Darth Vader #17 Review

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Darth Vader’s past becomes more mysterious. What does Cylo mean?

 Warning: This article contains spoilers for Darth Vader #17. 

Darth Vader #17

Writer: Kieron Gillen | Artist: Salvador Larroca | Colorist: Edgar Delgado | Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna | Cover Artist: Mark Brooks

The civil war on Shu-Torun rages on. Darth Vader continues to assist Queen Trios in her fight with the ore barons for control of the ore producing planet. While visiting an ancestral retreat of the Shu-Torun royalty, the Queen comes under attack by a large ship emerging from the magma that covers the surface of much of the planet. The ship will later be revealed to be named the Lava Leviathan. Darth Vader immediately takes control of the ensuing battle and issues orders to Cylo-V’s twin warriors. Somewhat surprisingly, the twins immediately acquiesce to Vader’s commands. Perhaps Vader has sufficiently established himself as a being further up the hierarchy, but thus far, the twins had not been accustomed to obeying Vader. The Lava Leviathan is quickly dispatched after Vader infiltrates the vessel, and plans to avenge the attack on the Queen are prepared. Vader orders Cylo to assemble his abominations for battle and departs.

In a communication with Grand General Tagge, Cylo chafes at Vader’s order to ready his “abominations.” Specifically, he is irritated that Vader failed to address him as “Doctor.” He mentions that Vader owes him for things he had done for him in the past of which Darth Vader is apparently unaware. Tagge is confused by this, and is unaware of what Cylo is talking about. Cylo advises Tagge not to worry about it, and that is old business. That is good enough for Tagge, but it is a huge foreshadow of some sort of development to come. Did Cylo have some part to play in Anakin’s transformation into Darth Vader? Is Cylo responsible for any of Vader’s prosthetics? The panels that contain this conversation may offer a hint. While Cylo talks to Tagge, he is working on what appears to be a cybernetic or robotic hand. In the background, a medical droid is observing a human male floating in a bacta tank. Is this another of Cylo’s experiments? This will undoubtedly be addressed in a future issue.

Later in his communication with Cylo, Grand General Tagge laments Vader’s usefulness in battle. Tagge notes that while Vader wins grand battles, Tagge wins thousands of smaller ones in the same amount of time. In essence, Vader takes too long and is inefficient. He is the blunt instrument that Tagge described him as being many issues ago. He methods are not conducive to winning a war. There is a stark philosophical difference between Vader and Tagge. The Emperor promoted Grand General Tagge after the destruction of the first Death Star. Ostensibly, that reason was because the Emperor agreed with Tagge’s philosophy that the way forward for the Empire was not in the creation of more Death Stars, but in assembling fleets that cost less and could be dispersed farther and further. In addition, Tagge was not around when the Death Star was destroyed, and the Emperor placed a lot of blame for that catastrophe at Vader’s feet. However, it is now apparent that the Emperor has a larger plan. Of course, the Emperor does create another Death Star, as is evidenced by the events of Return of the Jedi. Vader’s demotion is not so cut and dried. Tagge’s discussion with Cylo ends with Tagge stating it would be good if the victory at Shu-Torun was seen as an Imperial triumph and not a victory for Vader. Cylo responds that he agrees.

One of Cylo’s twins, Aiolin, approaches Vader and asks, “Who will win?” Vader is blunt with her, that she has no future, and there is no victory for them. Aiolin is aware that like the Highlander, “there can be only one.” By this, she means, there can be only one lieutenant to the Emperor that would be his enforcer. She knows her time is short unless her skills improve and implores Vader to train her if for no other reason to honor the martial skills of the Jedi of the past. Vader rejects her. He has nothing he can teach her as his skills lie with the force, and not technological trickery.

The real value of this sequence of panels between Vader and Aiolin is that it reinforces that even though Emperor Palpatine adheres to the “Rule of Two,” whereby there can only be two Sith—a master and an apprentice, he is not above putting Vader through trials. In some sense, this is beginning to seem like the trials that the Jedi must go through before a Padawan can be elevated to the rank of Jedi Knight. In the prior issue, the Emperor informed Vader that he was more important to the Emperor’s plans than he understood. He also told Vader that his plan would be revealed in time, but at a time of the Emperor’s choosing. Perhaps this entire mission is just another step in the Emperor’s tutelage of Vader for one day becoming the Sith Master and the Ruler of the Galaxy.

Beebox, the vertically challenged bounty hunter, arrives with what he claims is Dr. Aphra’s body. At first, I was concerned they were spoiling events from the Star Wars series. However, Vader sees through Beebox’s charade. Even though the body has been disintegrated, Vader knows it is not Dr. Aphra. As punishment and by way of making an example, Vader crushes Beebox’s windpipe through the Force and commands BT-1 and Triple Zero to dispose of the bodies. His actions are to serve as a warning to the other bounty hunters. That will be tricky. They don’t know they have been employed by Darth Vader.

The barons confer to discuss how they will combat Vader. They do not understand who he is or what he is capable of. Therefore, one of the barons declares they need an expert, which he provides via hologram, and it is none other than Dr. Cylo. This is an interesting development. The Darth Vader series has a habit of ending issues with mini-cliffhangers. In many cases, the ending is carefully constructed to tease a story development that may or may not pan out as the reader expects. The obvious question is whether Cylo is truly betraying Vader and therefore the Empire? The next question is whether he is doing so of his own accord or whether anyone else, such as Grand General Tagge is on this plot? After all, Cylo did just agree with Tagge that he understood it would be better for the Empire to triumph, not Vader. Also, Cylo seems to know secrets about Vader, so he may be in position to aid the barons in their fight with the Sith Lord.

Overall, this was a good issue. Darth Vader is starting to assert himself more now than ever with Cylo and his minions. He is claiming his rightful spot at the Emperor’s side. The one disappointment is that Vader’s combat scenes were fairly sparse and largely limited to scenes of him inflicting damage on the Lava Leviathan. However, plot points were introduced that are likely to play a larger part later in this story arc and series.

Favorite Panel:

As previously mentioned, a lot of ground work was laid for future stories in this issue. The dialogue between the characters was intriguing. However, there wasn’t one particular panel that contained a great line or a particularly strong reaction. As also discussed, the battle scenes were spectacular in the sense that they demonstrated Vader’s power, but were not memorable for providing great action. All that said, the Lava Leviathan had one particularly great panel as it emerged from the lava to attack the royal family’s retreat. Unfortunately, it did not receive much more exposure in this issue, but the panel it did get is this issue’s favorite.