Book Description: The Sith Empire has rallied its forces for an all-out battle for control of the galaxy. Its goal: Crush the Republic. And with so many Sith Masters among them, the goal is not unachievable. As Naga Sadow readies his fleet to attack, one lone person threatens to undermine the entire campaign -- Jori Daragon. She isn`t a Jedi. She`s an explorer, a mapper of hyperspace who stumbled on the plans of the Sith. And she just may be the savior of the Republic.
Nowhere left to fall Welcome to what is at this writing still the earliest chapter in the history of the Star Wars universe, a tale set 5000 years before the adventures of the film series.
CAVEAT ONE Before you consider buying this, be aware that this volume is but one half of the story and that the first half is available in The Golden Age of the Sith. This review covers both volumes.
CAVEAT TWO If you're a pathological Star Wars collector, you'll buy this book regardless of its contents. If you're a Star Wars fan who wants to catch up on your history, save your money and read a summary of the events at Wookieepedia. If you're a discerning comics fan, then you must have found your way here by mistake. If so, don't stop. Keep moving. Everyone else, step right this way.
Despite a title that suggests something we never see, namely the glory days of the Sith Empire, author Kevin J Anderson came up with a promising premise. At opposite ends of the universe, the Sith Empire and the fledgling Republic seek to chart new futures, the Republic to end years of civil war and forge a new era of political and economic stability and growth, the Sith to revitalize their moribund Empire by throwing off their isolation and launching a new era of growth through conquest. In between are the innocents through which we view these events, a scholarly Jedi called to arms and a pair of young space navigators, brother and sister who through their explorations inadvertently open the hyperspace route across which the Sith reach to shake the foundations of the newly emergent Republic.
With a setting so far back in the past, Anderson has a wonderful opportunity to develop a good part of the Star Wars backstory. We find, for example, that the Sith were a separate species living on their own world in a relatively undeveloped culture that was then hijacked by a group of exiled Jedi who enslaved the Sith and built a new culture based on veneration of the Dark Force. Over the years these Jedi interbred with the Sith and a number of them left to conquer nearby worlds and create a system-wide Empire ruled by an all-powerful Dark Lord. The Jedi themselves are scholar-warriors closely aligned with political forces preserving civilization, pretty much the same as we have always known them, with one discernable difference - they don't carry lightsabers. And neither do the Sith.
They carry swords instead; swords made of steel. They also wear sandals, toga-like garments, and capes. They fly in spaceships that have sails, and the slavers have spaceships with oars. The Sith world of Korriban looks like it was cribbed from photos of Abu Simbel, with towering Pharaonic deities ensconced on thrones overlooking wide valleys and surrounded by sphinx-like guardians. In fact much of the costume and character design, from the scarab-like symbol of the Sith ruler to the elongated chins and goatees of the Sith, evokes Egypt in very obvious ways.
The artwork, provided across both volumes by Filipino Dario Carrasco, Jr., is not terribly remarkable. It's at best serviceable, in a style reminiscent of John Buscema, one of the iron men of the comic book industry who must have drawn tens of thousands of pages for Marvel for three decades beginning in the 60's. Carrasco, Jr.'s work benefits from a change in inkers and colorist in The Fall of the Sith Empire, where the lines become a little cleaner and the colors a bit more vibrant, but still it's not work that will ever be remembered or about which anyone has ever written more than a few sentences.
The same pedestrian touch is obvious in the writing. Kevin J Anderson wrote a few Star Wars novels in the 1990's and several of those books can regularly be found in "Worst SW Novels" lists. In this particular series Anderson has no protagonist, so he needs to develop his supporting players in order to give us more than just plot. Instead we get characters that are little more than props and literary devices. The Jedi scholar is the narrative frame, the brother-sister navigators the point-of-view characters and the vector of conflict, the Republic Queen and the Sith Lord wrestling opponents wearing good-guy / bad-guy personas. No one has any particular motivation except to get us to the next scene. There's nothing suspenseful or funny or touching or wondrous; it's storytelling about as developed and predictable as painting by numbers.
And with so many other comic books out there to read, you can surely find something more engaging, more worth you time and your money than this underdeveloped Star Wars adventure.
Happy hunting.
Absolutely TERRIBLE As I stated in a previous Star Wars book review (`Yoda: Dark Rendezvous'), gems in the literary SW Universe are scarce, sparse, few, and far in-between - this graphic novel is no exception to that rule. In a nutshell, `The Fall of the Sith Empire' sucks. Hard. For some reason, the whole prehistoric, almost Egyptianesque, civilization of an ancient Republic and advanced technology (e.g. flying starships) just didn't mesh together in my opinion. I'm not saying the suspension of disbelief in such a setting is a futile effort for a reader, but the task becomes a lot harder to envision with the uninspired art and simpleton dialogue showcased throughout this graphic novel. Aside from all of that, the story is just, well, boring: twin hyperspace explorers cruise the galaxy, one of them gets kidnapped by a Sith, the Sith lord uses the other twin to infiltrate the Republic, and then the Jedi help defend the Republic against the Sith Empire. Same ole, same ole.
