Star Trek: Discovery (2017) TV Show Review

 Hey everyone, happy Friday! I'm back with another TV show review. This week I'm taking a look at Star Trek: Discovery, the show that took the franchise off life support, and brought it back to our TV screens on a weekly basis, as the series finale dropped yesterday. As for spoilers, well, I'm going to try not to include them in this review, but I might have to include some in order to talk about certain characters, like Burnham, Tilly, and Saru. So, let's get into it.

When it first debuted on Sunday, September 24th, 2017, Star Trek: Discovery was an experiment. At that point Star Trek had been off the air for about 12 and a half years, and very little had come out to keep the franchise in the eyes of the general public, aside for three movies that had come out in 2009, 2013, and 2016 respectively, which took place in an alternate universe within the broader Star Trek Universe. But the TV show side of the franchise had ended back in 2005 when UPN and Paramount had canceled Star Trek: Enterprise unceremoniously. At the same time, television was shifting from the broadcast model that had been the standard since the 1950s, to streaming with Netflix rising to prominence with House of Cards, Orange is the New Black, Marvel's Daredevil, Marvel's Jessica Jones, and Stranger Things being the most popular shows being produced. Cable television had also risen to prominence over the old network model thanks to shows like Game of Thrones.

With Star Trek being absent from any kind of television, outside of constant reruns of all five past live action TV series, for over a decade, the question on everyone's mind was: Could Star Trek be brought into the modern streaming model and be as successful as it had been on broadcast television from 1987 to 2005, or would it flop in the face of the change in pop culture, particularly with the rise of superhero TV shows and movies in the early 2010s? Leading up to the debut of Discovery in 2017, there was no guarantee that enough people would care enough for the show to be worth making, given that Star Trek tended to be a pretty expensive franchise when it came to the TV side of things. Especially because the movies were making less and less money at the box office as each one had come out.

While they had their problems, as any early seasons of a TV show has, I enjoyed the first two seasons of Discovery. They were well written, and even though I do prefer the more ensemble cast shows like TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Strange New Worlds, Discovery's approach by having more focus on three or four main characters, and then maintaining those same three or four characters in every season (unlike how Picard handled its rotating cast in all three seasons a few years later), worked pretty well. Except in the second season when they killed off a character that we were supposed to care about, but ended up not caring about because they didn't do anything with her except in the episode where she'd been killed.

Michael Burnham, played by the lovely Sonequa Martin Green, was one of my favourite characters in the entire show. She started off as the first officer of the U.S.S. Shenzhou, commanded by Captain Phillippa Georgiou, played by the amazing Michelle Yeoh. But after an encounter with the Klingon Empire that resulted in the destruction of the Shenzhou and the death of Georgiou, as well as a major war between the Federation and the Klingons, she was court martialed, stripped of rank, and sent to the U.S.S. Discovery, commanded by Captain Gabriel Lorca, to assist in the development of the top secret Spore Drive, which made Discovery an asset to Starfleet, as well as a major target for the Klingons, as well as other nefarious beings like Harry Mudd, played by Rainn Wilson.

What drew me to Burnham was that she wasn't perfect. Throughout the franchise's history, Star Trek always tended to focus on the perfect characters. The Picards, the Rikers, the Kirks, and the rest of Starfleet's heroic crews throughout the 23rd and 24th Centuries. Over the course of the series, Michael made mistakes and poor decisions, but she learned from those mistakes and grew as a character. Which was really refreshing because even on DS9, each character could only grow within the boundaries of who they were. Bashir was still Bashir, Quark was still Quark, Odo was still Odo etc. But with Michael and the rest of the characters on Discovery, they evolved and changed until they were very different people from where we met them in the show's third and fourth episodes. Which I appreciated.

My other favourite characters on Discovery, who are in every season, are Saru, played by Doug Jones, the man of a thousand faces though you rarely see his own face in a movie or on TV, Sylvia Tilly, played by Mary Wiseman, Dr. Hugh Culber, played by Wilson Cruz, and his husband, Paul Stamets, played by Anthony Rapp. Along with Michael, these characters formed the nucleus of the cast of the show and their development over the course of the show's five seasons were what kept me coming back to the show every season. I also enjoyed Keyla Detmer, played by Emily Coutts, and Joann Owosekun, played by Oyin Oladejo, and Adira Tal, played by Blu Del Barrio, and Cleveland Booker, played by David Ajala.

The first couple of seasons were rocky because the show was written by committee, and there was a committee of showrunners as well. Particularly after Bryan Fuller was fired as showrunner midway through production of season 1. But, once Michelle Paradise took over as the sole showrunner in season 3, in order to allow Alex Kurtzman and Akiva Goldsman to produce other Star Trek shows, things really began to take off. Seasons 4 and 5 were the strongest seasons of the entire show. Unlike the other modern Star Trek shows, which all had ten episodes per season from the start, Discovery started off with fifteen episodes in season 1, 14 episodes in season 2, 13 episodes in seasons 3 and 4, and then 10 episodes in season 5. The first two seasons came out before the big streaming service boom of 2019 when Disney+, HBO Max, and DC Universe debuted (among others), and most streaming shows still had twelve to fifteen episodes per season. By the time Picard debuted in early 2020, shows were starting to have smaller episode counts per season, with The Mandalorian having only eight episodes per season. 

As I said in the beginning of this review, Discovery was an experiment and it was a huge success. It ushered in a new golden age of the franchise on TV, with Paramount experimenting with animation, something that hadn't been attempted with the franchise since the early, post-TOS, days in the '70s. Even though we still don't have a new Star Trek movie coming out anytime soon, except for the upcoming TV movie, Section 31, we've had a couple of years where there four or five shows on throughout the year. Which is both incredible and insane for a franchise like Star Trek. 

Overall, despite it's rocky start with the show being written by committee, I really enjoyed Discovery, and I'm going to miss it now that it's over. If you've never seen Star Trek: Discovery before, I implore you to give it a watch. It wasn't always great, but when it was great, it was REALLY great. It's on Paramount+, AND the first four seasons are available on both DVD and Blu-ray, so it's relatively easy to get your hands on it.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for this week. I'll be back next week with lots more blog posts. So until then have a great evening and a wonderful weekend and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Superboy #1 (1990) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I'm back with another comic book review. This week I'm taking a look at the first issue of Superboy from 1990. Unlike the previous Superboy comic book series, this series isn't part of the main DC continuity. Instead it's based on the 1988 TV series starring John Haymes Newton (season 1) and Gerard Christopher (seasons 2-4) as Clark Kent/Superboy, Stacy Haiduk as Lana Lang, and Scott James Wells (season 1) and Sherman Howard (seasons 2-4) as Lex Luthor. Let's get right into it.

