Category: Imperial Court Circular

Rebel in the Ranks – Among the Best Novels in the New Canon

Posted on April 13, 2015by

sote-ritrJason Fry’s second entry in the Servants of the Empire young adult novel series takes place concurrently with the Rebels season one episode “Breaking Ranks” and his two books arguably do more to develop Lothal as an interesting place than an entire season of the still-excellent show has managed to do. If you’re still worried about the “young adult” part of that sentence, read our review of the first book in the series and have all your concerns allayed. Fry’s second book in the series continues to provide adult-like depth to the setting explored in the television show, but it also works really well as a YA novel that we would have really liked to read when we were younger.

While the first book in the series introduced the characters and the setting, this book builds on it while changing the tone enough that it doesn’t read like just a follow-up story. The first book featured themes of colonialism and adolescent sports drama that related to each other in surprising ways. By Rebel in the Ranks, the main characters have moved on to different things and the style of the storytelling changes accordingly. Yes, there are two main point of view characters now: Zare Leonis returns as a newly-minted cadet at Lothal’s Imperial Academy, while Merei Spanjaf’s role expands as we see her various undercover attempts to help Zare find out about his sister’s fate. The two characters’ different narrative arcs – and the contrast with the themes explored in the first novel – constitute the true meat of the novel, though part of the novel also overlaps with the story of “Breaking Ranks.”

Though we’re not a huge fan of novelizing television show episodes, Fry does it pretty well: the story of the novel does not play second-fiddle to the television episode, and actually serves to make the action in the episode seem a lot more interesting. As we said in our previous review, the Servants of the Empire books should be essential reading for any fan of the Rebels television show. We can now add an additional recommendation: it’s good reading for any young Star Wars fan not only because the readers might identify with the characters, but also because the audience might learn to relate to people they’ve never identified with before. It’s a book about camaraderie and teamwork, and those themes carry through from the book’s dedication to the very end. Merei Spanjaf, in particular, is a great female role model and Disney should pay attention to her!

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Mutatis Mutandis – Tarkin’s Empire, Familiar But Improved

Posted on December 5, 2014by

The Latin phrase mutatis mutandis loosely means “with only the necessary changes made” and that basically sums up the approach given to James Luceno’s characterization of the Galactic Empire in his novel, Tarkin. We won’t be reviewing the book per se – our editor has already done that – and we won’t be talking about the handling of Legends Expanded Universe material in this book (though mutatis mutandis also well describes it, especially given Luceno’s penchant for using EU) because ETE will be discussing the current EU/NEU state of play at a later date. Instead, we’ll take a look at the Galactic Empire and what Tarkin means for the Empire, especially next to portrayals in Edge of the Galaxy and A New Dawn.

So what’s the Empire like, in Tarkin? Truthfully, it’s the same as it always was. There are some changes to the ruling structure that we’ll get into, but the changes are essentially in name only and don’t materially change anything from the old EU structure of the Empire. There is some hinting that the anti-female and anti-alien policies are gone, but they’re not stated outright and it’s only really there by reading between the lines. What has changed is that the inconsistencies between the trilogies have been papered over – in the olden days we might have called them retcons, but the truth is that these changes are actually fairly minimal. Tarkin, like A New Dawn, presents an Empire that seems very consistent with the Legends EU in all but a few respects. This is a good thing – the Empire was generally very well characterized in the EU, at least structurally and philosophically. There were a few areas here and there that needed working, and the NEU has by and large taken care of those. The larger issues with the Empire had to do with the strength of villains as antagonists, which was sometimes flagging in the “Warlord of the Week” period of the EU: but whatever the weaknesses of the primary story in Tarkin, the man’s a good villain. But we’ll get to Tarkin the man a little later.

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Edge of the Galaxy: Not A Tie-in, But An Essential Thread

Posted on November 12, 2014by Imperial Court Circular

Jason Fry’s latest novel, Servants of the Empire I: Edge of the Galaxy, tells the story of a promising young student destined for the Imperial Academy and his disillusionment with the Imperial system that has brought him and his family such success. It is a prequel story to the Rebels episode “Breaking Ranks,” though it can be enjoyed by those who have not seen even a single episode of the show. What makes the story interesting is that the main character, Zare Leonis, makes for a fairly good proxy for a middle-class or even an upper-middle class audience. He is basically a scholarship student, a star athlete who has a galaxy of opportunities open to him if he just works hard enough: and yet he ends up glimpsing the sinister shadow behind the glorious Imperial façade. He is not a Jedi, alien, or orphan: his family does pretty well for itself, but the Empire is still a danger to him and those he loves. It’s that angle and how it’s developed that makes this story worth reading for any Star Wars fan, even one with little interest in the show it ties into.

