There’s also a panel that looks like artist Salvador Larroca copied it straight out of Episode 3 and once more there’s another scene of Vader butchering Tusken Raiders, like he did as Anakin in Episode 2. Later on we’re on Coruscant in rooms that heavily reminded me of the prequels - though it is interesting to see Vader and the Emperor set against the sunlight rather than the moody iridescence of space.
But it’s the title crawl where the prequel stench begins wafting its way to the reader, mentioning Vader’s “rebirth on volcanic Mustafar”. followed by a splash page STAR WARS: DARTH VADER, and the title crawl, which, I guess, is how Marvel are going to handle every new Star Wars comic, so that’s not going to get old anytime soon(!). The comic opens the classic Star Wars way: “A long time ago” etc. That’s essentially it, which, for a bumper-sized issue, doesn’t add up to much. Vader trades threats with Jabba, Vader gets scolded by the Emperor, and a certain fan favourite bounty hunter makes a cameo at the end. This is a villain-packed issue as Vader has interactions with the biggest and baddest in the Star Wars universe from one scene to the next. Like Jason Aaron’s main Star Wars comic, this series is set between A New Hope and Empire, with this issue taking its cue from the ending of last week’s Star Wars #2 - Marvel’s cross-pollination has begun! The rebels have blown up an Empire-run weapons factory and Vader is now forced to barter with Jabba the Hutt. And, while Gillen doesn’t totally fail, he hasn’t made as convincing an argument for the character in Darth Vader #1. Vader has always been brilliant as part of a bigger story - he should never BE the story.
That was arguably the biggest problem of the prequels: making Vader, or Anakin Skywalker, so central to those movies.
The two characters are comparable in that they are standouts in an ensemble cast but take them away and bring the focus entirely on them? They lose their magic. It’s interesting that Marvel chose Kieron Gillen to write this Darth Vader solo series because he also wrote a (terrible)Wolverine miniseries, Origin II. The stench of the prequels hovers over this comic as if the ghost of Jar Jar (you know he hanged himself after Revenge of the Sith) blundered into the presses and farted on the paper before the comic was printed.
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