Christian Ashley and Joe Dea dive deep into the rich tapestry of "Tales of the Jedi" in this episode of Systematic Geekology, unraveling the intriguing lore of the Old Republic and its epic conflicts. They explore the intricacies of the Sith and Jedi dynamics, showcasing how this comic series painted a vivid picture of the Star Wars universe long before the prequels came into play. With clever banter and insightful commentary, they discuss pivotal characters like Ulic Qel-Droma and Nomi Sunrider, whose journeys highlight themes of redemption and the complex nature of light versus dark. Listeners can expect a relaxed vibe as Christian and Joe navigate through the nostalgia of the '90s comics and reflect on how these stories have shaped the broader Star Wars narrative. So, whether you’re a die-hard fan or just dipping your toes into the galaxy far, far away, this episode promises a fun exploration of the legends that have captivated fans for decades.

Christian Ashley and Joe Dea dive deep into the rich lore of Star Wars Legends, specifically focusing on the Tales of the Jedi comic series. From the outset, they explore the era of the Old Republic, unraveling the complex history that shaped the galaxy far, far away. The conversation kicks off with a look at the Golden Age of the Sith, where Jedi and Sith alike engage in a battle for supremacy, introducing concepts such as battle meditation and the exploration of uncharted space. Joe highlights the significance of the Sith as both a species and an ideology, while Christian notes the series' role in reviving interest in the Star Wars franchise during a dry spell post-Return of the Jedi. As they navigate through the narrative, they discuss key characters like Ulic Qel-Droma and Nomi Sunrider, delving into their personal journeys and the broader implications of their choices. The pair also reflect on the comic's vintage aesthetic, attributing its unique storytelling style to the creative freedom afforded by Dark Horse Comics during the 90s, before transitioning into a discussion of the series' darker themes, including betrayal, redemption, and the cyclical nature of good and evil in the Star Wars universe.

Takeaways:

• Christian and Joe dive deep into the lore of the Old Republic, exploring the origins of the Sith and Jedi dynamics in the Tales of the Jedi comic series.
• The duo emphasizes the impact of the 90s storytelling style on the Star Wars universe, showcasing how Legends expanded the lore beyond what was seen on screen.
• Ulic Qel-Droma's tragic arc serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of power and the seductive nature of the dark side, mirroring themes found in the broader Star Wars saga.
• Nomi Sunrider's growth as a Jedi highlights the importance of resilience and redemption, illustrating that even in the face of loss, one can rise to become a beacon of hope.
• The discussion touches on the unique narrative structure of the Tales of the Jedi comics, which often eschews traditional three-act storytelling for a more expansive exploration of character and world-building.
• The podcast wraps up by reflecting on how the themes of redemption and legacy in Tales of the Jedi resonate with modern audiences, inviting listeners to ponder their own journeys.

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What happened in the days of the Old Republic? We're going to be asking this question a lot more in today's episode of Systemic Ecology. We are the priests of the Geeks.

I'm your host, Christian Ashley. As we're going to be going through all of Star wars, the major parts. The major, major parts according to the list I made compiled along the way.

So if you don't get your special niche thing, maybe you can let us know about it and we might do something. But I think I've covered everything we need to do and today we're going to be discussing the tales of the Jedi comics that came out in the Ninet.

And I mean we. Because it's not just me, Christian Ashley. It is also, of course, my returning partner in crime, Joe Day. How's it going, Joe?

What is up, geeks? I am happy to be back talking some Star wars nonsense.

Oh yeah, speaking of nonsense, we actually covered this the last episode you heard us do.

However, due to the usual technology mishaps that happen whenever we do an episode, that entire part of the conversation was too garbled to be of any use. Joshua did what he could. The man is really good at what he does. You know what? Sometimes technology hates you.

And I guess it was just God's way of saying we need to do this all over again. If we can get super spiritual and deep about this. Of course, that's exactly what his intent was, wasn't it, Joe?

Yeah, I got a. A, absolutely. That's the Lord works in strange and mysterious ways. But B, this is a deep cut for all of you long time SG fans.

Really, what Josh should have done is he should have left that whole section in the episode, but instead of the audio, just spam the sonic coin ring the entire time. The entire length of that section. For those of you that know, you know, perfect.

All right. So Joe, what have you been geeking out on recently?

I have been watching through for the first time the show Fringe. Other than the fact that I've pretty much called everything before it's happened, it's oddly a good show for when it came out. Very, very J.J. abrams.

The mystery box syndrome is there. I think for the most part they answer it pretty well, in my opinion. So I'm eager to see what you think when you actually Finish it out.

So I have had to put on hold my going through every year of horror for a while just to like real life stuff getting in the way of fun.

Like, there's not reinventing the wheel there, but like when you're actually, I'm watching the film and going, wait, vici France. Oh, they're saying we've made. We've dealt. We've dealt with the devil ourselves. Oh, man, I am loving that film so much.

Like, it may be the honeymoon phase, but I'm giving that sucker a 10 out of 10 right now.

Oh, yeah. No, I mean for. Again, it's the 40s, guys, and we're talking and it's a movie that a lot of the quote unquote tropes are.

Are just, you know, becoming a thing in media at that. At that point. And this is a movie that is better than anybody or that than it has any right to be.

I don't think I've heard a single person talk about this film. Maybe they have and it just went away. But yeah, okay, but we're not here to talk about Carnival sinners.

We're here to talk about Tales of the Jedi, a very, very different series. So, Joe, will you help me out here in explaining what this comic series is?

You know, we may have to repeat what we said before, but they don't know what we said. We're fine.

