Force Matters: Celebrate 10 Years of ‘Star Wars – Rogue One’ With A Superfluous One-shot

Jumping back to the end of May to breakdown the new Star Wars releases of the moment, as the comics settle into their apparent “series of limited series” life and Maul: Shadow Lord wraps up! 

Star Wars: Rogue One – Cassian Andor #1

By Benjamin Percy, Luke Ross, Mike Atiyeh & Clayton Cowles

Cassian must dodge a bounty hunter enroute to his fateful meeting with Tivik!

• This is the first in a series of character-specific one-shots created to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
• This is one is mostly set about 10 minutes before Cassian’s first appearance in the film (just before he meets (and kills) Tivik, the informant who from which he learns about the Death Star, Bodhi Rook, and Galen Erso), but it opens shortly before that, as Cassian is given the mission to meet with Tivik, and therefore, it also overlaps with the final minutes of Andor.
• This is the first, and to date only, appearance of Barger. 
• Tivik name-checking the Ghorman Massacre feels more like an effort to callback the series than a natural connection he’d make in that moment. 
• Ross’ work is nice, but feels a bit more rushed than his Legacy of Vader material. 

I really have no idea what “Cassian fighting a random cyborg tough ten minutes before the movie starts” adds to Rogue One (or Cassian’s character), but here we are. The moment where he pulled out the gas cartridge from his gun and threw it into a fire to create a diversion was fun.

Star Wars: Hyperspace Stories: The Bad Batch – Rogue Agents #3

By Michael Moreci, Reese Hannigan, Elisabetta D’amico, & Michael Atiyeh

The Bad Batch’s mission to neutralize the Separatist scientist brings them into conflict with Aurra Sing!

• Outside of Jango Fett, Aurra Sing is arguably the pre-eminent bounty hunter of the Prequel Trilogy era, though her appearance here is rather perfunctory.
• This the first appearance of the Gallo System (where the planet the two groups of Clone Troopers face off is located). 
• In the flashback, its said the future rogue clones need to check in with Commander Cody, meaning they were part of Obi-Wan Kenobi’s division (Cody being the leader of his Clone Trooper detachment). 
• Crosshair bouncing a shot off a bunch of reflective crystals harkens back to his technique of setting up small mirrors to enable his trick shots, as seen in Star Wars: The Clone Wars.  

It’s always fun to see Aurra Sing, but it would have been nice if she had a bigger role in the story. As is, it just kinda feels likes a distraction from the central clone-on-clone conflict meant to pad things out a bit. 

Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord 1×09 “Strange Allies”

Written by Christopher Yost and directed by Steward Lee

Maul’s squad, the Jedi and the Lawsons team-up to get out of Janix City and rendezvous with Dryden Vos. 

• Scott Whyte, the Dryden Vos voice actor, sounds nothing like Paul Bettany. 
• Rintero, the head of Crimson Dawn at this time, is a new character (though the fact that Vos wasn’t the head of Crimson Dawn at this time was established in previous stories). 
• No death in this series has hit me harder than that of the adorable murderbot Spybot. 
• With the death of Scorn (who goes out like a champ), Maul (Sam Witwer) has now lost both his Zabrak henchmen.
• Similarly, it sure seems like the last of his Mandalorian allies – including Rook Kast – go down at the end (so I guess she’s not the Armorer in The Mandalorian). 
• Maul is still dealing with injuries to his cybernetic legs caused by Daki earlier in the season.  
• The closing moments of this episode mark the first canonical meeting between Darth Vader and Darth Maul.

Great stuff as the season’s various plot threads come together and everyone starts to take losses as the climax looms. 

Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord 1×10 “The Dark Lord”

Written by Matt Michnovetz and directed by Nathaniel Villanueva

Maul, Lawsons and the Jedi face off against Darth Vader.

• The original title of this episode was simply “Finale,” in order to hide the surprise of Vader’s presence. 
• Vader immediately going for Maul’s bad leg is a pleasantly subtle indicator his martial prowess (quickly spotting a weakness and exploiting it). 
• Similarly, the fact that he holds off Maul, Daki and Devon with just one hand is pretty badass. 
• Devon very deliberately saving Maul from a killing blow from Vader justifies his season-long insistence on keeping her around and refusing to abandon her.
• Dryden’s ship is merely described as a “shuttle,” and its design is new. 
• Daki says that “true power lies in patience and cunning;” it’s not enough to save his life, but he is right in that the simple strike he landed on Maul’s leg back in episode 4 continued to bother Maul and hold him back, even though he ostensibly won that fight with Daki. 
• Vader is very much presented as an unstoppable horror movie monster throughout this episode, to the point where speaks no dialogue at any point. 
• The Imperial ship laying down cover fire is a Lamda-class shuttle, the same type used in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. 
• Marokk seemingly dies here, but he’s around in Ahsoka so he’s not gone gone. 
• Early in the fight with Vader, hints of “Battle of the Heroes” from Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith can be heard in the score; later, when Devon gets raged up following Daki’s death, the music from “Anakin’s Dark Deeds” can be heard. 
• I wouldn’t be surprised if Lawson turns up alive at some point in the future, especially since we don’t see a body and he pointedly saw Maul’s betrayal of Daki.