Legends Never Die: The Last Command

1993 capped off Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy with The Last Command. Grand Admiral Thrawn has acquired most of the Katana Fleet Dreadnaughts and thanks to the Imperial storehouse he found in Heir to the Empire, has an army of rapidly-grown clone soldiers to bolster his forces. While he prepares for a grand offensive against the New Republic.

Luke Skywalker investigates the nature of the clones and encounters the now-allied Noghri. Leia gives birth to twins: Jaina and Jacen Solo. Talon Karrde tries to form a Smuggler's Alliance for mutual protection among freelancers from the Empire. Niles Ferrier bites off more than he can chew. Joruus C'Baoth finally goes off the deep end. Disgraced senator Borsk Fey'lya finally does something productive. Garm Bel Iblis and Mon Mothma put their grudge aside. Leia, her assistant Winter and Talon Karrde's ace slicer (hacker) Ghent uncover the information leak on Coruscant. Mara Jade takes several hard looks at where her life has gone and where she wants it to go.

There's much that could be said about the book, but that would ruin the experience of reading it, and read it you should. Thrawn's cleverness is on display with some of his most creative tricks, and Bel Iblish shows just how capable he is of keeping up with the Grand Admiral.

Not to sound like a broken record, but the action, the character interactions, the traveling, the big crazy ideas that populate the galaxy, EVERYTHING oozes Star Wars in the best possible ways and the final showdown with C'Baoth is supremely satisfying in a variety of ways.

So, since that was a fairly short review of the book itself (by necessity, since otherwise it would involve spoilers) let's talk about strong female characters in the Expanded Universe.

There were a hell of a lot of them.

Zahn's trilogy in particular sets a very high bar since essentially every female he introduces is a supremely competent badass in multiple ways. Mara Jade is the biggest example: a wanderer coasting along the fringe after her life as the Emperor's Hand (A spy and assassin trained in the Force) abruptly ended, she gets drawn back into conflict and the echoing last command of Emperor Palpatine ordering her to KILL LUKE SKYWALKER. Through it all she undergoes significant character development, reconnecting with the Force and rethinking her hatred of Skywalker. She's her own woman, with her own goals and motivations, but makes an exceptionally good adventuring partner with Luke as the more cynical of the two. Mara was so popular among fans that Lucafilm eventually actually went and hired a real model to dress as the character and official art would use her face/appearance as reference material. As far as heroes that the Expanded Universe added to the Star Wars franchise, the woman named Mara Jade sits uncontested at the top. 

Leia Organa Solo's aide, best friend, and long time rebel intelligence agent Winter is another strong addition. A fellow Alderaanian with stark white hair and a perfect memory, she appears here as a side character helping Leia out with intelligence gathering and data sorting, but the character would end up appearing quite a lot in other materials and grow into her own (especially in the X-Wing series).

Even Garm Bel Iblis' two most trusted subordinates are women: Sena and Irenez (who feature most prominently in Dark Force Rising). Then there's Shada D'ukal, a very small role who's introduced as a space pirate's arm candy, but ends up being a deadly hired bodyguard in a firefight. Let's not forget Leia herself, negotiating the defection of a race hell-bent on honoring their debt to the Empire while she's heavily pregnant with twins.

While they're all some flavor of “badass warrior lady” each one's different and has different areas of skill and different flaws. Its great stuff, and the vast number of clickbait thinkpieces out there saying that “Star Wars FINALLY has a Strong Female Character in a lead role!” are, frankly, insulting to anyone who's ever dipped even a toe into Star Wars past the movies. These are good characters. Strong characters. Strong female characters, and they're being completely erased by a new continuity and a “Narrative” that can only assert itself by dumping what came before into the Memory Hole.

But yeah, read the Thrawn Trilogy. Its good Star Wars. Essential Tier, all the way through. 

Legends Never Die: Dark Force Rising

1992 brought us Dark Force Rising, the second book of Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy. Slightly generic title aside, it expands on the previous entry and further expands the lore and setting of the nascent Expanded Universe by dipping into relics from the Old Republic.

At this point, both the New Republic and Grand Admiral Thrawn's Imperial remnant are bloodied and looking for an edge in their fight. The NR is aware that there is an information leak, and Han Solo suspects the shifty Bothan senator Borsk Fey'lya and his Spynet connections and Lando goes along for the ride.