The prequel trilogy that Lucas would make. So, like, a lot of what we are experiencing here is writing in this. This whole section of the universe. And so going through the.

Going through the miniseries and you're like, wait, what? Wait, what? That seems like that's a playoff of that and all of the. The answer is yes.

And part of that yes is that if you are looking for a three act structure, hope, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, this is not what this is. This is not that type of Star Wars. But. But it is.

It is taking us into an era of the universe that does probably what Legends does best in that it continues the scope and Scale of the world that Lucas already established, that's moving outside of just what's happening in front of the camera or just what's happening right on the page in front of you.

Yeah, this is definitely 90s coded in many ways, most of them really good. And the fact that this is. You forget, we are very blessed as of this time that have many things and some would say cursed.

And I kind of agree with both with different Star wars media, like every year, essentially, whether it be comics or books or movies or TV shows or what have you. This was in the midst of a big dry spell that things were being picked up again. We're getting, you know, we got the Thrawn trilogy.

We were getting Dark Empire and stuff like that in the comics then. And we were getting stuff like this, too. So it was revamping the Star wars fandom. And it's like, oh, man, we're finally getting new content.

It's been like almost two decades since Return, you know, came out in theaters. We might have had Ewoks in a droid show, but that's about it.

So I don't know when the next time I'm going to be able to get on here and really sink my teeth into some Star wars so. Legends. I grew up on the.

The originals, and I'm talking about the unadulterated originals before any of the special features that George Lucas decided he needed to add every couple of years to that trilogy. And my neighbor where I. I just. I discovered it, he was a couple years older than me. He was a huge fan. We bonded over.

Over our shared love of Star wars. And he's like, have you hear the Extended Universe? And I'm like, wait a minute, there's more Star Wars.

And I, I jumped into this world that to me, has always felt like a natural extension of what now. Now we use the word canon right now that. Now that's the. That's the big word. So. So what? But. But what was established, like, what you saw.

What you saw was King and then all of these other works. At least we're talking about the age. The age that I'm in. Avid book readers are throwing their devices to, which I say, don't throw your device.

That's silly. But. But that. That was like this. This breath of fresh air for kids because you had just had those three movies.

You don't have three movies and then a prequel and then a sequel and 17 shows and a dude that's trying to pump out content like it's going out of style. And A new thing exceeds expected every year. It's an entirely different world than it was in the 90s.

And so you get this quirky comic book, comic book run that looks dated but intentionally so.

You know, the, the art aesthetic is, is what it is on purpose because we're talking about thousands of years before the mainline story is taking place. And all of it lended to this air of no, you were legit reading what came before in a way that for me.

And I'll, and I'll, I'll leave the, I'll leave the, the larger conversation about legends here for me. Something that Disney was never able to capture.

It felt like the brand and then other pieces of the brand, but ultimately disconnected pieces, not, not, not happening in the same universe as everything else.

I do not believe, for as much as I'm an apologist for the two more divisive entries into the series, the, the Disney star, Star wars canon in Book of Boba Fett and Obi Wan, I don't believe.

I think they were both cool, but I was never judging them off of whether or not they could exist in the larger universe that I had already grown to love because they had already taught me not to. You know what I mean? I'd already learned that lesson.

And so if I take that responsibility off of it, well, suddenly those shows become, become a lot better because they're cool one offs. But again, coming up in the 90s and coming up with what we now call as Legends. That was Tuesday. That was. You were just happy to get what you got.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah. It's super important to understand the times that these are coming out. Like this is literally fresh. We had like source books and stuff like that.

And I say we as if I was part of the fandom there at four years old, but when these were coming out, but like we as a fandom, so they were building on some of these ideas, like this obscure planet would show up in one of these or something like that and been mentioned like a source book, like a DND supplement as it were for Star wars. But you didn't have books, you didn't have art, you didn't have comics in this way. So.

And you also didn't have the constraints of canon, as it were, because you were creating it at this time.

So there's a huge amount of freedom given to people like Veitch and Anderson and plenty of others who are involved in this project in both the novels and the comics. So yeah, that's huge. Another thing we need to focus on here is that we're not going in release order when we're discussing these.

And we go to 4,000, skipping a couple decades, a decade or two ahead in where these Tales of the Jedi comics end. Like several decades before Knights of the Old Republic is released. The video game now with.

And I'll. And I'll take the ball from you for a second to add some flavor to anybody who. Who isn't otherwise well versed in Dark Horse in the way that.

The way that Dark Hole Dark Horse released things and all of that sort of stuff. They didn't make it easy to. To be.

To be an avid fan of some of the runs that they did over time with some of the, like, release things and different things like that. So, like, the. The. The chronology being off is very Dark Horse Flash for that. For that sort of. That sort of storytelling.

Yes. So if we did that, it would sound like we're going all over the place. This sounds a little more structured.

That's because in hindsight, we're able to make it structured. But if you were to read these at release, you'd be getting new information, and that's cool.

Then you could be going back a thousand years, or then it'd be like a couple years forward. All this. It'd be all over the place there. So, Joe, you ready to go in?

Yep.

All right, so first off, on our docket, we have the Golden Age of the Sith. All right, so 5,000 years before the Death Star is destroyed, we have a galaxy where there is a Republic, but they don't know everything around them.

There's still. This is a time of exploration, going out and finding new places.

There's big money to be had, like establishing trade agreements with species you haven't met with yet to, like, bring them into the Republic and all this mess. So as this is happening, it's also a time of expansion. There's this gal, Empress Tita, who's in charge of collective group in a solar system there.

Sorry, I'm getting my astronomical terminology wrong. I think a sector of space, we'll say.

