Allegiance, Part III: Dark Side of the Moon by Ethan Sacks
"Allegiance, Part III: Dark Side of the Moon" written by Ethan Sacks, illustrated by Luke Ross and Lee Loughridge
While still definitely enjoyable, this whole issue honestly felt like a needless side story. Not all that much happens and the First Order is just now heading toward Mon Cala. The Mon Cala "Ancient Rite of Challenge" is introduced which instead of feeling like a deepening of their culture, feels more like a random plot device since it hadn't been invoked in centuries and really came out of nowhere. And...I have NO idea where the title "Dark Side of the Moon" came from either. No clue what it's referring to...
Anyway, we left off last week with Leia's crew facing off against some Quarren who frankly were the ones who started the fight. But the people of Mon Cala certainly don't see it that way and Rey, Chewie, 3PO, and Rose end up imprisoned for their crimes. At the very end of last week's issue, Chadkol Gee, an isolationist Quarren, called up the First Order and offered up Leia and her crew on a platter. I was so hoping for that plot point to be addressed in this issue, but it was essentially left dangling minus Connix back on Anoat telling General Jonato that an armada of First Order Star Destroyers had jumped into hyperspace headed toward...Mon Cala. So it appears that word is spreading slowly amongst the First Order, which is weird.
Back to The Ancient Rite of Challenge, a fight to the death or submission, invoked by one of the Quarren bound and determined to do away with Leia's band of Rebels. Apparently, what's left over of the losers is fed to razor-mawed kakanas--they don't sound friendly at all! Rey takes up the challenge thinking she is going to be fighting the Quarren but soon finds that her opponent will be a repurposed combat droid from the Clone Wars named RK-9 (see him pictured below--definitely a scary guy), a remnant of the Battle of Mon Cala. The Rite takes place in the Sacred Arena of Salka'a and this fight is not pretty... This whole side step into Mon Cala "culture" just felt extra forced and I would've liked to know more about the galactic problems at hand rather than continuing to deal with petty infighting. I'm sure the story will advance in the next and final issue, but right now it feels stagnant.
As for Finn and Poe, Kendoh and her gang are trying and failing to capture Finn while Poe works on loading the weapons into their ship. We know something goes terribly wrong with this mission but I still have no idea what that something might be. I have to say that in this issue, I was probably more intrigued by the Finn and Poe story than the Leia and Mon Cala story which is the opposite of how I felt with the previous two issues. One really intriguing thing is we see Remex shapeshift into a Lasat and a Wookiee...how in the world did he find a Lasat to copy??? Have they come out of hiding on Lira San? Because we know that Zeb and the three Imperial Lasat prisoners were the last Lasats not on Lira San. Or are there more that were off-world when the Empire attacked Lasan? Hmmm...
So, the story didn't advance all that much, in fact it was fairly stagnant, and the First Order is just now heeding the call from Chadkol Gee. Something truly spectacular has to go down in the next and final issue for this series to have been worth the read. There has to be some sort of triumphant ending to make it all worth the reader's while, otherwise it really is just a story for the sake of filling in a gap...which I'm actually not opposed to as I love having more information about any and everything Star Wars...I just feel like they could have done a better job at this point with making this series impactful and necessary. Take that as you will. Still looking forward to next week's issue!!
Anyway, we left off last week with Leia's crew facing off against some Quarren who frankly were the ones who started the fight. But the people of Mon Cala certainly don't see it that way and Rey, Chewie, 3PO, and Rose end up imprisoned for their crimes. At the very end of last week's issue, Chadkol Gee, an isolationist Quarren, called up the First Order and offered up Leia and her crew on a platter. I was so hoping for that plot point to be addressed in this issue, but it was essentially left dangling minus Connix back on Anoat telling General Jonato that an armada of First Order Star Destroyers had jumped into hyperspace headed toward...Mon Cala. So it appears that word is spreading slowly amongst the First Order, which is weird.
Back to The Ancient Rite of Challenge, a fight to the death or submission, invoked by one of the Quarren bound and determined to do away with Leia's band of Rebels. Apparently, what's left over of the losers is fed to razor-mawed kakanas--they don't sound friendly at all! Rey takes up the challenge thinking she is going to be fighting the Quarren but soon finds that her opponent will be a repurposed combat droid from the Clone Wars named RK-9 (see him pictured below--definitely a scary guy), a remnant of the Battle of Mon Cala. The Rite takes place in the Sacred Arena of Salka'a and this fight is not pretty... This whole side step into Mon Cala "culture" just felt extra forced and I would've liked to know more about the galactic problems at hand rather than continuing to deal with petty infighting. I'm sure the story will advance in the next and final issue, but right now it feels stagnant.
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