Meanwhile, Luke Skywalker is drawn to a planet where the mad clone Jedi Joruus C'Baoth is waiting for him, claiming to want to teach him. Luke soon realizes that C'Baoth is incredibly powerful and also a budding tyrant and wants to help heal his damaged mind. C'Baoth's goal at the moment is to train Luke, Leia and her unborn twins as Jedi molded by his fractured mind.

Meanwhiler, smuggler baron Talon Karrde is on the run after Thrawn learned of his duplicitousness. Karrde is eventually captured and imprisoned by the Admiral because he knows where a large supply of valuable warships are hidden. Mara Jade tracks down Luke and helps him shake off C'Baoth's mind tricks. Like it or not, she needs his help rescuing Karrde.

Meanwhiler-er, a very, very pregnant Leia travels with Chewie & Threepio to Honoghr, the planet of the Noghri that have been trying to capture her to try and win them over to the New Republic.

Meanwhilest, Han & Lando stumble upon a ghost: a Corellian Senator who's long been thought dead named Garm Bel Iblis. Not only is Garm alive and well, he's been running his own splinter Rebellion against the Empire after splitting off from Mon Mothma over ideological differences. Bel Iblis is a tactical genius and has a line on some long-lost warships, but he's not one to rejoin the New Republic without some serious convincing.

It all ends in a race to find the location of a fleet of fabled Dreadnaught-class heavy cruisers called the Katana Fleet.

This is going to be a broken record, but Book 2 continues to do what Heir to the Empire did so very well: Grand space opera in the vein of the original Trilogy. World-hopping, action, tactical genius, new technologies, and adventure.

Of the two major new characters, Garm Bel Iblis fits into a kind of character archetype that Zahn is fond of: the highly intelligent master planner. Talon Karrde & Thrawn are both extensions of that. This is fine, since Zahn does them very well and differentiates their personalities and areas of expertise, but there are a lot of clever bastards populating this book.

This is balanced out by the other new character: Lowbrow ship thief Niles Ferrier. Ferrier is a scumbag who's only really good at one thing: stealing starships, and Thrawn wants him to find ships for the Empire. Unfortunately Ferrier thinks he can hang with the big boys, and fancies himself a master schemer. Amusingly enough, he's not.

Before I say “Its a good book, read it if you like Star Wars” I think there's room to discuss a few established characters.

Leia goes behind enemy lines to do what she does best: diplomacy. She's able to go into hostile territory protected by secrecy and her heritage as Darth Vader's daughter. Spoiler: she succeeds, without firing a shot and while heavily pregnant. Its remarkably well handled and shows just how powerful and essential to the New Republic Leia is.

Next, is Luke. Being a Jedi, Luke fights a lot, but this trilogy really hammers home the idea that its only ever as a last resort. Knowledge and Defense, never Attack, that sort of thing. Even when he learns that C'Baoth is completely mad, he doesn't want to kill him. He wants to help him, not kill him. Luke is a capital-G Good Guy, and has the skill and wisdom to pull it off exceptionally.

Dark Force Rising continues to be Essential Tier for the Expanded Universe.

Legends Never Die: Heir to the Empire

A survey of the Expanded Universe really ought to start with Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy. Published in 1991 by Bantam Spectra, the first book, Heir to the Empire, ushered in the Expanded Universe proper after a long period of dormancy where the only new Star Wars material being released was for the roleplaying game by West End Games.

Zahn was an established Sci-Fi author by this point, having won a Hugo Award (back when that still meant something) and created a Space Opera series of his own with the Cobra trilogy. (Not that Cobra) In the course of writing this trilogy, he worked closely with West End Games, and incorporated a lot of supplemental material into the books, establishing a cross-pollination between different products. It would take more new stories to start forming the true EU, but this was the keystone, and it was a huge success.

The setup is this: Five years after Return of the Jedi, the fledgling New Republic is struggling against a sudden surge of Imperial resistance. Said resistance comes from Grand Admiral Thrawn, an imposing blue-skinned, red-eyed near-human alien who has returned from the Unknown Regions to find the Empire in tatters and he is determined to right that ship.

Thrawn has limited resources and manpower, so he resorts to brilliant tactics and intel from a deep cover spy known only as “Delta Source” to attack against “the Rebels,” until he discovers the planet Wayland and one of the Emperor's hidden vaults guarded by a powerful, but insane cloned Jedi.

