Welcome to the First Issue Bin, where I — Ethan Kaye — randomly grab one of this week's comics that’s just starting up and give you the details on whether it should get added to your collection … or remain on the comic shop shelf.
Star Wars: Legacy of Vader #1
Writer: Charles Soule
Artist: Luke Ross
Color Artist: Nolan Woodard
Letterer: VC's Joe Caramagna
Editor: Mark Paniccia
From last week's SilverHawks #1 — where we went a long time in the future in a galaxy far, far away — we travel to the Star Wars universe ... a long time ago, in a separate galaxy far, far away. And like the SilverHawks, this one requires a lot of knowledge of Star Wars for you to enjoy completely.
The good thing is that if you have been keeping up with at least the Star Wars films, this one slots in quite nicely between The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker. Sure, it would be great if you saw Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, or read the several Vader's Castle side comics (published not by Marvel, but by IDW). But if you're just sticking to the main Skywalker saga, this issue paints in some of the blank spaces that weren't covered in the movies. Probably because ... they're not that impactful. Yet.
Charles Soule has been deeper in the Star Wars comic universe than anyone else, penning [deep breath] Lando, Obi-Wan and Anakin, Poe Dameron, Darth Vader, The Rise of Kylo Ren, the second series of Star Wars, War of the Bounty Hunters, Crimson Reign, The High Republic: Eye of the Storm, The High Republic: The Blade, Hidden Empire, Shadows of Starlight, and Dark Droids. He's officially a creative consultant at Lucasfilm. So I was excited to hear that this modern sci-fi master was back at the helm of another Star Wars book. And as Star Wars books go, it's great!
The star is Kylo Ren, the temperamental baby-man from the sequel trilogy. Soule and artist Luke Ross capture his stunted emotions in all their glory, lashing out at nothing like he did in the films, and forever stuck in his own thoughts of his family and legacy. With the death of Supreme Leader Snoke in The Last Jedi, Ren is fully in charge of the First Order, but he's so wracked with his own personal baggage that instead of acting on General Hux's proposed plans that were based in strategy, he just orders Hux to build him a fancy throne. It goes with his character perfectly.
The last section of the book has Ren heading to Darth Vader's castle on Mustafar, encountering and killing the guards there, and being taken under the wing of Vader's trusted advisor Vaneé, a blink-and-you-miss-him character from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story but a major antagonist in the Vader's Castle comic series and the animated LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales special from 2021. Now he's just a creepy head in a robot body, but he promises Ren that there is a way to turn a troubled obsession with the past into an imposing career of despotism. I mean, just look at Darth Vader.
Luke Ross's art on this, along with colorist Nolan Woodard, brought the Marvel Star Wars books up to heights not seen in quite a while. While I slogged through the multiple miniseries that made up the Battle of Jakku arc, and the great-spaceship-battles-but-lackluster-character-interactions for those books, everything in Legacy of Vader looks like it came off the movie screen. Even when the characters are stationary and having a conversation, the panels are askew, the perspective is tilted, and everything seems like it's in motion. Your eye bounces from panel to panel and your mind adjusts accordingly, conveying this great sense of being swept up in the narrative and being surrounded by remarkable places like Mustafar. It's clever and well executed.
While I complained about the lack of backgrounds in SilverHawks, Legacy of Vader uses its few empty panels to great effect. The only empty spaces are around panels of a solo Kylo Ren, which subtly emphasizes that this man feels alone all the time. Everywhere else there are stormtroopers, Hux, Vaneé, but in the moments where he is struggling with his past and future, he's doing these things devoid of environmental context. I see what you did there, and I like it.
Man Pain: 4/5
Art Tricks: 5/5
Temper Tantrums: 3/3
Holy shit that guy who had like one line has a whole backstory on Wookiepedia: Vaneé
Verdict: While it absolutely requires you to know the Star Wars sequel trilogy, it's probably the best Star Wars comic to come around since 2023's inspired Dark Droids crossover.
