Comics Star Wars #38-43: The Ashes of Jedha (6/6 Released)

A decent enough illustration of my point, I suppose. Leia would seem to be more a victim of changing sensibilities and modern hypersensitive attitudes than she is of poor characterization.

 

Except in the new canon books (PLOA, Bloodline, Aftermath) Leia is not portrayed as someone who resorts to physical violence because she disagrees with someone. Yes, someone of them take place ROTJ, but in PLOA where she's only 16 she acts 10x more mature than she's been acting in these comics where she's 19.

Yeah the "It was okay in the 1930s" doesn't really work, it was also acceptable in the 1940s to award your secretary for a good job by patting her on the behind, doesn't mean we should see Han or Luke doing that in one of the comics. We wouldn't accept comics where Han is continuously physically violent to Leia, we shouldn't accept it the other way around either.

 

So presumably the next step is to hold Lawrence Kasdan accountable for writing the scene in TESB where Leia shoulders Han out of the way while trying to repair the Falcon? Come on. Leia is not being "continuously physically violent" to Han in the comics, let's retain some perspective on that. Again: screwball comedy. It's a classic film genre, and Han and Leia from the very beginning were an homage to that genre. Recasting that aspect of their relationship as some sort of reversed domestic-abuse scenario may appeal to today's sensibilities, but thankfully Star Wars is more timeless than that.

 

You know, I've just about had it with Larroca, but his Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country adaptation doesn't look half bad.

 

Well, in that case, sadly, this will go nowhere then. Pity.

 

It’s not a matter of screwball comedy or “hypersensitivities” though. What does Han see in Leia AT ALL with the way she treats him? What would lead those two characters to courtship the way they are written?

She sees a continual screwup and he sees someone who is incapable of appreciating his efforts.

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She's young. Good looking. And the daughter of royalty. Plus a lot of men are attracted to women are able to stand up to them. You are trying to make physical attraction a whole lot more complicated than it really is

 

She also treat Luke terrible. I never see Leia as an awful friend so it's weird to me. She threatened Luke to leave him in his planet when she knows he lost his family, and she called him stupid/idiot in several issue. And looking how Marvel reacted to criticism to Captain America, they probably don't care if we like or not how they treat Leia

 

Hmm...well, that is good for a first/second/third impression, but Han is the type of guy who can walk into a spaceport and attract a couple of decent looking partners. I don’t know why he would put up with Aaron’s Leia for more than a couple of months.

But I saw a glimmer of hope with Kieron’s Leia/Han dynamic. And I am willing to see where he takes the relationship. He knows that there is a lot of course correction involved with his run, otherwise, why change authors now when the original author still had stories to tell (and outlined)?


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The art is getting unreadable.

Look, I really like Salvador Larocca, and I have since he was doing Fantastic Four with Chris Claremont, and then things like using Josh Holloway as the obvious reference for Tony Stark, or for Starbrand in NewUniversal started and I was still okay because references are...okay, in moderation, but I don't know if it's because the method is so easy and quick but it looks like fumetti now. These are photo comics with a digital layer over them. There was a Klingon from ST VI: The Undiscovered Country in the latest issue. I can tell exactly what frames from the OT he's using to shortcut these characters.

It's time to STOP.

I don't want to give up a Star Wars comic by my favourite writer (and honestly one of my favourite artists) over this. I fully believe that this is because he's pressed for time or someone higher up wants photo-realism, but the way it looks lately is just awful and it needs to stop.

If Greg Land can kick the habit so can Salvador, and if he needs to take breaks in between storylines...that's fine, get other artists in to give him time to do proper art.

These dead eyed posed cut and paste with an opacity layer thrown on lifts have no place in the comic.

 

I think it largely is due to the release schedule. Looking at Marvel's page on Wookieepedia (which isn't always a 100% accurate but is generally reliable enough to go by) we have three more issues set to be released by January 3rd. So they are still averaging more than an issue a month for this series.

So I think it just comes down to do you prefer having a quick release schedule or waiting awhile to get as good as art as possible. Obviously it seems Marvel has chosen the former for a lot of their Star Wars series.

There are probably reasons for the quick release schedule. Not only is it easier for the readers to stay up with the story when they are really prompt about releasing the issues but Marvel is also likely really on a timetable when it comes to Star Wars. We have new movies being released every single year and they have to keep up with that schedule. They can't spend over five years slowly releasing issues about Luke, Han, and Leia during the first year post ANH in order to get the best art as possible because it will then be time to start telling stories about Rey, Finn, and Poe. We could say that they could just start up brand new series for those new characters but if we took that mindset they would eventually have to have ten, twenty, or thirty separate series being written simultaneously in order to keep up with the demand.

 

I wonder if it would be better if they tried to swap between artists each story arc - so artists had a set period of time to work up 5-6 issues rather than an ongoing thing of ensuring there's another one done every couple of weeks for months on end.

