25: “He is as clumsy as he is stupid!”
Age 13/14/15? | 1981/82/83? Vader shows how truly merciless he can be.
Script & Art Notes
Vader’s Motivation?
Dead Admiral Ozzel. Ugggh…
In Empire, we got to see just how evil Vader is, and how terrifying it must be to work for him! Honestly, why would anyone work for him! Never mind the fact that the working environment is even more grey, and depressing than the most corporate building—but you’re living in near constant fear, and increasingly fear, as you rise up the ranks and take on more responsibility.
Actually, I sometimes wonder why Vader ever wants to do what he does. The thought never occurred to me as a kid, but now I’m finding it difficult to understand his motivation. Could it be for:
- Wealth? Nope. He lives like a monk and is surrounded by grey monochrome misery.
- Fun? Nope, he seems to be serious all of the time.
- Vocation? Because he wants to make the galaxy a better place? Maybe—however misguided it is.
- Evil? Maybe he just feels compelled to be evil—and a control freak.
- Mind-control by the Emperor and the Dark Side? Maybe.
- Obsession? Maybe.
So yeah, maybe he just feels—not enjoyment in—but some form of merely adequate contentment in exerting evil control over others.
Cor… flipping bloomin awesome Snowtroopers!
Raspy Speech Balloons
I like this treatment that I gave to Vader’s speech. See the wobbly balloons? Sometimes Threepio’s speech balloons are square looking, which is great. So I suppose I felt that ordinary balloons as we see in the Marvel version just looked a bit… ordinary. Like human voices. Vader’s voice has a mechanical quality to it, inbetween his asthmatic rasping breaths. He’s also pure evil, so my tortured, disfigured looking shapeless balloons just seem perfect. They’d definitely suit the Emperor. To be honest, I’d probably seen this in other comics, like Tomb of Dracula, or 2000ad and copied it—but I can’t swear to it.
So many unknown influences, all going into my youthful creative melting pot!
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Great work, as always!
One fun topic for discussion goes like this — was Ozzel an actual incompetent who was over-promoted, like Goering, or was he more of a Shindler, cleverly working to undermine the Empire from within?
Thanks Rob 😉
That’s a good question! Maybe Ozzel was an unsung hero! I wonder if he helped the rebels to blow up the Death Star too?
Especially since Ozzel pushed to dismiss the probe droid’s initial report as smugglers!