Hiroshima, Nagasaki, & Alderaan

In the film “A New Hope” viewers see a single shot of Alderaan before it is obliterated. They also get a short description from Princess Leia that it is peaceful and has no weapons and Ben Kenobi saying that, “Millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced,”

Fans have heard all this before, and are probably quite numb to the fact that The Empire has just wiped out an entire planet. That is why the following stories are quite important. These tales remind us of the individual people who were affected by the Death Star and the individual people who actually made the decision: the decision to blow up Alderaan.

The middle stories of the collection "From A Certain Point of View" ask some very tough questions about the destruction of Alderaan and some dark themes emerge.

"Laina” by Wil Wheaton

Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher from Star Trek) has contributed quite a bit to Geek Culture in the past 30 years. But this is the first time he has written for Star Wars.

“Laina” seems to be a simple story at first. A father (a rebel) is making a video recording for his baby daughter. He tells her of her mother’s death. He tells her of the Rebellion Against the Empire. He tells her that he is making the recording because he might not make it. He tells her that she is going to a safe place.

The story seems simple as first, but the twist ending is as terrible as anything I’ve read since “Cujo”. It will make the reader’s eyes bulge out in panic and think “No! No! This can’t be what is happening!”

Kudos to Wil Wheaton for making me feel such a raw emotion and terror- the way everyone should probably feel about super weapons.

"Fully Operational" by Beth Revis

General Tagge sees what his superiors do not. The Rebellion is dangerous. The Death Star is a step too far. The Rebellion will continue to gain sympathy and support among the common folk of the galaxy. The Death Star is not indestructible.

General Tagge is able to see all this because he is young compared to the old proud Admirals and Moffs that have already won their Clone Wars and are ready for retirement. Tagge comes in with a healthy dose of skepticism, maybe it is this that skepticism leads to his survival while his superiors perish.

This story is basically a rehash of the Imperial Staff Meeting from “A New Hope”. The fact that Tagge survives the Death Star, was established in the comic series “Darth Vader”. Why Tagge wasn’t on the Death Star when it exploded is explored further down in this article.

"An Incident Report" by Mallory Ortberg

This story is simply an incident report filled out by Admiral Motti after he was force choked by Darth Vader. Motti tries to address the incident as reasonably as possible, but the reader gets the sense that Motti’s reasonableness will be ignored by high command.

Oddly enough “Conan Antonio Motti” received his first and middle name on the set of Conan O’Brien. In 2007, O’Brien asked Lucas what Motti’s first name was and I guess Lucas’ on-the-fly response was "Conan Antonio". But how Lucas came up with the name… Conan… is a mystery for another day.

"Change of Heart" by Elizabeth Wein

Told from a “second person” point of view, the reader assumes the role of an Imperial Navy Trooper who witnesses the torture / interrogation of Princess Leia and then the destruction of Alderaan. The trooper is able to see things that Vader and Tarkin cannot, namely that Leia is lying about the Rebels being on Datooine. Eventually the trooper has a “change of heart” about his position in the galaxy. Get it? It's in the title.

"Eclipse" by Madeleine Roux

This story is told from the point of view of Breha Organa. This character may not sound familiar, but she is one of the oldest Star Wars characters. Breha was first envisioned in 1974 as the mother of Princess Leia. Lucas resurrected Breha for “Revenge of the Sith” and she appeared onscreen briefly at the end of the film.

“Eclipse” tells the story of Bail’s return to Alderaan and the bad news he carries with him: the fact that Leia is missing. Breha and Bail have little time together before The Death Star appears in the skies above. Breha attempts to start an evacuation, but by then it is too late.

"Verge of Greatness" by Pablo Hidalgo

17 years ago, Pablo Hidalgo was a Star Wars fanboy like the rest of us. He ran a Star Wars index called echostation.com where he would sometimes post his fan art. Today, however, Pablo Hidalgo has more power over Star Wars than anyone.

Hidalgo is Lucasfilm’s creative executive in story development. He is famous for maintaining the Canon of Star Wars, making sure everything is consistent. But he also carries out the development of every single Star Wars project- which means he is constantly juggling films, books, comics, video games.

Hidalgo’s contribution to this collection centers on Wilhuff Tarkin. Tarkin famously did not evacuate the Death Star in “A New Hope” and fans can guess why.  Not only is Tarkin overconfident in the technological terror he has constructed, he is quite married to it. Tarkin is seen overlooking the very beginnings of the Death Star in the final moments of “Revenge of the Sith”, which means he has been working on the project for nearly 20 years.

This story also focuses on Tarkin’s relationship to Orson Krennic (the villain of Rogue One) and explains why Tarkin finds Krennic lacking.