DC Comics was no stranger to doing comic books based on TV shows as they'd done comics based on the Star Trek franchise since 1984, and would go on to do comics based on various animated, and live action, TV show adaptations of DC Comics properties right up to present day. So it's no surprise that they did a comic book based on Superboy/The Adventures of Superboy, given that it was the longest running live action TV show based on a DC Comics character since Adventures of Superman ended after six seasons in 1958, as Batman, Wonder Woman, and Shazam! all ended after three seasons in the '60s and '70s.

I picked this issue up at a flea market that Brad and I went to on Saturday, the same one that I got the Clueless DVD at, and it was actually a big surprise as I'd never seen an issue of this series before. I knew it existed thanks to research on various DC titles over the years, but I'd never come across an issue before. So when I saw it in one of the long boxes that the flea market had, I grabbed it as it was $2 per issue. It's actually really good. I'm not familiar with the issue's writer, John Moore, but I do know Jim Mooney's work from various Batman and Superman comics from the '50s and '60s. I'm also familiar with Ty Templeton's work as he did alot of work on The Batman Adventures and The Batman & Robin Adventures comics based on Batman: The Animated Series throughout the early to mid '90s.

This issue acts as a prequel to the TV show, as it shows Clark and Lana leaving Smallville to head to Schuster University in Florida. I don't know if the entire comic book series is a prequel to the show, or if it's just this issue. Like with Star Trek in 1966, Superboy aired its first chronological episode as the series's fifth episode, where Superboy has his first public appearance, so it's likely this issue is the prequel, and then the rest of the series continues on in tandem with the TV show. Though I have no idea how far into the show the comic gets given that by the time this issue came out, the show was already halfway through its second season and the comic ran for 22 issues, ending in 1992, shortly before the TV show ended its fourth and final season. 

This is a good issue. I haven't seen a ton of the show, but I have seen at least an episode or two, so this was a great lead in to the TV show. However, because Clark and Lana resemble their comic book counterparts more than they do Gerard Christopher (or John Haymes Newton) and Stacy Haiduk, and T.J. White (Perry White's son in the show) isn't from the main DC continuity, this could easily have been on another Earth, if the Multiverse hadn't been erased during Crisis on Infinite Earths only five years earlier. So if you didn't know the TV show, you could still read this issue and get something out of it as a fan of Superman. 

Like I said, this issue covers Clark and Lana's departure from Smallville and their change into the characters they are in the TV show. Which is interesting, because it feels like a transition from the comic to the TV show. The story feels like a mix of John Byrne's Superman origin story, Superman: The Man of Steel, which was Superman's modern origin at the time this issue came out, and Geoff Johns's Superman: Secret Origins from 2009, which was 19 years away at this point. Still though there were elements of both stories in this issue, even if those elements were on a much smaller scale than either of those stories are.

Overall, I really enjoyed this issue. I'd recommend it, but given how long it took me to find a copy, and the fact that it's not in any collected edition, I'd say there's a very slim chance of finding a copy, in any condition. I got lucky on Saturday for sure. If you do find a copy though, I do recommend reading it. Even if you've never seen the TV show it's based on.

Alright my friends, that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for my review of Star Trek: Discovery season 5 and my thoughts on the series as a whole now that it's complete, with the series finale having dropped on Paramount+ today, with it airing on CTV Sci-Fi Channel here in Canada tonight at 9 pm. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Zack (1998) Book Review

 Hey everyone, I'm back with another book review. This one is a bit more obscure, as it's by a Canadian author named William Bell, and I honestly don't know how well known he is outside of Canada. So let's get into it.

Published in 1998, Zack is about a teenager named Zack, who is a mix of black and white and doesn't fit into the more intolerant small town of Fergus, Ontario. After discovering relics from the American Revolution in his backyard, Zack decides to travel to Natchez, Mississippi to meet his maternal grandfather, whom he'd never met due to his mom having a falling out with him after she married a white man. But, what he finds isn't at all what Zack expected or even wanted to find.

That's a quick summary of this book, because, like I said, it's pretty obscure. I first got it as a graduation/get well present from my grade 8 teacher in the summer of 2001 while I was stuck at home after having surgery on my right knee to remove the growth plates to prevent my right leg from growing even longer than it already was compared to my left leg. It became one of my favourite books as a teenager and I've read it numerous times in the last 23 years since it was given to me.

The book is written in first person, so we get all of Zack's thoughts, feelings and memories, and I really like him as a character. His feelings about getting dragged out of the city to the middle of nowhere are valid. Especially when there aren't as many black people in their new town. Yet, he also feels like a petulant child with the way he behaves towards his parents in the beginning of the book. Especially for someone who is 18 years old. I get it though. I also handled certain situations with my parents in less than stellar ways when I was 18.

While we see their relationship begin, we don't spend alot of time with Zack and his girlfriend, Jen. Especially in the back end of the novel as Zack takes his trip to visit his grandfather. Jen is pretty cool though and takes things in stride when there's a bit of tension between her and Zack after her cousin's racist comment in the park scene in the first quarter of the book. But otherwise the relationship isn't the focus of this book. Which is interesting for a teen book published in the late '90s.

I don't have alot more to say about this book. It won a couple of Canadian literature awards in 1999, but it wasn't one of those bestselling novels like Bridge to Terabithia or anything like that. I honestly still enjoy reading it though, even though I'm 20 years past the demographic this book was aimed at. 

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more blog posts. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Clueless (1995) Movie Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? Did you have a good weekend? I had a pretty great one. I didn't have D&D but I went to a flea market in Winchester on Saturday with my best friend where I picked up a few comics from the '80s and '90s and a few classic movies on DVD, Blu-ray, and VHS. One of the movies I picked up on DVD was Clueless from 1995, which is what I'm here to review for you today. So let's get into it.