And she has taken control of that with the help of the Jedi who are serving as arms of the Republic as being not, like, completely warlike, but to serve as a way of reducing casualties and making sure that other groups who would not be as good insider Republic are taken care of before they can be introduced that way.

So this is also when we're introduced for the first time to the concept known as battle meditation, which is a Jedi technique, to where they can focus so much into the Force, where they can go beyond themselves and offer direction to soldiers as they're fighting or leaders as they're giving orders and stuff like that to make them almost not a hive mind, but, like, unified in that sense. So we see that being brought up. We also see two people known as Gavin Jory.

They are spacers I was talking about earlier, who go and chart uncharted systems so that they can sell the rights to hyperspace, because hyperspace is scary. You don't know where you're going to end up. Everything's literally a leap of faith at this point in time if you don't know where everything goes.

So they make a jump after, you know, they're about to have their ship impounded. And that jump, surprise, surprise, brings them to Korriban, where the Sith are.

Yeah, this. So a handful of years ago, I went on a bit of a pilgrimage to try to.

To try to go as close to complete timeline order as I possibly could with, like, the. The entirety of. Of Legends canon. And I had. Like I said, when I was. When I was younger, I had experienced these and.

And all of that, but I took them in, in. In timeline order the last time that I. That I read through these. And it is fascinating to see what starts here. Like you said, battle meditation.

I didn't put it together that this is, like, the first. The. The first instance of that. But, like, there's so many bits and pieces across all of this story that are proto versions of the.

That universe that we know and love.

Yeah. It's, of course, leads us into the big thing, the Sith. Like, we didn't understand the Sith back in the day.

We kind of thought they had something to do with Darth Vader and Darth Sidious the Emperor Palpatine, but we didn't know for sure.

In fact, when, goodness gracious, Zahn was doing Thrawn Trilogy, he tried to make the Noghri the Sith so he could explain the title, you know, dark Lord of the Sith. For Vader, him being, like, their leader, it was like. And Lucas was one of the few things he actually shut down. It's like, no, no, no.

You don't get it. Well, to his credit, how could he, like, completely understand. And that's when the prequels do come out. We get a little more in depth.

But it's building off of stuff like this that happened before where we actually see Sith as a species, but also Sith as an ideology. And they are led these Sith after the death of one of their leaders, Marco Ragnos. We see two different factions forming because Sith are Sith.

We see Naga Sadow and Ludo Kressh and they both have different designs on taking over this world.

But that's when the Daragans show up and, and they learn about what the Republic is and everything and they freak out because they don't know what to do. Some people are more isolationist, some want to go conquer them immediately.

Either way, they put them down as spies for the moment and they try and get into their good graces. And eventually we get to the point where Kressh and Sadow kind of mess with each other and there's a civil war.

It seems like one side is lost, but the winning side at the time is going to go after the Republic. And that leads into the fall of the Sith Empire, which is our next one. Yeah, go ahead.

And that. So I feel like how I feel about these, about this comic series is how I hear a lot of people talk about Knights of the Old Republic.

Like that game series never really got into it. I'm not as big of a fan of Star wars games as I am the other forms of media, but that's true straight across the board.

So I recognize them for what they are other than the fact that I'm just not. That's not really my bag as far as gaming goes.

But storyline wise, this, this to me is, is the superior work because I've, you know, like every self respecting millennial will go on YouTube and watch Review videos and storyline compilations and all of that sort of jazz.

So this is setting up, like I said, it's follow the Sith Empire where the Sith have invaded the Republic. They've even gotten as far as Coruscant because they have the navigation data from the ship they. That the Darrigans had with them.

Like Jori and Gav is kind of getting kind of seduced because they're both force sensitive.

They weren't trained as Jedi, but like you can have force sensitivity and not be a Jedi because there weren't as many Jedi back in the day, not as many Watchmen doing their jobs.

And we'll see Watchmen in the later part of this is like establishing that as a concept, which is one of the coolest features I think in Star wars having like A Jedi in charge of like a sector of space to find Force sensitives. But like, yeah, Coruscant gets attacked. We learn what the Sith are as a Republican is becoming a thing.

So now the Jedi are working alongside the Republic to take them down. They team up with Empress Tita and her forces since they already have a pre established relationship there.

And we get into a Sith civil war in the midst of this because once again, Sith is Sith and Sadow and Kressh go against each other and Krech's ship is destroyed. And Sadow is very upset about all this because the Republic now kind of knows where they're at. So he flees to the uninhabited jungle moon of Yavin 4.

And that is where the temples we see in episode 4 are created by his kind of the slave race that works with him, the Massassi. And he is now using that time to build up his power so he can actually take over the Republic.

Yeah. Yeah. So this is the, this is the, the end of the golden age of the Sith, the Sith people.

But, but we're obviously going to see that because this is so far in the past. Any, any like, item is going to obviously survive.

So like a form of, of these people, like the Sith will, will survive beyond this point, especially with like, knowledge and temples and spirits and this, all of it taking place on a moon that like it's back in, back in the day. George Lucas basically threw the doors open and said, whatever you want to do. You know what I mean?

That's why we have so many takes in the extended, in the extended universe. And so a direct, a direct scenery explanation from the, the original movies was, was a big deal and it was awesome.

And not every single one of the works very directly tries to give as much flavor to the original movies as this one does.

Yes. Yeah.

The ties, I mean, they're not exactly what I'd call subtle, but at the same time, they're not like just fan service for the sake of being fan service. Like there's. They're reasoning things out. Why would these things exist? Who made these temples that the Rebel alliance is using in episode four. One?

