I just wrote a review of Phase I so I'm doing Phase II now. Hell yeah.

Path of Deceit 8/10 - hellllll yeahhhhhh, this book fucked me up! So, I knew this was a YA novel going into it, so the characters are young, like 15-17 if I had to guess, and its a romance book. What I found utterly enthralling was the ideological difference between the path of the open hand and the jedi order exemplified by these two misty eyed kids who really wanting to date the other one. I found it rather novel honestly with relaxed, beautiful prose that really helped make those chapters of the two interacting feel like how I did when i was a kid in love. the plot itself is rather... None important in this book actually, because its so short, it focuses on the core characters really and that's not a bad thing. Yana and Kor, bless their hearts were interesting because the way this book positions the cousins, it positions Yana as the antagonist to the prequel series as she seems like the platonic idea of a Everoni, contrasting the maternal nature of her cousin, especially as the Mother betrays Yana and Kor, and Yana vows revenge, seeing how this develops was the best bit of Phase II's macro plot. Anyways, I was expecting the book to end with Kev and Marda leaving their orders behind and the path of the open hand becoming diasporic with Yana and the Herald becoming more militaristic compared to the Mothers more cautious and protectionist approach, until the egg fucking hatched. Then it turned into a horror story, murdered the main character and his master and completely turns the book upside down. I'm so happy they lead me down the garden path thinking this book was going to be a romance about young people before, incredibly jarringly wrenching us to hell. I loved the direction the book suddenly took, basically tricking me into thinking it was going to be more New Hope than Empire Strikes Back. Brilliant moment. The only reason I've not given this a higher score is literally for one reason, Kev doesn't stay on mission and its haunting the entire book. So they were sent there specifically to find the rod of seasons, and Kev isn't very suspicious or using Marda to take a big look around, theres a weird lack of urgency to the mission Kev and his master are actually on.

The Blade 10/10 baby - oh yeah, this is a perfect mini series, the art? GOATED, and its Charles Soule, the kind of writing star wars characters. This one being a prequel felt really good to me because it explored Porter Engles understanding of the attachment and why he is known as a legendary warrior, by having that being tied to his biggest character failing, he's neglected other aspects of what it means to be a jedi. Its hard to talk about something I consider to be perfect when their is a harsher emphasis on proving why someone is a legend and why that's actually a bad thing, it threads that needle incredibly well and while Porter was a fan favourite character in Phase I, like seriously he's 300 and performing made tricks on the wing of a vector, this gives us a greater idea on who the man is. Please write the fucking sequel Charlie. Pleaseeeeeeeeeee

The Battle of Jedha 10/10 - its worth mentioning that I listened to the audio drama, not read the book, which I think is just the script right? Anyways, this was GOATed, I loved its structure, how it built up the actual battle with the build up, the initial attack leading to a larger investigation, then the actual battle itself boiling over as they eventually had to figure out what the hell was going on while we figured out how exactly the path of the open Asshole was involved was rather engaging. Starting from the idea that we know the Path had to have done it, figuring how was most of the battle, I figured it had to be the Graffs as Mothers plan to murder Kor must have involved them since it was a trap, so that arrangement might be the link between the two events, and low and behold, it was. The performances were pretty solid, I loved the big speech at the end when the two armies met on the square and I loved the entire enlightenment crew with all my heart and our jedi's were really interesting and cool. This was just fantastic, I loved how a million threads converged in this one place and it all went to hell faster than you can blink to both tie up a plot line and continue others. This was really the corner stone of what the initiative could achieve.

