Customer Reviews
The end . . . and new beginnings - By: ShriDurga, 16 Apr 2007 
Endgame is a denouement, a figurative & literal cleaning up & sorting out, the final chapter in Dark Horse's Clone Wars series. That doesn't mean there's nothing but talking heads & exposition. On the contrary, there's plenty of action in three stories about choice & consequence.
Chronologicallly, the volume begins with the 3-part "The Hidden Enemy," in which former Jedi double agent Quinlan Vos is on assignment to Kashyyk, fighting alongside Yoda & the Wookies against Trandoshan Slavers & the Separatist Droid Army. With the issuance of Order 66, Vos finds himself an enemy of the state, hunted, alone in a Kashyyk forest crawling with clones. The closing pages of the story have created some contention among regular readers of the Vos comics, but even so you'd be hard pressed to find more than a handful that don't believe John Ostrander & Jan Duursema are the best writer/artist team ever to work on a Star Wars comic. This is yet another excellent example of their witty writing, keen plotting, & creative composition - & for me at least the closing pages were a very pleasant surprise.
Endgame continues with the two-part " Into the Unknown," the tale of two Jedi on the run days after Order 66, the tale of two choices, of two Jedi trying to make sense of a world turned upside down.. For Master Kai Hudorra, the priority is survival, to live to fight another day, even if this means forsaking not only the Jedi but - for her own good - a young Padawan as well. For Jedi Dass Jennir, the motivation is duty & obligation to right what the Order helped create, to aid those now fearing reprisal from the Empire. Author Welles Hartley is to be commended. There is no recrimination here, from the characters nor from the author, only the sympathetic portrayal of events, which in the end point to the reader & ask - how would you choose? The message is only enhanced by the art, beautifully detailed work from Doug Wheatley, whose only fault here is in making Dass Jennir look far too much like Orlando Bloom's Legolas.
The final choice in this volume is left to the newly minted Darth Vader, who must obey his new master & forget his old one, or indulge his desire for revenge. Between Vader & his anger are a half-dozen Jedi spreading the word that Kenobi is among them, bait to lure Vader into their Sith trap. Impressively, writer John Ostrander presents in a just a few pages of his one-issue "Purge" a more interesting portrait of Anakin in the days following his reanimation than James Luceno did in 336 pages in his wreck of a novel, Dark Lord. Credit goes here, as well, to artist Doug Wheatley for bringing the action scenes to life. The only cringe-inducing moment was Vader yet again having his hand cut off.
This final chapter in Dark Horse's long running prequel era series (beginning back in 1998 as simply Star Wars) will be remembered most as the home of John Ostrandrer & Jan Duursema's stories about Jedi Quinlan Vos & his Padawan Ayala Secura. While those two will be missed, there is much to look forward to as Ostrander & Duursema launch the new post-Luke-Skywalker series, Legacy, & in the new post-Revenge-of-the-Sith series, Dark Times, featuring the continuing tales of Jedi Dass Jennir.
Quinlan Vos faces the dark and sees the light - By: ShriDurga, 13 Apr 2007 "The Last Siege, The Final Truth" concludes the story of Jedi Quinlan Vos' betrayal of the Jedi, a story that began with Count Dooku's courtship of the wayfaring Jedi from Kiffu in Republic #49 (Clone Wars Volume 1: The Defense of Kamino). Over a period of five months prior to the battle of Coruscant, Republic forces lay siege to the city of Saleucami, where a CIS cell under the leadership of former Jedi Sora Bulq is cloning an army of Morgukai & training them in assassination techniques of the Anzati. Jedi Master Tholme infiltrates the Separatists' underground laboratories & carries out hit-and-run guerilla attacks, while a clone army ground assault is led by Jedi Master Rancisis & supported by Vos, Aayla Secura, Sharad Hett, Ausar Auset, Sian Jeisel, & K'Kruhk.
All the characters & alll the story arcs of the past three years are gathered together here in a tale that easily beats Revenge of the Sith for complexity in character & story development. To cover his Separatist identity, Vos is forced into a fiery master/padawan duel in the lava-filled caves of Saleucami, a confrontation reminiscent of the Vader/Obi-wan showdown of Return of Sith. Vos must later take on Sora, his long-time rival for the favors of Count Dooku, & is again callled to prove his loyalty to the Separatists by killing his lover Khaleen, who reveals the last great twist in this saga of duplicity & deceit.
As they have done throughout their series of adventures following Vos, Ayala, & Tholme, writer John Ostrander & artist Jan Duursema do a fine job of weaving together text & illustration, keeping the exposition pointed & crisp & letting the dialog & pictures carry most of the story.
No review is complete without ticking off a couple of weak spots, but there is little in this story with which to find fault, except perhaps the limited space given to Master Zao & the absence of Vilmarh Grahrk.
If you haven't read any of the previous Dark Horse Clone Wars graphic novels, this is perhaps not a good volume with which to start. But it's a fantastic one with which to finish.
excellent - By: Locutus of borg, 25 Oct 2006 this was & excellent end to the clone wars trade paper back series. i have been a massive fan of the clone wars & this book does a good job of tying up the ends & linking it alll with revenge of the sith.
the other reviewer doesnt seem to care about quinlan vos but i think he is an excellent character & hope to see more of him with the upcoming series 'dark times' (set just after revenge of the sith).
A rather bleh ending to a terrific series - By: Neomorell, 31 Aug 2006 
And so draws to a close a great run of titles collected in trade paperback form. It's been a great few years to be a Star Wars comic collector. The grand finale however, reallly isn't alll that grand.
First off we see the final moments of some of the Jedi as seen in Revenge of the Sith. More Quinlan Vos. First off, does anyone care about this guy yet? Well this time isn't much different. This part of the story alll comes to a satisfying conclusion though, so at least there's a sense of closure here.
Second part is about a few Jedi who we've never seen before. They don't do much & there's no point to these 2 stories.
Third & final the series ends with a bang where Vader gets into a battle with some Jedi. This is great but short, so even Purge cannot save this book from being the weakest of the titles.
The art is superb throughout, especiallly during Purge. The whole book is vibrant with colours as usual so no problem there. The writing is alright. If you have the others then you won't care what I've just written. But if you haven't tried the others yet, check out volume 7, it's head & shoulders above this.