The pencils by Dario Carrasco are absolutely terrible, even for 1997, which is no excuse because there was some good art in `97. The mediocre artwork is one of the biggest blunders of this book (other than the writing). The characters in `The Fall' could have looked a lot better in the hands of another more capable artist. Carrasco's Naga Sadow looks like a tall, baldheaded, humanoid-simian that drank too much pink lemonade (in reference to the reddish-pink hue of Sadow's skin). I thought the Sith - the ancient Sith nonetheless - were supposed to be the ruthless, evil servants of the dark side? Dario Carrasco's rendition of Naga Sadow portrays a silly and cowardly villain who lacks any true substance. The flagships and starship fleets are appallingly dreadful: some of them look like giant flying insects, while the plain nature of others will make you sarcastically wonder, "Well, there was no reason for any detail now was there?"
The other major problem with `The Fall of the Sith Empire' is a problem that plagues much of the SW Universe, and that problem is insipid and unimaginative stories. Keeping in mind that, as far as the SW Universe is concerned, it's pretty much all been done before and the fact that there's very little left to explore in Lucas' cash cow franchise, every now and then someone can find a nugget of creativity to weave a story of some imaginative proportions in Star Wars Land. There were no nuggets for this team of creators, and besides, it's 2006 and we all know that SW is no longer just a movie, but a way for Lucas to make more and more money. The artwork sucks; the characters are bland; the story is literally the SAME OLD story told in Star Wars (Republic vs. Sith Empire) whether ancient or contemporary; and the dialogue of the story is paper-thin.
Imagine what characters like Empress Teta, Memit Nadill, or Naga Sadow would've looked like in the hands of Frank Quiteley, Sean Chen, Sam Keith, or Ladronn. I don't know if the alien Jedi Odan-Urr is a retarded excuse of a character period, or if he's that way in the incapable hands of Carassco. Either way, Odan-Urr looks like the world's first bucktoothed alien with a huge overbite...and no lower jaw. He's absolutely the worst, dumbest, and goofiest-looking Jedi I've ever seen. And Odan-Urr's master Ooroo (gotta love those SW names) is a Jedi Master that's a talking brain in a crystalline vat of fluid...???
Besides the pencil work and inks, the colors were putrid - they're basically off-color pastels. Think children's plastic Easter eggs pastels...or thrown-up taffies of different colors. Yeah. That coupled with the boring artwork makes for a simply illustrious visual joyride...
The entire story feels rushed in a sense, perhaps not in the original issue-by-issue format; but read in the linear context of a graphic novel with no ads to interrupt the adventure, the plot sometimes moves at a needless breakneck speed. Panels make enormous leaps in elapsed time from panel-to-panel, adding to the rushed sense one gets while reading `The Fall'. Not to mention, the bland characterizations and tired seen-it-before plot along with the rushed story double the hurried effect.
Literally, writer Kevin Anderson's writing is on par with George Lucas' screenwriting abilities. The characters are dense, flat, and uninspired. One of the things Mr. Anderson should've learned from the first SW movies is that having twins in a space opera sounds good, but making the idea 100% is another thing. You have Luke and Leia; Jacen and Jaina; and in this story, Gav and Jori (what "incredible" names) - the whole twin thing in Star Wars really needs to stop. As I said before, the dialogue in this novel is just atrocious. Lines like, "I am ruler of the Sith Empire and no one can stop me," make Naga Sadow sound like a complete wiener and a villain one sees on childish cartoons: not a Dark Lord of the Sith.
I don't know if anyone agrees with me out there, but there are certain things about the SW-EU (Expanded Universe) that shouldn't have been created, like `Jedi battle meditation': that's stupid and to save it from complete ridicule, sounds a lot dumber than what it is. I like the part in the graphic novel where one of the soldiers fighting for Empress Teta tells Odan-Urr, who's on the sideline doing battle meditation at the moment, to stop sitting around and get out there and fight with the rest of them. I agree.
All in all, I think `The Fall of the Sith Empire' was a good idea that just wasn't executed correctly. No wonder `The Fall of the Sith Empire' is out of print: it needs to stay that way.
O.K. visuals, story a little lacking This TBP is the second in the Tales of the Jedi story, if you are going chronologically in star wars time. It takes place a 1,000 years before the original Tales of the Jedi, and takes place a week or so after "Golden Age of the Sith". Out of the "TOTJ" series, it is one of the worst, but still better than most of the TBP's out there. I reccommend it for people trying to complete their TOTJ collection, not for a stand-alone read.
pitifully bad don't waste your time. i just read through all the tales of the jedi books and this one is by far the worst, and is horribly bad. i know you might get it because you, like i did, want to read them all...but trust me you'll only be wasting time and money on this one it's that bad.
Great Read! I do not agree with any of the negative past reviews given here. I thought Fall of the Sith Empire was a fitting conclusion to the setup in The Golden Age of the Sith. The information within and its events lead up to other comic and Star Wars storylines. It is told more like a story passed down for generations, a feeling I think the author wanted. In actuallity it is a story told from the events known to a young jedi who is now a master. He is later seen, much older, in the Dark lords of the Sith series (the story of Exar Kun).So there is not great detail in points that do not need more info. You are getting the basic story as to what happened and why, and that is great. No one else has tried to tackle this era in the Star Wars history. Also, i think the art work is justified in its rought style. The setting is in the SW past, and the story is not overly detailed; these characteristics lead to a rough look that was very satisfying. It would not be perfect like the Star Wars present and future time periods. People are entitled to their opinions, but I think some missed the point when actually figuring out why elements of the comic where done in certain ways.
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