Han Solo: Imperial Cadet #5 by Robbie Thompson

"Han Solo: Imperial Cadet #5" written by Robbie Thompson, illustrated by Leonard Kirk, Daniele Orlandini, Cory Hamscher, and Arif Prianto

     I quite liked how this series shook out! It had a super heart-warming ending and left us with the possibility of more stories in the future which I am definitely all for now!

     We ended last time on Qhulosk where Han's fellow cadet Valance crashed in enemy territory. Han took it upon himself to go save the cadet who, honestly, hated him. The rest of his squadron took up the mantle as well--so awesome to see them working together despite their feelings toward Han. I think deep down they actually care about him as much as he cares about them. 

     We start this issue with Han's squadron going off on a mission on speeder bikes to find Valance and rescue him...against Imperial orders...

     As they begin their mission, the Empire sends out TIE bombers for a strafing run to annihilate the Qhulosk city once and for all. Han kept the tracking beacons activated on the speeder bikes with the intention of this letting the Imperials know they were on the battlefield so they would avoid it...but we're talking about the Empire here...they don't care about casualties. Once the bombers start dropping their bombs, one of Han's fellow cadets asks, "Are you ever right, Solo? About anything?" haha--poor guy, he's really trying!

     Surprise surprise!!! Turns out the Qhuloskians aren't so great after all--they keep the Ghular people (see image below) as slaves to mine farium for building war ships! And this leads us to a crazy turn of events that I absolutely did not see coming! Kanina has a deep change of heart about the Empire once she learns what they're really capable of...

     Trivia: Kanina's planet is in the Huru system.

     So while the first few issues had me questioning the merit of this series, everything wrapped up so wonderfully that I'm inclined to say I enjoyed this series quite a bit. We finally got to see Han as an Imperial pilot and got to see some of the beginnings of him being the rogue with a heart that we all know and love. It's interesting though how we then see some of this heart get beat out of him in the events that take place during Solo what with Qi'ra and Beckett both turning their backs on him. He really can't catch a break. No wonder he's so hard-hearted to begin the Original Trilogy. Luckily he has Leia to worm away at his stony exterior. I'll be looking out for future Han cadet stories gladly!