Star Wars by Charles Soule vol. 6: Quests of the Force
Vol. 5 left off with the team of Luke, Leia, Lando, Amilyn Holdo, and Lobot stuck in the region of No-Space after the Nihil Drive they hooked up to their ship took them there. They did manage to make contact with the survivors of the lost Kezarat Fleet, but now their only way home appears to be through a bunch of nigh-unstoppable killdroids. Worse still is that Luke’s connection with the Force is all kinds of messed up now. Sometimes he feels like he can move mountains, others it’s like it’s not there at all. His lightsaber is also on the fritz too, which sends him on a quest to get a new khyber crystal to focus it. Yet this disturbance in the Force cuts both ways, which leaves Leia feeling like this is the right time to stage a strike on Coruscant while the Emperor and Vader’s abilities are disturbed as well.
I mentioned last time that Soule’s “Star Wars” run was looking for a new direction after it wrapped up the main story it was telling about the reunification of the Rebel Fleet back in vol. 4. Vol. 6 doesn’t provide that new direction even if the stories it tells are decent adventures nonetheless. The No-Space arc wraps up decently enough while the two-parter that follows is nice; though, your enjoyment will likely depend on how interesting you’ve found Soule’s musings on the Force here (and in “Darth Vader”) so far. The final one-off also manages to be pretty entertaining given the scope of what it’s trying to do.
While vol. 6 is written about as well as you’d expect for the series so far, the big surprise is that it manages to be one of the best-looking in this run to date. Though Ario Anindito’s work in the first issue isn’t anything to write home about, Madibek Musabekov’s art in the four that follow is quite striking in the level of detail and presentation he displays. The artist makes the space battles and Force-driven mindscapes look interesting and sells the drama of them quite well too. Andrea DiVito handles the final issue and he delivers a thrilling assault on Coruscant that also shows the beginning of the partnership between Lando and Nien Numb in a spectacular manner.
Soule’s run hasn’t been graced with bad art up to this point. As I’ve written about in the past, however, it hasn’t been all that thrilling either. For a series whose first run was illustrated by John Cassaday, it really feels like the art in “Star Wars” has been getting progressively worse ever since, even if it’s been handled by capable storytellers. “Quests of the Force” is the first time where it feels like there’s been a genuine uptick in the quality of the art compared to what has come before. I can only hope that Musabekov and DiVito decide to stick around after their contributions here.