Lit The 181st Imperial Discussion Group: The Mandalorian Armor!

Welcome back to another round of discussion in the 181st - less summary, more drama! This month, we start K.W. Jeter's The Bounty Hunter Wars by taking a good look at The Mandalorian Armor. Parts 2 and 3 won't follow immediately; the trilogy will alternate with Edge of Victory, which means the bounty hunters will return in May and July.

Now, where do we start?

- Bounty hunters are often enough a faction of their own in Star Wars, removed a bit from the rest of the criminal fringe (smugglers and mob bosses) in those circumstances. Does it make sense to highlight the profession so much just because Robot Chicken Star Wars II The Empire Strikes Back made the characters so popular? How does the construct of "the bounty hunter" shown in this book work for you? How do you compare the bounty hunter's spot as a "third faction" in the Civil War with the controversial Mandalorian propaganda in "A Practical Man"?

- If I remember one thing about these books from way back when, it's that I was disappointed by a discrepancy of title and content focus. What do you think? Is "The Mandalorian Armor" a fitting title for this first installment? Does the theme of the armour fill a central spot in the narrative?

- How about the structure: does it work for you? Does the connection between the two timeframes become clear soon enough? Do you enjoy the mystery? Do you actually see enough of a connection?

- The Episode 4 timeframe shows Palpatine "destroying the Republic", and kind of having hit a dead end with what his loyal Empire can achieve. This most probably rides on Palpatine's disbanding of the senate; but with the 19-year-Dark Times on our minds these days, would you say that the story would fit better in a different timeframe (minus details like knowledge of the Death Star's fate, obviously)?

- And finally, since TCW continuity issues are a sure way to create thread participation: When you read this 90s version of the bounty hunter world, do you attempt to reconcile it with contemporary canon? Do you acknowledge the books as some kind of historical curiosity, as a snapshot of the EU's past? And for that matter, can you even reconcile the Bounty Hunter Wars with the impressions you originally got from the OT (and maybe the Tales book, I can give you that)?

As always, everything else is fair game, too. Of course. Discuss away!

 

Is this the one that had a 40-page chapter that was nothing put a politic/strategy meeting between Palpatine/Vader/Xizor? I think I almost fell asleep reading that chapter.

 

Hoo boy... Love letter to Boba Fett and it required a big retcon for Zuckuss. A lot of the flashback sequences were catering to Fett and how uber awesome he is, at the expense of everyone else's dignity. Bossk became a raging buffoon who only wants to kill and eat everyone, and Zuckuss became a rookie dork. IG-88 was relatively unscathed, as he was reduced to a moving piece of background. The Circumtore job was just an excuse for Fett to crap on Bossk and Zuckuss, Craddossk crapped on Bossk and Zuckuss (Zuckuss ended up getting most of the crap), and everyone touted Fett as the greatest thing EVAR.

Yes, it brought the bounty hunters into the limelight, and it even laid the tracks for a pretty interesting storyline, and it gave us D'harhan. Unfortunately, the other hunters were collateral damage in this latest tale of Awesome McBadass Powerfist Fett.

 

I want to change my name to Awesome McBadass Powerfist Fett now.

 

It's been a while since I read this series, but I remember that this is where the notion of "EU continuity" died for me. Dengar, Bossk, and Zuckuss had appeared in one book prior to this. One book! Each one had their own short story that summarized their entire character. And neither the author nor the editor(s) could be bothered to try and acknowledge that in any way (until a throwaway reference in the third book to Zuckuss and 4-LOM's story that killed the whole point of that story anyway). Forget Force Unleashed, forget Clone Wars, forget Jacen Solo, forget NJO, and all that stuff. The release of this book was when George Lucas showed up at my house, punched my mother, and ridiculed me for spending money on fan fiction.

To weigh in the titles, I think each one is meant to be something essential to Boba Fett that he does without in the book itself. For the first book, he spends much of it out of his armor. In the second book, he has to travel on someone else's space ship. In third, he has no profitable quarry he's chasing, just survival. It's an interesting idea, if I'm right, but the execution was so lackluster it's hard to say.

I also remember wondering why everyone was standing around while the one Shell Hutt guy just kept ranting and ranting. The pacing of all these books were horrible.

 

I felt like Samuel L. Jackson from Pulp Fiction:

"SAY KUAT AGAIN. I %*(%#*(% DARE YOU!"

I have a bad feeling that this Moebius strip of a novel is the shape of things to come in the New Story Group Order: stories that come from nowhere and lead nowhere.

 

The bounty hunter continuity drove me nuts, and, well, I still find it obnoxious, since it does diminish everybody else. But . . . there's actually a lot of neat stuff going on elsewhere in the series. Kud'ar Mub'at and Balancesheet are the highlight of the series.

