Star Wars: Age of Rebellion - Boba Fett Review: A Serviceable Bounty Hunt Is Entertaining But Predictable

Bounty hunter Boba Fett debuted in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back and immediately captured the attention of fans, thanks to his intimidating armor and stealthy abilities that allowed him to capture Han Solo. In the decades since his debut, Fett remains one of the most beloved ancillary characters in the saga, with fans regularly professing their desires to see more adventures of the bounty hunter. With Star Wars: Age of Rebellion - Boba Fett, fans are given everything they'd expect to see in one of the character's treacherous adventures, but, while it's entertaining, it does little to enrich the character's backstory.

On a desert planet in the Outer Rim, Fett passes his time by taking one bounty after another, and, as you could imagine, effectively eradicating each threat that presents itself. When one adversary proves slightly more challenging and offers the bounty hunter a new opportunity, readers learn the true nature of the mysterious character and what his priorities will always be.

While Lucasfilm undeniably has a number of successes to their name, one of the areas in which they falter is by listening to fans. Rather than leaving us wanting more, they have the tendency to give us too much of a good thing, only for that supplemental content to disappoint us. Audiences were excited to see Boba Fett in Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, only to see the deadly mercenary as a child. These Age of Rebellion stories have run the risk of continuing this trend, but, as proven with this Boba Fett issue, Lucasfilm's partnership with Marvel Comics has successfully found ways to deliver new adventures of beloved characters without inundating us with contrived backstories.

This book gives Boba Fett fans everything they liked about the character in Empire Strikes Back. He lets his actions speak louder than words, he is ruthless in seeking his target, and his armor is completely badass. Writer Greg Pak clearly knows what fans have wanted from the character, which is why he delivers the deadly adventure we'd expect to see the mercenary embark on.

Even more effective than Pak's story is artist Marc Laming and colorist Neeraj Menon's work on the book, as one panel after the next delivers striking interpretations of the character, ranging from lonely treks across the desert to blast-fueled shootouts to crowded city streets. The duo works in perfect harmony with one another to deliver vivid interpretations of the lonely bounty hunter which likely mirror the gunslinger vibe of the character that George Lucas originally envisioned.

The book might make good on Fett fanatics' desires to see his execution-filled exploits, yet it fails to do anything new with the character that we couldn't have just imagined in our own minds. Nothing about the book feels inauthentic for the character, but we're given exactly what we experienced in Empire Strikes Back; Boba Fett is a calculated cutthroat who doesn't let anything or anyone stand in the way of his bounty.

Star Wars fans have learned the hard way, whether it be in Attack of the Clones where we saw the character's beginnings or Star Wars: Return of the Jedi when we saw his jetpack malfunction and send him to his clumsy doom, that it's possible to have too much of a good thing. What makes the character intriguing is how little we know about him, as there's something far more intimidating about the unknown than seeing even the deadliest of missions depicted.

A certain subset of Boba Fett fans will be thrilled by this book, possibly even seeing it as evidence of why he should get a long-rumored spinoff film, but the book also reminds us that sometimes less is more and every new detail we learn about the characters makes him appeal to us that much less.

Published by Marvel Comics

On May 8, 2019

Written by Greg Pak

Art by Marc Laming

Colors by Neeraj Menon

Letters by VC's Travis Lanham