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Knights of the Old Republic 22: Knights of Suffering, Part 1

What is it ? : The Moomo Williwaw arrives at Taris, and Mandalorian patrols spot Rohlan at the controls so assume it is a captured vessel and allow him to approach the planet. Zayne in the borrowed Mandalorian Neo Crusader armor leaps from the ship as it flies over the city, using his jet pack to land.
He is attacked by a combat droid, and uses his lightsaber to destroy it, but is spotted by some of the Taris resistance who initially assume he's a Mandalorian since he's wearing the armor, but then realise he's using a Lightsaber so take him to see Gryph.
They speak and Zayne is told how the upper city was lost, and the gangs in the lower city are the resistance, some fighting to protect their planet, and others just fighting to see what they can loot. Zayne discovers that the story of him killing the padawans has become a point of legend already and the people see him as a great warrior, he also discovers that Gryph has been hired by the head of a corporation to find Taris's Senator, who will get the charges on the two of them dropped if they succeed in finding him. The constable in charge of the Taris Police has also arrived in the undercity, but is looking for his family, blaming the gangs for their loss, and so forming a wedge between the different resistance groups.
We get to meet various characters from the Kotor games who are part of the resistance, including Mission and Griff Vao, and Brejik.
Zayne speaks to Mission Vao, who is warned by her brother that Zayne is a killer, but she likes Zayne so offers to show him something her brother has been hiding.
Elsewhere on Taris, a cloaked figure with head tails speaks to a young girl, telling her that "he" is coming, she sees him in her dreams, asking the girl if she's ready. The girl responds that she is, and sees him every time she closes her eyes too.
As Mission and Zayne get where Mission is leading them, they get attacked by Brejik and Griff, but Del Moomo stops him, and they discover that Brejik and Griff have been hiding the Constables kids, who can be used to ally the groups of Resistance together.
Everyone gathers Speeder Bikes and tear off through the city fighting their way to the location of the Constables Resistance group, but when they arrive Zayne spots the young girl from earlier and recognises her as Shel Jelavan, the sister of his co-padawan Shad Jelavan. Zayne had a crush on Shel so rushes forward to greet her, but she pulls a blaster and shoots him, as he lies wounded she steps forward to shoot him again, and Raana Tey steps forward Lightsaber ignited to protect her, urging her to kill Zayne . . .

High Points : There's quite a bit of infodump to bring us up to date with the situation on Taris and what Gryph has been up to since we last saw him. But we get Zayne straight into the action, and he's the one to find a way of bringing the Resistance groups together, so remains the prime motivating factor in the story rather than allowing events to happen around him.
And we end on a decent cliffhanger, where Raana Tey has used the story that Zayne killed the Padawans to turn the sister of one of them, someone Zayne liked and trusted, against him.

Low Points : One of my main problems with modern Star Wars is how small it makes the universe by giving us so many cameos that the universe appears to be tiny. And that problem is evident here, as we really didn't need to see Mission and Griff Vao as part of the resistance, the appearance of the gang leaders makes sense, as the gangs are armed and leading the defence of their planet. But another party member from the first Kotor game already, we only just left Carth Onasi, Are we going to see the first meeting between Mission and Zaalbar next issue? As it's something I really don't need to see. It really just amounts to dangling them in front of us, "Here, remember that thing you liked? Well here are some people out of it"
Just have some faith in your own story, and don't intrude on it with pointless cameos. Carth was pushing it, and I know who Alek turns out to be (which makes sense to see the beginnings of in this story), but Mission and Griff are just a step too far, especially as Griff really just seems to be here because his name sounds the same as Gryph.

So what do you really think ? : A lot of set up, but nicely balanced by a developing plot with Raana Tey and Shel Jalavan. Some pages are virtual walls of text, although this is nicely balanced with the action and the natural story development, overall a pretty darn good issue.

Final Words : It kind of amuses me that Raana's visions are accurate enough to put her and Shel exactly when and where Zayne will be, but the entire situation was started by the visions wrongly predicting that one of their Padawan's will fall to the Dark Side and kill them, without seeing that the prediction itself will set this in motion.

Score : 8.5/10

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