Let’s address a couple potential concerns before we dive into the review: first, it’s a tie-in novel for a kid’s show that’s listed as suitable for grades 3 to 7. We’ve already discussed how this makes good reading independent of the show, but it also makes good reading for an older audience because of the mature and deft way that the themes are handled. The only difference between this novel and an adult novel is the complexity of the sentence structure (expect fewer subordinate clauses) and word choice. The ideas and themes are not simplified. This means that young readers might learn a thing or two from this Star Wars story, but that older readers can get drawn in and may entirely forget who the intended audience is. Stories about youngsters learning to question authority are common, but this story handles the causes and consequences of such questioning with uncommon skill. It treats the subject with the weight it deserves, instead of trivializing.

The second concern is continuity: it reads just like any other Star Wars story, with a familiar setting and with familiar word-building. We had originally considered discussing this in our review, but coming up with a list of things that are still canon makes it seem as if that was the main purpose of the new novels, as reference material. As with A New Dawn, Edge of the Galaxy is a story that stands on its own that also happens to be good with continuity.

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TIE Fighter’s Rerelease: A Surprising Disappointment

Posted on November 5, 2014by Imperial Court Circular

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This review pertains to the initial GOG release of TIE Fighter. For a response to more recent updates, head here.

Twenty years after its original release, the legendary TIE Fighter is once again available to play on PC via a release by GOG.com. The game proved itself to be more than an entertaining flight simulation by creating a well-plotted and engaging story arc that allowed players to serve as a pilot in the Imperial Navy without undermining the themes of the Star Wars Trilogy. Players were able to understand how Imperial loyalists viewed the Rebellion, but the game also avoided whitewashing the evils of the Empire; players who read between the lines of their mission briefings realized with mounting horror that not everything was as heroic as it seemed. The combination of glorious heroics and dark undertones made it a surprisingly compelling game, and one that set the bar high for its successors in what is now called the X-Wing series of flight simulators.

October’s release is not the first time the game has become available on the market again. There were three distinct releases – and versions – of TIE Fighter. There was the original 1994 release of TIE Fighter and its expansion on floppy disks, a 1995 Collector’s CD ROM which enhanced the game while including yet another expansion, and then a 1998 3D remaster for Windows. The GOG release bundles together the 1994 floppy version and the 1998 3D remaster, and GOG has also released several other LucasArts games (including X-Wing, Sam & Max Hit the Road, and games currently available on other platforms including Knights of the Old Republic, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, and Monkey Island: Special Edition). Overall, the release is very welcome and will allow people to experience the wonder that is TIE Fighter for the first time, or perhaps the first time in forever. GOG’s decision not to include the Collector’s CD – what many consider to be the definitive version of the game – is a bit of a disappointment, however.

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A New Dawn shines a light on the future of Star Wars

Posted on August 18, 2014by Imperial Court Circular

In our previous review, we discussed how Honor Among Thieves provides a blueprint for the future of the EU. Since then, there has been a rather unprecedented change in the nature of the Star Wars Expanded Universe. Now redubbed “Legends,” the old EU is functionally an alternate universe continuity which serves as a large resource for the new ongoing Star Wars canon to draw inspiration from or even fully import background concepts and ideas. All upcoming Star Wars novels will be part of this new canon, vetted by the Lucasfilm Story Group in order to ensure cohesion between the novels, comics, television series, and films to a greater extent than the often ramshackle cohesion between the old EU and the films. A New Dawn (AND), written by Star Wars novel and comic veteran and fan-favorite John Jackson Miller (JJM), is the first adult novel to be released under the auspices of the Story Group.

Instead of a standard review, we’re going to take a look how AND uses and implements the old EU, and how it departs from it. To get the reviewing part out of the way though – it’s a fun Star Wars story with an original cast of characters and a fascinating villain. These factors are important to why it’s a fun story, but they’re also important in (hopefully) hinting at the style of future novels as well as the Rebels television series. Executive Producer Dave Filoni has already stated his preference for Rebels to focus on its particular cast of characters because the galaxy is large enough to show exciting adventures without needing to resort to film characters as a narrative crutch. If AND is any indication, such a thing is not only possible but also preferable.

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