Rebel Heist #3

Rebel Heist #3 (of 4)

Writer: Matt Kindt
Penciller: Marco Castiello
Inker: Dan Parsons
Colorist: Gabe Eltaeb
Letterer: Michael Heisler
Cover Artist: Adam Hughes (regular and ultravariant sketch cover), Matt Kindt (variant cover)

Rebel Heist #3 stars the mighty Chewbacca. In the films, we saw Chewbacca as Han’s trusty copilot and friend. Sure, he shot a few Imperials and commandeered an AT-ST on Endor, but part of Chewie’s character was the legend. Throughout the films, there were hints that Chewbacca was more than what he seemed. Han warned that Wookiees were known for tearing an enemy’s arms off and beating them with them. He was an alien who towered over others and cause people to cower from him with just a snarl and a glower. Rebel Heist #3 tries to tackle Chewbacca by building up the legend.

For this issue, the viewpoint character is the lobotomized stormtrooper who is a walking keycard. He’s certainly no rebel. Working with Chewbacca, he thinks of him as “it” and “thing”. For him, Wookiees are primitive animals who grunt and growl in some rabid, feral imitation of language. Yet working with Chewie on this mission, seeing the Wookiee in action, he changes his opinion and comes to realize that Chewie is a fully intelligent being with noble motivations. As such, the character aspect of this issue is very enjoyable. While I never cared much for the stormtrooper guy, he did provide a nice narration for Chewbacca’s story.

Visually, this comic hits some high marks. In the beginning, there’s a group of lizard aliens who have a great design and appearance. I first I thought they might be Trandoshans, but as the panels shift to some close-ups, they appear to be a new species. The first page of the issue uses a range of panels to suck the reader in. It starts with a close-up of a lizard alien’s eye, zooms out to the alien holding a rifle, and then pans way out for shot of scenery of the planet. Each panel has a nice amount of detail, brilliant coloring and lighting, and an attention to scope. There’s just the right focus in each panel to highlight the emotion and action of what’s going on. By shifting the focus and zooming in on just the right parts of the action and characters, the art team does a great job of bringing the pages to life.

The strength of the visual storytelling in this issue is very important as Chewbacca is very much a visual character. Just like the films, we never get to hear a translation of what Chewie is saying. He just speaks in growls. It’s always up to the characters around him to define the context of what is said. But even without dialog, Chewbacca can still make quite an impression with just his gestures. Thankfully this comic gives him a good amount of action scenes which further cements his visual presence. We get to see Chewbacca battling lizard aliens, a gang of Gamorreans, sewer monsters and stormtroopers. His portrayal is spot on.

The issue ends on a very nice surprise and teases at who we’ll be seeing next: Luke Skywalker. There is also a tie-in to Han’s captivity. But as of yet, we still don’t know exactly how this will all wrap up in the fourth issue and what the greater storyline might prove to be. Regardless, this issue packed in some action, great character work, and a very entertaining issue. I give Rebel Heist #3 a five out of five metal bikinis.

Reviewed By: Skuldren for Roqoo Depot.