Star Wars

Waru Express: Attack of the Clones

BriaLeave a comment

I took a few days off for Thanksgiving (and so I won’t completely kill Brian with my fast reading speed) (Editor’s Note: No seriously. I was concerning people.) but we’re back with more Prequel Era books!  This time, half of the books were obvious tie-ins to books from much further down the timeline and two of them were, well, Attack of the Clones based.  This one’s a bit more of a mixed bag than before.

Rogue Planet
Okay so you know how some people hate Boba Fett and get annoyed by how fans adore him and he gets all these appearances etc etc?  Yeah, that’s me except with Tarkin and the building of the Death Star.  Honestly, what is this obsession that EU authors have with him and the Death Star?  I mean, I know it was a cool looking space station that blew planets up but can we not credit everyone and their mother with its construction? (Editor’s Note: This is funny given how much I enjoyed reading James Luceno’s Tarkin. Not that it was my favorite but…)

Overall, the book’s okay but it’s so obviously there for the New Jedi Order that it feels far too much like an extended short story sometimes.  Character-wise, it’s good.  I actually really enjoyed getting some insight into the early years of Obi-Wan and Anakin’s Master/Padawan relationship.  (Editor’s Note: I think this could fit well with Charles Soule’s Obi-Wan and Anakin comic.)  I also rather enjoy Thracia Cho Leem because anyone who can out sass Mace Windu and still have his respect deserves your respect.  It’s too bad that she leaves the Jedi Order because wow is he going to need her in about a decade when Shatterpoint happens…  The only thing I’m really not fond of is getting beaten over the head with “Oooo Anakin’s going to fall to the Dark Side one day!”  I get what Greg Bear was doing but at times, it felt like a bit too much.  Also, I will be forever sad that Anakin didn’t get to keep his ship.  Poor baby. Continue reading →

Waru Express: The Phantom Menace

BriaLeave a comment

I finally gained a better grip on my sanity and decided to break these reviews into slightly smaller chunks so next up are the Phantom Menace related books!   The good news is that not only did I not hate any of them but I actually loved one of them.

Darth Plagueis
I have Sith Fatigue and apparently the only cure is more Sith!  (They’re like cowbell.)  Seriously though, I loved this book!  Granted, I’m a bit of a political junkie but there really wasn’t anything I disliked about this book except that I wanted another hundred pages of it.  (Editor’s Note: Much like that business on Cato Neimoidia, that doesn’t count.)  I positively loved how James Luceno took everything that happened in the Prequel Trilogy and wove together a background that not only made sense but helped flesh out the story.  It’s the Long Con, folks, and it pays off so gosh darn beautifully.  After reading this book, all of the questions I had about how Palpatine worked both sides of the Clone Wars were answered.

It wasn’t just the story line and the writing that I liked.  I was also rather intrigued by getting to see the characters we know from different angles.  In particular, I enjoyed the parts with Dooku and how his departure from the Jedi Order came about.  Palpatine himself was another character that I enjoyed getting to know better, much to my surprise.  What can I say?  I’m a sucker for a good descent into darkness tale.  (Editor’s Note: Sheeeeeeeeeeeeev!)  Continue reading →

Waru Express: The Really Old Republic

BriaLeave a comment

It took slightly longer than anticipated thanks to some difficulties with the library but I’ve finally finished the first leg of my Expanded Universe reread. (Editor’s Note: There was a two week gap between the opening post and this first one.)  The short version?  There were certainly some ups and downs and WOW am I glad to be getting out of these eras and away from these old school Sith.  (Sith Fatigue is a real and dangerous disease, folks.  It claims hundreds of readers every year.)

The Old Republic: Revan
I’ll freely admit to being a HUGE KOTOR fangirl back in the day.  Somewhere, buried on a hard drive, is probably a lot of half-written fanfic about the characters.  I was obsessed with Revan and had slightly ridiculous crushes on both Carth Onasi and Atton Rand.  (That was totally my right as a 14 year old girl.)  If you’ve never played either of the Knights of the Old Republic games, the one thing you should know is that your character (Revan in the first game and the Exile in the second) is essentially a blank slate.  You decide their gender, their looks, and their personality.  Therefore, I spent most of the first half of the book trying to reconcile the Revan in my head (a very snarky lady) with the canon Revan who is decidedly not her and is, in fact, a man.  (Curse you, canon!)  Also, I insist that Natalya Donn is totally a better name for the Exile than Meetra Surik.  I mean…. Meetra?  Really? Continue reading →

Woo Woo, All Aboard the Waru Express!

BriaLeave a comment

Back in the fall of 2012, I was unemployed and had a very bad idea that Brian, the editor over at Tosche Station, encouraged.  I had a little under 100 Star Wars books sitting on my bookshelf and hadn’t gotten the chance to reread them in ages so obviously the best course of action was to read all of them again.  I also let myself be bribed into adding The Crystal Star to the list.  SOMEONE STILL OWES ME A REREAD OF REVENGE OF THE SITH.

Thus the Waru Express was born.