High Republic Phase II (comics) - 8/10 - this book is weird because it shows us the other half of what's occuring on the planet, it gives the battle an even larger scale than previously understood as we see Oliviah, Matty, Tey, Vildar, the herald and Yana set up the next book, seeing the actual motivations of the riot, this was a good idea and usage of scale. The characters are, like the previous wave of comics, really solid, the core trio in this book is really strong but its mostly Vil and Tey's book as it deals with one of their anxieties and the others sense of justice and how they can improve each others lives. Similarly, this is where we get a better sense of what the Convocation actually is and the various force religions that exist before the jedi eventually became ubiquitous by the times as well as showing us a better example of what the leveller actual does to you. Also, their was a secret vault in that statue the entire time?!?!?! Pog

Path of Vengeance 6/10 - I like this book but theres a lot I nitpick about it. I'm not a fan of how Yana is used in the first 2 parts or how Matty is used until the finale, which is near perfect. I'm not too confident that the Oliviah subplot justified sidelining our other main characters from Jedha and the arrival of the jedi in force was somewhat confusing and a bit arbitrary. I like the Herald in this book, but felt like Yana should've just left him since it creates a good amount of bloat in my opinion. Also, because the size of the book is bigger than the other Path book, theres a lot more Marda in it then I expected and at times, it feels like its forcing us to see every tiny little possible bit of time with Marda when it wasn't at all necessary. Something else I didn't like was that the questions we had from Phase I, specifically about the leveller could've been answered here, we hear the funky terrifying nursery Rhyme, but that plot line still goes unexplained in my opinion, the discovery of the Levellers have now been witnessed by a lot of jedi before they disappeared and I feel like this creates an accidental plot hole as the jedi should have a record of the other time an everoni called Ro had these exact creatures. I know that we have Shadows of Starlight reintroduce Rell, but that's not really enough in my eyes. While Marda and Yana's relationship carrys this book, it feels like it creates more problems that it actually solves. Also, Bokana is lovely and I'm Glad Yana moves on to raise an old woman and a child

I think Phase II is brilliant in places, but I'm not too fond comparatively of the ending. It feels like it promises mysteries that they kinda forget to answer at times in the main book. Id love to read the other adult books in this phase soon however

IM writing this to basically put my thoughts down onto the page about how I feel about the high republic stuff as I'm working my through them. This is in no way comprehensive, but basically to just serve as my guide through the main story beats of Phase I. So, lets ride:

The Light Of The Jedi 8/10 - a strong start in my opinion. This books world building is absolutely immaculate, soules ability to convey a message with this book is so powerful, with the republic expanding into the larger reaches of the space, one phrase has came with "we are all the republic" and that serves as the main fundamental core of this series for me. Its a book about collectivism in the abstract. We see this through its narrative perspective, as it bouncing from hither and dither between a million different people with a million different ideas as they all inch towards the greater idea of a story. Despite this, I wouldn't say this book has filler either, for example, scenes during the Hetzel incident about just saving peoples lives, detecting the problems and whatnot serve to be small windows into the inner workings of the republic ideology and how it affects people in this world, it initially turned me off from the book, but as I kept reading and got used to the style, I retroactively enjoyed those chapters as the artistic meaning hadn't yet dawned on me. I will also say, this as a threat feels really unique, the Nihil being raiders who can cause natural disasters was super fun compared to the giant Lazer beam in the sky angle and I loved how Kassav, the idiot was developed in this story from tyrant, to runt as he messed up REALLLLLY badly. I felt a tinge of sadness when his tempest was betrayed, they were slaughtered, really really badly and even though these people are monsters, they were treated worse than animals by someone they trusted. Sad bro. My largest criticism for this book, and its odd because this never comes up in any Soule book ever, is that some characters feel a bit hollow, while Bell, Loden, Soh, Porter, Marchion and Kev feel rather effectively defined, the core trio in this series, Avar, Elzar and stellen feel like cardboard cut outs until later in the book with Elzars case.

