Finally, after an interminable wait of three and a half months (anyone remember when films took a year or longer to come to video? No? Just me?), we have the home video release, on DVD, Blu-ray, and Digital HD, of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Is it the home video release we’ve all been hoping for, or a bare-bones offering designed to tide us over until a sequel trilogy boxed set is released with the real goods? A little from column A, a little from column B, it turns out. Read on to see what I mean.
Category Archives: Reviews
Review: Poe Dameron #1
Less than a year ago, we had the wonderful Heather Antos, Assistant Editor for the Marvel Star Wars comics, on the Tosche Station podcast and we maaaaay have begged a little for an X-Wing/Rogue Squadron comic. And we weren’t alone in really hoping to see more stories focused on X-Wing pilots in the new canon. A few months ago, we learned that Poe Dameron was getting his own series. I’ll be honest with you all: when Marvel announced this book, I was mostly excited but also a tiny bit hesitant. I’ve been a huge fan of Charles Soule’s work in the Star Wars universe thus far and Phil Noto’s art is always lovely but I wasn’t quite sure if it was possible for someone to that find that same vibe that made Stackpole and Allston’s pilot books so good.
I shouldn’t have worried. Not for a minute.
Poe Dameron #1 has a little bit of everything. It has the assembling of the squad. It has some fun flying action. It has BB-8 being adorable. It has Leia Organa being the badass General that she is. It brings in pilots we already know. And it has Poe calling BB-8 buddy. What else could you want?
I don’t want to overhype this book but I also want to strongly encourage everyone to go pick it up today. This is absolutely the book that so many of us have been hoping for and I’m so glad that it’s finally here. Poe Dameron is in the hands of a very strong creative team and I absolutely can’t wait to see where the hunt for Lor San Tekka takes us and I definitely can’t wait to fall even more in love with this new group of pilots.
Review: Tales from a Galaxy Far, Far Away: Aliens Volume 1
With Tales from a Galaxy Far, Far Away: Aliens Volume 1, Landry Q. Walker returns to a good old element of Star Wars: short stories about the random beings we see in the background of the films. The 90s saw the publication of more than a few of these, ranging from Cantina tales to Jabba’s Palace. Walker lets the background characters from Jakku and Maz Kanata’s castle take starring roles in these six stories, helping flesh out the universe just a little more in this collection.
High Noon on Jakku
At last! We have found the elusive Constable Zuvio! High Noon on Jakku is a fun little mystery tale where, interestingly enough, the most intriguing character is a droid called CZ-1G5. It’s also a story that provokes thought about the state of droids in the galaxy far, far away. Is it still odd for some of them to not have owners? It’s definitely odd to think about the concept of a droid having free time and doing volunteer work.
A Recipe for Death*
A Recipe for Death is like the lovechild of Chopped and your detective show of choice with a dash of Star Wars. (That was a sentence I never expected to type.) This story really helps drive home that these are definitely a return to the old Tales from collections. Where else would you have a Star Wars story devoted to a whodunit tale set in a kitchen? This particular story was engaging and kept me guessing all the way to the final reveal of the murderer and the new sous chef. Continue reading
Review: Darth Vader #18
It turns out that all Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca had to do to keep me happy while Dr. Aphra is in mortal danger is have Vader be involved in a plot line that has royal intrigue. I didn’t even worry about her once during this issue! Out today is Darth Vader #18 in which everyone’s favorite Sith Lord must battle the enemies of Shu-Torun’s Queen and Cylo’s apprentices while simultaneously keeping the murder bots in check. Who says that Sith Lords can’t multitask?
As per usual, spoilers and discussion after the jump. Continue reading
Rebels Review: The Secret of Chopper Base
The Mystery of Chopper Base has the distinction of being an episode that I was enjoying but mostly ambivalent towards for most of it but had me completely hooked by the end thanks to a very well placed musical cue. Kevin Kiner continues to nail it this season. That last slowed down version of the Imperial March? Perfection. That Big Damn Heroes moment? Also perfection. But let’s break down the rest of the episode.
As mentioned in Rebels Recon, this episode served a sort of season finale for most of the crew of the Ghost. They found a new base for the Rebels and complete their mission. For the Jedi amongst the crew, we’ll continue to follow them next week so it was nice to get one last team up and see them work together to save Rex from the spiders on the planet. Sabine in particular gets some solidly good moments and even saves the day. If the Ghost family had been relying on their Jedi to save them, they never would have survived. Speaking of which… Continue reading
Review: Obi-Wan and Anakin #3
Everyone’s favorite Master/Padawan team is back in Obi-Wan and Anakin #3 by Charles Soule and Marco Checchetto. It’s a little more of everything that’s made this book so gosh darn good thus far.
Palpatine. We’re going to start with Palpatine. Look, I know I said it last time but I’m sad that we can’t get a Palpatine ongoing from Soule. He is so clearly having the time of his life getting to write these Palpy Flashbacks in this book. I know he’s already writing the Poe book and a zillion others for Marvel but… oh you mean that even writers have to sleep sometimes? Alas. Getting back to the point, it’s fun to watch Palpatine and Anakin interact because while he clearly has an agenda, he doesn’t have to be nearly as subtle because Anakin just doesn’t pick up on the manipulations. It’s simultaneously delightful to watch Palpatine be the Puppet Master and incredibly sad to watch Anakin be manipulated by someone he trusts.
