Crimson Empire #4 (of 6)

Story: Mike Richardson, Randy Stradley
Pencils: Paul Gulacy
Inks: P Craig Russell
Colors: Dave Stewart
Editor: Diana Schutz

Jax arrives on Phaeda. Merkon's role as a spy is exposed. Jax captures Mirith and launches an attack on the Rebels. Reviewed 03/23/98 Story How's this for a Star Wars story idea: An Imperial leader captures a female leader of the Rebel Alliance. He has her tortured to get information. When she shows resistance to the torture, he instead threatens to destroy her planet. When this produces information... destroy the world anyway. Later, let her go and follow her to reveal the real location of the rebel base. Sounds good, right? Well this time it's not 'A New Hope'. Let me tell you... Mirith Sinn is no Leia Organa and Jax is certainly no Tarkin. I understand that Lucas himself originally reused plot devices with the second Death Star and has been quoted to the effect that Star Wars is like a symphony with recurring themes... but this issue is the perfect example of the kind of unoriginality that has plagued this whole title. Of course, it doesn't help that the most interesting character -- Kir Kanos -- is completely absent. Art The bright light is that the art has improved. I don't think I'll ever care for the style, but the poses are more creative and varied and camera angles other than 90 and 45 degrees have been adopted. I must say that the technology is very well done and the coloring remains strong. Complaints about wardrobe and alien species design still stand, but one can hardly expect these things to change mid-series. Is it just me, or are two panels on the bottom of page 15 copied and pasted exactly right beside each other?? Conclusions Reverse of last issue... art is looking up, story is uncomplicated and unoriginal. 5/10. Not recommended.
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