 

I thought I'd heard a lot of positive stuff about this series over the last few years and was curious how this discussion would go, since I was never a big fan. I love the colour scheme of the first book's cover though, that's an ace cover, and the burgundy lettering fits perfectly.

See, I was really expecting a lot of TCW hate, so it's fun to only get reactions from this side of the argument at first. I always wondered why these characters were apparently made up on the spot, and while Dengar doesn't get too bad a deal, Bossk and Zuckuss are just atrocious. I can't help but wonder why the others would have stood next to Fett on the Executor if none of those were actually any good (and saying "Fett's the only one who caught Solo" doesn't shine a light on the other guys' quality, since there could obviously be only one winner in the race). But I must admit that I wasn't a big fan of most of the Tales interpretations, either - IG-88 is obvious, I didn't like the Jaster Mereel "obsessive compulsive law man but doesn't do a straight bureaucratic job either" idea, and Zuckuss and 4-LOM saving a Hoth extra and joining the rebellion because they are actually kind of nice doesn't gel with people standing on Vader's flagship, either. The excellent Robot Chicken sketch series works as a simple bit of fun at the movies, of course, but I think it's uncanny how many parallels it forms with the EU's "bunch of losers" approach.

It's 26, which actually surprised me. Did they really talk for that long? Well, okay, they needed some space to say Boba Fett's name a few more times.

This time around, I consciously wondered where that idea came from since it's kind of out there for the SW universe. Not that it doesn't fit, it's a great concept, but I can't help but wonder how Jeter came up with it. Coming straight out of JJK's writing, I must say I also enjoyed the writing a lot in the opening. Jeter can create atmosphere, and he can create new standalone sci-fi set pieces. His medical droids are also a hoot. The only problem I see is that he kind of writes a parallel universe, or a non-SW universe.

Interesting idea, I'll take this in consideration for the next two books. However, naming books for stuff that's not in them is a bit... out there for books like these, especially if there's no key chapter that hits you over the head with the meaning (like Star By Star did, that honestly was a shining moment of clarifiying a book title). To be honest, I look at the Bounty Hunter Wars books and I can't help but think that they are more or less an executive decision that no one checked in on during the concept/writing stage. The titles say "cool Boba Fett book!" (well, except for Slave Ship, which seems even more executive level by not getting what the Slave 1 is), and the covers were probably painted with just a faint idea of what to put in there. Even the series title! Bounty Hunter Wars sounds like a respectable old-school way of saying Bounty Hunters Unleashed or Bounty Hunters To The Max!, doesn't it.

 

How can you not love the idea of Boba Fett was once an insanely lawful neutral frontier lawman?! He already is the lone, mysterious gunman; it is a perfect background for him!

 

Which didn't always gel with their Marvel incarnations.

 

I've never read this trilogy. But I absolutely love the fact that its characterization of Zuckuss was apparently so bad as to necessitate a multiple-personality-disorder-retcon. Seriously, that's the EU at its finest. Half of the The Clone Wars discrepancies could be explained away if that kind of retcon were used more often. Barriss? Check. Valorum? Abruptly changed personalities after talking to Bail and didn't actually get aboard the Star of Iskalon. Ryloth? Only rotates when it's Bill, the playful one. Who needs "A Wizard did it" when we actually really do have "That was his other personality"? Brilliant stuff.

 

I admit, I do have a fondness for that retcon. Psychology has always been a bit of a hobby of mine, and I'm attracted to unhinged characters. One of these days, I'd like to write up a case history for Zuckuss and dig around in old source material for more symptoms to match the diagnostic criteria. I also hold out hope that perhaps some enterprising author would take that retcon and explore it even more. There's so much story potential!

 

Now that a mod kicked me out of my own thread, I hope you guys will manage...

 

You need to re-read The Last One Standing until you like it.

 

Yeah, agreed on this. The Shell Hutts are another weird yet fun element, and I recall the next book having a cool idea about genetically-altered miners who had been abandoned when they were no longer profitable. I just wish the stories themselves moved a bit faster and did something more dynamic than have all these nifty things speechify at each other for thirty pages at a time.

Yeah, seeing Bossk and young Boba pal around is just amusing to me, now. Maybe there are three different Bossk's: one who partnered with Boba back during the Clone Wars, a younger punk who was a rival to Boba during the last years of the EMpire (this is the one who Cradossk sired, unless they're all siblings), and the one who was hired along with Boba to find Han Solo in the asteroid field. Outrageously, two of them both had a ship named 'Hound's Tooth' that was stolen by Tinian I'att, but hey, coincidences happen, will of the Force, yadda yadda. If they expect me to accept Zuckuss' multiple personality disorder, I don't see why a whole bunch of Bossks are a problem.

I took it less that they were nice, as the Rebellion had an easier time making friends because it is nicer than the Empire. Zuckuss and 4-LOM just really learned how to learn how to trust obviously honest people. They still intended to continue on as bounty hunters.

