“The Broken Path”
Creative Staff:
Story: George Mann
Art: Eduardo Mello
Colors: Ornella Savarese
Letterer: Studio Ram
What They Say:
After the attack by the Path of the Open Hand, the Jedi mission to Dalna recuperates aboard the crashed spaceship. But they are far from alone. Stalked by both Path disciples and a Nameless evil, the trapped Jedi knights enact a desperate plan to escape. But how will the defenders of the Republic fare against a monster that feeds off of the Force itself?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The stories of the High Republic era are definitely fun even if I’m still struggling with the period in some ways. With two other series ongoing right now, Dark Horse has this four-issue High Republic book here that leans a bit more into the younger set one might think but delivers a solid enough experience. George Mann wrote a lot of Doctor Who previously, which feels ideal for some of this, but he wowed me with Engineward a couple of years ago, so I’m curious to see how all of this will play out. He’s joined by Eduardo Mello on the artwork with Ornella Savarese doing the color design and it has a good feeling about it with some interesting character designs and a good sense of ship flow that feels like it sets it to this age a bit since it’s supposed to be a couple of hundred years ago.
With a two-month window between issues, it’s not too hard reconnecting with the series from a big-picture point of view but the slim time we had with the characters before – which is done as a flashback framing from a different story – means there’s less connection this time around. The concept is still interesting enough as we get the Jedi ship with their allies on this world where they’ve been overtaken by some of the Path of the Open Hand – which is more of a closed fist now as they’re on the offensive – and having to struggle with that. At the same time, there’s a creature outside of the ship that has been causing issues and is getting more intense. Placing it all on some rim world that’s in the middle of nowhere, it creates the right kind of atmosphere and tension that’s reminiscent of later Alien films.
So what we get here are three stories including what’s happening outside with the flashback. Within it, we get the Jedi dealing with fending off the Path members, which isn’t easy as they’re being more aggressive than expected, and because of the other story point. The creature outside is something that consumes Force energy and its attacks are disorienting the Jedi around it just by its presence. It’s also attracted to the Jedi as they’re an extra tasty meal. So we get action elements going on here with the team splitting up to protect those that are injured and work with the crew of the ship to take a stand. Another of the Jedi heads out to try and scare off the creature using the ship itself while two others, disconnected from the group, find their way outside after being captured by one of the Path only to discover just how dangerous everything is. It’s a ramping up of danger that plays out pretty well overall even if you haven’t connected with the characters.
In Summary:
Exploring more of the High Republic era, the second installment of this series shows more of how the Jedi are dealing with the situation. I still find everything with the Path to be ill-defined with them and the nature of the period at times but that’s because I’ve had such a disjointed presentation of it all that hasn’t really coalesced. This series hasn’t helped or hindered it but just left me a touch more frustrated. The story that we get here works well enough but the framing of it as a flashback slows things down in a short series and takes me out of the story at hand. I’m hopeful there’s some payoff to it but otherwise, it’s easy to enjoy as a straightforward space opera book without thinking of the Star Wars side too much at times.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dark horse Comics
Release Date: April 19th, 2023
MSRP: $4.99
