Star Wars #17 - Marvel Comics

STAR WARS No. 17, May 2016

Somewhat annoyingly beginning this edition’s narrative after Princess Leia and smuggler Sana Starros have already apparently dealt with “a security breach” at Sunspot Prison, Jason Aaron’s script for Issue Seventeen of “Star Wars” certainly lived up to the Alabama-born author’s “idea of doing a Star Wars prison story, which is something very different than what we've done so far.” In fact, this second instalment to “Rebel Jail” probably wrong-footed its 107,058 readers on several occasions as the plot’s central antagonist turns out to be a murderous Rebel sympathiser of sorts, and the “poor, misguided princess” is driven to re-capture a number of released inmates alive rather than simply kill them as “the [new] man in charge” wishes.

Such pleasing prose really does help ramp up the intrigue as to the identity of this book's heavily armoured mysterious mercenary, as well as add an interesting spin to Organa’s lethal predicament by forcing the former member of the Imperial Senate to punch her way out of trouble, rather than just blast her opponents as her colleague recommends; “No one would blame you if you pulled the trigger. It’d certainly be a better death than the one he was about to give you.” 

Of course, despite all its dynamic, pulse-pounding panels and captivating moral dilemmas, it is difficult to believe that the sequence’s “adventure heroine” is realistically physically strong enough to overpower the likes of Imperial Special Force’s agent Kolar Ludd, a Gamorrean, a Zabrak, and at least two other highly dangerous prisoners without resorting to killing at least one or two of them. Yet such a willing suspension of disbelief is entirely necessary, particularly if any perusing bibliophile was ever going to imagine this comic’s subsequent cliff-hanger which disconcertingly sees “lawfulness” Leia hand Doctor Aphra a laser rifle and then seemingly turn her back upon Darth Vader’s “side-kick”.

Sadly, a lot of the impact to this third best-selling book of March 2016 is arguably also lost as a result of Leinil Francis Yu's somewhat inconsistent pencilling. It’s clear from Aaron’s comments at the time of this twenty-page periodical’s publication that the writer was “a huge fan of his stuff” and felt the Filipino was “a great choice for this arc.” But a number of the artist’s “dynamic pseudo-realism” drawn panels, such as when Luke and Han try to avoid a squadron of “bucket-heads” whilst “transporting illegal livestock”, debatably don’t look quite right.

The regular cover art of "STAR WARS" No. 17 by Terry Dodson & Rachel Dodson