Here we go. We've explained it. Like, did we have to know? Did we? Yes, and I think it works. And at the same time, we're having the Jedi Academy trilogy.

Your mileage may vary on whether or not they're actually good or not in some people's eyes, being written by Kevin J. Anderson. And it's going to be referencing stuff made in this comic series.

So they're going to be in some ways referencing each other because they actually, like Joe said, there were different people involved in Legends back in the day, and everyone wasn't as concerned with continuity as far as other people were. And there were always going to be disagreements made. But for what's going on right here, they're pretty tight knit.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's unfortunate because that one of the most cohesive periods in Star.

An extended Star wars setting in storytelling is some of the most diametrically opposed pieces that you can have because this story is great. The other one that Christian is talking about sucks.

I, I got to that and I, I engaged with it a little bit, but I'm like, I'm not gonna read something that I'm not enjoying. You know what I mean? Like, I'm, I'm just not, I'm not a, I'm not a hardcore complaint completionist like that. And so like, it's so hot and cold and.

But, but it goes to the, the, the oddball beauty of Legends continuity and unfortunately the divide also, you know, we, we are both kind of in that same wavelength of Legends fans.

But even within Legends fans, you get people who prioritize one part of the timeline versus another part of the timeline and all of that sort of jazz. Yeah.

I mean, for instance, like, when it comes to the Jedi Academy trilogy, there are people who prefer it. Other people prefer like the fix fic novel, as it were, I Jedi or, you know, stackable kind of comes in and, you know, fixes some.

Certain things he saw were bad, you know, which. Some of which I agree with. But then I think he makes cornhorn a little too much like a Mary Sue.

I don't think he ends up as a Mary sue, but it's like really, really close there because of his strong feelings on the matter. So. Yeah, turns out Star wars fans are divisive people. Who'da thunk?

Yeah, who'da thunk it? But yeah, it's.

It.

This, this is in the context, adding the kind of flavor that I think a lot of people were hoping for out of the prequel trilogy with getting the backstory of Vader and getting Palpatine's rise to power and all of those kinds of things. And so this is. And the style of storytelling here, especially before the thousand years pass, because we are about to jump time. A thousand years.

And this.

But, but this is like when you, when you hear Luke talking about the legends of, of the Jedi and, and like the, they're these great mystical warriors, especially if we're really just honing in on the 70s.

These Luke Skywalker and what the Jedi, what the Jedi were made out to be, were not what they ended up being, but they, they really didn't like Lucas, I believe, had his three act structure. But beyond that, it's very clear that this man did not have the rest of his world fleshed out. But I digress that.

But, but if, if you're longing for that in Jedi form before politics before or the, the, the closely knit tied, this is your error.

Like this is it because you're, you're getting a lot of what feel like the ancestors of this light and dark side conflict that is in like the main part of the story.

That's a good segue into the next part where a thousand years later, as Joe said, we get to the actual titular initial comic tales of the Jedi where we go through two different story arcs. There we start off with Ulic, Qel, Droma and the Beast wars of Onderon. You want to take it away, Joe?

Yeah. So Onderon has been in a generational conflict between the people living in the fortified city of Iziz and the Beast.

Right.

Isis. Yeah. And the, the Beast Riders living outside of the city. But the Jedi eventually discover that something deeper is happening.

The royal family is influenced by the dark side teachings of Freedom Nadd, who is a Jedi who fell from the dark side and became a Sith Lord. Which part of where I think the, the, the prequel trilogy kind of dropped the ball a little bit.

Like the spectacle of the duel of, of the duel between Obi Wan and Anakin. Dope. No notes. Like, come on. Like we, we're all, we were all bought in for that, for that one.

Like it is all of the spectacle and all of the grandeur of the sword fight and all in the music and the whole thing. But there's kind of this, this reverence given a little bit at the very beginning to the idea of a light side Jedi falling to the dark side.

Especially with Obi Wan using the death language that he's using to describe the relationship between Anakin and Vader and all of that sort of jazz. Like, it feels like there's a gravitas to the idea that, that isn't really capitalized on in, in Anakin's story. Like it's not.

You don't really feel it as much. Or at least I didn't really feel it as much in that. And I've come around hard on the prequel trilogy. Like I, I see what George was doing.

I see the story it was telling. And yeah, of course it's different than the story of the. From, from the originals.

So, so your, your mileage may vary on how effective you think that story was in what it was saying. Now, I don't. Don't jump.

Scare yourself and go watch episode three in the theaters like I did in today's climate, you're going to leave really, really uncomfortable. That's all I'm saying. But like, this feels like the gravity is. Is there.

Like it's, it's treated as like this unspeakable evil and tragedy and travesty. That a light side. That a light side person is false. You know what I mean?

Yeah. Because this is where like for Ulik is our main character at this point in time.

We'll be introduced to our next main character and the next story that they tell. But we are seeing essentially what is the start of his eventual turn to darkness here.

And like the, the price of fighting against evil, seeing how another Jedi failed beforehand and how that could potentially motivate him. Seems the world isn't as black and white as he kind of thought it was. And then.

But at the end of the day, being on the side of light at this part of the Ark. Yeah. And you're right, there's a whole weight that gravitas is a stupendous word to use for this.

And the idea of how could you go from being on the light and then completely reversing who you are to become this person you never would have thought you'd become on the dark side as it is. Like. Yeah.

And the whole Onderon thing here we've got the whole, the elitists of like, we live in this walled city because the fun lord Star wars and science don't work. And don't worry about it when they care about it. Care about when they don't care about it.

Don't care about it because Andron and its moon ducks get really close to each other and what would otherwise be very, very bad.