What really doesn't help sometimes are the colouring and shadows. Angel Unzueta's work with Arif Prianto in the Poe Dameron ongoing works much better, because the colours are more vibrant and there's far fewer shadows.

 

I imagine that Marvel are fully capable of organizing their schedule and they're the ones in control of when they release stuff, not Disney or LFL (except perhaps in rare cases like the movie adaptations). Why is their scheduling, that they determine, therefore negatively affecting the quality of their output? Just look at the Thrawn miniseries, annnounced this July, coming out next February. That's a 7 month lead time, and you can bet that work was underway before the announcement. If they're working with a 7-month window before the first issue (so a total of 13 months for the whole 6-issues) then that means they're fully capable of doing this across the board. There was no excuse for Mace Windu, a miniseries that they could have released literally at any time of their choosing, looking the way that it did.

With the ongoings, things are perhaps harder, but that's why you rotate artists in and out. Most ongoings work on arcs where creative teams regularly switch around precisely for that reason. We've just come out of a series of 5 one-shot issues which any other artist could have stepped in to draw, leaving a Larroca a break between the end of the Screaming Citadel and the beginning of this new one. But for some reason, every one of these Larroca did himself. Why? This was the perfect opportunity for a break and to allow him to 'catch up'.

I don't think it's the schedule or the artist being quick, someone somewhere seems to think that Larroca's art is not only good enough, but good for the series and a selling point for it.

We need only look at the history of the Star Wars series before Larroca came onboard to see that they indeed can and do rotate artists. We started with Cassaday (6 issues), had a single issue break with Bianchi, then moved to Immonen (5 issues), Deodato stepped in for 2 issues during Vader Down, and then we had a single issue from Mayhew, a run by Yu (4 issues), another single from Mayhew, and then finally a run from Molina (5 issues). In 25 issues we had 7 artists! None worked on it for more than 6 issues.

Meanwhile Larroca has done 25 issues of Vader and 13 issues of Star Wars without a break (I suppose you could count the Vader Down and Scarlet Citadel inserts, though I honestly don't remember if these came out monthly or bi-weekly, which meant that he was still releasing 1 a month). And to add to that 13 we can add another 5 for this current arc. Has there ever been an artist that has drawn that many Star Wars comics (over 40)? Jan Duursema?

If anyone at Marvel is reading this, I implore you, give Larroca (and us) a break. Just one full arc without Larroca and Delgado would be heaven at this point.

 

Wow, that's not exactly a case of Qapla art, is it?

I'd agree it's a case of a short-cut, understandable but a really bad result.

I'm also convinced that Marvel are expecting too much from the colourist. Tech allows far more, but in most cases, a good amount of skill is needed to get the most out of it and that takes time and experience, which I don't think is being allowed for.

The other solution is that the artist colours their own work, but it still requires a lot of ability and the Sejics are working elsewhere:

Stejpan:



Linda:



Both are very good at using digital colouring, but they wouldn't have acquired that quickly.

 

In a single series, yes, Duursema has drawn over 40 issues of Legacy volume 1 and I think Republic too. BUT, she did take breaks between arcs and some issues, so it never was 40+ issues straight of Duursema.

I completely agree with your post. I'm not interested in the main SW series anymore largely due to the so-so story in Aaron's run, but also because of the bad artwork by Larocca. I am interested in the story by Gillen considering he's one of my favourite canon SW comic authors, and if it wasn't for the (again) terrible art I probably would've read the latest issue.

I've advocated the same before, but so far it seems like it's fallen on deaf ears. Nonetheless, it's a good point that I hope Marvel will wake up to soon.

 

Jan did indeed need breaks, it's why we got so many great interlude stories that got us away from mopey Cade.

 

Ooo, where's that Honor Harrington picture from?

 

I agree Marvel needs to use multiple artists for arcs. The art should help tell the story, not take a reader out of the story. I can forgive some of the laziness in the background of which there are ample examples in the latest issue #38 ...

Spoiler

There were no clues in the art on page 8 that the Falcon had lifted off.

Commander Befa is the best example of the problem with Larroca's faces in the latest issue. But even some of the other characters look bad. Look at the art on page 13. Leia and Ubin look fine in the first 3 panels. The character faces work with the rest of the art in the panels. Then in the 4th panel Ubin has a creepy distorted face followed by the 5th panel which looks like someone wearing a Princess Leia mask which is also creepy. Her head is facing one direction, but the face is facing another direction. It's just... bizzarre!

The Han and Luke faces makes me want to sit down and find the photos they are taken from. All of them are recognizable.

I know Larroca can draw because I've seen it in some of his earlier work like on the Fantastic Four title. Larroca needs to stop whatever it is he is doing with these creepy faces.

 

Tales of Honor: Bred to Kill.