Released on Wednesday, July 19th, 1995, Clueless is one of the most popular movies to come out in the 1990s. It's also a movie that has never been done again. In the '80s, you had movies like Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Revenge of the Nerds, Porky's, The Goonies, and John Hughes movies like The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Weird Science. Then in the late '90s and early 2000s the pendulum swung back the other way and you ended up with movies like American Pie, Eurotrip, and Road Trip. So to have a movie like Clueless, that isn't a wholesome Disney movie in the mid '90s is almost an anomaly. As writer and director, Amy Heckerling, who directed Fast Times at Ridgemont High in 1982 and National Lampoon's European Vacation in 1985, Clueless is a fantasy. It was never meant to reflect real life. Which is really how the movie feels when you actually sit down to watch it.

A loose adaptation of the 1815 novel, Emma, by Jane Austen, Clueless was originally developed as a TV pilot for 20th Century Fox Television by Amy Heckerling. However, after Heckerling's agent read the script, he suggested that she make it into a feature film. She did but Fox executives passed on it, fearing that boys wouldn't go see it because the film focused on girls. So the movie went into turnaround, which means that the film could be sold to another studio during its development stage. Once producer Scott Rudin got his hands on the script, a bidding war for it began. Heckerling chose Paramount because, not only did they have the highest bid, but they owned MTV and Nickelodeon, and they were hugely successful with the demographic Heckerling wanted Clueless to be aimed at.

The cast of this movie is chalk full of actors and actresses that I'm familiar with. Of course there's Alicia Silverstone as Cher Horowitz, the lead character. While Alicia wasn't in anything major during my teen years, I've seen her in Batman & Robin, where she played Batgirl, and she starred alongside Brendan Fraser in Blast from the Past (1999), which I own on DVD but haven't watched yet. Then there's Paul Rudd. I swear that guy hasn't aged a day since this movie came out 29 years ago. Aside from a bit of gray in his hair, he looks the same now in movies like Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire as he did back then. I'm not as familiar with the rest of the main cast. The only ones I'm pretty familiar with are Breckin Meyer, who appeared in alot of movies in the 2000s like Road Trip, Josie and the Pussycats, and Garfield: The Movie as Jon Arbuckle. I forgot that he'd also been in Herbie Fully Loaded. I haven't seen any of the other movies that Brittany Murphy had been in, but I remember her from the commercials for Just Married and 8 Mile in the early 2000s. Wallace Shawn is probably the actor I know the best given that he's been in so many movies and TV shows that I've seen and really enjoyed like The Princess Bride, the Toy Story franchise, A Goofy Movie, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as the Ferengi Grand Nagus, Zek, and as Sheldon's mentor, Dr. John Sturgis on Young Sheldon. And then there's Donald Faison who I know as Turk on Scrubs, as various voices on Robot Chicken, and as Booster Gold in the final season of DC's Legends of Tomorrow.

One of the things that impressed me about this movie is how positive it is. Cher (Silverstone), Dionne (Stacey Dash), and Tai (Murphy) aren't at each other's throats, even when Cher and Tai have a bit of a falling out near the end of the movie over Josh (Rudd), it wasn't this big conflict the way you'd see it in movies like She's All That (1999) or Mean Girls (2004). Which is very different for movies set in the '90s, as the late '90s would start to bring about that meanness that was dominant on TV and in movies in the early 2000s. 

One of my favourite scenes in the movie is when Dionne, who is learning to drive, Cher, and Murray, Dionne's boyfriend, played by Donald Faison, are in the car, and they end up on the freeway somehow. The girls are screaming and when the giant truck is behind them Murray starts screaming like he's in a horror movie. It's hilarious because even here in Canada, there are some drivers who avoid the four laned highways (our freeways I guess you'd call them) unless they don't have any other choice.

I also find it interesting that it popularized the Valley speak that was prevalent in the '90s, particularly on shows like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and the original English dub of Sailor Moon. In fact modern day speech has kept many of those phrases, such as "as if!" and "Whatever!". But the fact that the movie influenced language AND fashion says alot about the movie itself. It's iconic.

The comedy is also pretty hilarious. It's mostly alot of one-liners and quips, but they're hilarious. For example in the gym scene just before Tai is introduced, Amber, who is Cher's rival, played by Elisa Donovan, who played Sabrina's friend, Morgan in seasons 5-7 of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, says to the gym teacher, "Ms. Stoeger, my plastic surgeon doesn't want me doing any activity where balls fly at my nose." and Dionne chimes in with, "Well there goes your social life.". There are tons of lines like that which are hilarious, and you really feel the friendship between the characters. Which is also unusual in movies like this at the time. 

The soundtrack for the movie is pretty good. I like the songs, but, with the exception of "Kids in America", which had a cover by the Canadian alternative rock duo, Len, for Digimon: The Movie in 2000, I've never heard any of the songs in this movie before. They're totally perfect for the movie, but, I'd never heard them before. Which is crazy because alot of the time I hear songs from a movie's soundtrack long before I've seen the movie. Like with Flashdance, Dirty Dancing, and The Breakfast Club, among others. Especially when a movie was as successful and popular as Clueless was.

While I've never owned it on VHS, I'm pretty sure I've seen Clueless before I watched it last night. So, on Thursday night, the VHS Club Video Podcast did an episode on this movie, which was cool, as I'd heard of it, and was pretty sure I'd watched it on TV before at some point in the 2000s after I'd gotten my TV/VCR combo set for my 16th birthday in 2002. By sheer luck I found the 2005 "Whatever!" Edition DVD at the flea market that Brad and I went to on Saturday, so I bought it and ended up watching the bonus features on Saturday night, and then I sat down and watched the movie last night for this review. The bonus features are great and go really indepth on the creation and writing of the movie. Unfortunately Alicia Silverstone doesn't appear on any of the bonus features outside of archive footage from when the movie was being filmed in late 1994/early 1995. Which is interesting because she did appear in the bonus features on the 2-disc Special Edition DVD for Batman & Robin, which came out a little bit after this DVD for Clueless had been released. I suspect that she couldn't do these bonus features since they were probably filming them around the time that WB was filming the bonus features for the Batman movie DVDs, including Batman & Robin.

About a year after the movie was released, ABC began airing a TV show based on the movie as part of their TGIF Friday night comedy lineup, with Amy Heckerling producing it. Donald Faison, Stacey Dash, Elisa Donovan, Twink Caplan (she played Ms. Geist in the movie), and Wallace Shawn reprised their roles from the movie, while Paul Rudd, Brittany Murphy, and Breckin Meyer were cast in other roles in the show rather than their characters from the movie. Their characters, along with Alicia Silverstone's character, Cher, were recast for the series, with Rachel Blanchard (Are You Afraid of the Dark?, 7th Heaven) replacing Alicia Silverstone as Cher. The show debuted on September 20th, 1996, a week before Sabrina the Teenage Witch debuted. However the ratings weren't great, so the series moved to UPN for two additional seasons, after the end of the first season. I vaguely remember seeing commercials for this show when I was a kid, but I didn't really pay much attention to it.