But what they do because Star wars science, their atmospheres merge for a little bit and that allows these flying beasts from the moon to go onto Onderon.

So a punishment is for the people who are rabble rousers or people the royals don't like, pretty much get kicked out of the city under the threat of exile, thinking it's a death sentence. But what they do is they end up becoming the beast riders.

Like taking these animals that come from Dxun and like riding them and like, providing, like, a rebel army, as it were. And that's part of the story of the Jedi learning. Oh, we were on their side because we expect them to be the good guys.

And yet they're being misled by the Sith teachings of Freedon Nadd and his followers and cultists. But the Beast Riders are actually trying to make peace through a union of marriage between the princess and the leader of the Beast Riders.

So it's a very fun story of, like, subverting expectations in a good way compared to other people who try to do that in Star Wars. But that's another story for a different time.

Yep. And so I just want to, you know, blinking, you'll miss it before I throw it back to Christian for our next protag.

But like Christian said, this came out first. This was your initial introduction to this section of the story. And so this is the first time that you're getting the look at the ancient Sith.

So, like, in timeline order, we're seeing that, like, okay, so a thousand years and the Sith are still doing things. Like, they're still the influence of the dark side and all of that jazz. But like this, you. You are.

You are stepping into a story that is already part way told, you know?

Yes. Yeah, absolutely. That's part of the fun of it. Like, I've never been real big on the art for this series or for Dark Empire.

And like, no, like, shade on the artist who works on both, if I remember correctly. Can't remember his name. But what it does do is I can look past that and still see a really good story.

And these are really well told stories for the most part here. And like, we start with Ulik. Now we get to our next character. The saga of Nomi Sunrider is kind of the next arc that comes up here.

And she is introduced as the wife of a Jedi, a Jedi Knight, which, by the way, once again, we said it last time, but you didn't hear it. This is before we have the prequels coming out. So as far as the writers are aware, this is what Jedi should be like.

You know, firefighters have wives and husbands. You know, priests, pastors have wives and. And the like. Then we have, you know, police officers, so on and so forth. Firefighters. I already said that.

So why shouldn't Jedi get married? Yeah, so this is built on the idea that they don't know what Lucas is making. And he approved of this in the first place.

He allowed them that, from what I understand, gave them pretty much free reign to do almost whatever they wanted. With this, I think he only had to step in a couple times, but I'd have to look that up again.

So with that in mind, this is shocking to a lot of people reading this for the first time. It'd be really shocking for someone right now to look back and go, wait, that's what the Jedi were like. Yeah.

And that's part of the thing is, like, as you're making a mythology here, like, the Jedi are not static beings as an organization, like, at different times, just like, you know, as is the case in the church, you'll have a denomination, believe a certain way and break away. Or you'll have, like, we're really cool about this, but now we're going to not be cool about it 100 years from now.

Like, as people change, as, like, feelings on matters change, this is where we end up. So she.

They have a daughter together, Vima, and he is bringing these odigan crystals, kind of like force lightsaber crystals to be used and lightsabers and the like. But he is killed by a Hutt gangster.

And by the way, we had a nice hut in the story before this, even though this wasn't released in chronological order. So it's very interesting to see, like, when they play up the racial stereotypes, the species stereotypes, I should say, and then they don't.

So, like, obviously, they're very focused on what Jabba would have done here.

We get that character involved, and now Nomi has to step up to the plate, and one of her husband's final words is, hey, go to one of my masters, Thawne, and be trained as a Jedi. Because I know you're force sensitive, too.

And another great thing about the comics, one of my favorite things that you can't always do in live action, you can make things weird, man. We have a giant triceratops Jedi Master, who is our Jedi Master for Nomi. And I adore every moment of this.

It's one of those things that shouldn't work, and yet I love every single moment of it.

Yeah, well, that's part of. I think. Part of. I think why that works is that this unapologetically commits to the bit.

Like, this is something that is weird and different and not necessarily what you're used to and feels like of another time. And because that's really the case, and I think partially because at this point in time, nobody's told them that they can't. So literally, it's all.

It's all good, because there was nothing that. That already existed, that as long as you walk Forward with confidence. It's sci fi.

And, and, and I, and I think that's beautiful because I think that's part.

That's half the reason why sci fi isn't bigger than it already is, like, as a, as a, as a genre, because you've got hard sci fi and you've got soft sci fi and you've got sci fi like this, and you've got sci fi like that in sci fi. That should, that, that should pay attention to actual science and sci fi, that throws science out the window entirely.

And, and all of those different flavors.

That's not a bad thing inherently, to have all of those different flavors until you start getting wrapped up in whether or not your flavor should be the only flavor of sci fi. And that is a really big in.

And, but, but it's interesting because we didn't have, like, when this was coming out, we didn't have the access to everybody's opinions that we have. So, so we're not, we're not told what not to like and what to like.

And with this, like, at this era in, like, how weird this is and all of that sort of jazz, like, it's, it's closer to sci fi, like, so like sci fi like Star Trek or sci Fi, like Star wars or different things like that. So there weren't such narrow categories for what could and couldn't happen. Yeah.

And we get a great Star wars story here for Nomi in that she is presented with the perfect opportunity for revenge as part of her training. When, you know, the pirates who killed her husband attack Ambria, the world that she's training on. And she doesn't. It's not like.

It's not like she can't attack them, which is. There's this heresy now in a certain part of Star wars media is like, Jedi can never attack at all because they misunderstand the quote.

You only use it for defense, not attack. It's like, no, in the act of defense, you are attacking. What he's trying to say is, like, you can't. Attack is like the aggressor.

