Story: Michael A. Stackpole
Pencils: Jim Hall and Drew Johnson
Inks: Gary Martin
Lettering: Vickie Williams
Colors: Perry McNamee
Cover Art John Nadeau
TPB Cover Art: Timothy Bradstreet and Grant Goleash
Family Ties is technically the seventh installment in the XWRS series. However, since it was published with The Making of Baron Fel in the trade paperback Blood and Honor, it could still be considered the sixth installment. Since I don't own the TPB, I consider it the seventh.
This installment picks up a couple of threads from both The Making of Baron Fel and In the Empire's Service. It starts out with the funeral for the pilots fallen in the Battle of Brentaal. I love the way the artist shows how each pilot is dealing with the grief in his or her own way, in a way that fits the personality of each pilot. I especially feel sorry for poor Wedge, who looks like the weight of the grief is about to bow him in half. Here is a guy who has seen way too many of his comrades fall, and I liked his thoughts about Salm's speech. Yes, they may have nobly sacrificed their lives for the cause, but they would rather be alive and partying with their friends.
This scene also shows us this artist's rendition of each of the pilots, and I have to say I was impressed. Finally, we have a good-looking brown-haired Tycho! Hobbie looks good as well, and I like the way Plourr's hair has grown out. I would also like a pair of the Rebel crest earrings that Plourr and Feylis are wearing.
After the funeral, Wedge decides to introduce Fel to the rest of the squadron and drops the bombshell that he is now one of them. Could you imagine being one of those pilots? Here you have just returned from a ceremony where you mourned those lost in battle, then you are told that one of the guys responsible for their deaths will be flying with them? In a way, I don't blame Nrin for wanting to rip Fel's head off.
I love the banter in the scene where Wedge enlists Wes, Hobbie, and Plourr to go to Corellia. This banter is kept up throughout all of Family Ties and is one of the things that was pretty much missing before this point. Sure, Wes and Plourr had some before, and Wes and Hobbie, but in this scene, I can see just how close they all are, even though Plourr is "NOT going anywhere with these two!" I love that line! Coming back to haunt us as well are those notorious Bothans from Requiem for a Rogue.
The promise that was hinted at in The Making of Baron Fel seems to be coming to pass in Family Ties. They are looking for Fel's wife and Wedge's sister. The three arrive on Corellia and head out for Fel's estate, and find a poisonous bug known as CorSec.
But, can it be? It is! This "poisonous bug" is none other than our Corran! Our Corran, but with the wrong eye color. This Corran has blue eyes. And who's that with him? I know! It's Susan Ivanova from Babylon 5! Oh, wait a minute, wrong fandom, but it sure looks like her. It must be Iella Wessiri then. I'm guessing it's her, since not once in the entire comic is she referred to by name. She should've been called Iella or Officer Wessiri at least once. After all, at the end, Wes knew Corran's full name, even though he only gave them his last name, and his first name was never mentioned. I would just like to say right now that I would like to cast Claudia Christian (Ivanova) as Iella Wessiri if Rogue Squadron is ever made into a live action movie or series.
We are also introduced to Corran's favorite person in all of CorSec in this scene, our beloved Agent Loor. The way he manipulates Corran and Iella, and by implication our three Rogues, is just amazing. I would go on more about it here, but this will be a topic of an editorial I'm planning to write on this. All I'll say for now is that I think Loor set up the whole kidnapping, although I do have to wonder who Corran and Iella's "man on the inside" is. Gil Bastra, perhaps? For figuring out that Loor was part of the whole nasty scheme, Plourr rose a lot in my estimation.
I loved watching Corran and Plourr interact. If things had been different and/or I was inclined to write an alternate reality fanfic, I think those two would've made an interesting couple. Their problem, however, is that they're too much alike in personality and even somewhat in circumstance, althogh Corran would have no way of knowing the latter at this point. I felt sorry for poor Iella at a few points during this arc, as she always seemed to get stuck in the middle of things, trying to keep a rein on Corran.
One thing that annoyed me about Corran's use in this arc was his tendency to constantly keep talking about having hunches. Okay, I know that it would be harder to translate Corran's internal workings into comic format, and I believe that Stackpole was still learning the fine arts of scripting, but if I were Iella, and he walked around constantly talking about having hunches, sooner or later I'd be tempted to haul off and hit him. I was actually excited when Plourr confronted him about why he and Iella happened to show up at the alley and he avoided the question. I was thinking that he'd had a hunch to be there as well, but didn't want to talk about it. Then, two panels later, when Iella asks if they should take them in, Corran has a weird look on his face when he tells her about the hunch he has. It's almost like he doesn't want to talk about them in front of strangers. I was kind of let down, actually, when we find out later that a contact on the inside had let them know about the meeting in the alley.
On the other hand, I really liked the firefight sequence in the alley. The panel where Iella tells him she'll cover him, and the one right after that where we see him looking down the barrel of his blaster, he just looks like he's almost outside of the firefight. There is so much chaos going on around him, but yet he looks like he is able to tune it all out so he can better focus on what he wants to do. Now here's an instance where I could believe him to be unknowingly using the Force. If that is true, then I liked this scene far better than any of the times he talked about his hunches, because it was shown to us and not clumsily inserted as dialogue.
Overall, though, I really enjoyed this one. Not only because it's the first time we ever get to see Corran and Iella in comics, but because I enjoyed seeing Wes, Hobbie, and Plourr get some focus. They get to show sides of themselves that we'd only seen in bits and pieces in the other comics.
I'll close with a quote from Family Ties #1 that I sincerely hope does not come back to haunt us in the New Jedi Order series. This is about Coronet City and, by extension, Corellia.
Wes (I'm guessing, no face shown here: Wow, look at this place. Something weird about it.
Plourr: What's weird is that it's not been wasted by fighting.
Hobbie: Corellia has largely stayed out of the civil war.
Wes: A place without war. Never thought it was possible.
Reviewed September 9, 2000 by Kelly M. Grosskreutz.
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