There was also a series of novels published by Simon & Schuster from 1995 until 1999. The first several books showed the movie versions of the characters on the covers, but by the 11th book came out in 1996, the versions from the TV show began appearing on the covers instead. Unlike the Sabrina novels, also by Simon & Schuster, I don't recall ever seeing the Clueless novels in the Scholastic book orders or at the Scholastic Book Fairs at school. I probably did and I just don't remember, being that that was almost 30 years ago and I don't remember EVERY book that I saw in those book orders or at those book fairs. 

Overall, I had a great time watching this movie. I definitely plan on watching it again. It's not my favourite movie, but it was still so much fun. Again, it was weird watching a positive movie made in the '90s that wasn't a wholesome Disney movie. It's a movie aimed at teenagers, but it didn't feel the need to be raunchy or depressing. Which is something I really appreciate about it. If you've never seen it before I definitely recommend watching it. It's available on Paramount+ in the United States, Canada, and the U.K. for those of you who enjoy streaming movies and TV shows, and it's available on Blu-ray, DVD, and VHS for those of you who prefer watching movies and TV shows on physical media.

That's it for me for today my friends. I'll be back soon with more blog posts throughout the week. Including at least one comic book review, maybe a book review, and my review of season 5 of Star Trek: Discovery as the series finale drops on Thursday. I haven't decided whether I'm just going to review the season or do a full series overview like I did with season 3 of Star Trek: Picard. You'll at least get a review of the fifth season from me on Friday. Until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (2023) Movie Review

 Hey everyone, how were your weekends? Mine was pretty busy. I played Dungeons & Dragons with some friends on Sunday, and then I went over to my sister's place to watch Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves as I hadn't had the opportunity to watch it yet. That's actually what I'm here to review today. So, let's strap ourselves in and go on a quest to talk about this movie. Let's get into it!

Released on March 31st, 2023, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves did pretty well critically, but ultimately it ended up bombing at the box office due to numerous factors, including poor marketing from Paramount, Entertainment One, and Hasbro, competition from The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and D&D fans boycotting Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast because of controversies surrounding their handling of the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Personally, I think there's a little more to it than that.

Created by Gary Gygax and Dave Ameson in 1974, Dungeons & Dragons has always been this niche thing that many people attribute to nerds and people who live in their parents's basement. Which is completely unfair because D&D is a major strategy game that requires creativity, imagination, and the ability to think on your feet. But because of this weird stigma, and the fact that it's incredibly difficult to get into as a player, especially if you're trying to join a group who is in the middle of a campaign, and the Dungeon Master, or DM, is difficult, people really don't understand what the game truly is, and therefore, don't understand its potential as a storytelling medium.

It also doesn't help that an attempt to make a live action D&D movie was made in 2000, and it was a terrible movie from everything I've ever heard about it. I've never seen it, so I can't say one way or the other, but, I think that movie also sticks in the general audience's minds when they hear the words "Dungeons & Dragons live action movie". 

As a result, Honor Among Thieves ended up having alot of hurdles to overcome and, unfortunately, it ended up not overcoming most of those hurdles. At least the critics liked it. But, honestly, none of that stuff matters. Why? Because, this is a fantastic movie. I'm pretty new to D&D as I only started playing it about a month or so ago, but while I was watching the movie with my sister and my brother-in-law, I kept thinking to myself that everyone who worked on the movie managed to bring an entire D&D campaign to life on the screen.

The movie was written by Jonathan Goldstein, John Francis Daley, and Michael Gilio, and was directed by Goldstein and Daley. For those of you who might recognize the name John Francis Daley, he played Sam Weir on Freaks and Geeks (1999-2000), and Doctor Lance Sweets, a psychologist that Booth and Brennan work with on Bones (2005-2017). More recently, he starred in a movie called 5-25-77, which is a movie about the first Star Wars fan and how the movie changed his life as an amateur director, even before he saw the movie, as it was delayed being shown in his small town. These people who worked on the movie have to be D&D fans, because you do not get this movie as it is without fans making it. You just don't.

The cast is incredible. I've loved Chris Pine as an actor ever since I first saw him as Captain Kirk in Star Trek (2009), and while I haven't seen every movie he's been in since then, I've absolutely followed his career with interest and awe, because he did a fantastic job as Kirk in that first Star Trek reboot movie. He's great in this movie too as Edgin, a bard. I'm less familiar with the rest of the cast, with the exception of Hugh Grant, whom I've seen in a few movies, and have heard about for a good chunk of my life. I've seen each of the other cast members in at least one movie. I saw Michelle Rodriguez in The Fast & The Furious (2001), Justice Smith in Detective Pikachu (2019), and Sophia Lillis in It: Chapter One (2017) as teenage Beverly Marsh, and apparently she also played Nancy Drew in the 2019 movie adaptation of The Hidden Staircase, the second book in the original Nancy Drew book series. The only main cast members I'm entirely unfamiliar with are Chloe Coleman, who played Edgin's daughter, Kira, and Daisy Head, who plays the Red Wizard, Sofina. Oh and Bradley Cooper has a quick appearance as Holga's (Michelle Rodriguez) ex-husband, Marlamin, who is a halfling. 

I don't want to spoil anything, but the story is fun, interesting, and runs at a very nice pace. There are lots of easter eggs for fans and players of D&D, but you don't have to be a fan or a player to enjoy this movie. Which is something I was extremely pleased with, because, as I mentioned earlier, I'm relatively new to the world of Dungeons & Dragons and there were plenty of things that went right over my head until my sister or my brother-in-law pointed out to me at certain points. That didn't inhibit my enjoyment of the movie at all though.

 I recommend this movie to anyone who is a fan of the Fantasy genre. I watched it on Netflix, but it is also available on DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K Ultra-HD, if you prefer to watch it on a physical media format, instead of streaming it. I'm hoping to get it on Blu-ray so I can watch it again, because I really enjoyed it.

Alright my friends, that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more reviews and other posts. Until then have a great rest of your day and I will talk to you all again soon. Take care.

