Organization: Penn State University
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 16:48:58 EST
From: <DCC117@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.starwars
Subject: Re: Dark Empire #6

 REVIEW : DARK EMPIRE #6

 WARNING : This post deals with material or events from
 Dark Empire #6 from Dark Horse Comics.
 If you have not read these books and do not wish to spoil
 your enjoyment of them should you read them at some point in
 the future, do not examine the remainder of this post.
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Well, I thought it was OK.  There were a bunch of things I
liked, no real surprises, some things I didn't like, etc.  I
was glad to see that the "stalling" of the Devastators by
interruption of the Control Signal didn't completely end the
battle right then and there; i.e. the Imperial crew actually
put up some kind of a fight, even when the Devastators were
mostly out of commission.  As I've mentioned before, the
solution to the Devastator plot could be anticipated way
back in the beginning of the series, and has bothered me
ever since then; it seems way too simple and predictable,
and a supposed evil genius like Palpatine should have
been able to see the inherent weaknesses of the scheme.
   Also, I found it kind of hard to believe that R2 could
( all by himself ) generate a whole new code for the
machines...he's only a mere astromech droid, after all.
I concede that what he did was possible, though; it
just seems like sort of a stretch. How much programming/
intelligence/ability is locked away in R2, anyway?
   This ties in to another thing that bothered me about the
issue, and the series in general : the parroting of lines/
exchanges from the movies. Don't get me wrong, I can handle this
in small doses and in certain situations. But stuff like
3PO talking about R2's "delusions of grandeur" and the
"shut up, 3PO " exchange with Han was just right out of
ESB.
   I thought the "Sea Commandos" were kind of goofy. They
seemed somewhat pathetic in contrast to the Devastators.
   I liked the Emperor's ship, however, even though I thought
more could've been done with it. Also, more detail could have
been shown. It seemed improbable that Luke and Leia could've
made it to a shuttle in time; apparently, the end of ROTJ
( with Luke commandeering a shuttle and fleeing the DS ) was
reused here, but less realistically. The Emperor's power
turning back upon him should have been an instantaneous
thing, with no time left for any kind of escape short of
teleportation, which isn't possible on a technological
basis in SW, but could be imagined through some type
of Force use. In fact, the concept of the hyperspace
wormhole used to pull Luke to Byss in the first issue
could've been used in DE #6 to provide Luke and Leia
with a realistic means of escape, especially since the
Emperor's destructive Force storm was what destroyed
Palpatine's ship. I think there's a good chance that
reasoning such as this might be used to explain
( at least partially ) the return of the Emperor
in later Dark Horse SW stories.
    Here's a question:
WHERE DID LEIA GET HER SABER?  The one given to her by
Vima-da-Boda was destroyed in DE #5, if I remember
correctly.  Did she get Luke's saber from ROTJ somehow?  Or
are we supposed to assume that, like Luke in ROTJ, she
constructed her own?  I find that unlikely; although she
displayed a sudden and somewhat inexplicable infusion of
Jedi powers in this issue, that doesn't mean she would also
suddenly gain the ability to construct a saber ( which
brings up the question: where did Luke get this ability? )
   At one point, I thought Luke and Leia were actually
going to have a saber fight...it sure looked that way,
anyway. In retrospect, maybe it's better they didn't,
because it's not clear where she would've gotten saber
skills to go with her saber....unless whatever level
of training she's gotten from Luke in the past included
such skills. Also, it looked almost like they were
trying to imply the Emperor's saber hand was artificial,
going by the apparent lack of blood seen in its severing;
however, we know the Emperor is a newly reborn clone,
with ( at this point ) no mechanical parts of any kind,
or at least that's what I'm assuming. Of course, there
wasn't really any visible blood in the ESB scene with
Vader and Luke ( cauterization and all that ), but
the hollowed appearance of Palpatine's wrist made it
resemble Luke's.
   Speaking of which, hadn't Luke said that the Emperor
was making him a "better" artificial hand? To my
knowledge, this was never really explained. Maybe the
next series will deal with this somehow.
   And why did Luke win DE #6's saber fight when ( just
one issue previously ) Palpatine had soundly beaten
him? I suppose one might say the same about the
battles in ESB and ROTJ, if not for the six-month
time period between the two. In the case of DE #5 and 6,
there was really no time gap at all. In other words,
Luke's victory in the saber battle in #6 cannot be
ascribed to a change in ability, but instead to a
change in attitude.
   Another thing: I expected that Boba Fett would make
another appearance in this final issue; perhaps he
will be brought back in the continuation of the series.
I assumed that it was significant that Fett had made
it to Byss and that the planet's shields cut his ship
in half - i.e., I assumed that Fett's portion actually
made it to the planet's surface and that Fett would
reappear in DE #6.

   I was surprised to see that the twins ( Leia's first
two children ) were named at the end of the issue.
I'm wondering if this has any canonical basis, that is,
whether these names are going to be used for the
characters in the proposed third trilogy of films.

   In terms of continuity with Timothy Zahn, I thought
this issue made a good showing, all things considered;
Jorus C'baoth was mentioned at the end of the issue,
as was the fact that Ben/Yoda(/Anakin) no longer appear
ghost-wise to Luke as they once did, which coincides
with Zahn's story.

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