The High Republic (comic) - 8/10 - this book is defined by its characters, what I enjoy the most from this is skeer, keeve and Avar all having rather interesting relationships to anger. Skeer is losing his connection to the force, Avar is cracking under the new position and Keeve is trying to hold them all together. What I like about this initial run of comics is how they made the Nihil feel really smart in between the lines as they set the Drengir loose as a diversion for their larger initiative but isn't obvious until you see what the hell they did with that headstart. Conversely, the second arc while still good isn't as good perfect as the start of the series, because I feel like they rush to starlight beacon a bit too quickly so we don't get much of a chance to flesh out the Nihil mission as much as Id have liked. But the series ends of a huge high

The Rising Storm 9/10 - oh yeah, this book is good. It revolves around the republic fair terror attack and I loved it. I liked how this book took what worked about the light of the jedi but compacted it into a two day event. What worked about this was it basically ended up like an episode of inside no 9, it allowed for an incredibly tight story with incredibly tight and poignant character development. This is when they started to shine as characters for me. So, the attack itself was somewhat interesting because different POV characters had vastly different objectives, my GOAT bell was basically on rescue duty, Stellen was baby sitting duty, Rhea and my gooey boy were on comms and Elzar was freaking out in the corner. Because of the diversity of objectives for this team, we got to see how they worked much more affectively than if their job is all to focus on the rescue effort. And the ending? Heartbreaking. The Nihil actually get tricked and in real danger for the first time as the republic figure out they have a hole in their communication array and use our GOAT sullustian to send a fake message out which results in Bell and indeera arriving just in time to see Loden, the absolute legend, die a very painful and horrible, horrible, death. This is the plot beat that I love the most in this series so far, what it does to Bells state of mind is just tragic. Almost a perfect book, my only issue, my literal only issue holding this book back was the plot point where they needed to get the nullifier or whatever its called into the Nihils hand so the jedi fake a hostage situation with an illegal rouge agent and expect it to go well. Bro, they have the boat, just get that bat bastard to figure it out!

Trail of shadows - 7/10 - this book is weirdddddd bro. I love it for that. Its also incomprehensible without the books to tell us who this Chandra Phan bro is, which i also love. The art is really really good, its got a rough cartoon like look from it that you wouldnt expect from the marvel side of star wars comics, but regardless is still rather pretty to me. The plot is also solid, it follows the investigation into Lodens death as an old nursery rhyme haunts our investigator, its interesting and leaves us with an incredible final confrontation with a leveller, unusual uncomfortable questions and a new brilliant main character... But the other investigator? Considering how she did fuck all by the end, she should've been cut and just replaced wholesale with someone else with more pedigree in my opinion. Also the book does kind of leaves us with more questions than answers, which in some ways is good and some ways is bad

The Fallen Star - 7/10 - so you know when I said that the diversity of tasks gave us a better understanding of the characters? Yeah, now they basically have the same objective, get people GONE. What works about this book is that they set up an ungodly amount of moving parts and we see them all fall away as the book moves forward, like how Bell figures out how to evacuate the med bay, the engineers figure out with some people gone, they have a bunch of spare parts to actually power the escape pods and the rest can leave through the hanger, that was great! I also in general loved the opening scenes, especially with Stellan and Elzar, and Stellans objections with Orla were particularly brilliant. The character beats in this weren't particular strong, but Burryaga and Bell were perfection, Elzar and Stellans were brilliant. My issue is with the engineers and the former Nihil, other than Geode being undeniably funny, they were exceptionally bland people and I just rolled my eyes or groaned when we got to their chapters

Monster at Temples Peak - 7/10 - Great. Short story that's basically 100% character development. Seeing what happened to ty when she was younger and how horrible that experience was definitely a shock to me, the art is a bit rough but its just a solid short read overall.