Star Wars: The Jedi Academy Trilogy #3 - Champions of the Force (1994) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well for a Friday afternoon. I'm back with my review of the third and final book in the Jedi Academy Trilogy series by Kevin J. Anderson, Champions of the Force. I actually finished it on Wednesday, but I did groceries on Wednesday and I was at an appointment yesterday, which is why you're getting the review today. And there will be spoilers because most of what I want to talk about here I can't talk about without spoilers. So, you know what to do if you've never read the book before. Let's get into it.

Remember when I said that Dark Apprentice was the weakest book in the trilogy? Well, I was wrong. Champions of the Force is the weakest book in the trilogy. The main storyline of Luke establishing the Jedi Academy on Yavin IV, at the site of the old Rebel base seen in A New Hope, and the fight against the spirit of the ancient Sith Lord, Exar Kun, ended halfway through the book. As a result the rest of the book is stumbling through Kyp Durron's redemption, which comes way too quickly, Admiral Daala failing at her attempts to destroy the New Republic's military forces, and Han, Lando, and Mara taking Kessel for Lando's new spice mining operation. Not to mention wrapping up whatever Ambassador Furgan was trying to do with Anakin Solo.

That's not to say that I don't like The Jedi Academy Trilogy, because I do. But, I can see why alot of people don't. It's not a story that warranted an entire trilogy to tell. But, having read interviews with authors and editors, I suspect that Bantam needed to fill the 1994 schedule, and with the success of the Thrawn Trilogy from 1991 to 1993, they knew they needed another trilogy to fill the schedule since 1993 only had two books come out, the first being the final book in the Thrawn Trilogy, The Last Command, by Timothy Zahn, and the other being The Truce at Bakura by Kathy Tyers. And with 1994 being the year that George Lucas announced he was making the Prequel Trilogy, and the Special Edition of the Original Trilogy, Bantam needed at least three more books to come out along with The Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton, and The Crystal Star by Vonda N. MacIntyre. Of course, this simply speculation on my part, based on information I've gotten from various interviews, where certain books or certain trilogies of books were published simply to fill the publication schedule because another book fell through or not enough books were on the schedule in a particular year to begin with.

The thing is though is that Anderson isn't Zahn, and, as I mentioned in my review of Dark Apprentice, he had alot of projects going on in 1994. Not only was he working on The Jedi Academy Trilogy, but he was also working on his only standalone Star Wars novel, Darksaber, several Star Wars anthology novels, including Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, and the Young Jedi Knights series with his wife, Rebecca Moesta, as well as his second original novel, Climbing Olympus, AND he was working with Tom Veitch on the Tales of the Jedi comic book series for Dark Horse. And with Bantam's insanely tight publication schedule, Anderson had to crank out these three novels pretty quickly since Jedi Search came out in March, Dark Apprentice came out in July, and Champions of the Force came out in September. So I can understand why these three books aren't the best Star Wars novels from that era. 

One of the things I like about this book is that it is Anakin Solo's first full appearance in the novels, as well as his first full appearance overall as Dark Horse didn't publish Dark Empire II and Empire's End for another couple of years following the publication, and he had a brief appearance in Dark Apprentice. Kinda like how Jacen and Jaina had a brief appearance in The Last Command, but Jedi Search was their first full appearance.

I also like the interactions between Han and Lando in this book better than I did in the last one. I felt they were too antagonistic with one another in the last book, but here, they're definitely more where they were in Return of the Jedi. What I didn't like was Lando's interactions with Mara Jade. They felt too sleazy for my tastes. Lando is supposed to be charming and suave, not creepy. I dunno, Lando just felt off to me when he was interacting with Mara. Especially since he didn't trust her at all in The Last Command, and there's no story that happens between Zahn's books, and this trilogy, where Lando could've changed his mind. And there's no way he'd actively hit on her even when he wasn't actually hitting on her. 

I don't understand why Kyp Durron was chosen to appear in The New Jedi Order either. He has only two other appearances in other Bantam era novels, one of them being Darksaber by Kevin J. Anderson, and then he appears in the twelfth book of the Young Jedi Knights series prior to his appearance in 1999's Vector Prime. So he's not really a prominent character during the Bantam era. He's a character I've never really liked either.

As I mentioned earlier, his redemption came way too quickly, considering he blew up an entire star system, killing billions of people with the Sun Crusher at the beginning of this book. Yes, he was under the influence of Exar Kun, but, Kyp's targets were his own. He chose to fight the Empire, rather than to destroy the New Republic and the new group of Jedi Knights at the academy, despite Kun's plans for him. He willingly destroyed Carida. So I'd say he got off lightly.

I wish we got to spend more time at the Jedi Academy given the name of the trilogy, but I have a theory as to why we didn't spend more time there. George had never wanted the novels to do very much with the Jedi, the Sith, or the Force because if he decided to make more Star Wars movies anything the authors came up with in the novels would be overridden by what George chose to do in the movies. Especially around the time that Anderson was writing this trilogy, since George knew by then that he was going to make the Prequel Trilogy and that focused heavily on the Force, the Jedi and the Sith. Which is why he kept the novels and comics away from the Prequel era, only allowing Tales of the Jedi to exist because it was set thousands of years before the Prequel era. 

 As with the previous books in the trilogy, I first read Champions of the Force when Garrett lent it to me in 1998-1999. I eventually got my own copy sometime in the 2000s. The copy I have in my collection now is the original 1994 edition with the embossed STAR WARS logo on the front cover. The book would be re-published with the Legends banner across the top of the covers and spine in 2015 with the rest of the trilogy. 

Overall, this wasn't a great trilogy of Star Wars novels, nor was this a good Star Wars novel. I still enjoyed reading it though. Even though they aren't good books, I think I enjoyed reading them because they're familiar to me since I read them several times over the years as I've never had the biggest Star Wars collection so I tended to re-read the ones I did have over and over again. It is hard to recommend this trilogy to people though because, while it is important because it introduced alot of things that became staples of the Expanded Universe, like Luke's Jedi Academy, it's also a pretty skippable trilogy of books. But, if you really want to check them out, I recommend you do so.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for this week. It was kind of a write-off week for me because I was out on Wednesday morning and then out yesterday afternoon and I hadn't actually planned to review Champions of the Force this week for that reason. Nor did I plan other blog posts either. I'll be back next week with some cool posts. So until then have a great weekend and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Star Wars: The Jedi Academy Trilogy #2 - Dark Apprentice (1994) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? Did you all have good weekends? Mine was pretty quiet. I'm back with my review of the second novel in The Jedi Academy Trilogy by Kevin J. Anderson, Dark Apprentice. I honestly don't have a whole lot to say about this book, because despite some important events happening in the book, the majority of it is more setup for the third book, Champions of the Force. As usual, there will be some spoilers for this 30 year old book, so be aware of that. Let's get into it.