Your job is to protect.

So she has learned that lesson through this, you know, through the training she has with Thawne and seeing her daughter growing up and going, okay, no, I'm not going to be the same person they are. That means I can still wield a weapon, I can still protect others, but it doesn't mean I stoop to their level. Love it.

All right, so next up on our docket, we have the Freedon NADD uprising.

We go back to Onderon for this one, and we see the Jedi are involved with Queen Amanoa, who was a princess from before, if I remember correctly, and she's trying to get the Beast Riders together with Isis.

But unfortunately, there are cultists who are using Sith magic and trying to cause discord inside of Onderon to try and take control away under the guise of, you know, potentially maybe even bringing Freedon NADD back. We also get, like, these two. I think they're cousins. Yeah.

Satal and Aleema Keto, who are, like, Sith weeaboos, as it were, who go around collecting Sith artifacts and, like, trying to use their powers. And they find this dark side cult known as the Krath, who are also involved with the Freedom Nad uprising to an extent.

And so they're trying to, like, bring the Sith back in some way, shape, or form. And that's when we get a big battle between them. When they attack Jedi. Yeah. Jedi reinforcements go to Onderon from Ossus.

That's when we have a huge battle there between everyone. And eventually they're able to, like, get rid of the spirit of Freedon Nad, which recedes back into his sarcophagus.

Not to be seen again until Nazi Republic, too. Kind of.

Kind of, yeah.

Yes. Anything on that one, Joe?

Yeah, I. I thought it was interesting. So. So the last time that I. That I read through this, obviously it was after I had known what, like, Knights of the Old Republic was and all of that.

And I thought it was interesting to see the, like that fleshed out, like, taking these things side by side with each other.

Which.

But which. Which Knights of the Old Republic is that. Does that fall into. Into legends, or is that canon? I don't know.

Legends, legend. Revan has been mentioned in canon. You wouldn't know it unless at a source book, but technically, he's canon to the new canon.

Yeah, yeah. That.

That, to me, is like, the biggest travesty of the modern age, that there's not more from this era that is at least touched upon or made canon or different things like that, which, seriously, Disney. I understand you are. The executives are listening. And so I'm just saying I have a whole trilogy centered around the Rule of Two in Darth Bane, all.

All locked and ready to go. I Will, I will gladly share that with you. And. And we can do beautif business and put Star wars back on the map again.

Remember, we had Empress Tita all the way a thousand years ago. That system has been renamed after her. There's an overthrow of the monarchy there by those cousins I mentioned earlier to the Ketos. Ketos.

They're working with the Krath, who have abandoned the Freedon, that uprising and everything, so that they can kind of make their own way in the galaxy. This is when Ulic and Nomi start really working together.

They work together in the previous one, but, like, they're really kind of getting closer here. Like, there's been enough time between her husband's death. They're really, like, they've been romantically tied.

They're certainly attracted to each other. Like, what's going on with that?

And as part of this, Ulic decides he's going to go infiltrate their ranks so he can feed information to the Republic and the Jedi. But he starts really getting seduced by the dark side a little more, and he gives a little more of himself up every time he does something like this.

And like, Nomi, like, is fearing this, tries to go and save him, but he shuts him down.

And he kind of pals up with Aleema instead, kind of making her his consort, as it were, and decides he's going to be the warlord of the craft, become a Sith in his own right. Even though I don't think he uses that word yet. But eventually he pretty much is.

This is when he then pals up with a guy named Exar Kun, who is a fallen Jedi who also sought, you know, Sith knowledge as well, that he's gone to different worlds. He's been a Korriban, he's been to Yavin 4. He's done his research, and now he thinks, okay, I'm going to do this. And fights look for a bit.

But they end up, like, deciding, you know what? This isn't doing anything. Let's work together. And that's where that part of the story ends.

Yeah, this. It's. It's interesting to me how. How similar this section is to specific points in the Skywalker Saga, because there's like, this.

This undercurrent of. Of distrust that's, that's there that, like, I, I, I'm strong enough to flirt with danger but come out unscathed to get the job done.

And this idea that the Jedi are hiding things and all of that sort of jazz, that's very reminiscent of Anakin. Whereas the story of the idea of a Jedi feeling like they are strong enough to dance with the devil in the pale moon light and not have to.

And not have to pay for it with, with this idea of, of learning about the Sith but not, not falling to it is we see again with, with sequel books with Luke.

Yeah. I mean, at this time, you know, with Dark Empire coming out, like, Luke falls into this too, a little bit too.

Like, becoming Palpatine's apprentice for a time to try and placate him and try and infiltrate things, but ends up seduced for a bit to the dark side. Not completely and utterly, but, like, way too close for his comfort zone.

And eventually he's able to be brought back to light with Leia's help and everyone there. But it was closed for a bit.

Yeah. And this is where we're pointing. So, like, this is where the story really starts to, to accelerate.

And that's part of where there's value in looking at this chronologically because now you're getting closer to a crescendo because you're going, you're, you're going further in the actual, like, you're getting to the end of the story, even though, like, that's not, that's not release order and that. So, so looking at this history of the Sith and these conflicts with the Sith and then a thousand years and then conflict and gravity.

And now you've got good guys thinking that they can, they can learn from the bad guys without becoming a bad guy themselves. And it's slow and it's pulling in a way that, that, like I said, other eras tried to capture that I would argue. And maybe it's the, the age old.

Right. Like, would you rather hear it or would you rather see it? Would you rather read it or would you rather view it? You know what I mean?

Like what, what one gives you more artistic license to be able to immerse yourself in the world more? And I think that that answer depends very situationally for me. It's not, it's actually not 100% of the time.

