– Spoiler Review –
Yub Nub! Writer Steve Orlando brings us the next 4-issue miniseries, this time focusing on the furry murder bears of the Forest Moon of Endor…Ewoks! Despite all the necessary set-up in issue #1, Ewoks gets off to a fun start with returning faces, Legends made canon, and an intriguing glimpse at the creatures’ culture.
What I found most surprising, logistics-wise of the issue, is how there’s not only a framing story here, but the flashback ties into the current maxiseries event, The Battle of Jakku. For the framing story, we start sometime in the near future, where Wicket W. Warrick is being asked by the woklings to share a tale, one he essentially suggests means the same heart Leia Organa showed them and the galaxy lives on in their village, Bright Tree. There’s a reference to The Princess and the Scoundrel, as Leia is in her wedding dress and Wicket talks about how she chose their village to have the wedding there, so that was nice to see. As for how it ties into The Battle of Jakku, Wicket’s flashback tale sees an Imperial General offering Moff Adelhard, the maxiseries’ antagonistic Imperial force, a substantial weapons haul if he gives him the resources to obtain it from Endor’s Forest Moon. I wasn’t expecting either of these things, especially the tie-in, though I liked its addition the most as it feels more like an excuse to have this story rather than something that will overwhelm it, and it just goes to show how much Marvel is focused on the event right now.
One aspect I was happy see writer Steve Orlando explore a little is the culture of the Ewoks, as they debate how they must react to future outsiders given the conflict on their little moon where they joined with the Rebels against the Empire. Last year saw two different releases which featured deeper looks at the Ewoks: From a Certain Point of View: Return of the Jedi featured several stories from different Ewoks’ perspectives, opening up some unique views about their role against the Empire; and Return of the Jedi – Ewoks #1, which went no dialogue style and yet still had a lot to say about the little warriors. Ewoks #1 doesn’t go as deep as either, but what it does cover, through the optimistic and welcoming Wicket versus the loner and pessimistic Meedro, holds enough promise for some deeper themes along the way and feels like an understandable situation for the group to consider after everything: how do they want to deal with outsiders, who will no doubt continue to come now this has happened? Their normal way of life won’t be the same so they’ll have to make adjustments, which I look forward to seeing how this story impacts their decision making, but having the framing story on top of this already is a big hint where this is all headed, sort of dulling the impact.
The Imperial General who comes to Adelhard with the promise of weapons is a new character, Tern Koyatta, to claims to have been the administrator of a weapons depot on the Forest Moon and he only survived the destruction of his frigate when his lower ranking officers supposedly sacrificed themselves for him. I find some of his story hard to believe, especially the sacrificial actions of his underlings, as we quickly see the type of man/Imperial he is when he and his selected crew of mercenaries crash land on the moon, as he barely lifts a finger in his own defense and uses the promise of credits if he’s kept alive to secure their defense of him. The crew Koyatta put together includes some new faces and some familiar ones: Zuckuss and 4-LOM, who featured in the Bounty Hunters series, gaining a host of new fans (including me!); Khu Fornot, who looks sort of like a clone and is wearing Imperial armor; and Koll Orvenk, a mighty Douwtin, and his droid buddy’s head dangling from his neck, EE-X77. New and old are entertainingly written by Orlando and I look forward to the group dynamic and their own individual actions, especially since they use local superstitions to try and work their way into the Ewoks’ home. It’s through an attack by Duloks this group learns of several local Forest Moon fears: the Great Devourer aka the Gorax, a creature created for Caravan of Courage, which this issue celebrates the 40th Anniversary (it’s currently on Disney+), that has since made its way to canon in several spooky stories; the Red Ghost, from the Legends Ewoks animated TV series (also on Disney+), an Ewok named Asha Fahn, who is seen hiding amongst the trees this issue; and the Adversary, which the Dulok points at 4-LOM when saying it, though it’s unclear why they specifically point at the droid but I’m sure we’ll find out as the series progresses.
On art, there’s Álvaro López and Laura Braga, with Antonio Fabela on colors, with Joe Caramagna lettering. As far as I could tell, it’s Braga responsible for all the pages with the Imperials in it, López for the framing story, at the very least, and I wasn’t sure if he also did the Ewok sections in the main/flashback story or if that was Braga too. And while this might seem like a strange place to start for talking about the art, but I had such a visceral reaction to Caramagna’s sound FX towards the end of the series, where the village’s intruder call hovers in the sky above the trees, becoming partially obscured by them even, but it creates this feeling of it carrying across a long distance and being very, very loud, and my mind went straight to the horn call they make in Return of the Jedi, the noise rattling around in my brain the moment I saw it, and I love how it only took this little panel to do it. I found it interesting how our one glimpse of the Red Ghost made her seem more capable and deadly in the forest than our entire time with Meedro, as she seems to be less about flashy when it comes to her outfit than he. Meedro wears a big skeleton skull over his head, flaunts his scarred eye, and wears a shiny green armor, with a big, obvious spear at his side, whereas Asha covers herself in a huge white pelt of some animal she killed and her headdress is simple, yet bright, like she isn’t scared to be seen, while her weapons look small and practical. I’ll be interested if these two will butt heads when/if they meet.
Here is one other thing:
- We’re still in the dark on Marvel’s plans after the maxiseries Battle of Jakku wraps up, but they did just announce a fun way to celebrate 10 years of canon comics: A New Legacy, a one-shot featuring all the comic created characters with a great list of talent behind it! I still feel like NYCC will hold a hint at what Marvel’s plans are, so check back to the Manor after October 18 for news from the publishing panel there, which looks even more likely since writer Marc Guggenheim revealed his yet to be announced Star Wars project will be announced then!
Ewoks #1 looks to be a solid start to something fun yet maybe deeper than expected.
+ Glimpses of Ewok culture and a promise to dive into it
+ Both teams for art do the furry creatures justice/love the instant reaction from one simple sound FX
– Framing story seems to take away from main story
Ryan is Mynock Manor’s Head Butler. You can follow him on Twitter @BrushYourTeeth. You can follow the website on Bluesky, Twitter @MynockManor, and Instagram @mynockmanor.