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A review by blancwene
Shadows of the Empire by Steve Perry
3.0
For 2020, I decided to reread (in publication order) all the Bantam-era Star Wars books that were released between 1991 and 1999; that shakes out to 38 adult novels and 5 anthologies of short stories & novellas.
This week’s focus: Shadows of the Empire by Steve Perry.
SOME HISTORY:
Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire was conceived as a multimedia project, telling one interconnected story through a novel, comic series, video game, trading cards, soundtrack, and toy line: essentially, "a movie project without the movie.” With the release of the Special Editions and Episode One pushed back to 1997 and 1999 respectively, Shadows served as a pilot for the wave of materials that were to come. The novel of Shadows of the Empire made it to number five on the New York Times bestseller list for the week of May 5, 1996, and was on the NYT list for six weeks.
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
I remembered some of the original characters—Dash Rendar, Xizor, and Guri—but little of the plot. To be honest, I think I got the plot of the Nintendo 64 game confused with the plot of the novel, and the game is both heavily Dash-centric and covers a much wider span of time.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
Han Solo is trapped in carbonite, and Leia, Luke, and Lando need to track down Boba Fett before they can rescue him. Meanwhile, Prince Xizor of the Black Sun criminal syndicate conspires to replace Darth Vader as the Emperor’s right hand man by killing Luke Skywalker...
THE CHARACTERS:
I felt like Perry had a pretty good grasp of our main trio! Luke is still struggling with the revelation about Vader, but he’s also growing and maturing as a Jedi. He builds his own lightsaber, and he gains new understanding of the Force. Leia is conflicted—she loves Han and wants him back at any cost, but Luke is still her best friend. So when it becomes obvious that someone’s trying to kill him, for better or worse she heads to Black Sun for intel. (This decision clearly falls on the side of “for worse.”) Lando fills in for Han, yet remains a distinctly different character. He’s smart, he’s suave, and he’s a little cranky about Han’s wonky upgrades to the Falcon.
But Han isn’t here, so Perry introduces a Han substitute: Dash Rendar. He’s a Corellian, he’s from a wealthy family that was kicked off Coruscant by the Emperor, he was thrown out of the Imperial Academy, he has a fancy fast ship and he’s a really good shot. Everyone says that Dash is such a great pilot, and if only he would help the Rebellion! He seems to be in direct competition with Han Solo, but he also feels a bit unnecessary. We don’t need a budget Han Solo, and I would rather have the trio feeling Han’s loss than a hasty substitute smuggler inserted to fill the gap.
I liked Perry’s depiction of Vader. He wants to bring Luke over to the Dark Side, but he still has enough free time to dig into Xizor’s stratagems—and very deviously destroy him. The Emperor is hovering in the background, manipulating the situation like a puppet master. Perry seems to imply, though, that leaking the Death Star II plans to the Bothans is originally Xizor’s idea, and I very much doubt that.
Xizor is royalty, he’s hugely wealthy, he’s the third most prominent person in the Empire, but he’s also independent from all that? Idk. I don’t like Xizor, because outside of his unsettling subplot with Leia, he’s boring. He doesn’t really do anything. I can appreciate he’s an intelligent schemer, but I am very glad that he’s (presumed) dead at the end.
Guri is a human replica droid, the Star Wars equivalent to Blade Runner’s replicants. I liked her as a character, because it’s fun to have a powerful woman running around, but I felt like she was potential rather than an actual fleshed-out character. The existence of a droid that can pass for a human opens up so many ethical and philosophical questions that Perry doesn’t touch on at all. And Xizor boasts that he paid 9 million credits for Guri. That...doesn’t sound like very much? Was she on sale??
ISSUES:
Because Shadows is an interquel, filling the gap between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, Perry relies a bit too heavily on flashbacks/memories from ESB. The prologue shows us the scene between Vader and Palpatine in ESB, but from the perspective of Xizor. In the first chapter, Leia has a nightmare that retells the carbonite scene and Luke remembers the cave on Dagobah in great detail while walking on a tightrope. Limited use of flashbacks are helpful to get the reader situated, but these are overly lengthy and ultimately unnecessary.