Fair point, but I think there was a conscious policy at the time to ignore the Marvel comics. I don't know how Bantam justified not keeping characterization consistent between literally the only two books it had published about the bounty hunter characters. (Aside from complete apathy, I mean.)

 

Out of the bounty hunters, Zuckuss and 4-LOM always struck me as the odd ones out. They weren't nice, per se, but compared to the rest of the hunters, they were a bit more sociable. It helped that they had courtesy and civility on their side. They were the polite hunters who would apologize and explain that it's nothing personal and just business as they haul your butt in for a wad of cash.

Punch-clock villains, you could say.

 

In that way, they were probably representative of the majority of profitable hunters. Even Fett has aspects of that to his personality, in his better stories. And even as 'The Bounty Hunter Code' makes so many references to TBH Trilogy, I think it more serves the spirit of those short stories by highlighting the "just business" approach and the variety in all the hunters.

That said, I have to give TBH Trilogy props for formalizing the world of the Bounty Hunters. Before, there were vague references to Guilds, but the big guild and Cradosssk and all that was the foundation on which a lot was built. Even Kud'ar Mub'at serving as a living PayPal service for Bounty Hunters was a nice bit of worldbuilding that worked its way into the Code handbook.

 

I'm a huge Boba Fett fan, and I still think these books are by and large atrocious. The first adult-level EU novel I ever read was Tales of the Bounty Hunters, and the continuity problems, like for Loopy, killed the whole "one canon" idea for me pretty early on. I got back on the wagon after discovering Wookieepedia and this site, among other things, but whatever.

My main issue isn't the inconsistencies in characterization, it's that the characterizations are all completely flat. Aside from the Assemblers, and arguably D'harhan, there isn't a memorable or interesting character in the entire book/series, original or already established. Boba Fett is a boring invincible, infallible "hero" (I might be a fan of his, but even I don't want to just see him utterly destroy everyone he goes up against without breaking a sweat), Dengar is Mr. Exposition, Kuat of Kuat is so extremely boring oh my God, and I could just go down the list.

As brought up before, what this book does somewhat well is general plotting and worldbuilding. Seeing the Bounty Hunter's Guild in action is cool, the Assemblers are a really neat race that I wish had been used elsewhere, and a lot of other similar things. The ideas are all there, and the plot isn't honestly that bad overall. The problems are, as I said, characterization, and the pacing/prose of the books themselves. It's a book's worth of plot, if that, stretched out over a trilogy. I got the first two books in the series and never bothered getting or reading the third for years after I'd finished the first two, and only read it via the library when I did instead of buying it. That should say something about it right there.

 

All I remember about these books is that I liked Kuat of Kuat because he had a pet cat and I cried when they got blown up.

 

This was one of the worst Sw novels i've ever read. Although i only made it through a couple of chapters of this abomination, so i guess i didn't "read" it. Also dude that's essentially a transformer gun thing.

 

D'harhan is like something I'd come up with while playing with action figures. Jam a gun on one figure and INSTANT AWESOME. He speaks to my inner eight-year-old.

 

Heck just froze over...because I agree with you on all points.
I actually still have these books in a box somewhere, but the only reason I kept readying them was to find out what happens to the Assembler. I feel like someone presented Jeter with a Boba Fett picture and was like "Hey, write something about this guy...we don't actually care what it is."

The way D'harhan is described kinda reminds me of that scene from Iron Man, where Obadiah Stain says "He built it in a cave, with a box of scraps!".

 

So, let's focus our minds on D'harhan for a bit.

[checks Wookieepedia to see how much has actually been sourcebooked about the character...]

Huh, The Last Jedi? Well, if he's 'just another' bounty hunter in those, I'm not surprised I didn't keep that one in memory.

Cyborgs obviously are a part of SW, and had been at the point Jeter invented the character. In retrospect, it's especially interesting to compare this to the background TCW implies for Grievous: A living being that wants to improve his fighting capabilities, becoming a machine in the process (Vader, Dengar, and even Lobot might not have chosen vast cybernetic changes). Does D'harhan appear like he willingly chose this? While he might seem similar to 80s sci-fi-action staple RoboCop, does the over-the-top modification make this seem more like a Masters of the Universe action figure (wouldn't have needed a lot of modification for those, TrakNar)?

Or are concepts like D'harhan and the information spider things that happen when you hire a sci-fi writer and give him free reign? Both of these characters, along with the cybernetic cat, remind me of cyberpunk (and maybe steampunk for D'harhan's ancient cooling system) a lot.

 

I don't remember much of D'harhan's backstory, just that I considered him kriffing awesome, and I actually knew of him from Last of the Jedi before I read the Bounty Hunter Wars. As a sidenote: how do you guys pronounce D'harhan? I used to pronounce it "Duh-har-Hahn," but I think I prefer my brother's interpretation, and I've adopted it as my own: "Dahr-Hahn."