Force Matters: Luke Skywalker Is Going To Disneyland in ‘Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge — Echoes of the Empire’ #1

Two more Maul episodes in this installment, but hey, there’s a comic book too!

Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge — Echoes of the Empire #1

By Ethan Sacks, Jethro Morales, Roi Mercado, Rachelle Rosenberg & Clayton Cowles

Heroes and villains from across eras converge at the Black Spire outpost on Batuu.

• Following the recent announcement that the Disney Galaxy’s Edge parks would begin featuring costumed characters and other elements from eras outside the Sequel Trilogy (chiefly the Original Trilogy and The Mandalorian), this miniseries is intended to create some in-universe narratives to support that change (and, presumably, eventually be made available as a collected edition for sale in the parks).
• As such, many of the characters in this issue are characters from the parks (who appear either as animatronics, costumed actors, or named owners of shops/restaurants), including the Ithorian Dok-Ondar (who oversees the the Den of Antiquities, a high-end collectibles gift job at the parks), Savi and the Gatherers (who run the workshop where you can build your own lightsaber), Oga Garras (proprietor of Oga’s Cantina, one of the park restaraunts), and Mubo (who runs the Droid Depot where you can build your own droid).
• Farmer & Stacks, two retired Clone Troopers, operate the Black Spire Surplus shop in the Disneyland park, though this issue marks their first appearance.
• Tohago is a comics original character, who debuted in Galaxy’s Edge #1
• The named Jedi we see in the brief High Republic Era setting is Carver Drow, one of the characters from the Disney Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures show (he trained on Batuu).
• The bulk of this issue’s story is set between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, with Han encased in carbonite.
• Aside from their brief encounter in Return of the Jedi, the most notable Luke/Boba Fett fight prior to this is probably in Star Wars (2015) #6, in which they battled in and around Obi-Wan’s old home, leading to Fett delivering the news to Vader that his son is the one who blew up the Death Star.
• When Vader arrives on Batuu, he does so aboard an TIE/es assault shuttle aka the TIE Echelon, rather than the traditional Lamda-class shuttle of this vintage. This is the shuttle which can be found parked in both Galaxy’s Edge parks. Originally created for use in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and intended to be of First Order creation, this issue canonizes the idea put forth after the announced park re-theming that it actually dates as a prototype to the Imperial Era and was used by Kylo Ren in the Sequel Trilogy era as a result of his broad affection for vintage Imperial trappings.

It’s difficult to separate this from the broader motivations behind its existence, though Sacks — who performed a similar task with the previous Galaxy’s Edge miniseries and other assorted tie-in material — clearly has some affection for the setting and characters. And there’s worse ways to dress up your theme park-servicing story than dropping a Luke Skywalker/Boba Fett fight into the middle of it.

Star Wars: Maul — Shadow Lord 1×05: “Inquisition”

Written by Jennifer Corbett and directed by Tatyana Drewry Carvin

The Empire arrives in Janix City, and they’ve brought along an Inquisitor.

• I’m not sure if Rook Kast (Vanessa Marshall) should be walking around without her helmet one, given the relationship between the Mandalorian Death Watch (of which Kast is a member) and the Children of the Watch (the offshoot group to which Din Djarin [Pedro Pascal] of The Mandalorian fame belongs). Then again, it’s never been made terribly clear when the Children of the Watch deviated from Death Watch and/or adopted that rule.
• We can hear the term “scandoc” aka Imperial memos being used in this episode.
• The Inquisitor Marokk (A.J. LoCascio), aka First Brother, debuted in the Ahsoka series, where he was working with Force Witch Morgan Elsbeth (Diana Lee Inosanto). At some point between now and then, he dies, since he was ghost animated by Elsbeth’s magic in that series.
• Daki’s (Dennis Haysbert)Jedi mind trick sure seemed to work out as well as it probably should — it’s all well and good to trick one Stormtrooper but then all his buddies are going to immediately wonder why you’re acting weird.
• The line from Daki about how tyranny always falls calls to mind Nemik (Alex Lawther) from Andor‘s line about tyranny requiring effort to maintain. 

Appropriately enough, the arrival of the Empire on the scene shakes things up for everyone, and I love the way all the different sets of characters — Maul and his crew, Lawson (Wanger Moura), Two-Boots (Richard Ayoade) and Rylee (Charlie Bushnell), Daki and Devon (Gideon Adlon) — are all immediately and impactfully affected by it.

Star Wars: Maul — Shadow Lord Season 1×06: “Night of the Hunted”

Written by Christopher Yost and directed by Steward Lee

The situation escalates quickly as the Lawson family is targeted by Marokk.

• Christopher Yost is a long-time comics writer who created X-23/Laura Kinney.
• The gunships used throughout the episode are Low Altitude Assault Transport/infantry (LAAT/i) ships, which debuted in Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones. The idea seems to be that the Empire is still utilizing older Republic tech (this would also suggest most of the Stormtroopers we see in this show are still clones). 
• The two-legged vehicle patrolling outside the TDF headquarters is an AT-AC (All-Terrain Armored Cannon), which debuted in Star Wars: The Bad Batch.
• Suck it, Two Boots; you called in the Empire and now they made you get rid of your boots.
• The alien who presumably rats out Lawson and his crew when they enter Rheena Sul’s (Pamela Adlon) casino is a Devlikk; the only previous appearance of one was a podracer in Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace.
• Catalor is a new world. 
• Obviously, we can’t see who Marokk is talking to at the end, but in descending order of likelihood, the candidates are likely the Grand Inquisitor (Jason Issacs), Vader (James Earl Jones), or Emperor Sheev Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid).

Once more, the pacing of this series is appreciated; other shows would have made an arc out of the Lawsons trying to hide the Jedi from Marokk. Instead, it serves as a jumping off point for another kinetic episode that thoroughly destroys what is left of the Lawsons’ pre-Maul (Sam Witwer) life.