Comic review: Kanan- The Last Padawan #1: Departing One Direction member pops up in Star Wars

Writer: Greg Weisman
Artist: Pepe Larraz
Publisher: Marvel (Disney)
Released: 1st April 2015

I’m not going to get too upset with this one. I had the feeling that it would be bad, but you have to give things a chance, right?

You can’t stop yourself from trying out new things, because then you’d never be surprised when things are actually decent. Marvel is pretty bad these days, but that doesn’t mean that they will always be bad. They might be a part of the dehumanising corporate new world order machine, but they have individuals working for them, and my hope in the power of the individual hasn’t completely eroded yet.

I picked up this book for a number of reasons. Firstly, it’s Star Wars, and I used to like Star Wars, when it was good. Secondly, I didn’t know the writer (I’m always interested in checking out new writers), and thirdly, I’d never heard of the Kanan character.

So who is this Kanan bloke? He’s a pretty boy Jedi who is flying around the galaxy with his cool team of hipsters. He has a ponytail, douche bag goatee beard and he doesn’t appear to own a T-shirt. Actually, looking at him again he kind of reminds me of that bloke who quit One Direction last week. Okay, so that kind of sucks so far.

What is his story about? It’s mainly a flashback sequence to the days where his Mum was training him to be a Jedi. She’s not really his Mum, she’s actually a Jedi master, but let’s face it, she’s his Mum. The story is a bit dull and appears to be about discovering who this Kanan pretty boy is as a character, what makes him tick and all of that other back-story stuff that is really intriguing, just as long as you don’t know too much about it.

This title is going to follow Kanan’s very recent past (He looks about seventeen years old), and milk it until every ounce of mystique (he doesn’t have much anyway) is completely drained from the character. We’ll see the tragic death of his Mommy/Jedi, and other cliché stuff that will helpfully rid the narrative of any boring old people and leave the schoolboy superstar free to roam the galaxy having adventures with his buddies whilst acting like a cool, interesting and tortured young hipster.

Are you interested in any of that? If you are, then buy the book. I’d think that (and this is just a guess) this story MIGHT appeal to very young girls who like boybands. That could be the audience, not that young girls read comic books in huge numbers though, so that could be a problem. Perhaps it could appeal to soft comic book readers types who don’t like to think, and instead prefer to have detailed character portrayals of third string Star Wars poseurs who fly around the galaxy showing off their abs and tribal tats to all of the pretty alien girls out there?

That can’t be a big audience, can it? Aggghhh, what do I know? Somebody out there must be enjoying this soft, testosterone free ride into irrelevance. I don’t get bent out of shape when I read a book like this. It’s just Marvel comics pushing out another 'Star Wars' product. It's neither inspired, nor interesting. It has no connection to anything real, and the story is formulaic, flat and pedestrian, that’s all.

I get a bit confused about who is actually reading and enjoying something as tame as this, but that doesn’t mean that there’s not somebody out there who loves every page of it. If we met we wouldn’t have anything to talk about, that’s for sure. She would say something like; ‘It was really cool.’ I’d be nice, and wouldn’t even bother trying to explain why it isn’t. It’s just another boring Marvel comic book, and not worthy of my time.


Rating: 3/10 (Dull book about a Star Wars boy-band character)