Perry offers up the backstory behind some elements from RotJ, like Leia’s Boushh disguise and Luke’s black Jedi garb. But the explanations behind them aren’t particularly intriguing. Guri gives Leia the Boushh costume so she can sneak into Coruscant, and Leia keeps it. Dash gets Luke some new clothes on Coruscant, and I guess Luke liked them so much that he kept wearing them into the next film. I guess I’m annoyed because Leia and Luke didn’t actively acquire these items; heck, her Boushh disguise gets a more interesting backstory in the Forces of Destiny cartoon! (S2 E6: Bounty Hunted)
There's also a weird disconnect at times. Leia has to don a disguise to sneak onto Coruscant, but Luke & Lando and then Dash just...hide behind a freighter? And apparently everyone knows this trick? I thought that Coruscant had planetary shields and floating attack stations and all that! Knowing that the Millenium Falcon and the Outrider and Rogue Squadron were duking it out in the skies of Coruscant years before the New Republic tried to retake the planet strikes me as improbable, to say the least.
One of the problems here is that despite Perry’s decent characterizations and exciting action sequences, the story is remarkably static. Despite their best efforts, we know that Han isn’t rescued until RotJ, and that Luke won’t face Vader again for a while. So in a sense, you know how everything is going to end, and Xizor and Black Sun don’t feel like much of a viable threat. (Not to mention that Lando absolutely trashes Xizor’s Palace, and then Vader blows up his skyhook. I think Black Sun will be out of the running for a while…)
But my biggest issue was the following: I think one of the main reasons I never reread Shadows is because the Xizor & Leia plotline deeply unsettled me. Essentially, Xizor is a rich and powerful man who has never been told no. But it goes beyond that: he sexually harasses Leia, but he also attempts to remove her agency. Xizor is a Falleen, and apparently they can give off pheromones that can completely overpower someone’s will. So it’s not enough that Leia has to fend off the advances of a creep, but she has to attempt to do so while she’s drugged. Leia is a strong lady, and she gets her mind back and fights him off, but these scenes were so uncomfortable that I almost abandoned the book. When I read Star Wars books, I’m usually looking for escapism, not nightmare fuel.
IN CONCLUSION:
Shadows is a decent Star Wars story, with some thrilling action scenes at the climax. Perry has a good handle on the canon characters, and it fills in the gap adequately between two pieces of existing canon. Unfortunately, Dash is a disappointing character who can’t match up to Han’s legacy, and Xizor makes me really uncomfortable. It’s worth a read, though, if not a reread.
Next up: [b:Wedge's Gamble|513198|Wedge's Gamble (Star Wars X-Wing, #2)|Michael A. Stackpole|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327941416l/513198._SY75_.jpg|2923893] by Michael A. Stackpole.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/52nVYMD14bc
This week’s focus: Shadows of the Empire by Steve Perry.
SOME HISTORY:
Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire was conceived as a multimedia project, telling one interconnected story through a novel, comic series, video game, trading cards, soundtrack, and toy line: essentially, "a movie project without the movie.” With the release of the Special Editions and Episode One pushed back to 1997 and 1999 respectively, Shadows served as a pilot for the wave of materials that were to come. The novel of Shadows of the Empire made it to number five on the New York Times bestseller list for the week of May 5, 1996, and was on the NYT list for six weeks.
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
I remembered some of the original characters—Dash Rendar, Xizor, and Guri—but little of the plot. To be honest, I think I got the plot of the Nintendo 64 game confused with the plot of the novel, and the game is both heavily Dash-centric and covers a much wider span of time.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
Han Solo is trapped in carbonite, and Leia, Luke, and Lando need to track down Boba Fett before they can rescue him. Meanwhile, Prince Xizor of the Black Sun criminal syndicate conspires to replace Darth Vader as the Emperor’s right hand man by killing Luke Skywalker...
THE CHARACTERS:
I felt like Perry had a pretty good grasp of our main trio! Luke is still struggling with the revelation about Vader, but he’s also growing and maturing as a Jedi. He builds his own lightsaber, and he gains new understanding of the Force. Leia is conflicted—she loves Han and wants him back at any cost, but Luke is still her best friend. So when it becomes obvious that someone’s trying to kill him, for better or worse she heads to Black Sun for intel. (This decision clearly falls on the side of “for worse.”) Lando fills in for Han, yet remains a distinctly different character. He’s smart, he’s suave, and he’s a little cranky about Han’s wonky upgrades to the Falcon.
But Han isn’t here, so Perry introduces a Han substitute: Dash Rendar. He’s a Corellian, he’s from a wealthy family that was kicked off Coruscant by the Emperor, he was thrown out of the Imperial Academy, he has a fancy fast ship and he’s a really good shot. Everyone says that Dash is such a great pilot, and if only he would help the Rebellion! He seems to be in direct competition with Han Solo, but he also feels a bit unnecessary. We don’t need a budget Han Solo, and I would rather have the trio feeling Han’s loss than a hasty substitute smuggler inserted to fill the gap.
