– Spoiler Review –
Leia and Evaan travel to Sullust and the Alderaanians there aren’t as friendly to their Princess as one would expect. Cue rockrenders, R2 helping save the day, the threat of the mole revealed, and Leia generally being a woman everyone can and should look up to in Princess Leia #3.
The group of Alderaanians hiding out in a cave on Sullust are led by the Preserver Jora Astane, who is immediately suspicious of Princess Leia strolling in knowing the Empire is hunting them all down. Outside of the suspicion, there seems to be some disdain from Jora towards Leia, which likely stems from Jora being quite comfortable running her own little show and seeing Leia as a threat to her command. But before she can choose to do anything rash or not against the Princess herself, Jora’s tech team uncovers communiques from Leia’s ‘borrowed’ vessel the Lord Junn between Tace and her sister Tula, who just so happens to be aboard an Imperial Star Destroyer and betraying Leia and crew. This prompts Jora to brand Leia and Evaan traitors but before she can have them chased down, the Imperials land and start taking out the ill-prepared enclave. But what do you know, R2-D2 thinks a little outside the box and helps Leia save the day.
#2’s reveal about Tula working for the Imperials thankfully didn’t stay a secret to Leia and crew for long, but we still didn’t learn anything about why Tula would betray her family and fellow Alderaanians even after the Imperials blew up her home planet. There’s a hint it’s not by choice, as Commander Dreed admits he’s waiting for her to betray them sooner than later and Tula takes a good long look at the picture she has with her and Tace afterwards. The mole hunt looks to go into full swing next issue.
The interactions between Evaan and Leia are the strong point again in #3, as their mutual displeasure and respect for each other comes across wonderfully in sometimes funny or subtle ways. They both tend to be honest with each other, which is an extremely welcomed thing and lends itself to some great dialogue exchanges where they test each other’s perception of things; an example would be Evaan, despite not being Leia’s biggest fan, trying to convince Leia she shouldn’t take the blame for the actions of the Alderaanian’s under Jora’s command and not give up hope. And while Leia does makes a great counterpoint about what all her hope has brought her so far, seemingly placing the weight of the galaxy on her shoulders, it was nice to see her faith in hope rewarded by the end.
Here are a few other things:
- The quick discussion on the subject of hope gels well with the one in the Star Wars Rebels episode “Vision of Hope.”
- It’s a little disappointing we didn’t get to spend a little more time on a group of Alderaanian survivors who don’t welcome Leia with open arms, as it’s an intriguing subject that last time got a pretty decent look in the Legends novel Razor’s Edge.
- Artoo’s plan to bring in the rockrenders was another notch in his impressive belt of saving the Skywalker family.
Three issues in and I’m definitely wondering why Leia’s personal journey is a limited series compared to the others. Her tale is being told just as well and is another fine example of Marvel’s so-far strong start to their retaking of the franchise.
+ Leia and Evaan
+ R2’s plan
+ Well-paced
– Would’ve been nice to spend a little more time on Jora’s dislike/mistrust of Leia
Ryan is Mynock Manor’s Head Butler. You can follow him on Twitter @BrushYourTeeth. You can follow the website @MynockManor.
Princess Leia
#1 | #2 | #4 | #5