Comic Review: Rogue One – Darth Vader #1 (One-Shot)

I should not have complained about the long break between issues! It has been a couple of weeks since we had the last one shot, celebrating the tenth anniversary of Rogue One. This series of one-shots has been a sheer delight: beautifully illustrated, well written and celebrating everything fantastic about the monumental film. Most of these stories fare that good, that I want more, for the creators to have a chance of expanding the story further. Whether that will happen, only time will tell, but we do have one, final story; the dark lord himself. There is an extremely high standard that has been set with the previous comics. Not only that, but Vader is also notoriously difficult to write and utilise well. I’m excited, I’m nervous, but maybe this anniversary will end on a high? Hoping to meet those standards is writer Chris Condon is no stranger to comics, having written for many a series but is new to a galaxy far, far away. Joining him is artist Luke Ross, who is no stranger to Star Wars, nor to Darth Vader himself. The new with the established, I wonder how they will tackle this story…

The story opens with us focusing on Krennic, trying to get access to Keynes crystals on the planet of Harreld. This serves two purposes, it sets the stage for Vader, but it also lets us – the reader – know roughly when this is set. Krennic is superbly written by Condon and by that, I mean, very annoying and arrogant, exactly as the character should be. It is clear that Krennic is not a diplomat, in fact he is just not one for words. The more I see of Krennic, the more I get the impression of the car salesman, he doesn’t actually do anything but move lots of pieces around and then takes credit for it all. This is only further reinforced when he meets Vader. You can easily sense that Vader has had enough of Krennic. This is important as when these negative traits resurface in Rogue One you can instantly understand why Vader force chokes this character – heck I want to force choke him! Condon just adds to this character; adds to the character you love to hate.

But we are not here for Krennic, we are here for Vader and Vader’s entrance is stunning. Krennic bumping into him is incredible and Ross captures Vader so well at this pivotal point in the story. As I’m mentioning the art, let’s delve into it. Ross does an incredible job. Everything with Vader just works perfectly. This first entrance, his full-page entrance out of the water. Then we get to the reflections in his lenses, which even when it is not a close up shot, you can still see. Vader has never looked better!

But Vader isn’t the only thing that Ross gets right. Krennic and his expressions really help to set the mood and the little details that are littered throughout really give that real world feel. The trooper throwing up on the attack sticks in my mind. The latter half of this issue is almost purely artwork and Ross carries the story easily.

So, let’s talk about the structure. This comic is shorter than previous entries, and it is very noticeable. The start of this comic is perfect. The opening, the entrance of Vader, the visuals, all works brilliantly. It really captures the atmosphere of the movie. We then go into pretty much artwork only, in an attack reminiscent of Saving Private Ryan, which again, works brilliantly. The way Vader rises up out of the water, captured so brilliantly by Ross, works and worlds well. The word I keep coming to is brilliant because up to here, I am really enjoying the story. Then, we get to the confrontations, the one-on-one fight. And it falls flat. The fight is over before it has begun and the story abruptly ends. So abruptly that I’m having to check if I’m missing something. With such a great build up, the payoff feels weak.

You cannot overuse Vader, those that do, always seem to lose the magic of the dark lord. Condon is very good at not going to over the top and giving us more action than words when Vader is involved. This is where Krennic comes in to explain the situation. Everything here has been well thought out and should work. After the incredible high standard set by the previous one-shots, this one just falls a little short.

I really thought I would be gushing over this issue, I wanted to like it. If it was just the first half…maybe first three quarters, I would have been singing the praises of this story and then incredible artwork that goes with it. But a shorter comic and an abrupt end really make this a bit of a disappointment. I think keeping Vader with more forces than just himself would have worked much better. And after such a beautiful build up, more time needed to be spent on the climax. It is not the ending for the series that I wanted. It is always a risk having Vader for the conclusion. Expectations are always high because of the character but in this series, with such high quality throughout, Darth Vader just needed a bit more care given to the ending.