I'm not sure I could point to a set standard of one over the other for me, but here I can say that the books leave more canvas to paint with than the movie does.

Yeah.

So this will bring us to our next part here, the Sith War, where, like I said, this is where Exar Kun and Ula Kildroma become the Sith of their era after they've listened to the teaching of those who came before. They're trying to conquer the entire galaxy. And Ulik does it from, like, the military standpoint initially.

Exar Kun does it from the let me talk to people and seduce them over to the dark side with words. Because he's like. He goes to the Jedi that he knows the apprentices and the like, and he's like, guys, they're hiding secrets from us.

The people I've been learning from, like, they don't have restrictions. Like, what's this Jedi wussing us over here? Like, let's get stuff done.

And this is also when we're introduced in the comics, I believe, for the first time to the Mandalorians, thus creating another subsection of Star wars fans for decades to come, as they are defeated in combat by Ulic, and he gains the allegiance of Mandalore there to bring them to his side. And now they're going to fight the Jedi.

You know, the defectors from the Jedi go and train under Exar Kun, um, and he's got a holocron there he's, like, trying to get them to destroy, but at least trying to, like, use and utilize it, like, creating new acolytes for himself in that method to, like, one day oppose Ulic and become the leader of the Sith.

And it's at this point where Nomi and several other Jedi form a faction together, and they're able to take down Ulic and put him up to trial for everything that he's done.

And this is when Exar Kun comes with the descendants of the Massassi warriors who were left behind all the way in Yavin 4 to battle with the Republic.

One of the great Jedi Masters there, but Os boss, who's been in the background for all this time helping other people out, being, like, a Master of Masters to an extent, ends up dying in the midst of this. And, yeah, his goal was to rescue Ulic for this time to, like, so that he can do it himself pretty much.

He doesn't want someone else to do it for him.

And we also have Aleema in this time, like, messing with Sith sorcery to the point where she sets off a supernova that kills a bunch of people, almost destroys Osis in the midst of this, which at this time is, like, one of the biggest Jedi outposts there is. So that would have been a huge blow if she had actually been able to do that.

It's also at this point where Ulik's brother, K. I don't think we mentioned him, but, like, he trained together with him growing up. And after they duel, Ulic actually kills him. And Nomi is like, you're too far gone.

And this is where I think we see for the first time, someone actually stripping the Force away from someone, and Ulic is left without the Force at all. So he's basically almost become blind, as it were, because he's lived his entire life with the sense, and now it's gone.

And we're able to defeat the forces of Exar Kun, but his spirit kind of like merges with the Massassi Temple and will later be actually probably around the same time, be part of the Jedi Academy trilogy.

Yeah, yeah. The. The fact that they. They added this layer of magic to the. The. The Sith teachings in this series that really differentiated them from the Jedi.

Like, the Jedi could do things, but it was very much a. They're. They're meant to be mirrors of each other in a way where certain things are emphasized here and certain things are emphasized here. One.

One group is the good guys, one group is the bad guys. I mean, in. In architecture. So here we're getting a work where the. The. The. The bad guys are truly differentiated and even.

Even unto death, with Exar Kun's spirit being trapped in the temple, that just gave it a different. A different feel than just, oh, he got run through with a. With a. A lightsaber, and that's the end of it.

Yeah, that's another example of, like, we saw Force lightning in, you know, Return of the Jedi uses an obviously Sith tactic, but that's part of the fact that they have a movie budget, but they don't have a super movie budget where they could go wild and wacky and crazy. You know what?

Comics can do that because an artist has way more time, isn't going to be paid as much, unfortunately, compared to certain people who can do that on screen. So you have all these wild things of a supernova happening because of systematic.

We'll have, like, Palpatine and Dark Empire doing weird and wacky things with Sith alchemy, bringing things together. Like, it's super fun because, like you said, it really distinguishes them from the Jedi. Otherwise, they kind of look like the same.

They're just different colors. Yep. All right, now for our final one here, we have Redemption, which is actually one of my favorite parts of this.

So Ten years after the events of everything happened before, Nomi has become like the Jedi Master. I don't think the Grandmaster as a title had been created yet, but she's pretty much that for the Jedi.

She's called this whole convocation together, like, we need to meet up and we need to have a church council. We got to make sure everyone's on the same page here. We can't be bringing those books into the Bible or anything like that. No. And it's.

At this point in time, there's some leftover elements from the people they were fighting before. There's also pirates and the like. But there's also people who've been affected by the war, one of them being one of the Cathars, the Cat people.

Sylvar, who had fought in the Sith War. She had lost her mate Krato, who was also a Jedi, to due to him fighting Ulic.

And she's angry because he was stripped of the Force, but, like, there was no official title because one of Nomi's things was like, okay, you've been punished enough and just. Just go. Go into exile. And around this time, she's seeking vengeance.

But Nomi has kind of been neglecting her daughter Vima, who is also Force sensitive. You would think, you know, that she would train her, but, you know, parents aren't perfect people.

There's a lot of trauma there, and she's not expressing it in the best way. So as part of this, she is denying her daughter. So Vima decides she's going to go off and learn it on her own and do her own thing.

And that brings her to the planet Rin Var, where the rumor is that's where Qel Droma has exiled himself to is this frozen, think off kind of planet where no one would ever want to go.

She finds him there, and he's like, I'm not going to treat you, teach you the ways of the Fourth, because unlike someone else, I have a legitimate reason for not doing it, because I actually have a better backstory here. But along the way, she kind of gains his trust still. Bar is still trying to track him down. And Nomi has figured out that her daughter is fled.

