Doctor Aphra Volume 2: Doctor Aphra and The Enormous Profit collects issues 9-13 and Annual 1 of Doctor Aphra. It was written by Kieron Gillen with art by Kev Walker in the regular issues and Marc Laming and Will Sliney in the Annual.
Synopsis
Triple Zero and BT-1 up to no good.
Still in possession of the Rur crystal, Doctor Aphra organizes an event to auction the artifact off to the highest bidder. She gets a veritable who’s who of lowlives and shady customers who seek the Immortal Rur for one reason or another. Some wish to make use of its technopathy as a weapon, others want it to investigate the possibility of their own immortality, and some want it for historical purposes. Among the bidders are the Xonti Brothers, who are responsible for Black Krrsantan’s brutal gladiator training; the Shadow University, an underground academic group; and Yonak, the current leader of the Son-Tuul Pride gang. Things are going fairly well for Aphra until Triple Zero begins to suspect that she plans to deactivate him and BT after the sale is concluded. He contacts Vader and informs him that a group of criminals are gathered to bid on an ancient artifact, but does not mention that his old minion is involved. He then takes the Rur crystal and places it in a droid that was previously damaged in a demonstration. It is, at this point, that Doctor Aphra begins to have a bad day. Rur, armed with two lightsabers, goes on a kill crazy rampage; and the Murderbots unleash the station’s automated gun turrets on the guests. Triple Zero demands that Aphra remove the constraints she put into their programming and basically free them. Having no other choice, she relents, and the droids go on their way. Vader and his troops arrive and start taking everybody out. Vader confronts Rur and defeats him. Meanwhile Black Krrsantan has pressed Aphra into assisting him getting to the Xonti Brothers. BK captures the two of them and makes off in their ship; Aphra having decided to stay behind and try to get to the Shadow University’s ship which is full of priceless artifacts. Miraculously, Aphra manages to avoid Vader and escape with the ship. Triple Zero and BT make themselves unwelcome guests on Yonak’s ship. In a series of epilogues, we see Aphra enjoying a vacation, Triple Zero using Yonak as a puppet to rule the Son-Tuul Pride gang, Darth Vader delivering the Rur crystal to his master, and Black Krrsantan subjecting the Xonti brothers to some very unwanted “personal training”.
Dr. Aphra confers with the Shadow University.
Annual 1 serves as both a prologue to the story just described and something of an origin story for Black Krrsantan. In it we learn that BK actually allowed himself to be taken off Kashyyyk by a Trandoshan “acquisition crew” and handed over to the Xonti Brothers for training. It seems, though, that the wookiee gets more than he bargained for when the already harsh gladiatorial training they subject him to comes to include the surgical application of sub-dermal plating and endoskeleton enhancements. Krrsantan vows that he will some day change their lives in a way similar to how they have changed his; a life debt, if you will. The framing device for the story is that Aphra has found two journalists who want to interview BK, and while they do she uses their ship’s transmitter to advertise the Rur auction.
Review
Rur rampage.
And so we add another chapter to the ongoing adventures of rogue archaeologist Dr. Chelli Aphra, and it’s not bad. In fact, I have to say I enjoyed this more than the first volume of this series, and it was certainly much better than the acrid grease fire that is The Screaming Citadel. This one has a great cast of supporting characters, some of whom return from previous comics appearances. Darth Vader is used fairly conservatively, not arriving until the very end of the third issue; and he doesn’t exactly hijack the story when he does show up. I can’t think of a more appropriate way for the Immortal Rur storyline to come to an end than for him to get his butt kicked by Darth Vader and then put on a shelf in the Emperor’s walk-in closet. Despite the plethora of guest stars, Aphra and her crew are by no means overshadowed here. Black Krrsantan is the star of the annual and figures prominently in the regular issues. When you do an origin story for a character, there is always the danger that it will be too much information (or TMI as the kids say) or just plain unnecessary; that’s not the case here, there’s still some mystery to BK. For example, what was this act of disgrace that he committed that made him an outcast among the wookiees and so keen to leave Kashyyyk? As is often the case, Triple Zero shines here as well (not literally of course) with his morbid humor. The idea that he and BT would, by the end of this story, be unconstrained by a master/droid dynamic was pretty brilliant and will be followed up on in the next storyline.
Killbots: footloose and fancy free.
And then there is the titular character; thus far it seems that every venture that has been undertaken by Chelli Aphra in these comics has, in some way or another, come back to bite her. Working for Vader, taking Luke to the Citadel, auctioning off Rur; all of these enterprises nearly ended in her downfall. Aphra is portrayed as a selfish and manipulative person throughout her appearances; and this isn’t just my opinion, those very labels are put into her mouth more than once. Aphra isn’t just written (by Gillen) as a “good guy” or “bad guy”. More often than not, villains are either portrayed as believing that they are, in fact, the hero; or they take nothing but joy in their evildoing. Aphra, on the other hand, has insight into her own nature. She knows she is bad. She also doesn’t seem to take joy in her immorality as she often struggles with making different choices and sometimes actually does; but not all the time, or maybe even most of the time. You could say that Aphra is portrayed as a self-loathing character, which is something unique in Star Wars. Darth Vader could be described as self-loathing, but he is also in denial; Aphra is not in denial, she has insight. So what is her main motivation? Why does she do what she does? She says in this story (while describing herself in the third person) she only cares about credits. I don’t buy it. We know Aphra suffered the loss of her mother as a child and was alienated from her father. Is this what made her the person she is now? Did it lead to a nihilistic outlook? Is she a masochist? Is she suicidal? Deeper insights into Aphra have, to my knowledge, yet to be revealed. I hope we will eventually get some; and, as much as a I genuinely like this character, I hope we see some kind of evolution with her.
Notes
Darth Vader puts a stop to all this Rur nonsense.
Among the potential Rur buyers at the auction: Papa Toren, previously seen in the Lando mini-series; Sutha the Hutt, seen in the Darth Vader series; representatives of the Droid Gotra, references to which have been peppered throughout a few comics and novels in the new era; and the Ezaraa, who were seen at the Queen’s reception in The Screaming Citadel.
Aphra mentions that Rur’s technology dates from “well before the Republic”. I assume she is referring to what is called the Galactic Republic, which existed for about 1000 years before the Empire as opposed to what is known as The Old Republic, the Galactic Republic’s predecessor.
An 8D series droid appears in the story.
Aphra vacations on the planet Zeltros, a planet previously seen in the original Marvel Star Wars comic series.
Son-tuul Pride was the gang in the Darth Vader series from whom Vader seized the credits that Aphra was then ordered to steal from the Empire.
Comic Pack Wish List:
The Xonti Brothers would be pretty cool, android Rur with his dual lightsabers, and I’ll say it for the hundredth time: Black Krrsantan is a must.
Score:
Even though I enjoyed this volume more than the first, I give it the same 3 skull rating. It’s built atop the foundation established by Volume 1. As I said in that review, I really wish we had gotten more real insight and history into Rur and the time from which he came.
