Art: Raffaele Ienco
Colors: Neeraj Menon
Letterer: VCs Joe Caramagna
What They Say:
EXEGOL UNLEASHED! As punishment for his rebellion, DARTH VADER was broken by THE EMPEROR, his limbs shattered, forbidden to use THE FORCE. But after surviving OCHI OF BESTOON, THE EYE OF WEBBISH BOGG and the horrors of THE RED NEBULA, Vader stands on the verge of uncovering the Emperor’s greatest secrets. But will the revelations on EXEGOL empower Vader — or his master? And what new doom awaits LUKE SKYWALKER as a result?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
With a couple of months between installments, they never helps a storyline and certainly not one like this where it’s trying to fix things from the Rise of Skywalker film. To Greg Pak’s credit, he does a solid enough job here of trying to make the case that this has been the plan all along. And the novels have laid out that Palpatine has had a larger goal all along as well, though it’s mostly been believed it related to where Thrawn is from. Pak works through more of this here while Raffael Ienco gets to put together some really great pages as we navigate Exegol and all the weirdness that comes there. Ienco’s designs continue to be a fantastic combination with this property that I didn’t expect and we get such intensity out of Vader even behind the mask that it really showcases his artistic talent.
Vader’s time on Exegol has him mastering the creature that we got the taste of before and seeing him striding that across the landscape to confront Palpatine is definitely a great visual. Palpatine, as always, promotes the idea that he has seen all and is working a variety of plans to ensure his success. There’s a very Hari Seldon feeling to Palpatine as these assorted supplemental works go on that’s both amusing and frustrating since it makes him almost infallible. That said, we know that he’s also seen a path where Luke can win against him which is why he’s worked so hard to create all of these other situations. We see the genetanks where the clones are growing. We even see that he has Luke’s hand and is experimenting on that, which is kind of terrifying. And we get the further push from Palpatine that he is truly the master of all.
The focus with so much of this here is that for Vader, for his subservience to work, there must be pain associated with it. Hence the trials, hence Palpatine mentioning that they’ve essentially done this before in different forms. It’s the reminder he needs to bend to the Emperor’s will and it unfolds surprisingly well here. It does have some grim moments, such as the beings that he’s forced to fight for a while, but it also has an area I really need to think about more. In showing off the fleet of planet-buster Star Destroyers that he’s building, it’s made clear that he’s been hoarding the Kyber crystals and is powering much of his programs this way. But the whole creating pain within them in order for them to serve the Sith feels like a step slightly too far and just doesn’t work well as a narrative throughline to all that we know about them. Still, I do like seeing the mound of Kyber and knowing what it’s going to be used for in the future on display here.
In Summary:
There’s a lot to like here in terms of getting to understand Vader at this point in his life more and why he’s still so bonded to the Emperor. With him trying to sway Luke in ESB and Palpatine knowing about it, this push to get him back into place or kill him has worked out as expected and sets him up well for when we see him in the films next, but with conflict inside. I like some aspects of what we see with Exegol here but I am frustrated that the comics are having to do so much heavy lifting for something that the sequel trilogy didn’t spend the proper time doing. Every film has places to explore and expand on but this is fundamental material that should not be discovered first in a comic.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology | Amazon Kindle
Release Date: April 28th, 2021
MSRP: $3.99