She's trying to go towards her, and Ulik, over time, is kind of learning, okay, I messed up, but I can actually do some good here by training, you know, the next generation, as it were. So even though he doesn't have access to the Force, he still remembers his training. So he's teaching her how to do this.

So eventually, everyone finds Them, and they're almost willing to give things up, but one of the pilots they brought with them who was trying to make a big name for himself, he was kind of a nobody.

His name's like, Hogan or something like that, shoots and kills Ulic Qel Droma, who can't defend himself because once again, he doesn't have the Force anymore. So they're all shocked because, like, even, you know, Silver had kind of given up her revenge. Nomi was kind of getting ready to forgive him.

Then he dies. But there's a great moment that happens here, and instead of, like, just being a body, he becomes one with the Force.

And so that kind of lets everyone know. It's like, yeah, he did all those terrible things, but he was making up for it in the end. And that's where we left off the tails.

And it's interesting because it's. It's a very much a.

In a beat that becomes very familiar the more you get into Star wars where there's a lot of bittersweet endings, you're very rarely for. For the first major moment, like Cap Capstone moment, to be one that is so bright and hopeful.

Star wars definitely found its home telling bleaker endings than that one where there isn't. There is a grain of good, but it's not pure by any stretch of the imagination.

Yeah, it's a great way of putting it. Obviously, he's still the man who did all those things forever ago.

In the same way Darth Vader was still the man who ordered all those executions and allowed genocide and everything as part of working for him, for Palpatine, and yet remembered who he used to be at the end and gave all that up to save his son, to meet a better man. And that's why he can become one with the Force.

Yeah. Yeah.

And when you take the whole thing in, right, when you take this entire series as one collected work, redemption acts as this earned conclusion to a story that, like, starts with the Sith as an empire, and then the civilization falls, but their knowledge survives.

And then we get a new generation of Sith with or with of Jedi, with Sith corruption starting to resurface, and then people intentionally recovering forbidden knowledge that the Jedi are trying to bury.

And then the bad guys thinking that they can, or the who would become the bad guys thinking that they can control the darkness in order to win their confidence ultimately is their undoing.

And through all of this, the stories asking this question that's paid off at the end of whether someone can become more than the worst thing that they've ever done. And you get interesting answers to that more than once. So. So, yes, Ulic gets his.

But also you get Exar Kun's answer to that in a much different way, where the thing that he thinks is going to give him freedom actually traps him inside of a cage of immortality.

It's that if you do them right, people aren't going to complain about it. You know what I mean?

Yeah. It's not that. Just because it's been done poorly or not as great or outright terribly doesn't mean the trope itself is bad.

It means there's a good way to do it and there's a really bad way to do it. Or you're the first person to do it. Like, we were talking about the Fausti and deal earlier. Yeah.

Obviously that comes from Faust, you know, and everything that came before that, hundreds of years before the movies that we know and the books that we know would go into stuff like that. It's on how you execute it that matters here.

And I think this is a perfect execution of someone who many people today would be, oh, he was a bad person. Therefore, no redemption ever.

Versus people like us who kind of go, you know, as broken people ourselves, who know all the terrible things we've done to each other and the people around us, and go, well, I don't deserve redemption. And yet I've been offered it. Thank God for that, number one. But how do I proceed with the knowledge this is who I was?

I don't want to be that person anymore. What do I do in light of that? And, yeah, obviously there's no Christianity in Star wars, but you see some parallels there.

Right? Right.

All right, Joe. We're still over time, but we're not as bad as I thought we'd be. So on the back, we did it.

Yep. Yep.

All right, so that is the Tales of the Jedi. Next time, I believe it'll be tj, John and I, if we can get that done. We're going over the games and comics of knights, the Old Republic.

Joe, you're welcome for that. I know you said you weren't big on the video games. I don't know if you read the comic series with Zane.

Yeah, I did.

Okay, if you're available, see if we can get you on for that too. So guys, I messed up the bonus question earlier so I didn't have anything tied into this. So on the fly I made one up.

Very important, you know, life changing question we're going to be asking ourselves. Double bladed single or double lightsabers in our bonus question. If that fascinates you, you want to throw a little money our way, you can have it.

A fourth wall in the link down below and and plenty of bundle questions like that. Extra episodes like Kevin and I just did our review of Spider Man. Brand new day. It's going to be on the fourth wall page there.

So Joe, anything else you want to discuss before we wrap things up?

Yeah, no, I think that's about it.

Okay. Yeah. You have a recommendation for the audience to check out.

Dive into Legends if you haven't. If you're just a fan of good old fashioned stick to your rib Star wars storytelling. Don't get wrapped up in what counts and what doesn't count.

Or this or that. Just take in some good stories.

I'll second that. But I also say X Men 97 Season 2 finished this week and I will say I like it less than season one, but that's not like because it's still good.

I just want better for it in certain aspects and part of it is just how rushed it is. And because they only have so many episodes to get stuff done that's not their fault. It's you know, money in production and all that jazz.

But I still think it's worth checking out. Like I still enjoyed a lot of stories they were telling. So guys, yeah, thank you for everything you do.

Please get a chance to a five star review and your podcasting platform of choice. Help us this rating there help us find more people. Feel free to send episode topic ideas our way.

We'd love to hear them so we know what you guys care about.

We can do episodes on those things you have any questions you want to send to us they can go to systematic ecology gmail.com with to shout out some supporters Real quick. Thank you very much to Ethan Overcash, Austin Nance, Amber Riley and Jonathan Augustine, Gunner Burgum and Frank Trogl. You guys are the best.

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