I liked Perry’s depiction of Vader. He wants to bring Luke over to the Dark Side, but he still has enough free time to dig into Xizor’s stratagems—and very deviously destroy him. The Emperor is hovering in the background, manipulating the situation like a puppet master. Perry seems to imply, though, that leaking the Death Star II plans to the Bothans is originally Xizor’s idea, and I very much doubt that.
Xizor is royalty, he’s hugely wealthy, he’s the third most prominent person in the Empire, but he’s also independent from all that? Idk. I don’t like Xizor, because outside of his unsettling subplot with Leia, he’s boring. He doesn’t really do anything. I can appreciate he’s an intelligent schemer, but I am very glad that he’s (presumed) dead at the end.
Guri is a human replica droid, the Star Wars equivalent to Blade Runner’s replicants. I liked her as a character, because it’s fun to have a powerful woman running around, but I felt like she was potential rather than an actual fleshed-out character. The existence of a droid that can pass for a human opens up so many ethical and philosophical questions that Perry doesn’t touch on at all. And Xizor boasts that he paid 9 million credits for Guri. That...doesn’t sound like very much? Was she on sale??
ISSUES:
Because Shadows is an interquel, filling the gap between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, Perry relies a bit too heavily on flashbacks/memories from ESB. The prologue shows us the scene between Vader and Palpatine in ESB, but from the perspective of Xizor. In the first chapter, Leia has a nightmare that retells the carbonite scene and Luke remembers the cave on Dagobah in great detail while walking on a tightrope. Limited use of flashbacks are helpful to get the reader situated, but these are overly lengthy and ultimately unnecessary.
Perry offers up the backstory behind some elements from RotJ, like Leia’s Boushh disguise and Luke’s black Jedi garb. But the explanations behind them aren’t particularly intriguing. Guri gives Leia the Boushh costume so she can sneak into Coruscant, and Leia keeps it. Dash gets Luke some new clothes on Coruscant, and I guess Luke liked them so much that he kept wearing them into the next film. I guess I’m annoyed because Leia and Luke didn’t actively acquire these items; heck, her Boushh disguise gets a more interesting backstory in the Forces of Destiny cartoon! (S2 E6: Bounty Hunted)
There's also a weird disconnect at times. Leia has to don a disguise to sneak onto Coruscant, but Luke & Lando and then Dash just...hide behind a freighter? And apparently everyone knows this trick? I thought that Coruscant had planetary shields and floating attack stations and all that! Knowing that the Millenium Falcon and the Outrider and Rogue Squadron were duking it out in the skies of Coruscant years before the New Republic tried to retake the planet strikes me as improbable, to say the least.
One of the problems here is that despite Perry’s decent characterizations and exciting action sequences, the story is remarkably static. Despite their best efforts, we know that Han isn’t rescued until RotJ, and that Luke won’t face Vader again for a while. So in a sense, you know how everything is going to end, and Xizor and Black Sun don’t feel like much of a viable threat. (Not to mention that Lando absolutely trashes Xizor’s Palace, and then Vader blows up his skyhook. I think Black Sun will be out of the running for a while…)
But my biggest issue was the following: I think one of the main reasons I never reread Shadows is because the Xizor & Leia plotline deeply unsettled me. Essentially, Xizor is a rich and powerful man who has never been told no. But it goes beyond that: he sexually harasses Leia, but he also attempts to remove her agency. Xizor is a Falleen, and apparently they can give off pheromones that can completely overpower someone’s will. So it’s not enough that Leia has to fend off the advances of a creep, but she has to attempt to do so while she’s drugged. Leia is a strong lady, and she gets her mind back and fights him off, but these scenes were so uncomfortable that I almost abandoned the book. When I read Star Wars books, I’m usually looking for escapism, not nightmare fuel.
IN CONCLUSION:
Shadows is a decent Star Wars story, with some thrilling action scenes at the climax. Perry has a good handle on the canon characters, and it fills in the gap adequately between two pieces of existing canon. Unfortunately, Dash is a disappointing character who can’t match up to Han’s legacy, and Xizor makes me really uncomfortable. It’s worth a read, though, if not a reread.
Next up: [b:Wedge's Gamble|513198|Wedge's Gamble (Star Wars X-Wing, #2)|Michael A. Stackpole|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327941416l/513198._SY75_.jpg|2923893] by Michael A. Stackpole.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/52nVYMD14bc