Back in the current time line, Obi-Wan’s brokered a temporary truce between the waring groups but… okay can people please stop taking advantage and twisting Anakin to their goals? If you’re not careful, you’re all going to turn that poor boy to the dark side and then you’ll– Oh wait. Crap.
Checchetto’s art paired with Andres Mossa’s coloring continue to be drop dead gorgeous, by the way. This is an amazing team who puts out some really gorgeous work. I hope we get to see more from this pair in the Star Wars universe.
Obi-Wan and Anakin continues to be so enjoyable that I can’t stop wishing it was an ongoing. (How’s that for an endorsement?)
Review: Star Wars #17
Jason Aaron and Leinil Yu are back with Star Wars #17 in which the boys get into trouble and the ladies team up while also in a lot of trouble. Okay but actually… are our heroes ever not in trouble?
Spoilers after the jump. Continue reading
Rebels Review: The Forgotten Droid
With a potential new base found, the Rebels need fuel, and the Ghost crew is once more on the case. Heading to a well-guarded Imperial refueling outpost, Hera puts Chopper in charge of staying with the Ghost and monitoring Imperial transmission, but he instead gets distracted by a new leg strut at a nearby shop.
Chopper being Chopper, he ignores his orders and instead steals the leg. After being accidentally abandoned by the Ghost crew, he is chased by stormtroopers into an Imperial cargo ship, where he meets an inventory droid, AP-5.
In The Forgotten Droid, we learn a bit more about Chopper’s backstory and his character beyond the fact he is a somewhat malicious, unpredictable droid. He’s a veteran of the Clone Wars, where he was a military droid, saved from a crash by Hera on Ryloth. AP-5, too, is a Clone Wars veteran, having been a tactical droid during the same Ryloth campaign. The two droids bond over their war stories, and Chopper shows he can care about something other than himself, surprising even Hera. This episode helps to build upon previous episodes, such as Homecoming, with little tidbits of character history.
Review: Kanan #12
It’s nothing short of a crying shame when a good comic comes to an end but Kanan #12 by Greg Weisman and Andrea Broccardo is a well written finale that not only lets the book go out with not only a bang but includes a fantastic character appearance.
Spoilers after the jump. Continue reading
Rebels Review: Shroud of Darkness
“Shroud of Darkness” starts right in the middle of the action, with Kanan and Ezra fighting the Inquisitors. They took the Phantom to find a new base, and somehow the Seventh Sister and the Fifth Brother managed to track them. They’ve been tracking them for a while, actually, and Kanan decides it’s time to ask the Force for guidance. Thus Kanan, Ezra, and Ahsoka head off to the Jedi Temple on Lothal.
It’s no secret I don’t usually care for Force-centric episodes, which is ironic considering my favorite scenes in the Original Trilogy involve Luke’s Jedi training and confrontation with Palpatine. The “luminous beings” speech from The Empire Strikes Back is my favorite in the entire saga. At some point, I feel like The Clone Wars and Rebels went overboard with Force mysticism, to the point where it’s just too weird for me. Your mileage may vary, of course, but I prefer to interpret events like Mortis as happening in the Force, not in real life (or ignore them completely).
This is a long way of saying I probably shouldn’t have liked this episode, but I did! I liked it a lot, actually, mostly because of Kanan and Ahsoka’s plot lines. I love Kanan having to deal with the implications of training Ezra, and that he might fail in doing so. I love him facing the Temple Guard and realizing the answer is not to fight. His insight is very similar to Luke’s in Return of the Jedi (and makes me really excited to see Episode VIII and why exactly Luke decided to leave the galaxy). Kanan being a full Jedi Knight has a ton of implications and I’m really excited to see how this affects the show going forward. The revelation that the Grand Inquisitor was once a Temple Guard was a bit predictable, given what we’d heard in behind the scenes interviews, but made me wonder if that’s how the Emperor got all of the Inquisitors.
I also loved Ahsoka dealing with her suspicion that the Sith Lord they faced is actually Anakin Skywalker. Hearing Matt Lanter’s voice again was awesome, not to mention a knife to the heart. Ezra seeing Yoda was a nice touch, but I’m much more interested in Kanan and Ahsoka. Sorry, I know people love Ezra, but he’s just not my favorite. The idea that Ezra might go dark, however, intrigues me a lot. I can’t lie.
The Inquisitors track our heroes to the temple, but the Force helps them escape. Vader arrives at the temple too late to catch them, but he has some insights of his own. Insights that will most certainly spell certain doom for some of the Jedi. (It should spell doom for all of them, but that’s another blog post.)
We’re nearing the end of Season 2, and this episode made me really excited to see how things wrap up. I also can’t wait to see Ahsoka confront Vader again, because I’m masochistic like that. Overall, “Shroud of Darkness” was a great episode, with little to complain about. I just hope we get more with the other characters throughout the rest of the season as well!