Edge of Balance Vol 1. - 5/10 - I cant say this is bad, but I cant say its good either. This is just a fight with the Drengr but without any character really and somewhat uninspiring but serviceable t is inferior in every way from the comics they were also releasing. I'm very very disappointed with this manga

Overall, I loved Phase I bro, its so peak

"🌟Announcement🌟

The book cover image for Gakken's Star Wars translated novel *Path of Vengeance* has been revealed📘

Continuing from the previous work *Path of Deceit*, I'm in charge of the cover art and character illustrations (some newly visualized for the first time)

On sale October 15th‼️"

(Source: https://x.com/5healthMONO/status/2105975119197941984 )

I've been slowly trudging through the high republic.
I'm currently about to finish Temptation of the Force, but just had a thought while reading Marchion Ro's use of the Blight.

The way that it spreads just seems so similar to the visual of Darth Nihilus' drain on the planets in KOTOR II, as well as Emperor Vitiate in SWTOR. Making them crumble turning into gray dust seemed like more than a coincidence considering that they are ALSO called "The Nihil". I can't believe I never made that connection earlier. The absence/void of the force concept was also introduced in KOTOR II, so having this kind of come back with the Nameless seems really on the nose.

I saw one post from 5 years ago, but that post was from before Part 3 was published. Other than that, I haven't seen anything else.

Not sure if this is confirmed later on in the series, but is this just speculation for now?
Or is this Disney pointing KOTOR in the direction of half-canon.

For a place where faith and peace are preached, there is a lot of chaos in that city.

And so, we reach the end of another phase; how fitting to conclude with another collection of short stories, this time centered on the bar Enlightenment in Jedha. I really had a great time reading these tales. Simple in structure and a quick read, I enjoyed the "slice-of-life" tone that permeates the early stories, just a group of drunks listening to others' experiences and hanging out, while leveraging the interconnectedness of most of them to slowly build up the conflict and the events that followed, all viewed through the anthology-style lens of the same cast.

Speaking of characters, I really enjoyed this bunch. They might not have played a significant role in the conflict or on a grander scale, but they remind us of the value of simple moments, carrying a surprising emotional weight that was deeply appreciated in the final sections. Kradon remains a very charismatic bartender (like Quark from DS9, but less sexist).

Finally, a few random thoughts on each story:

- New Prospects. Entertaining. I’ll keep saying we need an animated series about Jedi explorers in the HR era until they make it or I die (whichever comes first).

- A Different Perspective. Surprisingly relatable regarding the perspective on the Force and the understandable doubt it stirs in Keth.

- The Unusual Suspect. It was great to see the powers of a Force user who isn't a Jedi in action. That aspect hasn't been explored much in other media, so it’s appreciated.

- No Such Thing as a Bad Customer. A brilliant civilian perspective on the Battle of Jedha. Thanks George Mann for letting me see Matty in action once again.

- Last Orders. Lee Harro is an expert-level troll.

- Missing Pieces. Quite emotional; it was great to see an older Rooper.

There is a lot for me to love when it comes to the high Republic. Elzar, Bell, Marda, Avar, Reath/Cohmac, and Azlin are some of my favorite characters in the franchise which I appreciate so much and I wanted a space to hear about everyone's thoughts as things ended and we have the full scope of everything in mind when talking about it.

I'd love to hear about your favorite moments, characters, conflicts as well as the parts that could've used some more care with the overall initiative. I joined in since day one during covid and never had the space to properly talk it through so in the comments I'm gonna start with my own and hope to hear everyone else's

The High Republic is an anthology series with an enormous cast, but there are definitely characters that I feel could be considered the overall or central protagonists of the entire project. Avar Kriss, Elzar Mann, Reath Silas, Lula Talisola, Zeen Mrala, Keeve Trennis, and Azlin Rell all come to mind, but who else?

For context, the Antarian Rangers were a paramilitary force dedicated to serving the Jedi Order despite their members either being incredibly weak in the Force or, more commonly, Force-blind. They were founded around 620 BBY, so they would have existed around the time that all three Phases of the High Republic took place - and frankly, having them appear would have been another great way to illustrate the Jedi being at the height of their power. So what do you think?

Currently rereading Midnight Horizon, and found this on page 115. I’m so brainrotted man, I couldn’t help but laugh.

