MTFBWY #13: Lost Clone Wars Found, Ultimate Star Wars & Lords of the Sith Reviews

Welcome back to MTFBWY, ComicBook.com’s weekly column on all things Star Wars. This week, we’re taking a look at not one but two major print releases on shelves, Ultimate Star Wars, the first encyclopedia exclusively featuring the new canon established by the Story Group, and Lords of the Sith, a new novel by Paul S. Kemp.

More Lost Clone Wars

But first, there’s new Star Wars: The Clone Wars episodes! Well, there’s almost new episodes, anyway. You see, when The Clone Wars ceased production, the team at Lucasfilm Animation was well into season 6, which aired on Netflix as “The Lost Missions,” and even had some work done on the rest of the season and into season 7! While they haven’t been able to fully produce the episodes, they did finish the audio and the “Story Reel” format, basically loose animatics, for several extras. After releasing an arc last year, this year’s Star Wars Celebration Anaheim debuted yet another arc, focusing on the Clones. With Rex back in the mix in Star Wars Rebels this year, now’s the perfect time to catch up with his story. The first episode of four is embedded here and you can catch the rest at StarWars.com (it’s currently at the top of the page).

The Bad Batch – Star Wars: The Clone Wars Story Reel on Disney Video

The Ultimate Star Wars Resource

The full color screenshots and illustrations certainly help its readability too, making every page dynamic (and making it easy to find what you’re looking for…Droids included). With full timelines embedded for the bigger characters, and certain events displayed in big, two-page (or more) spreads moment by moment, there are many ways for you to find Star Wars knowledge, both the major and minutiae.  

If you’re a casual fan, there is a lot to learn within these pages. If you’re a die-hard, and curious about what the Story Group considers canon, this is where you can find the absolute most. And if you do anything remotely connected to Star Wars for a living, this is absolutely essential. It is, as advertised, the Ultimate Star Wars resource.

Lords of the Sith: Vader is Scary Again

Since the old expanded universe became Legends, there are stories, timeframes, and relationships that need, no, demand new exploration. The dynamic between the Emperor and Darth Vader was really only explored in the original trilogy, relatively speaking. While The Cone Wars explored the origins of their relationship, the height of their power still remains mostly empty.  

While Rebels season 2 promises to show this a bit, at least from Vader’s perspective, the new novel Lords of the Sith gives us the official canon’s best look at Vader and his Master. Through Star Wars novel veteran Paul S. Kemp’s fearsome lens, we see a Darth Vader with power and swift retribution, who is ever manipulated by the Emperor.

But in typical Star Wars novel fashion, the story doesn’t follow just Vader and the Emperor. It also spins the tale of Cham Syndulla (as seen on The Clone Wars and Rebels pilot Hera’s father) and his crew of Twi’lek freedom fighters trying to liberate Ryloth from any occupation. There are also explorations into the Imperial structure, with Belkor Dray and Moff Delian Mors showing how corruption and betrayal seeded themselves within the ranks, mirroring the code of the Sith Lords themselves.

Regardless of the other two storylines, the meat of this novel comes in the titular characters. Interestingly, while the Emperor does officially have both his civilian name of Palpatine and his Sith name of Sidious, he is never identified by either in this book. The grand majority of the novel, in fact, identifies him solely as “Vader’s Master,” which underlines the nature of their relationship. While the Emperor continually calls Vader “My apprentice,” or “My friend,” or even, especially in the presence of underlings, “Lord Vader,” he is only called Master. It’s even in expository narrative and dialogue, and it’s impossible to ignore. There is no real friendship here, and while Vader may occasionally consider his Master’s death and a rise to true power, he knows his place. He is, and thanks to the Emperor’s unrelenting manipulation, always shall be, the apprentice. We see this in the action too, when the Master shows his true power in a flurry of lightsaber and Force use we got just a taste of in The Clone Wars.

That’s not to say, however, that Vader doesn’t get his due. Indeed, like the Darth Vader series from Marvel Comics and his appearance in the season two premiere of Rebels, the Darth Vader portrayed here is a scary, strong, and utterly disturbing presence. This is established right away in a classic horror movie style scene, where Cham and his cohorts listen over an open comm as Vader makes short work of an entire crew – that scene really set the tone of Vader’s ruthlessness, backed up in later scenes. The best of the book, and the most cinematic piece of prose I’ve read in years, comes at the climax of act one, the attack on the Perilous, a Star Destroyer carrying the Emperor and Vader. While the Free Ryloth Movement makes progress and begins to look like they may be successful, Vader’s single-handed counterattack is downright frightening. There are descriptions of his movements as a pilot that mirror his success as Anakin in the Clone Wars, and even of his son Luke’s skills in the original trilogy. This only serves to illustrate how that skill can be terrifying in the wrong hands.

The Master’s manipulation consistently fascinates, and brings up mentions of characters like Rex and Ahsoka, and other links to Vader’s past. Now that it has been firmly established in canon that Vader remembers his full life as Anakin, fans of the prequels and Clone Wars especially will feel the constant pain he experiences. It’s a stab to the chest each time he remembers a moment, and the knife is twisted when he uses that pain, in Sith fashion, to do further evil deeds.

Of the Twi’lek crew, only Cham and his right-hand woman Isval are heavily featured. The latter gets a brief sidestory of her own that serves as an interlude, and should really twist the thoughts of fans who think Star Wars is a simple story of good and evil. Their relationship dances around romantic feelings, with Cham taking an almost Jedi-like stance to it; if he lets himself acknowledge those feelings or get too close, he fears it will affect the mission. With no Jedi in the actual story, it’s an interesting way to touch on that credo.

Lords of the Sith is unquestionably the best novel yet in the new all-canon series of books. The novels show a Darth Vader who must be feared, but has a strange relatability like he did in the original films. That dichotomy is reflected throughout the book in relationships and actions, and fits everything from individuals to the galaxy at war. I highly recommend this book to all Star Wars fans, and especially to those who think Darth Vader should make everyone cringe in fear at the power of the Dark Side.