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joysweeper (joysweeper) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-09-28 07:55:00

Entry tags:

char: wedge antilles, group: rogue squadron, publisher: dark horse, title: star wars

Young Wedge Antilles
I really like Wedge Antilles. This is a bit from "The Phantom Affair", an arc of the X-Wing Series comics known for really good art, which has a flashback to when his parents were killed.

Sorry, I'd write something witty and catchy, but nothing's coming to mind.

Wedge is negotiating with these small birdlike aliens over a superweapon they're said to have developed, and although the Mrlssti are on good terms with the New Republic, the Empire wants it too.

They get it done and the section on fire detaches. "We are out of foam, Jagged!" "Never mind, Zena, we did it!" The section falls towards the sun - we don't see it explode so much as recede, and their speech bubble sort of shreds. "Wedge? Do you hear me?" "Yes." "We love you, son." The last panel just has a little fire with the sun behind it.

There's another subplot here about Loka Hask and his pirate crew; the pirates showed Loka some eyeless octopus things infesting the engines, and a few pages later while Wedge was shooting at him Loka got into a space suit and fled, even though his pirates didn't have suits and died. Loka sucks like that. He started as an Imperial pilot, got kicked out for associating with pirates, and after this apparently the Empire took him back as a diplomat. Not a great call, Empire.

So yeah, that's a bit from "The Phantom Affair" that I posted on old s_d. Thinking about more x-wing posts. This series has its ups and downs, but I like it.

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aaron_bourque
2009-09-28 12:19 pm UTC (link)

The Phantom Affair had awesome art by the late Edvin Biukovic, with tons of little bits of business in the background of crowd scenes (random George Lucas cameo being my favorite) and great expressions (even of the Stormtroopers). It's also got one of the faster moving plots of the X-Wing comics, a definite improvement over the debut series, The Rebel Opposition which . . . was kinda scattershot and disappointing. It wasn't even collected until the recent X-Wing Omnibuses, with good reason.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

joysweeper
2009-09-28 09:37 pm UTC (link)

No one really likes The Rebel Opposition. Stackpole was apparently angry at how Baron implemented his script - originally there were no Wookiees, Plourr was a Quarren, and I think Tycho wasn't supposed to pretend to be an Imperial while calling himself Tycho Celchu of Alderaan. And they got some details wrong, like the name of Tycho's fiance. So it's good that the series managed to continue and improve.

I'm considering posting from The Thrawn Trilogy comics, since one book is illustrated by Biukovic, but wow that thing is long. Maybe later.

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	midnightvoyager 2009-09-28 01:13 pm UTC (link)
	My face has an octopus, your argument is invalid. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	(Anonymous) 2009-09-28 01:33 pm UTC (link)
	It's actually little-known rule of diplomacy: he with the most octopi is presumed to be in the right. As you already noticed, Hask has clearly trumped Wedge's arguments by showing up with an octopus on his face. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	kamino_neko 2009-09-28 01:47 pm UTC (link)
	... What in the name of God is going on with that Imperial's face? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	thanekos 2009-09-28 06:50 pm UTC (link)
	at one point, said imperial had to evacuate a ship. while donning his evac suit, he discovered a parasite had crawled into it. by the time they found him, the thing was pretty much stuck for life. (Reply to this) (Parent)

joysweeper
2009-09-28 09:52 pm UTC (link)

I love the pathos of Wedge's opposition to Loka, but even in the next issue, when Loka is talking about how he wished someone had killed his parents and taunting Wedge into attacking him, then getting fried by the cell bars, I cannot ignore the limpet.

Half the time I just call him Captain Limpet-Face. The limpet is reaching into his mouth and nose. I can't imagine why he wouldn't have it removed; even if it had made him lose his eye and ear and a chunk of his face, he's Imperial, and Imperials love cybernetics.

It's probably just a Red Right Hand, a deformity that underlines a character's evilness. Stackpole uses this a lot - Isard has one blue and one red eye, Semtin has prosthetic eyes, Krennel has a red prosthetic hand, that one guy Thrawn helped take out had diamond-shaped pupils.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	midnightvoyager 2009-09-28 10:41 pm UTC (link)
	It's Star Wars. Red Right Hands are a side effect of being evil. ...frankly, it amuses me on some level that you could literally walk up to people in the Star Wars Universe and guess if they are evil or good with a pretty decent success rate. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	damar148 2009-09-28 01:48 pm UTC (link)
	It looks like a facehugger had a poor aim and refused to try again. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	daningram 2009-09-28 01:53 pm UTC (link)
	Does that mean that it's been trying to mate with his ear for all that time? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	kamino_neko 2009-09-28 01:59 pm UTC (link)
	It'd make the chestburster stage rather more...impressive. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	cainofdreaming 2009-09-28 02:57 pm UTC (link)
	And now you've gotten me to think what would happen if the facehugger went for the wrong end of its victim. Ey. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	marsdejahthoris 2009-09-28 07:27 pm UTC (link)
	Sluggy Freelance did that. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	daningram 2009-09-28 07:51 pm UTC (link)
	Is there really a right end for a biological invasion that devours your insides? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	cainofdreaming 2009-09-28 08:13 pm UTC (link)
	The other end of the galaxy, I should think. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	sistermagpie 2009-09-28 04:19 pm UTC (link)
	Ignoring the thing glued to the guy's face (or maybe the guy himself is what's glued to a human-looking thing), I love me some Wedge--thanks for posting this! (Reply to this) (Thread)

	joysweeper 2009-09-29 01:19 am UTC (link)
	Wedge is awesome. Happy to post. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	sianmink 2009-09-28 05:05 pm UTC (link)
	My parents are DEEEAAAAADDDD!! Now I gotta wonder what would happen with a Star Wars Universe version of Batman. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	pyrotwilight 2009-09-28 05:22 pm UTC (link)
	Isn't that Vader? MY WIFE IS DEAAAD. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. (Reply to this) (Parent)

joysweeper
2009-09-28 09:44 pm UTC (link)

That actually is Wedge, sort of, if smaller in the scale of galactic importance and without the "cowardly and superstitious lot" stuff. There was a period where he tried to live a normal life, and then Imperials killed his girlfriend, he devoted himself to the Rebellion, and he turned out to have a real talent for flying.

He's an X-Wing pilot and not a Force-Sensitive, a supercommando, or Han Solo, but he's important for how how resourceful and determined he is, in and out of his snubfighter. At least in stuff by Zahn, Stackpole, and Allston. Everyone else tends to either ignore him or shunt him off to fly combat and narrate about how hard the enemy is fighting.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	lieut_kettch 2009-09-28 06:24 pm UTC (link)
	Thanks for posting. Never realized Jag Fel was named after his grandfather. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	joysweeper 2009-09-28 09:38 pm UTC (link)
	Yep! While I dislike the New Jedi Order in general, that's a nice touch. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

aaron_bourque
2009-09-28 10:12 pm UTC (link)

NJO had a rocky start, gathered a bunch of steam and then I ignore Star by Star and everything after it because "You gotta kill Anakin! We can't have TWO Anakins! People might get confuzeded1! Also, twincest."

. . .

It was worse when Stackpole and Keyes did so much greatness with him. They should've just let him wallow in his angst and be done with it.

Grrrrr.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	joysweeper 2009-09-28 11:37 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah. I didn't like Anakin until NJO, but he actually wasn't terrible there. I liked the two Allston books, but that's a given, since they have the Wraiths and Wedge as Blackmoon Eleven, the Greatest Pilot Of All Time. (Reply to this) (Parent)