“The Dawn Alliance”
Creative Staff:
Story: Charles Soule
Art: Ramon Rosanas
Colors: Rachelle Rosenberg
Letterer: VC’s Clayton Cowles
What They Say:
The fate of THE REBEL ALLIANCE FLEET is at stake, as its last remaining divisions face off in battle against the brutal tactics of COMMANDER ELLIAN ZAHRA and her crew on the TARKIN’S WILL. For Zahra, this fight is personal; her revenge will not be complete until every life lost on THE DEATH STAR is avenged. Epic space warfare in the true STAR WARS manner!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The series has done some solid work in playing with its sizable cast in engaging ways and this installment again takes us to a storyline that’s been percolating for a bit in the background with the focus on Shara Bey and Kes Dameron. Charles Soule has been working that for a bit and I’ve enjoyed the way these two have been placed into the storyline for a while now in a pre-ROTJ setting so that we have Poe in-continuity. This issue has Ramon Rosanas on board again doing some great work in capturing that Star Wars feel across the board. There’s usually some solid consistency in the Star Wars artists overall for the “house” style that we get an Rosanas gets that easily while still keeping his own particular take on things mixed into it, giving it an appealing look overall.
Now, Soule has done a lot of things that I’ve liked over his run and there are plenty of things to like here in the classic Star Wars sense. But there are always some elements that just leave me cool and it’s one of the few times a space battle just does not work for me here. That main storyline involves Zahra opting to draw the Rebel Fleet into following toward the surface where it’ll obviously go to hyperspace after escaping the gravity well on the other side. But she’s crafty enough to fire ion cannons that take out the drives on the Rebel ships, causing the rest of the fleet that hung back to destroy their own so they don’t crash on the sizable rebel base on the surface. That has Zahra basically getting a big win but events force her into crashing her own Star Destroyer as well later on – and surviving it after getting others to abandon ship. It’s like the worst moment of Return of the Jedi when The Executioner model slams so clearly into the Death Star model. It just takes you out of things entirely.
Less problematic is the story with Kes Dameron and his team now that they’re aboard the destroyer early on. They’ve figured out where Shara is being held and the group basically provides cover for that reunion, which is decent but awkwardly achieved. What we get from there is an understanding that things are going bad outside with the battle, but the key thing is for Kes and Shara to get off the ship since that was the whole point of the thing. The other members that came along are, well, basically red shirts in their own way. But they do at least get to take down the main power source for the ship which causes it to lose its orbital velocity. It’s what messes up what Zahra has planned and that aspect isn’t bad. But after Zahra rattling off all the things that this ship has, and the amount of personnel aboard it, that the three or four Rebel pilots are able to achieve this – even after the Death Star – just feels weak. And oh, yeah, Kes is going to get a talking to about the chain of command after the fleet just lost half a dozen more ships. Oof.
In Summary:
Though there are pieces about this that I do enjoy, there are a lot of frustrating elements as well. And, amusingly, it kind of shows why Leia gives Poe as much crap as he does in a couple of decades in The Last Jedi with the kind of stuff his old man was pulling during the Rebellion itself. Regardless, Zahra’s plot is just too much, the Rebel Fleet falling for it so easily is too much, and it relies on so many things in the midst of a large-scale battle to go completely right 100% of the time. It just rubbed me wrong from start to finish. The smaller moments are good and I even like the sacrifice bit because it fits in with some of the Rebel mindset. But there was nowhere near enough resonance because it’s just background characters at best sacrificing themselves and it doesn’t land well because of that.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 9+
Released By: Marvel Comics
Release Date: May 4th, 2022
MSRP: $3.99
