Review: ‘Darth Vader’ #46 – Sabé Returns and Vader Raids Palpatine’s Sith Stash
The Darth Vader comic is building up momentum as we approach the end of its run. Not only has Sabé reappeared after her reintroduction in the recent “Free Comic Book Day” issue, but Darth Vader’s attack on Exegol with the Schism Imperial has begun.
It’s good to see Sabé back. While some of her story with the handmaidens got a little repetitive last year, this series has missed her ever since her partnership with Darth Vader ended before the Dark Droids crossover. There’s not much of her in this issue, but I’m very much looking forward to seeing what role she’ll play in opening up Vader to the possibility of redemption.
Vader’s plotline was much more exciting. Not only was it fun to see a bit more of the Sith Eternal, but an admittedly small twist in the action prevented the issue feeling too straight forward. I didn’t see it coming at all which was particularly refreshing. Lieutenant Pryde has some particularly interesting character beats in this issue too that presumably sets up his eventual defection from Vader.
This is all combined with some frankly gorgeous art, whether it’s a shuttle flying through a nebula or Darth Vader standing out on a battlefield. This was an entertaining issue of Darth Vader as it builds momentum towards its end, and I’m looking forward to seeing how this battle on Exegol shakes out.
Spoilers ahead…
We kick things off with Sabé, who has made contact with Warba, the Jedi pretender who stole Luke’s lightsaber back in the main Star Wars comic run in 2019. Sabé intends to use the pretender’s contacts to find Luke, though Warba insists on accompanying her to meet him. It turns out Warba doesn’t trust someone who recently served Darth Vader, and who can blame her?
I’ll be interested to see where this goes. The prospect of Sabé finding Luke is an enticing one, allowing her to tell him a little bit about his mother, but we know that she won’t be reuniting father and son before the events of Return of the Jedi. In the end, Sabé will have to try and redeem Vader herself and that won’t end well for her, but perhaps there’s a way that she could survive into the New Republic era…
Over at the Red Honeycomb Zone, Vader’s plan is set in motion. It seems that the Empire delivers regular shipments of resources to the Sith Eternal for them to bring back to Exegol, and Vader has hijacked that by stowing himself and his droid army inside the containers. Sly Moore outlines the benefit in allying with people like Admiral Corleque, who clearly hates Vader, disguising his true intentions to the Sith Eternal representative.
As the Sith Eternal return to Exegol, the main members of the Schism Imperial quietly follow in a shuttle. They pass a sleeping Summa-Verminoth (not the same one Vader tamed in an earlier issue of this comic run, as that one was killed by Palpatine) and Enric Pryde gets an extremely painful vision of his own death on Exegol. We know that this is referencing the Battle of Exegol in The Rise of Skywalker, but he is expecting to die on this current visit to the planet.
This revelation, along with his unadulterated devotion to Darth Vader, raises a couple of questions. What does it say about him that he continued to serve Palpatine so faithfully in The Rise of Skywalker, clearly aware that returning to that planet likely meant his death? Will his allegiance shift from Vader to Palpatine by the end of this story arc and if so, what triggers it? Vader is clearly not treating him with respect, so I think we can form an idea of what might happen, but it is an intriguing sub-plot to follow.
I have to say I didn’t see the droid Vader reveal coming at all. The whole distraction was well executed, and it reminded me of the kind of plan Anakin would have come up with in the Clone Wars. Vader so often prefers to use brute strength over cunning and trickery, I wasn’t sure he still had it in him. Perhaps this is yet another sign that his old self is returning to the surface.
He destroys one of their main temples and brings back a huge block of red crystal to the shuttle. I’m not sure what the crystal is — my first guess is kyber? — or how it will help them destroy Palpatine. I hope that’s not all they’ve come for, as I was hoping to see some particularly cool Sith artifacts come into play for the big showdown between Vader and the Emperor. A big crystal doesn’t quite cut it.
Of course, the Sith Eternal activated a beacon summoning the Summa-Verminoth which should be heading to the planet’s surface shortly. We have seen Vader tame one of these beasts before, but surely they’re not going to repeat that again so it will be interesting to see what happens this time.
This was a thoroughly entertaining issue stuffed with deception, intriguing sub-plots and returning characters along with great action scenes and dramatic reveals. I hope Darth Vader keeps it coming until the final issue which will presumably arrive later this year.
Rating: 8/10
Josh is a huge Star Wars fan, who has spent far too much time wondering if any Star Wars character could defeat Thanos with all the Infinity Stones.
