When you announcea Modern Star Wars novelabout a ragtag team of hypercompetent pilot , it ’s hard not to immediately suck up connection to Michael A. Stackpole and Aaron Allston ’s study on some of thebest Star Wars booksof all time : the X - Wing series . Alphabet Squadron , this Disney - canyon heir to the stool , is the closest the current canon has , but brook out in a few observably intriguing means .
indite by Alexander Freed , Alphabet Squadron — the first in a trilogy of novels paired with an ensuant Marvel Comics miniseries — is set in the immediate month after the Battle of Endor inReturn of the Jedi . The Empire is broken and on the backfoot , but still a threat . The Rebel Alliance ( née New Republic ) is struggling to deal with being hurl into the very genuine place of governing regulation instead of being the scrappy guerrilla upstart . It ’s a similar scenario as to where the X - Wing volume embark on out , with Wedge and Rogue Squadron hunting down Ysanne Isard after the liberation of Coruscant , and Freed — already having done so to majuscule effect with the thrill - on - the - earth soldier ’s position in Battlefront : Twilight Company — evokes a likewise unflinching coming to the rigours of dogfight outer space armed combat . There ’s an emphasis less on the wholesale shell the Star Wars movies revel in and more of the intimate yet petrifying phone and fury of being trounce into a flyspeck little hunk of metal as blaster bolts light up the vacuity around you .
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Yrica Quell, the uncertain ‘hero’ of Alphabet Squadron.Image: Jeff Langevin (Del Rey)
Plus , like those Word , alternatively of following the major journeys of type like Han , Luke , and Leia , it focuses on a cast of characters of new characters draw from the faceless legions of the Republic ’s military forces , the background extras of the Galactic Civil War . In this caseful , specifically , agroup of pilots — Yrica Quell , Nath Tensent , Wyl Lark , Chass na Chadic , and Kairos , make the squad name thanks to the myriad alphabet - base ‘ Wing ’ ships they each fly . get together by the fledgeling New Republic Intelligence to take down a still - mesh Imperial Aces squadron known as Shadow Wing , the squad hopes to take out a dangerous target area and deport a moral boost by flagging New Republic force as they chase down the settlings of the Imperial Remnant .
It ’s within the makeup of its nominal mathematical group where Alphabet Squadron start amount out from under the shadow of the Star Wars Starfighter novel that make out before it . While they were n’t Saturday Morning Cartoon floor of sodding shining heroes ( especially Wraith Squadron , the notorious police squad of misfits that combined its piloting skills with undercover agent - fi skullduggery ) , Stackpole and Allston ’s Rebel fender were , for the most part , undoubtedly heroic peoplefighting the upright fight for a noble cause they all believe in — and doing so in a elan practically bordering on titillating competency porn . The Rogues and Wraiths loved each other , cared for each other , think in the New Republic ’s ideals , and were damn expert at their jobs in the outgrowth . It ’s what made those books so lovable and fun .
Alphabet Squadron are not those kinds of people .
Wraith Squadron, as depicted in art for the Wizards of the Coast Star Wars Roleplaying Game.Image: Jeffrey Carlisle (Wizards of the Coast)
If anything , they ’re the complete opposition , outside of the fact they ’re also extremely well pilots . And it ’s in play with that first moment that Freed ’s novel truly excels , while still delivering the intense space - armed combat action you want out of a Star Wars Holy Writ about pilots .
Because really , in between the slick dogfight action Alphabet Squadron is a slow , compelling character dramatic event about the organisation of the group . Slow not just because the clock time is train to infix us to each of the unit ’s members at a touchy pace , but slow because we really get to delve into what makes each Alphabet airplane pilot check mark , their motivation and personalities . And what we learn is that these people are far from the shining , gung - ho heroes you ’d see plastered on flyers and bill poster as the look of the New Republic Starfighter corps . They ’re damaged , humiliated people , torn apart by a war they ’re still skin to truly end — a war that not all of them even fought on the same side of , for the most part .
Wyl , the naive young A - flank pilot of the team , is the closemouthed to an idealist the police squad has , but he ’s a conflicted man who line up himself pull in between a desire to remain loyal and finish the fight , and a despair to come back home to his ( intriguingly realistic and ‘ low - tech ’ in the kingdom of Star Wars planets ) humans . Chass , the B - Wing bomber , is a Jyn - Erso - know zealot driven by a deathwish and fury over battle she survived where fellow pilot did not . Nath , the Y - Wing pilot , is a former Imperial who desert not out of a sense of honor , but because he was about to be caught on rottenness charge . He ’s haunted by being the sole subsister of a Shadow Wing team that extinguish his fellow former Imperials , hiding out away on the fringes of the New Republic ’s attention doing easy jobs , and avoiding being fling into the fire of conflict again . Kairos the U - Wing flyer is the most mysterious of the group , and left intentionally so , a dogmatic Rebel and perhaps the good buffer of the team , left unexplored beyond the terrifying brain-teaser of a masquerade party she never claim off .
Kairos, Wyl, Nath, and Chass, the other motley members of the team.Image: Jeff Langevin (Del Rey)
Like their hodgepodge mashup of starships , the members of Alphabet Squadron do not fit together . They ’re all issue forth from dissimilar linear perspective on the warfare , unlike goals , and they spark off of each other moderately furiously as they attempt to work together , unsure of where their motive genuinely lie . They ’re abrasive in a way of life you do n’t really expect from your Star Wars zep , unless it involves them almost like a shot moderate for each other to get on with saving the day . Even the true cause Alphabet is brought together — by an Intelligence agent named Caern Adan , hoping to nock an easy winnings that will ensure his own ascent up the ranks of the still fledgling New Republic Intelligence — is far from truly noble , with any adept being more of a byproduct than the dead on target intention of their mission .
