4 issue Test #41 - Darth Vader

It’s been a while, but we’re back and it’s time to correct a mistake I made long ago. When I picked up Star Wars, it was great, I did not pick up the Darth Vader series that ran alongside it. I eventually bought it in trades and it’s awesome. But a new Darth Vader series came out recently and I’m going to be giving it the 4 issue test.

Issue one picks around the ending of Revenge of the Sith, with Vader shouting NO! But in this version, his force blast knocks Emperor Palpetine backwards. Vader is angry but Palpetine tells her that the pain of her death is a gift. He can either accept it or die. Vader chooses to live but is struck by force lightning from Palpetine, he asks about his lightsaber, he tells Palpetine he lost it but no, that blade belonged to a Jedi, he is a Sith, before drawing his own, threatening to kill Vader if he ever uses the force against him again.

He tells Vader to set personal vendettas aside as such needs pale next to the needs of the Empire. He tells Vader that Sith lightsabers are red because they’ve been made to bleed. Kybers in kyber crystals are alive, a Sith uses the Dark Side to pour their pain into the crystal and eventually it becomes red. This is the first time the term bleeding a lightsaber has been explained, it was brought up in the Ahsoka novel. He tells Vader he needs to take a Jedi’s lightsaber.

The Emporer drops Vader off in the Mid Rim, telling him he needs to go out, find a Jedi and steal his lightsaber. He had arranged for some transport, but it appears to have been stolen. Vader walks and quickly finds the thieves and takes them down without hesitation

Unfortunately, that’s the end of the main story. There’s a back up story that I can sum up in 2 sentences. Darth Vader wants to meditate but he’s interrupted by bad news from various sources who he kills. He’s followed by a droid who eventually also gets broken so Vader can meditate.

#2 opens at a jedi outpost where clone troopers are playing around. They detect an incoming ship but because Vader’s a douche he doesn’t transmit the clearance codes, he destroys several ships before coming aboard, using on the of the lightsabers on display to kill the clone troops in his way.

He searches through the archives with the help of a droid to find any Jedi who took the Barash vow before order 66. These people are sworn not to involve themselves with anything involving the order. It’s self-exile with the force your only company. They wouldn’t have even responded to the purge but wouldn’t have had clone troopers to kill them.

More clones arrive, hoping they can turn him in but Vader kills them before disposing of their active grenade. The droid has found Vader a target. A Jedi named Kirak Infil’a, he hasn’t been active for years, before Anakin would’ve even heard of him. But he had only one purpose in the order, to fight. We see Kirak, meditating with various artefacts floating around him. He carries a red scar on his chest.

#3 continues where we left off, Kirak is levitating what we find out are Padawan traps, as he continues to train in combat with his droid, Arex. The discuss what’s left for him if the order has fallen, he says he will live as a Jedi, and you can guess probably not for much longer. He senses an approach and orders Arex to ready defences.

The artefacts, Padawan traps damage Vader’s ship and force him to land. Whilst the droid can repair the ship. He exits the hangar which is quickly blocked by one of Kirak’s defences. He asks from afar if he was the one who eliminated the Jedi. Vader tries to force-choke him but he manages to block the attack. Vader confirms he did kill the Jedi and has come to kill him. He stands atop a mountain called Passvaal, a test for Jedi which becomes more challenging with height. Arex opens the sluice gate and pushes Vader with water, but that doesn’t stop him for long. He’s fighting a bunch of birds, raptorans on a bridge. Arex offers to blow the bridge, but Kirak decides to face Vader and allows him to come close. Vader is now mere steps away, although the fight did damage one of his legs.

He uses the force to throw rocks at Kirak, he is able to block for a while but is ultimately pushed back. Arex fights but Vader rips the lightsaber from him and tosses him away. Kirak realises he wants the lightsaber. They fight and Vader is further damaged to the point where he can no longer stand. He pushes Vader over the edge and lets him fall to his death. Yeah, right

#4 opens with Vader using pieces of Arex to repair his own damage. Kirak heads to a workshop where he had stored his ship. The workmen tell him it might need a tune-up and may take a bit of time. He seems confident that he killed Vader, he is much mistaken. He soon senses his error and comes out to confront them, atop a dam. They fight but they are interrupted by cops, telling them this is a critical structure and to cease. Vader throws them over the edge. Kirak catches them but Vader uses the force to tear through the structure and flood the entire village. Kirak wants to fight with honour but Vader knows little of such, he takes the lightsaber as Kirak tries desperately to save the people from the flood, but once he does so, he kills Kirak with a force choke as the flood ravages the valley.

So that was Darth Vader #1-4, is it any good, here are my thoughts.

First off, I will say it’s a good thing to set the story immediately after the establishment of the Empire. It offers more potential for character development as we see Anakin embrace the role of cold-hearted monster as opposed to the angry boy he was back when he fought Obi-Wan. I also appreciate the reference to bleeding the light sabers.

That said, I think there are some errors in Vader’s character here. Like I said, Anakin’s time as Darth Vader has only just begun, and it feels like he’s grown in minutes into said cold-hearted monster. Him flooding the valley was a perfect example of this. They want to make him a badass and they certainly succeeded in that front but it’s at the cost of ignoring a lot of potential the prequel setting allowed for.

In the last volume, we were between A new hope and Empire strikes back, Vader is approaching his top form, it made sense for him to be that badass, here it feels unnatural.

But that’s not my biggest problem, sadly. A book like this needs a strong supporting cast or a strong ‘hero?’ for Vader to defeat. The supporting cast for this book really amounts to ‘random droid;’ no-where as complex as some-one like Dr Aphra and her supporting characters. As for Kirak, I really have no opinion of him, they weren’t up front with what he did to get himself exiled and that’s probably the only bit of character we have for him. His droid is loyal and skilled but much like Vader’s droid, there’s a missed opportunity for any sort of levity.

These are problems that plague the issues. #1 avoids it by mostly sticking with Palpetine but #3-4 showcase this issue tremendously. Speaking of, the pacing is also a little on the slow side, as you can tell by the briefness of my summaries each issue offers very little in terms of plot progression.

The artwork is good, it feels right in the Star Wars universe. What doesn’t is that stupid backup feature in #1 that exists solely to raise the cover price. F*ck you Marvel Comics!

Rating

#1 7/10

#2 7/10

#3 6/10

#4 6/10

Overall 6.5/10

Strong artwork and badass moments are enough to make this a good comic despite a ton of flaws. I’m going to see what they’re doing with Vader meeting the inquisitors before I make up my mind about this comic.