Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsLast chapter ruins the entire action-packed, character-driven story and my day.
Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2021
This is a beautiful paperback with no spelling or grammatical errors. There were a few descriptive words that I felt were oddly placed, but it didn't effect the overall impression of the writing style of Drew Karpyshyn. Karpyshyn has a wonderful style that shifts perfectly on which character is being focused on in that chapter. Should it be the contemplative Sith Lord on the other side of the galaxy, it shifts to explain his dueling thoughts about the situations he finds himself in, which is far different from the perspective of the Jedi we accompany.
It's a really epic adventure, and I loved the different perspectives throughout. Scourge isn't somebody who you could relate to without some serious soul searching, and the book is able to provide enough insight into the inherent fear that drives the Sith. My favorite parts of the story were with Canderous Ordo and the Mandalorians, which provided a unique, lived-in look into the culture of these people.
The book annihilates itself in a flurry of grimdark storytelling decisions that makes the book unreadable, and not ten minutes after finishing it, it now resides in my donation pile.
Spoilers ahead, but it would be better to read it knowing how to ends so you can enjoy the good parts for what they are.
After the Emperor blows T3-M4 into literal smithereens, Scourge, in a whirlwind of visions of all potential futures, decides to kill Meetra and vie for the Emperor's favor so he may one day defeat him alone. Scourge is given the gift of immortality, but at a cost: infinite and total bodily pain. Revan is forever imprisoned within paralyzation in hidden chambers within Dromund Kaas, and feeds off of Meetra's force energy as he subtly convinces the Emperor, through a mind connection, to never invade the Republic. Bastilla grows old as her son grows up.
To recap: two characters die with no sacrifice given, Revan and Scourge are subjected to never-ending torture, and Bastila and her son will never be given closure on Revan.
I've been having a bad week, and I was really looking forward to the ending of this story after having spent so much time on it, and it just made my day worse. My favorite book is Phantom of the Opera, and it inherently has a very sad ending, but it was with purpose and it fit the narrative of this tortured man who became a monster, finally gifting his victim freedom through his own end. This is Star Wars, and I didn't think the story would end with "well, through an unfortunate series of missteps, everybody died and is permanently imprisoned and the main character's wife will one day die never knowing what became of her husband." It was a worthless ending to an overall exciting and vibrant story, that heralded the reasoning why Revan and Malak ended up on the dark side.
Which, if I may add, was a frustrating enough reasoning for their turn to the dark side. I personally liked the idea that inherently, through war and hunger for knowledge, the dark side seeped into them from the inside out and corrupted them, the insinuation that the dark side is more powerful than the strongest warriors in the galaxy. But no, it was some schmuck who ate a planet that they happened to come across that decided to puppeteer them. It gives Malak and Revan too much of an out for their actions, which I've always hated. If you character does something bad, they did something bad. They shouldn't have to ever say, "Oh no, the only reason I did that was because of this other guy!" or "Oh no, I didn't do that at all, I just took the glory for it because why not!"
A mediocre reveal for a pretty big plot point in the Old Republic was the least of my frustrations after the ending. I know some people may think that it would have been boring or an unfitting Happily Ever After if they had gotten to kill the Emperor, save the galaxy, and go back home, but in my eyes, there were dozens of ways this could have ended without such an unnecessarily upsetting ending.
Read at your own discretion, and just be prepared for a bad ending with no real purpose.