Creative Staff:
Story: Charles Soule
Art: Andres Genolet
Colors: Rachelle Rosenberg
Letterer: VC’s Clayton Cowles
What They Say:
Some of the Rebel Alliance’s best and brightest have gotten lost in an unknown region of space while hunting for a lost treasure. How will Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa, Chewbacca, Lando Calrissian and Amilyn Holdo ever survive the horrors…of No-Space?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
We’ve had some good stories in this run lately and the previous issue took us to a pretty fun place with a character I really like, bringing in Holdo for more use. With the expectation of big changes going through this year for the comics side of this franchise, we’re inching ever closer to the events of Return of the Jedi. Once again, Charles Soule does a solid job as always but it’s definitely interesting going into this after watching the first half of Andor and wanting to feel more of that kind of property than the kind of lighter touch here. This issue has Andres Genolet on board for the artwork again, and his presence overall works well with it. There’s usually some solid consistency in the Star Wars artists overall for the “house” style that we get and.Genolet gets that easily while still keeping their own particular take on things mixed into it, giving it an appealing look overall.
With the group in search of the lost convoy in order to get its fuel for the fleet, they’ve ended up in this strange “no-space” location where nothing seems to work well. When they try to engage the hyperspace engine it just takes them toe exactly where they are. It’s clearly the gizmo they added previously but the situation is precarious since they have to land on the floating rock in order to power down the ship and remove it. Of course, the rock ledge has an atmosphere and they’re all curious and go exploring first instead of just removing the device, which leads them to find a kid in a spacesuit that calls them News and then discover that some impervious robots are getting ready to manhandle the ship. It’s chaotic while still introducing the basic elements that long-time science fiction readers can pick up on easily enough. It’s not a surprise, though a little frustrating, that we end up with one more thing that lightsabers can’t cut through. You’d think a lot more people would have been able to withstand the Jedi over the centuries with this stuff.
What saves the day is another ship idling up that gives them sanctuary – if they toss their weapons – and then brings them to the actual colony in this area. It’s no surprise that it’s strung together by the fuel ships from centuries ago and that others have gotten stuck here over the years. There are not a lot of details to this yet but it’s a familiar approach to use and it provides for a decent setting to work with. What we get more of is the time between Leia and Holdo as Holdo talks about wanting to give Leia some time away from the Rebellion so she doesn’t burn out only to regret what this has turned into. Leia’s pretty okay with this, however, as it’s a challenge that she’s looking forward to overcoming. Thankfully, we do get some decent time with Luke and Lando as well which provides for some levity and even Lobot gets in on this once in a while.
In Summary:
While the previous issue started strong for me, I knew things would become a bit dicier as we got into the meat of the story because it’s going to play to some very familiar tropes. Slapping some Star Wars characters onto it doesn’t really change much of it but it is fun to play in another corner of the larger galaxy for a bit. Mostly, I’m just glad for more time with Holdo because I’ve felt invested in the character since their first book appearance ahead of The Last Jedi’s release and am glad to see some smart use of someone from Leia’s past that has been there for her for decades beyond the core group. Soule has her down pretty well here and I’m curious to see where else they’ll go with it and this story.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 9+
Released By: Marvel Comics
Release Date: January 4th, 2023
MSRP: $3.99