Originally published on June 1st, 1994, Dark Apprentice is the weakest book in this trilogy. It introduces a few characters who will be long lasting characters in the Expanded Universe novels, but, otherwise it does little else in terms of story or character development. 

Han and Lando spend the entire book playing Sabacc for ownership of the Millennium Falcon. Which is the least interesting part of the book. Leia barely has anything to do too. In fact, despite Luke having the most to do, between dealing with the death of Gantoris and the fall of Kyp Durron to the Dark Side, it's not that interesting. I think it's because they abandoned the whole Kessel subplot from Jedi Search entirely, but failed to replace it with anything interesting.

As I mentioned in my review of Jedi Search, Admiral Daala is a bit disappointing as a villain. But I think part of the problem is that she came after Thrawn, the resurrected Palpatine, the Ssi-ruuk from The Truce at Bakura, and Warlord Zsinj from The Courtship of Princess Leia. She didn't do much in Jedi Search, since she wasn't introduced until pretty late in that book. And even here she doesn't really do anything to differentiate herself from other Bantam era EU villains. Even the ones to come after her like Ysanne Isard. 

The stuff with Admiral Ackbar was pretty interesting, but we didn't get enough of it in this book. I've liked Ackbar as a character ever since I read the X-Wing series. Of all of the supporting characters from the Original Trilogy, Ackbar is the most prominent during the Bantam era. He's in just about every book from 1991 to 1999, even if it's just a quick appearance for a mission briefing, with the exception of a few of the standalone novels, the Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy, and The Han Solo Trilogy. So to have him have a character arc in this trilogy is great, but, like I said, Anderson didn't do enough with it.

I'm going to talk about this in my review of Champions of the Force, but I think The Jedi Academy Trilogy suffers from Kevin J. Anderson not having enough time to flesh things out. At the time this trilogy was coming out, and likely when Anderson was writing it, he was working on Tales of the Jedi with Tom Veitch, editing the Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, Tales from Jabba's Palace, and Tales of the Bounty Hunters anthology books, AND writing the Young Jedi Knights series with his wife, Rebecca Moesta at the same time. While the comics had started coming out in 1994, the books wouldn't start coming out until 1995, so he was still working on a bunch of projects at once, all with deadlines that were pretty close to one another given Bantam's publication strategy for the novels coming out at the time.

On top of that he tried to include alot of story into only three books. As a result, alot of them feel less interesting and less developed than they would've been otherwise. Like the Han and Lando stuff. That could've been extremely interesting, given their history, which would originally be fleshed out in the Han Solo Trilogy by A.C. Crispin, and then be realized onscreen in Solo: A Star Wars Story in 2018. But because Anderson has so much going on in these books, it doesn't work quite as well as it should've.

Same thing goes with everything going on at the Jedi Academy on Yavin IV. That should've been way more captivating than it was, given that the trilogy is called the Jedi Academy Trilogy. But, because Anderson pulls off in every direction rather than focusing on one or two storylines, it ends up not working because not enough time is devoted to any one storyline. Which is something that Anderson is much better at than this book makes him seem like he is. 

Don't get me wrong, this book is well written and Anderson does a great job at introducing the various storylines that make up this book, he just doesn't seem to be able to finish any of them. I've already started reading Champions of the Force and so far the book seems to be focusing on Kyp Durron and his fight against the remnants of the Empire and what's happening on Yavin IV with the other characters, including Luke's Jedi students, and Luke himself. I just wish that Dark Apprentice could've done that better.

Dark Apprentice was republished in 2015, most likely at the same time as Jedi Search and Champions of the Force as Del Rey seems to have re-published each book in each Bantam era book trilogy togetrher, so all three Thrawn Trilogy books together, all three Jedi Academy Trilogy books together etc. The Wookieepedia page for Dark Apprentice specifies when this book was republished with the Legends banner, under the cover image for the Legends banner edition in the cover gallery. Even before seeing that though, I figured it had been re-released with the rest of the trilogy in 2015, since the copyright info in the Legends banner edition of Jedi Search says 2015 in it.

I actually have a copy of the original 1994 paperback release for the book in my collection. When I was younger I had the reprint from the late '90s or early 2000s, whenever Bantam re-released it without the embossed lettering for the Star Wars title at the top, but now I have the original edition from 1994 with the embossed lettering, which is pretty cool. 

Like with the rest of the trilogy, I read Dark Apprentice in early 1999, when Garrett lent it to me when I was in grade 6 and he was in grade 5. I honestly don't remember what I thought of the book when I first read it. Not entirely anyway. I remember not liking it as much as I did Jedi Search, but that's it.

Overall, it's an okay book. I would only recommend reading it if you're reading the entire trilogy, not as a standalone book as you won't get much out of it. And, like I said, none of the storylines feel very interesting given how much Anderson tries to tell in this one book.

That's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more reviews and other blog posts. I'm not sure what else I'll be writing about this week, but I have some ideas. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

The Transformers (1984) TV Show Discussion

 Hey everyone! Happy Friday! I'm back with another blog post. Today I'm going to be talking about the 1984 animated series, The Transformers and my history with the show itself, rather than my history with the entire Transformers franchise. So let's get right into it.

Airing in first run syndication from September 17th, 1984 to November 11th, 1987, The Transformers is a show I had no connection to when I was a kid as it ended before my first birthday, and it didn't appear on any of the channels I got when I was a kid that I can remember. I remember seeing the commercials for the Generation 2 toyline in the early to mid-'90s during Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and other shows on YTV and Global, but I never actually watched the show. Not even the Generation 2 repackaged versions that aired from 1993 to 1995. That version aired on YTV in 1994, but I wasn't able to watch YTV all that much because we had an antenna and rabbit ears at home at the time, not cable. So I really only watched YTV when I was in the hospital or at my grandparents's houses. And with Rugrats replacing Mighty Morphin Power Rangers on The Zone in the fall of 1994, I was really only watching YTV for The Zone and shows like The Big Comfy Couch and PJ Katie's Farm. So I didn't really have much access to YTV from 1993 until 1996. And being that I was watching shows like Ghostwriter on the TVO Kids block on TVOntario after 6 o'clock in the evening, as soon as Rugrats was over I'd change the channel, I really wasn't watching YTV later in the evening when I was in the hospital. So The Transformers completely passed me by when I was a kid.

