Star Wars: Darth Vader and the Ninth Assassin #1 Review

If you’ve read the one sentence synopsis of this comic book, then you’ve pretty much read the entire first issue. A man hires an assassin to kill Darth Vader. Yup, that’s about all you’ll get here. It’s a cool concept -- hence why I threw down $3.99 to check it out-- but it doesn’t offer anything that will make you want to see how it all pans out.

Everything we spend 22 pages learning about could have been done in less than half that, leaving the rest of the book to offer up something to get excited about. But no. The guy who wants revenge on Vader? Totally bland. Vader himself? Doesn’t say a word. The assassin who is so good that he’s thinks he can take out Vader no problemo? His plan makes little sense, plus his costume looks like a bad ripoff of Vader’s.

The overall artwork by Stephen Thompson is solid, but it’s not enough of a draw to make this a worthwhile title. There’s a cool page where he uses nearly all of the most popular Star Wars races to depict eight assassins -- much less decorated and obvious than bounty hunters, of course -- and he makes Vader doing a flip look pretty neat. So there are a few things that are well-done, but nothing that really sucks you into the comic.

If you want a great Star Wars comic, then you’d be better off going with Brian Wood’s ongoing Star Wars series. Or if you want something that’s already collected, try out last year’s Darth Vader and the Ghost Prison, where the art and the narrative work together to bring you an uncompromising and intriguing Star Wars story.

Joshua writes for IGN. If the Powerpuff Girls are made of sugar, spice, and everything nice, then he is surely made of ketchup, pizza, and lightsaber replicas. Follow him on Twitter or IGN.

Source : ign[dot]com