The first was an adaptation of On Basilisk Station.

Sadly, doesn't look like there's going to be a third miniseries. I really enjoyed them.

 

I'm not going to agree with you guys. I kind of like the way Marvel is doing things and think they can do even better. I think their stories and art are way better than what we got from Dark Horse. Regardless of the sales, the marketing ability, the tall v short crap. The Dark Times from Dark Horse suffered a lot despite having very good art. There were numerous delays and by the time certain stories got completed, I just didn't care. I spoke about this a lot on the boards back then and at the dark horse forum. Marvel star wars this go round, love them, hate them, not agree with them, loathe them, have done a great job with the license. From Jan 2015 till now Nov. 2017 how many comics books have they come out with? From different series? Was on the top 100 how many times? And when they weren't, they definitely didn't fall below 110. Even what I considered their weakest titles still did very good. For comics, Marvel has delivered even to the point that it's beating some of their own titles. I understand choice, but I don't think Larroca has done that bad. Is he a Dursamma or whatever her name is? No.

 

So I've read #38 for the 2nd time and I'm still trying to make sense of what's going on...

Spoiler

So let me start with the Empire. Back in Rogue One, the Empire uses Jedha as a weapon test for the Death Star. The test is successful, and then it's used at Scarif before we see it again in ANH at Alderaan. Then it's destroyed when it goes to Yavin IV.

Now in this comic, the Empire is back to Jedha to get more kyber crystals, I'm assuming for Death Star 2 or something else, not sure yet. Obviously the current staff have been doing a poor job so Metal Arm guy and Queen Trios from the Vader comics are there to do the job correctly and to "finish what Grand Moff Tarkin" has started. I'm not sure what that means, but let me pick up the name you dropped.

Am I correct so far?

So on the opposite side we have the Rebels - Saw's rebels - the Partisans AND the big three. We have a panel where Han is talking to Chewie, but it appears he's not on board the Falcon as he's not drawn once in this issue and he's not shown with a hood on this head at the end so a little confused there.

Then there are the two new characters. I kind of get who the Force Priest is, but not sure how he survived if he was studying in the temple on Jedha. And the girl, she said she was at Yavin in the sick bay and then left the Rebellion to join the Partisans? I'm a little lost on her backstory as well.

So Leia's plan is an alliance with the Partisans so they met in the same method in Rogue One, with bags on their heads - makes sense. And the big reveal is that we have another suvivor - two tubes. I forget which one it is, but I know someone answered prior when I asked so thanks, but I already forget.

So I appreciate all this issue is doing to tie things together from different movies and comics, but I felt like I had to do a lot of research to understand what was going on. I'm still kind of confused on what is happening in certain panels. Also, the Empires appear to have "scanned" faces like they are doing with Luke, Leia and Han. Any idea who those faces belong to? Why not just draw them?

There's definitely a lot to unpack here and with this new story I would have appreciated a little more exposition at the beginning to create a strong foundation for moving forward but I guess we'll see where this goes.

 

Yeah, you're right on all points. They're supposeably still mining for crystals for Death Star II (or at least because they're shown to be very explosive). Chewbacca is elsewhere entirely when he's speaking over the radio and not just outside of the cockpit (this really isn't very clear). We also don't know why Leia wants what's left of the Partisans to join the alliance, she doesn't say why when talking to the new girl (which you think would come up) and so that she has put her life and the lives of her friends at risk of being murdered seems a bit of a stretch logically (and really, what strength could the Partisans, who had to be rescued remember, possibly offer them?). I'm going to cry foul if it's revealed that the Partisans still have an army. And there's a bizarre bit where Leia addresses this Partisan turned Rebel turned Partisan by name only to have her tell Leia her name a few panels later.

I'm not sure why the ruler of another world (the queen) has to go on a working vacation for the Empire. Presumably she has stuff to do herself, like rule her planet which has just gone through a destructive civil war, and could just delegate what is essentially a middle-management consultation job.

Sorry for the negativity on this issue, I don't like the writing at all either (I mean really, you introduced your big bad by having him arbitarily murder another officer on the bridge?). Fortunately, I'm not paying money for this.

 

"Dursamma or whatever her name is"

 

TiniTinyTony Tony Ubin Des was originally from Jedha and went back home after she heard the news and joined the reformed Partisans. And yes. Leia is attempting to gain an alliance with the remaining Partisans

redxavier Queen Trios is pretty much Vader's slave at this point. Though it wasn't directly referenced that Vader had her go to Jedha we could assume that is the reason for her being there.

 

Yeah, I guess. But what about her appearance in Vader shows that she would be the person to send to consult on mining? Is she an engineer or planner or some such? Maybe in the next issue she'll have brought some actual experts from her planet with her, otherwise this is going to feel like a contrived way to bring back another of Gillen's characters.