#the eye of darkness

[soneakyr]

"She heard Elzar swallow, but neither turned to look at the other. Her hand, hanging by her side, brushed gently against his. Just for a moment. But it was all they needed. For now."

(I'm obsessed with EOD ending)

[darth-memes]

[ihassheepquake]

I'm reading The Eye of Darkness and I just really love this line from Belin to Avar Kriss in chapter 29.

"You may be a Jedi, but you don't have to save everyone. You can't save everyone. It's the fact you even try that makes you different from the Nihil. You don't have to win, Avar Kriss. All you have to do is try. That's enough."

If that's not really the message of Star Wars, I don't know what is.

[lilypuffsw]

Avar & KC-78

[milkmanviii]

In honour of more Avar content, I made Avar Kriss’s lightsaber, with cedar and gonçalo alves with a spalted, erm… wood, stand (I don’t know what kind of wood that is it wasn’t labelled when I bought it).

Avar’s hilt is a little less complicated than Stellan’s, this one took around a week compared to about 2 weeks for Stellan’s, but it’s still a great design even among high republic lightsabers. I still haven’t quite figured out how to make things fit completely perfectly but generally the gaps are small enough to just fill in. I also ran into a small wormhole in the gonçalo alves I had to fill in which I’m hoping isn’t that noticeable.

The Eye of Darkness was everything I needed. My boy Reath got 4 whole mentions, including one physical appearance (yes I was counting, don’t judge me). Also Burryaga just allowing Ember to burn his fur so he could give her pets is so cute.

[bikananjarrus]

elzar thinking about the last glimpse he got of stellan. elzar thinking about stellan’s laugh.

(the eye of darkness / temptation of the force)

[queensaule]

i am once again asking: where are the jedi therapists

[asteroids-and-tractorbeams]

How I feel whenever George Mann writes a fight scene where Bell Zettifar does some cool Jedi move

[arkham-prisoner]

How I imagine any Sith Lords secretly watching the Jedi face The Path of The Open Hand, Nihil and Nameless during The High Republic Era

[bereft-of-frogs]

Ghirra trying to gaslight the chancellor and the council is so funny

‘The public execution? What, were you guys like…mad about that??? Really?’ GIRL YES???

I’m so glad I got to this part at home I CANNOT keep a straight face

[jewishcissiekj]

Star Wars - The High Republic: The Eye of Darkness

[soneakyr]

Avar Kriss, Elzar Mann and the beauty of expressing their feelings and love through their hands:

Light of the Jedi:

The Rising Storm:

The Fallen Star:

The Eye of Darkness:

Love, pain, comfort,expectation, anticipation and even denial. Everything is in their hands.

So, what will be the next one?

[darth-memes]

STAR WARS THE ACOLYTE COMES IN 30 DAYS!

[ihassheepquake]

So as I finish Defy the Storm by Tessa Gratton and Justina Ireland, I've noticed a theme throughout the High Republic that comes back to different variations of Rose Tico's line from The Last Jedi "That's how we gonna win. Not fighting what we hate, saving what we love." It's never exactly the same, but the essence is always there. Victory not through defeating an enemy or destroying something, but in saving something. I do think there's an ideological difference between the two approaches to achieving victory. Vernestra Rwoh says something kinda similar to the Jedi Council at the end of this book, and Belin told Avar Kriss something similar in The Eye of Darkness by George Mann.

I really love seeing this idea show up as a theme throughout this era because I think it's really central to the theme of Star Wars. That scene of Rose in the movie gets a lot of hate for being "stupid" and because "that's what Finn was trying to do." But in my experience, the people who react that way tend to be the same people who love Luke "redeeming" Vader at the end of Return of the Jedi (in quotes because I'm sorry Vader, but doing one good thing and then dying after being a tyrant for decades isn't redemption) and fail to realize that that's what Luke was doing. He was winning not by defeating what he hated, but by saving what he loved. The ability for even the worst people to choose to do something good is one of the core tenants of this franchise. Now, it obviously doesn't always work. Anakin was, in his own really fucked up and selfish way, ultimately trying to save what we loved when he fell to the dark side (but I think that's also very much a result of love with attachment vs love without attachment, which is a different conversation for a different time). But this idea working is still pretty consistent throughout the movies, even when they throw in a little destroying what you hate.

Anyway, as I get ready to start my next book of The High Republic (Temptation of the Force is technically next but I still need to read The Rising Storm, Path of Deceit, and Path of Vengeance before Tears of the Nameless releases on the 24th), I'm excited to see if and how this theme comes back up again.

[lilypuffsw]

Still stuck to the fact that, in The Eye of Darkness audiobook, Elzar says "I l-" at the end of his message for Avar.

[milkmanviii]

Wooden Jedi vector, made with cedar, panga panga, redheart, and lacewood, with a cherry stand.

This was quite awkward to figure out because there isn’t one specific way a vector should look. All the official art is very slightly different so I had to figure out the right shapes and proportions for everything so it still looked enough like a vector. It’s not massively symmetrical but the Art of the High Republic book mentions that ship models for Star Wars actually have built in asymmetry to make it look more lifelike, so yeah that’s all definitely intentional I did that on purpose, definitely…

The joints on this could definitely be stronger, it’s literally just held together with glue, but as long as you don’t swoosh it too hard it does hold itself together.