"Far Too Remote" by Jeffrey Brown

Jeffrey Brown is a cartoonist who is most famous for the “Darth Vader and Son” series and the “Jedi Academy” series. Consumers of the audio version of the collection “From a Certain Point of View” will not even be aware that this story is in the book.

“Far Too Remote” consists of a single panel depicting Cassio Tagge arriving on Dantooine to find an abandoned “Rebul Base”. Well, this solves the mystery of why Tagge wasn’t on the Death Star when it blew up, and it feeds directly into the next story.

"The Trigger" by Kieron Gillen

It was an amazing surprise to discover that Doctor Aphra, gets her own story in this collection. Doctor Aphra first appeared in the “Darth Vader” comic series which eventually evolved into her own comic series.

Aphra is an intergalactic archeologist and is the "Indiana Jones" of the Star Wars universe. Aphra is a fun character and this is a fun story, but there are still serious themes here. Aphra questions exactly how the Empire was able to blow up an entire planet. Who pulled the trigger? Was it similar to a firing squad, where many people pull many triggers, so that no one had to live with the guilt? What kind of person could pull that trigger any way?

In this story Aphra finds herself at the wrong end of a trigger. Her life hangs in balance as she tries to reason with the person holding a blaster to her head. What kind of person is he? Is he the kind who can pull the trigger? Furthermore, what kind of person is she?

"Of MSE-6 and Men" by Glen Weldon

MSE-6 is a mouse droid on the Death Star. MSE-6 is having a bad day. His master TK-421 was not at his post. It turns out TK-421 was murdered by a smuggler, a farm-boy, an old man, and a wookiee.

I’ll give this story points for effort. The narration is told through the head of MSE-6, whose thoughts are shown here in very basic computer code. Somehow MSE-6 becomes the unintentional messenger between TK-421 and an unnamed Imperial officer, who start to form a romance whilst they pass messages back and forth through the mouse droid.

Overall this tale tries to do too much and the results are truly bizarre. The finished product is truly a mess and in the end the most clever thing about this tale is probably its title.

"Bump" by Ben Acker and Ben Blacker

Stormtrooper TD-110 is probably the most famous trooper in fandom, and we didn’t even know it until now. Not only is he the Sandtrooper that was brainwashed by Ben Kenobi and tricked into stating, “Move along. Move along,” he is also the Stormtrooper that bumped his helmet on a Death Star blast door.

The other Sandtrooper story in this collection “Born in the Storm” featured a Sandtrooper sick of his job and ready to leave the Empire. But in this story, TD-110 is the opposite. He wants nothing but to serve his Empire, but cannot stand the singe mistake he has made- letting Kenobi, Luke and the droids go.

I guess that mistake gets him thrown off of the Death Star because TD-110 reappears in The First Order years later and is featured in the junior novel “Join the Resistance: Escape From Vodran” which is also written by Ben Ackner and Ben Blacker

"End of Watch" by Adam Christopher

This tale tells the story of a slightly disgruntled station commander aboard the Death Star during the search for Luke, Leia, Chewie, and Han. This is not the first story in this collection about a slightly disgruntled Imperial and after a while, it all just gets boring. I mean who kriffing cares about these people? Just because a character might exist and just because an author can write about that character- it doesn’t mean the result is going to be a story. “End of Watch” is not a story, Adam Christopher. A story needs rising action and some sort of climax. The words you have come up with form sentences and those sentences form paragraphs, but shouldn’t story-telling be more than that?

"The Baptist" by Nnedi Okorafor

One learns many things about dianoga in this tale. Dianoga are from the planet Vodran. Dianoga have seven tentacles. Dianoga are hermaphroditic and are able to choose their gender. The Dianoga that attacked Luke Skywalker in the garbage compactor was named Omi. Omi was force sensitive.

When I say Omi was force sensitive, I don’t mean that she had a lightsaber or could levitate things with her mind. But Omi did receive visions of the future. It was these visions, more than anything, that led her to attack Luke Skywalker in the trash compactor, although to Omi, this attack is more of a ritual. That moment for Luke, as much as anything he experienced after leaving his tiny moisture farm, was a sort of baptism- in which he became a new person.

I know that a force wielding dianoga seems kind of silly and unnecessary, but in the end all that matters is whether or not the story works as a story. This one does. Kudos to Nnedi Okorafor for making us care about this seven-tentacled creepy crawler.

Until Next Time

Now that I am 75% of the way through this book, I can’t wait to read the last 25%. Not all these stories are winners, but there is enough good stuff to keep a reader interested. Happy Reading Star Wars fans.

Who Owns the Mos Eisley Cantina Anyway?