Sometime between 2009 and 2012 I picked up the first season of the show on DVD, as the 25th Anniversary DVD sets had just been released by Shout! Factory in 2009. I don't remember when I bought it exactly. It was either after I'd seen Revenge of the Fallen in theatres in 2009 or after I saw Dark of the Moon in 2011. It was actually the first two or three live action Transformers movies that made me interested in watching the original cartoon series. So when I found the season 1 DVD set from Shout! Factory for a reasonable price at either Walmart, Futureshop or CD Warehouse (I'm pretty sure it was at Futureshop), I bought it and watched the entire season. I thought it was good, but being that I was an adult by the time I saw it, it didn't catch me the way it might've had I been alive when the show first aired in 1984, while the toys were initially coming out. I'd watched Beast Wars when it was on in the late '90s. I ended up not getting the remaining DVD sets for the series either and eventually gave away the season 1 DVD, because I'm not a big Transformers guy, and I knew I was probably never gonna rewatch the first season anyway. So I got rid of it.

Then sometime in 2019 I picked up the original 2000 Kid Rhino DVD release of The Transformers: The Movie (1986) for $1 at the Ottawa Geek Market. I eventually watched it, but, again, because I didn't see the movie when I was a kid, I ended up not getting why people love it so much, so I eventually got rid of the DVD as well, because I knew I was never gonna watch it again. Especially because I bought it for a dollar, so it's not like I spent $20 to $30 on it like I would've if I'd bought a newer edition, or if I'd bought the 2000 edition when it first came out.

That's my brief history with The Transformers. Just a quick, short, blog post for a Friday where the sun is shining brightly here in Ottawa. I'll be back next week for more blog posts, including my review of book 2 in the Jedi Academy Trilogy, Dark Apprentice. So until then, have a great weekend and I will talk to you all again soon. Take care.

Batman #416 (1988) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I'm back with another review. This time I'm taking a look at one of my favourite comic books. So let's dive in and discuss Batman #416, which was published in late 1987, but has a cover date of February 1988, which is why I put the year of the cover date for the issue. There will be some spoilers, so let's get into it.

Despite having been collecting Batman comics from the '80s and '90s since the early to mid 2000s, I didn't get this issue until probably 2013 or 2014, maybe 2015 at the latest. It wasn't an issue that I read when I was growing up. It became my favourite though because, not only was it the first post-Crisis On Infinite Earths meeting of Dick Grayson/Nightwing and Jason Todd/Robin, but it's also Dick's first post-Crisis appearance in a Batman comic as Nightwing as the last time he appeared in a Batman comic, at the beginning of Batman #408, he was still Robin. Not only that but it fully establishes Bruce and Dick's relationship following their fallout in Batman #408. 

After Jason botches a takedown of a Cocaine lab and Dick has to save him from getting killed at the hands of the criminals, he visits Bruce in the Batcave and fills him in on his life following his departure from Wayne Manor. Dick also isn't happy that he had to find out about the new Robin from the newspapers rather than from Batman himself. Bruce reveals that he brought Jason on as Robin, despite dismissing the older, original, Robin, because he missed Dick and needed a partner. Dick and Jason go on to take down the bad guys from the beginning of the issue.

One of the things that I like about this issue is that it does establish Bruce and Dick's relationship now that Dick is no longer Robin. Especially for those who read this in the '80s and weren't reading The New Teen Titans/The New Titans ( the comic changed names in 1987 or early 1988), and hadn't been introduced to Nightwing yet as Dick was absent from Batman from issue #408 until this issue. Unlike in the pre-Crisis continuity where Dick was around to guide Jason in his new role as Robin. It's this new relationship between the two that has this ongoing behaviour from Bruce, which prevents him from calling Dick when he needs help, as what happened in Knightfall after Bane broke Bruce's back. Dick had to find out about the new Batman from the newspapers as well, rather than from Bruce, Tim or Alfred. 

I also like the relationship between Dick and Jason. Dick knows what it's like to be Robin and to grow up fighting crime alongside Batman. After seeing Jason in action, he takes it upon himself to help the new Boy Wonder as he grows up and learns the craft from Batman. Basically acting as a sounding board for Jason since Bruce is so emotionally distant and indifferent. However, I know that Dick doesn't appear in Batman again until Batman: Year Three, which is the telling of Dick's post-Crisis origin as Robin, and Jason only appears in The New Teen Titans in issue 20 of the second volume, which came out in 1986, as Crisis On Infinite Earths was wrapping up, and he doesn't appear again in that series outside of flashbacks and his image on a computer screen in the Titans Tower, so we don't actually see Dick and Jason interact with each other after this issue, like we had in the two years before Crisis On Infinite Earths altered the history of the DC Universe entirely. Or how we'd see Dick and Tim interact after this.

I think that's my biggest problem with this issue and this era of DC's publication history in general. Jason Todd was really shafted hard after his character was altered for the post-Crisis DC Universe in 1987. Because of that his relationships with the other members of the Bat Family didn't really have time to develop and grow before he was killed off in A Death in the Family. Even when we had flashbacks to this period in books like Batman: Gotham Knights, like the one where Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) teams up with with Jason for a mission, all that story does is establish their relationship since Barbara was absent from this period, since this issue came out right before The Killing Joke did. Even by the time Jason returned as the Red Hood in the late 2000s, the DC Universe had already been altered by both Zero Hour in 1994 and Infinite Crisis in 2005, with new retcons being added or changed or removed after each event. 

Jim Aparo is the artist on this book, and he, along with Norm Breyfogle, were the first Batman artists I ever experienced since they were both working on the Bat titles when I started reading Batman comics in 1993, during Knightfall. So I always enjoy seeing his earlier work on the Batman books.

This issue is collected in Batman: Second Chances, which is a trade paperback that was published in 2015. The book collects Batman #'s 402-403, #'s 408-416, and Batman Anuual #11. While I own this trade paperback I actually have 416 in single issue form as well. That's how I read it for this review.

This issue also formed the basis for the 17th episode of The New Batman Adventures, "Old Wounds", in 1998. Instead of Jason Todd, Nightwing teams up with Tim Drake, and Bruce doesn't appear in the wraparound story, only in the flashbacks to when Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) discovered Batman and Robin's true identities and Dick quit being Robin. I hesitate to call it an adaptation though, because there's very little of the original story in the episode and Dick is telling Tim about the end of the original Dynamic Duo, rather than Dick filling Bruce in on what he's been doing since he quit being Robin and left Wayne Manor.