Meanwhile, Luke Skywalker has a final visit from Obi-Wan Kenobi's spirit urging him stay vigilant against the Dark Side and promises that he will find new allies. Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa Solo, now pregnant with twins, are busy flying around the galaxy doing diplomatic work when strange gray aliens repeatedly attack them, intent on capturing Leia specifically. Leia also has to deal with intrigue in the government as the stalwart Admiral Ackbar butts heads with the slippery Bothan senator, Borsk Fey'lya. Han is trying to make inroads into the smuggler scene to set up freelance supply lines that the New Republic badly needs, which leads him to smuggler baron Talon Karrde, a man who's risen to prominence in the wake of Jabba's death.

After a disastrous encounter with an Interdictor cruiser, Luke comes into an uneasy alliance with Karrde. Intelligent and urbane, Karrde's real stock in trade is information, and he knows more about Thrawn than he's willing to let the New Republic have for free. Karrde also has a mysterious lieutenant, Mara Jade, who wants nothing more in the world than to kill Luke Skywalker. Mara was the Emperor's Hand, a Force sensitive assassin and spy that answered only to Palpatine. The Emperor's death effectively destroyed her life. Naturally, she and Luke have to survive a hostile forest together.

Meanwhile, Lando Calrissian has a new business venture that is promptly raided by Thrawn, and the mole miners stolen from Lando are used in a climactic space battle where the Empire cleverly attempts to use the miners to board and capture New Republic capital ships to steal them. The New Republic repels them, but at significant cost to their own drydocked fleet.

Meanwhile, Leia and Chewie capture one of her would-be kidnappers and learn he's a Noghri, a species of lethal hunters who were sworn to serve their “savior” Darth Vader. Moreover, Khabarakh, the captured Noghri, calls Leia the Mal'ary'ush, the Lady Vader, and agrees to the dangerous prospect of negotiations with his race.

Heir to the Empire is amazing. It captures the grand space opera themes and the world-hopping pulp that the Star Wars Trilogy was built on. The pace is rocket fast and never lingers too long on mundane drudgery. The heroes are in character and growing as people. Luke is maturing as a Jedi. Leia is swamped by matters of state and imminent motherhood. Han is chafing with respectability but growing into it. Lando is up to his old entrepreneurial tricks.

The new characters are fine additions. Thrawn is the obvious standout, since he's a deliberate contrast to Vader's rage and Palpatine's gleeful tyranny. Thrawn isn't so much a “villain” as he is an antagonist. He wants order in the galaxy and sees the Rebellion (he refuses to acknowledge the New Republic by title) as rampant, violent chaos that must be quelled. His effectiveness is based on an analytical mind that would make Mycroft Holmes jealous, and he has weaponized art history as a means of studying species to find their weaknesses. Thrawn is, however, still an antagonist, and while reasonable and intelligent, he is unbending and cold with regards to his enemies. He has no interest in negotiating with the New Republic. He wants them beaten down.

The viewpoint character for Thrawn is his second-in-command, Captain Pellaeon. Pellaeon is an old veteran who served back in the late Republic and into the Empire. A competent commander, but lacking in innovation, he was the one who took command at Endor after the Emperor's death and sounded the retreat to cut the Navy's losses. Pellaeon doesn't really get what Thrawn's doing all the time, but he trusts him implicitly, and is another believer in re-establishing law and order in the galaxy.

Joruus C'Baoth, the mad Jedi clone, isn't evil in the direct sense, nor is he related to the Sith in any way. He's clearly powerful and possesses wild mood swings, but wishes to impose order as well, though with him at the top deciding what that means. He's something of a Jedi supremacist, where he sees those with the ability to use the Force as the top of the food chain. He and Thrawn butt heads frequently, but Thrawn has access to ysalmiri, little lizards that create bubbles where the Force can't work, that can keep C'Baoth in check.

Talon Karrde is something of a combination of Han and Lando. Hands-on, but with a very strong organization sense that makes his smuggler group one of the most reputable out there. He's smart and has contingency plans, and he doesn't like being caught between the Empire and the New Republic, so he tries to play off both sides. Mara too, doesn't like being caught between the two factions and simply wanted to find a peaceful place for herself when Luke Skywalker comes walking into her life and the romantic tension that follows.

The characters are great. The action sequences are good, and the grand sweeping scope is everything you could want in a Star Wars story that builds on where Return of the Jedi ended. There's a reason why people clamored for years to turn this into a sequel movie trilogy.

Its damn good, and an essential read for anyone looking at getting into the Expanded Universe.

Essential Tier