(Part Two of: From a Certain Point of View- Review)

To quickly answer the question in the title of this blog- It’s a Wookiee named Chalmun, therefore the Cantina is technically called “Chalmun's Spaceport Cantina”. Why a Wookiee from Kashyyyk would be on Tatooine…. as Johnnie Cochran would say “That does not make sense!” But apparently this fact has been canon since a 1993 roleplaying game.

There are at least two bartenders at Chalmun’s. One is Wuher (the one who doesn’t like droids) and on the nightshift you’ve got Ackemena who was played by Bea Arthur (one of the Golden Girls) in the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special.

The rest of this blog will focus on stories 11-17 in the book “From A Certain Point of View”. These are the Mos Eisley Cantina Stories. Many of these sideline characters haven’t been heard from since the anthology “Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina” published in 1995.

“Not for Nothing” by Mur Lafferty
In “Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina” there was a story centered on Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes called “We Don’t Do Weddings”. As far as I can tell this story is more or less a sequel to that one. “Not For Nothing” addresses the fact that Bith have large eyes, no eye-lids and are living on a desert planet where sand is always blowing around (a fact which some of the band members are NOT okay with).

“We Don’t Serve Their Kind Here” by Chuck Wendig

Wuher is the bartender at the Mos Eisley Cantina. Surprisingly very little has been written about this character in the old Expanded Universe or the new. A role-playing game gave him the name Cedo Partu in 1997, but the name never caught on, and so Cedo is now Wuher.

Anyway, Wuher is basically a good guy, just a little grizzled- And he has a right to be. He was orphaned during the Clone Wars when droids invaded his home planet- Thus his dislike for droids. Really, Wuher is as lovable as any harmless curmudgeon.

“The Kloo Horn Cantina Caper” by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Matt Fraction
The longest story in this collection so far focuses on many patrons of the Cantina including Kabe the Chadra Fan, Muftak the Talz, Myo the Abyssin, and Djas Puhr the Sakiyan. 

This story is not without humor considering you have Matt Fracion of “Sex Criminals” fame as one of its authors. In the end, wagers are made and serendipitous events occur.

“Added Muscle” by Paul Dini
The shortest story in this collection so far focuses on Boba Fett. Instead of revealing any details about Fett’s motivations (which is what these stories generally do) , we get to see a lot of his personality, which is a treat. The prose is quite strong here, and it is certainly the most artistically crafted piece in this novel.

“You Owe Me a Ride” by Zoraida Córdova

This tale is one of the weakest and easily forgettable of the collection so far. It stars the Tonnika sisters, Brea and Senni, who are not the most memorable of Star Wars characters to the point where they don’t even have action figures. I would have bet good money on the fact that every single Cantina-goer had an action figure counterpart, but not true for Brea and Senni. Apparently, Lucasfilm did not get a waiver signed from the actresses to use their likeliness and to this day the only toy that exists is a single micro-machine miniature (not even a pair for each twin). I realize now that I used to own this figure, but was not able to locate it for the purposes of reposting.

“The Secrets of Long Snoot” by Delilah S. Dawson
Garindan ezz Zavor is the long snooted bounty hunter who reported on the location of Ben, Luke, R2 & 3-PO in the Mos Eisley Space Port. This tale is the “Twelve Years a Slave” version of Star Wars because it turns out that Garindan used to be a rich socialite on his homeworld, but the Galactic Empire took him into slavery. Now he’s just trying to earn enough creds to escape Tatooine and get back to his family. Yet time is running out. 

“Born in the Storm” by Daniel José Older
Born in the Storm presents an incident report filled out by stormtrooper TD-7556 about the goings-on in the hunt for two rebel droids on Tatooine. TD-7556 is one of the troopers that stopped Luke and Ben’s landspeeder and asked to see identification. TD-7556 is not the one that Ben pulls his Jedi mind trick on- he’s the other one. The one that just wants his day to end so that he can get a tall glass of booze down at the Cantina. TD-7556 doesn’t hate the Empire because of any evil thing they have done, he just hates the Empire because he hates his job. We’ll call this story the “Office Space” version of Star Wars. This incident report is the final communication to his employers before he decides to metaphorically take a bat to the copy machine.

Until Next Time

I decided to keep this blog focused on Mos Eisley, so I’m not quite halfway through this book yet. If you haven’t picked up a copy of “From a Certain Point of View” it is available at your local library. Happy Reading Star Wars Fans!

From a Certain Point of View Part 1

“From a Certain Point of View” has a concept so interesting, one wonders how it has not been done before. Essentially the book is a retelling of the original 1977 Star Wars film, but told from the perspective of side characters. The 40 stories are written by 43 authors and I will be covering 10 per week until the end of the month.