Overall, this is a fantastic issue. It's self-contained, on both ends of the issue, it sets up alot of the new dynamics between Bruce and Dick, and Dick and Jason, and it's a pretty emotional story to read. Especially for this era of DC Comics. I recommend giving it a read if you can get your hands on it. It's not really a key issue, in terms of important Batman milestones, but it's also not a throwaway issue either. So a copy of the individual issue should still be pretty cheap, despite the issue being nearly 40 years old at this point. Like I said, it's also available in the trade paperback edition that I mentioned, and that book should still be in print even though it's now nine years old at this point. So you should be able to find it in some format pretty easily.

That's it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more posts. I might do either a movie review or a TV show post next. I haven't quite decided yet. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

Star Wars: The Jedi Academy Trilogy #1 - Jedi Search (1994) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how were your weekends? Mine was pretty good. I had a Dungeons & Dragons session with my friends on Saturday and that's been alot of fun to do. Today I have yet another book review for you. I know I've been doing alot of those lately, but that's what I'm kinda into right now. I'm taking a look at the first book of the Jedi Academy Trilogy by Kevin J. Anderson, Jedi Search. There will be spoilers, despite the fact that this is definitely a setup book. So let's get into it.

First published in February 1994, Jedi Search is one of the first Star Wars novels that Garrett lent me after the X-Wing series. This book was also the first look EU fans ever got of Kessel, which had only been mentioned by both Han Solo (the Kessel Run) and C-3PO (the spice mines of Kessel) in A New Hope, and was mentioned in Heir to the Empire and The Last Command, both by Timothy Zahn. 

After arriving at Kessel in the Millennium Falcon to open diplomatic relations with the system, Han Solo and Chewbacca are attacked by Kessel's defense forces, and are taken captive by the person who ran the spice mines, Moruth Doole, a member of the Rybet species, a former associate of Han and Chewie's during their smuggling days. Meanwhile, while Leia is awaiting the arrival of the Solo twins, Jacen and Jaina, who are coming home now that they're two years old, she must also contend with the ambassador from the Imperial Academy world of Carida, who refuses to see the New Republic as the legitimate government, despite the Empire having been defeated multiple times, including during the brief reign of the resurrected Emperor Palpatine the previous year (as shown in Dark Empire). 

At the same time, following his brush with the Dark Side of the Force at the hands of the resurrected Palpatine, Luke Skywalker has chosen to set up a Jedi Academy and to start training the next generation of Jedi Knights, acknowledging that he can no longer keep peace in the Galaxy alone. While on Kessel, Han, Chewie, and fellow prisoner, Kyp Durron, stumble upon the facility that created the Death Stars, the World Devastators, and the newest Weapon of Mass Destruction, the Sun Crusher, the Maw Installation, during their escape from Kessel. We also meet the latest Imperial warlord, Admiral Daala, Tarkin's lover, who'd been hidden away inside the Maw since before the Battle of Yavin. 

The Kessel stuff wasn't as interesting to me as Leia's interactions with Ambassador Furgan, and Luke's search for his first Jedi students, Gantoris, and Streen. I think that's because Luke's storyline in this book has far more lasting results for the Expanded Universe as a whole in terms of the return of the Jedi Order. Yes, while Daala does appear from time to time, she really doesn't become that prominent within the EU until the Legacy of the Force series and the Fate of the Jedi series in the late 2000s and early 2010s. So while she's introduced in this trilogy and has one more appearance in Anderson's standalone novel, Darksaber, she doesn't show up again until 2008.

I think the reason I like the politics stuff with Leia is because I love seeing Leia be so diplomatic and dedicated to bringing as many worlds into the New Republic as she can. She also struggles to balance her work for the fledgling New Republic government, and taking care of Jacen and Jaina now that they're home from Anoth, where baby Anakin is still staying, under the protection of Winter and the defenses put in place by Luke and Admiral Ackbar when they discovered the planet. 

I've never been a fan of Qwi Xux, the scientist who helped create the Death Star, mostly because, she's not that interesting of a character. Outside of being mentioned in Death Star and one appearance in The New Jedi Order, Qwi is pretty much confined to the Bantam era, as she has no more appearances in the post-New Jedi Order books. While she does help Han, Kyp, and Chewie escape the Imperial forces in the Maw, she's mostly here as plot convenience rather than an actual character. Especially with where we see her in the next two books in this trilogy.

I've also never been a huge fan of Kyp Durron, even before his behaviour in the New Jedi Order series. I think Luke was a bit too lenient on Kyp at the end of this trilogy, but I'll get to that more when I review Champions of the Force. Basically, I don't really care for the character, but he is one of the characters that has a lasting role in the Expanded Universe from this point on. Though Kyp doesn't get a major role to play after this until the New Jedi Order series.

 While I did eventually get my own copy of the original 1994 paperback edition sometime in the early 2000s, along with the other two books in the trilogy, I got rid of it in 2015 or 2016, along with a good chunk of my Star Wars book collection, when my parents and I were getting ready to move. A couple of years ago though I picked up the 2015 Legends banner edition paperback that Random House published when the original EU became the Legends continuity. While Wookieepedia doesn't provide the year for the Legends banner reprint, because I have a copy in my collection, I was able to see that it was published in 2015, around the time that the canon novels, A New Dawn and Tarkin were coming out in paperback, having been published in hardcover the year before, and just before Heir to the Jedi was either coming out in hardcover (early 2015) or just coming out in paperback (late 2015). All three books are advertised inside the front cover of the Legends paperback of Jedi Search, but it doesn't specify whether they're paperback or hardcover.

Overall, Jedi Search still holds up pretty well. I know that the Jedi Academy Trilogy isn't one of the more well regarded novel trilogies from the Bantam era, but I've always enjoyed it. And I loved going back and reading it again after nine years or more, as I don't actually remember the last time I read it. If you've never read it before and are a fan of the original Star Wars Expanded Universe, I recommend reading it as it does establish characters who show up again, particularly in Del Rey's line of novels from the 2000s and early 2010s, AND it establishes Luke's Jedi Academy, which will be a staple of the EU until the New Jedi Order series.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more posts throughout the week. So until then have a great day and I will talk to you later. Take care.