Canon Comic Review: Star Wars "Hope Dies" Arc (Issues #50-55)

The Empire strikes first at Mako-Ta! As the Alliance seems to be at the peak of its power, Rebel leadership gathers to celebrate the completion of their fleet. Darth Vader has other plans, and he’ll make sure Queen Trios helps him carry them out. “Hope Dies” today at Mynock Manor – but does something else die, too?

While there has rarely been a time when there wasn’t a Star Wars title on the shelf, we haven’t had a Marvel flagship title for too long. Since the series started in early 2015, we have amassed a fairly large collection of issues, finally reaching the 50th issue early 2018. In honor of the momentous occasion, Kieron Gillen went big: the destruction of the Rebel Alliance! Or, at least, the beginning of it. Drawing together threads born from “The Ashes of Jedha” and “The Mutiny at Mon Cala,” “Hope Dies” presents an intimate look at Vader’s greatest offensive against the Alliance so far.

After the Mon Calamari defected from the Empire, the Rebellion’s fleet has grown exponentially. Rather than fighting with cobbled together squadrons of stolen starships, one-man snub fighters, and a few stolen Imperial ships, the Alliance now has a worthwhile fighting force all their own! This happened, in part, thanks to the help of seeming-Imperial-defector Queen Trios of Shu-Torun, who helped move Shu-Torun supplies to the Alliance. Princess Leia finds this as a cause for celebration, bringing together the highest echelon of Alliance leadership to put on a dazzling display of Rebel power outside of Mak0-Ta docking bays. Unfortunately, the Empire sees this as just a valuable time to make their own display….

In terms of dramatic weight, this arc should have carried more than almost any other comic arc across the entire franchise. Queen Trios is a fan-favorite (or, at least, a favorite of both me and Ryan!), so we welcomed her with open arms into the series. When she defected to the Rebellion at the end of the “Ashes of Jedha” arc, I found this to be a really fun wrinkle in her storyline. Turns out, thanks to the illumination of a back-up story in Star Wars #50, she had never turned at all! Instead, Darth Vader had coerced her into pretending to side with the Alliance as she loaded the Rebel fleet up. In Darth Vader’s mind, if the Rebellion was bigger, it would become an easier target. A smaller Rebellion would be hard to put down, chasing random cells of insurgents. In order to give the Rebellion power without being too obvious, he forced Trios into giving her already stressed resources to Leia as well. This betrayal hit hard, but I ended up loving it. I still find Trios to be an intriguing character, and I am thrilled to see where she is going from here! One interesting nuance left to her, so far, is her reaction to being forced to betray Leia as their friendship blossomed over time.

The second gut punch should have come as we watched the evisceration of Alliance leadership. Each issue saw the death of yet another Rebel leader. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel like these deaths carried much weight. For the most part, Gillen was limited in terms of whom he could kill. We know that Mon, Leia, Hera, and a few others survive past this battle and into the later films, so they were off the table. Even (thanks in part to an editing error) Draven seemed safe, as he appeared to send memos during the Battle of Endor (in The Rebel Files). In a surprising move, Draven is the most prominent character to die! Other Rebel leaders were definitely destroyed, but I had to pop over to the ever-informative Wookieepedia in order to understand who that character was. While I appreciate Gillen’s deep dives into Rebel leadership, it fell a bit flat when I had to pause the issue to see who died. It is hard to put a finger on the problem here: should I know more obscure Rebel leaders? Should Gillen have killed fewer? I don’t think either of those are the answer. I would’ve loved to see some of these characters appear earlier in the series to re-familiarize myself with them before they met their end.

Actually, I wonder if this arc would’ve had enough time to introduce these characters itself. Gillen’s first two arcs were relatively slow, but I expected “Hope Dies” to pick up the pace and bring the series back to full speed. The series definitely hit a lull, and I’m sure most would disagree when exactly they would say that happened, but the last arc that I truly enjoyed was “The Last Flight of the Harbinger.” While some individual issues were well-done, I was excited to see what life Gillen could breathe into the series. Unfortunately, “Hope Dies” didn’t bring the series as high as I would’ve liked, as it moved just as slowly as the previous arcs. If this arc couldn’t pick up the pace, I wonder what it will take to make this series exciting again. It partly suffered in needing to focus, again and again and again, on established film characters. The characters that were open targets were taken out, but at the expense of knowing who they were.

I also wonder if this was the right medium to tell this story. While Larrocca’s art, in terms of starfighter design and detail, was exquisite, it is especially hard to show movement in print. This made the space battle seem rather slow, moving from one frame to another without always showing the movement from one to the next. Some fights were especially truncated while others were drawn out longer than I thought they needed to be. It’s not all bad: the comic does provide some fun elements. When else would we see Han in an X-Wing pilot outfit? We also see a lot of the turmoil in Leia’s heart after Trio’s betrayal.

The rest of the team who makes up the arc is Larrocca on art, Cam Smith on inks, Clayton Cowles on letterings, Guru-eFX providing the coloring, with Tom Groneman on editing. All I will say about the art at this rate (as the individual issues’ reviews have covered the problems with the art) is that I am excited to be seeing new artists with the next arc. The coloring and art proved to be consistent problems with the series, especially since the series camped on Larrocca’s art after having changed artists every arc previous to “Yoda’s Secret War.” Staying with one artist at a time was a mistake, especially this one.

In the end, I didn’t find “Hope Dies” to be the shot in the arm that I would’ve hoped for from the series. While there was enough to like, the flagship title is starting to show its cracks more than it ever has before. It’s time for Gillen to bring some new life into the series.

You can follow Chris on Twitter @ChrisWerms, and of course, you can follow the Manor on Twitter @MynockManor!

Star Wars Comic Reviews
Ashes of Jedha | Mutiny at Mon Cala | Hope Dies (individual reviews by Ryan): #50 | #51 | #52 | #53 | #54 | #55 | The Escape | The Scourging of Shu-Torun | Kieron Gillen Retrospective