With Sabé in tow, Darth Vader pursues a rogue Imperial governor and encounters a new weapon with some strange aftereffects in Star Wars: Darth Vader #24 written by Greg Pak, art by Marco Castiello, colored by Carlos Lopez and lettered by Joe Caramagna.
While the days of slapping them with a foil-enhanced embossed chromium cover are largely behind us, there is still a tendency in the comic book community to celebrate or otherwise mark the occasion of a series hitting an issue number which is divisible by twenty-five. Which is to say, with the series’ twenty-fifth issue looming, it becomes clear in Darth Vader #24 that much of what the current “Crimson Reign” story is building towards will come to a head in that issue. What, exactly, it’s building towards (other than “something”), remains unclear, however.
That sense that we’re heading towards the endgame of the storyline comes in the second half of Darth Vader #24. Before it, we get the newly-Imperialified Sabé leading Vader in a mission against the corrupt, Crimson Dawn-affilited governor who is running roughshod over the colony of freed slaves Sabé helped establish. Learning the governor is planetside and not on her orbiting Star Destroyer, they storm her base. Easily overriding the defenses, they learn she’s finished work on a new weapon, one designed to absorb the life force of its targets, up to and including whole planets (it’s sort of a reverse-Death Star, destroying a world by absorbing its energy rather than destroying it via a blast of external energy). Its first target is Darth Vader.
Vader survives taking a direct hit from the weapon (though he is briefly felled by it and the governor considers the weapon to be a success), but in the aftermath of the blast, he experiences a series of flashbacks and hallucinations. It begins with Vader reliving the destruction of Alderaan in A New Hope, as the purpose of this new weapon is revealed to Vader, Sabé and their forces. Then, he revisits past atrocities committed by Anakin Skywalker: the slaughter of the Tuskens in Attack of the Clones, and of younglings and the Separatists in Revenge of the Sith.
Then, the more hallucinatory flashbacks begin, as Anakin/Padme morph into Vader/Sabé and back again, with Padme/Sabé insisting there is still good in him while Anakin/Vader angrily insists there is not, throwing up a wall (styled notably like the walls which surround him while in his meditation/healing chamber as seen in The Empire Strikes Back). The issue concludes on a cliffhanger in that hallucinatory world, as Sabé tries to breach the wall while Vader’s narration insists he cannot be turned to good, only for it to explode outward as Vader declares Sabé has no idea what she’s done by trying to turn him to the light.
What does all that mean? Presumably we’ll learn in the next issue, the series’ 25th. The question of who Vader is and why he does what he does has been central to writer Greg Pak’s take on the character in this volume of the book. At one point, he seemed to be setting up Vader’s turn to the light in Return of the Jedi, only to move the character firmly back to the Emperor’s side. Post-”War of the Bounty Hunters”, Vader’s commitment has been to the notion of order. A notable moment in that regard occurs in this issue, in which Vader expresses his anger at the corrupt Imperial governor not for throwing in with Crimson Dawn or betraying the Empire, but for failing to serve order. The idea being that Vader is serving the Emperor and attacking Crimson Dawn only because it aligns with his new personal mission to instill order throughout the galaxy.
How this plays into whatever metamorphosed form Vader takes when he emerges from behind his self-constructed vision wall next issue remains to be seen. But for now, it leaves this issue feeling a bit lacking, concerned more with setting up the (presumed) finale of the “Crimson Reign” plotline than in telling an entertaining story in its own right. Darth Vader #24 falters in other areas as well. Ochi of Bestoon makes a triumphant return at one point in this issue, swooping in on a speeder bike to save Vader when he’s incapacitated by the governor’s weapon, but the art, from Marco Castiello filling in for Raffaele Ienco, fails to properly sell the moment. Ochi’s arrival is depicted via a big, heroic full page splash, but nothing in the preceding page’s layout or action sets up his arrival. It’s just a turn of a page and then bam! Ochi appears as if out of nowhere.
The “Crimson Reign” storyline has largely eschewed traditional storytelling formatting, bouncing around from various subplots while featuring different supporting characters from issue to issue. In that regard, Darth Vader #24 is the most traditionally-structured of the lot, reading very much like a typical “move the characters into position for the climax” penultimate issue. As a result, it’s difficult to gauge its success without reading the subsequent issue and knowing what’s to come. But even a gangbusters conclusion to “Crimson Reign” (if, indeed, the next issue even is the conclusion of the story arc) won’t be able to change how workmanlike and largely unexciting this issue is.
Force Facts
- The planet destroyed by the rogue governor’s new reverse-Death Star weapon is named Karolia, and resides in the Belderone system; the planet Belderone first appeared in the original Marvel series’ Star Wars Annual #3 and later factored into a handful of Expanded Universe stories before being canonized in the novel Tarkin.
Austin Gorton also reviews older issues of X-Men at the Real Gentlemen of Leisure website, co-hosts the A Very Special episode podcast, and likes Star Wars. He lives outside Minneapolis, where sometimes, it is not cold. Follow him on Twitter @AustinGorton