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If you like your Star Wars a bit more unobjectionable - cutting and unwaveringly oppressed with flesh valiance , it ’s disarm at first . Watching those barrier the police squad have set up around themselves and with each other slowly bust down as Alphabet begins to spring into something more resemble a group of fellow pilots — if not quite friends yet — thanks to a little help from the book of account ’s closest thing to a Star Wars “ renown appearance ” in Star Wars Rebels’General Hera Syndulla , is a joy , even if Alphabet Squadron sinks its meat hooks into you by having its lead be so funnily remote and , at time , casually unlikeable .
Yrica on the cover of Alphabet Squadron.Image: Jeff Langevin
But because it ’s done with such a measured glide slope , it feel more earned than most other Star Wars taradiddle about mass being shove together in the melting pot of astronomical polite war . You ’re not quite rooting for all of them by the rule book ’s last act , but you ’re empower enough to care about whether their next mission will institutionalise them hurtling out into the void of infinite to their death .
You ’ll notice I ’ve not mentioned one specific Alphabet Squadron star just yet — its cover song “ hero , ” Yrica Quell , eventual pilot of the team ’s tenner - Wing . She ’s the quality Alphabet Squadron spend the most time getting into the headspace of , and for skillful reason : she ’s a enthralling spin on a trope Star Wars isall too familiarwith underserving .
Yrica ’s intriguing frame-up , and the cause for concern that head to her bristling with many of the New Republic ship’s officer and fellow pilots she meet throughout the Quran , is that she is a deserter from Shadow Wing , and more specifically , someone who only defected after the end of the Second Death Star . Although horrify by the genuine cruelties of the Empire , she ’s a fair sex who was n’t really endanger to it , with a calling in safeguard rapture from pirates rather than hunting down Rebel scum . But her distinctly Imperial sensibilities and her only - recent defection means that Yrica spend most of the playscript on the back foot , deeply distrusted by the people she ’s signed up to fight alongside . And Yrica has good rationality to be uneasy of the New Republic , incertain if she ’s doing the right thing as she is forced to cultivate with masses out for their own gains rather than the allegedly noble cause they all think in .
Shadow Wing strikes in its own Marvel spinoff series.Image: Giuseppe Camuncoli and Elia Bonetti (Marvel Comics)
Typically , Star Wars treats its Imperial defector with only a momentary period of malaise before they ’re immediately embraced into the champion ’s crimp — see Iden Versio and her friend in Battlefront II for aparticularly jarring example — regardless of anterior action . Yrica ’s distrustfulness among her fresh allies is leave to linger and occasionally fester to fascinating effect , and when conflate with her own worked up distance and personal traumas , she make for a focal point character that is , at fourth dimension , distinctly hard to connect to ( but not in a means that is offputting ) . Even as Freed delve into her headspace more and the al-Qur’an commence getting beyond the team - building stages , there ’s still some mill about dubiousness not just for the lecturer , but for Yrica herself , if she ’s really on the side of the holy person now . It ’s a eccentric discharge with an machination that is only matched with the refreshing nature with which Yrica ’s past with Shadow Wing is treat , and makes Alphabet Squadron ’s distinctly measured footstep and density worth take through .
But after all the fascinating fiber body of work with Yrica and the squad , it ’s in reality in the Squadron ’s foil that Alphabet is at its faint — which is a pity , given that , if we ’re continuing to make ecstasy - Wing parallels ( which we are , we always will be , Wraith Squadron constantly , etc . ) , those book give our grand cowcatcher excellent villains to go up against in Isard and Warlord Zsinj . The shadowy specters of Alphabet ’s target , Yrica ’s former Imperial building block Shadow Wing , make for a compelling scourge at multiplication — especially in the early stages of the book as they unrelentingly pick at New Republic ships and starfighter wings pilot by cowcatcher , bring home the bacon a lingering apprehension that is really unnerving .
But they ’re a mostly faceless one , with few standout characters to match our cast of complex and miscellaneous ‘ heroes’—so their scourge does n’t really develop into a sincerely personal scrap for Alphabet to deal with , even with several members of the squad have very personal reasons to block off them . Maybe it ’s because of the novel’sweird Marvel draw - in , with the comic pick up the quagmire and focusing exclusively on Shadow Wing itself ( and Yrica ’s metre in the unit ) before the case of the novel . Maybe it ’s because , sleep with we ’ve get another two books on the mode , Freed just chose to put the character dramatic play spotlight on his broken supporter as they undertake to pull their myriad pieces together with their Modern allies .
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But whatever the ground — I’m hoping it ’s more like the latter than the former , because “ everything ’s link ” nature ofDisney ’s Star Warscanon apart , you should n’t have to say a comic book to make the novel you otherwise purchased feel more complete — it ’s a gambit that mostly pays off for Alphabet Squadron ’s first sortie .
Shadow Wing itself might not be more than a faceless threat quite yet , but the dysfunctional , discredited ACE of this new Starfighter Squadron are some of the most compelling young additions to the Star Wars canon in late year , and I ca n’t await to see where their mission takes them yet .
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