The goal of the project was never to pull a Pablo Hidalgo and reread everything although it is tempting to do a sequel project one day and reread all the rest of the Legends books.  The rules were thus: I started chronologically and read my way through my own personal Star Wars book collection.  I also be reread and read some books for the first time that I am able to get from the library and/or also interested me. Every two to six or so books, I posted my thoughts on them.  The original project lasted seven months but I’ll be reposting them (with some minors edits and probably a touch of modern day commentary) once a week. On the list below, the ones marked with a * were ones I’d previously read but didn’t own while those marked with a ~ were ones I hadn’t read before.

To those of you who experienced the Waru Express when it originally happened… enjoy the trip down memory lane.  For those of you who have never had the pleasure… buckle up because it’s going to be a wild ride.  Feel free to tweet me any thoughts you may have along the way @chaosbria. 😉

THE LIST: Continue reading →

Costume Feelings in a Galaxy Far, Far Away

BriaLeave a comment

There’s something magical that makes your heart stop when they first open the blast doors into the Star Wars and the Power of Costume Exhibition because you’ve just watched this neat little introduction video and then all of the sudden—there right there!—is the Queen Amidala Throne Room gown. It was smaller than it comes off on screen (probably because Natalie Portman is a lot smaller than me) and the lights on the bottom were understandably not lit up but there it was. I let out a little squeak and this was warning sign number—no wait, that’s a lie. Warning Sign #1 that I was going to be emotionally compromised was hearing about this exhibit and getting tickets for it. The chances of me not being at least somewhat embarrassing because of all my pretty costume emotions were nonexistent. (Look son, I know what I’m about.) Continue reading →

Millicent the Cat has a Secret

BriaLeave a comment

Millicent the Cat

Originally posted on Tosche Station on February 9, 2016

Despite dozens of people saying otherwise, the theory that Snoke is actually Darth Plagueis continues to live on even though so many of us wish it would just die. Fear not! I come before you with a new theory… one far younger and more powerful. Per interviews with Andy Serkis, we know that Snoke is actually a brand new character for the Sequel Trilogy. Thus far, most of the Snoke Theories have ignored this.

Star Wars fans were recently alerted to the existence of a new character this weekend… Millicent the Cat. Millicent is a bit of an oddity. Not only does she belong to General Hux but she also has a litter box in Kylo Ren’s torture room. This is no mere kitty. She is Millicent, Daughter of… some other cat. You owe her your allegiance. Therefore, I feel that it is my obligation and my sworn duty to present to you a theory backed by what I consider to be irrefutable evidence: Snoke is actually Millicent the Cat. Continue reading →

Review: Lords of the Sith

BriaLeave a comment

This review was originally posted to Tumblr on April 27, 2015

Lords of the Sith by Paul S. Kemp has the distinction of being both a book that’s what it says on the label and of also being filled with unexpected surprises. Out today in bookstores everywhere, Lords of the Sith successfully gives you your fix of Vader and Palpatine being ruthlessly effective when it comes to taking care of business while telling all sides of the story.

Vader getting a story in which he gets to be the badass supreme can often be impressive enough but when you add in Palpatine also getting his hands dirty?  You know it’s going down.  Part of what makes the Emperor such an effective character is how rarely he actually dives in to the fray himself.  Readers and watchers know that someone’s going to die the minute the lightsaber (or the Force lightning) come out.  Not many people have lived to see this brutal efficiency and for good reason.

Continue reading →

Diversity in Star Wars

BriaLeave a comment

Originally posted at Tosche Station on July 2, 2013

Casting rumors have been flying around rampantly almost as long as we’ve known about the Sequel Trilogy and with the recently leaked Episode VII casting breakdown, it seemed like a good time to tackle an issue that’s been bothering me a lot lately: the lack of diversity in leading roles in the Star Wars galaxy when it comes to gender, race, and species.

The Star Wars galaxy is an incredibly diverse place.  There is an in-numerous amount of different species in the galaxy far far away all living on hundreds upon hundreds of different planets.  So why is it the default in Star Wars films and literature to (almost) always make the protagonist a white male?

Think I’m exaggerating?  I recently completed a reread of 130 Expanded Universe books.  Out of those 130, only 15 of those books had a leading character who was not a straight white man, excluding books that you could potentially argue are led by Skywalker women.  Five of those books are the Republic/Imperial Command novels and I’m even including books like The Cestus Deception and The Approaching Storm which were co-led by aliens and (you guessed it) a straight white male.  15 out of 130. That’s about 12%.  In a galaxy where I couldn’t even name all of the alien species if I tried?  I haven’t sat down and looked at every single main book in the Expanded Universe but I reckon that number wouldn’t rise much above 15%.  That’s pretty bad and unfortunately, the films don’t do any better.

Star Wars is an epic universe that is ripe with opportunity for diversity.  This is science fiction we’re talking about here.  To quote writer Jane Espenson, “And if we can’t write diversity into sci-fi, then what’s the point? You don’t create new worlds to give them all the same limits of the old ones.”  If the vast majority of the named cast is white and mostly male, then the creators are failing at truly embracing the core tenants of what science fiction should be about.  What really makes all of this jarring is when you watch the films (especially the Prequel Trilogy) and see the wide variety of species and races in the background.  It’s not that the writers and the character designers and the special effects artists are lacking in imagination because clearly those characters and those ideas are there.  So why haven’t we been seeing more Star Wars stories with more diversity in the forefront? Continue reading →