Raymus by Gary Whitta

Raymus Antilles is quite an obscure Star Wars character, but he has been played by 3 different actors in 3 different Star Wars films. He is the captain of the Tantive IV and this story bridges the gap between the last scene of Rogue One and the first scene of A New Hope. The story, if nothing else, tells why Tantive IV is being pursued in sublight speed rather than just warping right to Yavin IV. Antillies meets his end when he is choked to Death by Vader in the opening scenes of A New Hope, which is where this tale leaves off and the next tale begins.

 The Bucket by Christie Golden

TK-4601 is the stormtrooper who stunned Princess Leia shortly after she gave the Death Star plans to R2. Like FN-2187 would do in the distant future, TK-4601 questions many things about the Empire he serves. He seems to have a soft spot for the princess that he captures. TK-4601 also appears in Christie Golden’s novel “Battlefront II: Inferno Squadron”.

The Sith of Datawork by Ken Liu

This story is full of wit and sarcasm and its purpose is to explain why the Death Star trooper does not blast R2 and 3-PO’s escape pod to smithereens when it was determined that it had no life signs. Apparently the Empire was rewarding employees on a shot-to-kill ratio, meaning if a rebel didn’t die, the shot would count against your record. The story also focuses on bureaucratic paper-pusher who is a master of her trade and is one of the highlights of the first quarter of this collection.

Stories in the Sand by Griffin McElroy

Jot, the Jawa, is aware of the galaxy outside of Tatooine and would do anything to escape it. When Jot encounters a blue astromech droid, he learns of a heist that could change the fate of the galaxy. Jot’s decisions become intertwined with the fate of the droid and decisions are ultimately made.

Rerin by Sabaa Tahir

This story is kind of an oddball and doesn’t seem to fit with the rest of this book. Rerin is a Tusken Raider who steals half of a green crystal from some Jawas. Rerin escapes with the shard, and that’s pretty much it. The implication is that the shard is half of a kyber crystal, I guess, but the story seems disconnected from any bit of Star Wars canon that I know about.

The Red One by Rae Carson

This story tells the tale of R5-D4, the red droid with the bad motivator that Luke and Owen almost purchased from the Jawas before settling on R2. While listening to this tale, I noticed immediately that it was very similar to the 1999 comic “Skippy, the Jedi Droid”. Both stories insinuate that R5-D4 self destructed on purpose to help R2 on his quest.

Rites by John Jackson Miller

I was sort of floored by this story because it tied in perfectly with my John Jackson Miller journey that started with a question that I posed to him in May. “If you could choose one of your old Expanded Universe characters to bring into the new Disney canon, who would you choose?” Miller told me that he would choose Gryph, but what Miller didn’t tell me (couldn’t tell anyone because of secrecy) was that he had already brought back A’Yark.

A’Yark was the female Tusken warrior in Miller’s novel Kenobi, which I read in August and is a part of the Old Expanded Universe. “Rites” seems to insinuate that everything that happened in his novel “Kenobi” is accepted in the New Disney Canon. By extension of that you could also accept into Canon the events of Star Wars: Outlander (A prequel-era comic) and probably many other connected comics.

I’m very surprised that keeper-of-canon, Pablo Hidalgo, would allow Miller to blur the lines between the new Disney Canon and the Old Expanded Universe Canon, especially with the prospect of a Kenobi prequel film in the works. 

Still, it is very cool for fans of Miller to see A’Yark back in the fold. Especially since she’s the only character I know of, after Grand Admiral Thrawn, to be “Re-Canon-Ized”.

Master and Apprentice by Claudia Grey

After writing three Star Wars novels in the past few years, Grey brings us a short story focused on the Force Ghost of Qui-Gon Jinn. While Luke looks on over the dead bodies of his Aunt and Uncle, Qui-Gon appears to Obi-Wan to talk about the boy’s familial past, and the destiny that shapes his future. Jinn seems to actually be able to see the future. It’s nice to see this Master/Apprentice pair interact with eachother after 20 years since Phantom Menace. The character of Qui-Gon has been mostly absent from Star Wars since Disney took over.

Beru Whitesun Lars by Meg Cabot

A brief story told in first person by Beru Whitesun Lars, who is reflecting on her life after she was killed in a Stormtrooper raid. Blue Milk and Bantha Cheese are frequently mentioned.

The Luckless Rodian by Renée Ahdieh

Greedo seems to hate Han Solo, quite a bit. I guess Han might have stole a love interest from him or something? This book ends with Greedo’s demise and, though there is no evidence that would conclusively settles the "Who Shot First" debate, this story seems to insinuate that Han was the only one who shot.

That’s all for now. I’ll be back next week with 10 more stories