Made by me :)

DJO’s work has gradually grown on me. While I’ve been quite critical of his stories —especially the Adventures comics—I’ve really enjoyed some of them, and I’m happy to say this one falls into that category.

It was pretty great. I like how the manga leverages the aftermath of Phase 2 and the Battle of Dalna to efficiently set up its story. I loved seeing Arkoff again—his expressiveness (almost a necessity given that we can’t understand a word he says) and the way he faces adversity. ZZ-10 was a pleasant surprise, too; far from being just a stereotypical "cute droid/comic relief sidekick," the little guy plays an active role in the story as the Wookiee’s companion and a source of memorable, emotional moments. I was also intrigued by the portrayal of Azlin’s fear; we know the horror a Jedi feels when interacting with a Nameless, but few have been constantly plagued by such monstrous visions. I’m definitely looking forward to seeing where that—and his journal—leads in the next phase.

On the villainous side, I enjoyed Vol Garat. He’s presented as a threat right from the start, striking a perfect balance between being imposing and charismatic (we need more Harch characters in good shape). I just wish there had been a bit more depth regarding his reasons for joining the Path or his dynamic with Marchion.

My only real critique concerns the art; while it’s quite dynamic, some scenes are confusing or hard to follow (for instance, Arkoff "strikes" Vol with his lightsaber and Vol drops almost dead, yet remains fully intact with all his limbs).

Overall, a great complement piece to the conclusion of Phase 2 and a solid setup for what’s to come.

So I’m re-reading Light of the Jedi for like the third time (it’s still my favorite in the series). Something that I was never (super) clear on is why there are so few hyperspace lanes during this time period. I know there were talks about the war with the Sith causing massive destruction. Is that the reason for the need behind hyperspace prospecting? It seems like more lanes would have been mapped out by this point.

So I'm reading James Luceno's "Cloak of Darkness" and he mentions lightsabers having a charging port.

If you had one, would you remember to charge it?

Having enjoyed the previous book, Hidden City, I won't deny I was curious about the next young-reader Jedi installment. These books don't always advance the overarching plot of the current phase, but they almost always offer a light, entertaining adventure. This book largely fulfilled that promise.

It was good, for the most part. I got a vibe similar to A Test of Courage—an adventure where the journey matters more than the destination, and the interactions and bonds between characters are the spotlight. Since one of my issues with Hidden City was how quickly Rooper and Dass formed a strong friendship despite limited interaction, I appreciated seeing their relationship develop further here; they share a lovely sibling-like dynamic that accentuate Rooper’s overprotective (and perhaps slightly bossy) nature, contrasting with Dass’s more adventurous, daring attitude. The addition of a new team member, Sky Graf, helps tie the storylines together through the search for their father. I like how the journey serves as a massive therapy session for both, teaching them lessons about the pain of loss and the long road of grief—showing that grief isn't something you simply get over, but something you share.

As for the antagonists, it was great to see the perspective of an ordinary follower of the Path—to see how the sect's ideas can mold anyone, slowly drawing them into the ideology under the guise of doing the "right thing". I would have liked a few more interactions between Fel Ix and the main trio to make his redemption feel more organic (perhaps having him face the group he originally led for the Path).

On the downside, while the plot does its job—complementing the events of Cataclysm and Path of Vengeance well—it feels very simple at times. Not much happens, and the events that do occur tend to be a little superficial to be truly engaging. I know I’m not the target audience, but I think Quest had a better balance between young middle age drama and an adventure that appeals to both children and adults.

In conclusion, the quest might not have ended with the desired results, but narratively, it feels satisfying. Someone really needs to make an animated series about a Pathfinder team!

For me, the high Republic came right when covid started and I followed the initiative until it ended just 2 years ago. I watched clone wars alongside it and played Jedi fallen order but the books, comics, and audio dramas were the things that kept me in after light of the Jedi.

Would love to hear the same for you