 Hey everybody, welcome back to my Star Wars channel. My name is David and today we're going to do another book review. All right, so another book review if you don't already know I'm going through all of the old-school like legends series books going through them in order and kind of looking at them from a 2019 perspective point of view and just seeing if they hold up to today asking some questions about whether they still fit into the Star Wars canon if they're still good books if you would like to read them pick them up now like if they've stood the test of time and They're still a good read because I think we remember these books in hindsight And we we remember them and they're tied to our youth and we reminisce and we say all those books were so great But you know now I'm a 50 plus year old man, and are they still great that they still hold up I mean, I love Star Wars. I love everything Star Wars. And so I always give everything a fair shake I'm not one of those haters that you know hates on the movies or anything or the products And I'm typically not very critical if you put Star Wars on Something whether it's a shirt a coffee mug a toy or a box of crayons I'm probably gonna buy it because I just I love it. I love Star Wars And so this is my offering to the Star Wars community kind of thought it'd be fun to go back through some of these old Books and see if they hold up today. We're gonna look at the second book in the rogue squadron Series or actually it's the trilogy from Michael Stackpole. It's the it's the Michael Stackpole trilogy the first three books Wedges gamble. All right. So wedges gamble takes place about a month after the conquest of Borleas the rebels and rogue squadron have to deal with imperial probes by the rogue warlord Zinge, I think that's how you pronounce his name Wedge Antilles and his rogue squadron are sent on a covert operation to the planet Coruscant And there they are to find the weaknesses in the world's defenses and help take it away from the galactic Empire Thus bringing galaxy-wide victory for them much closer The rogues members are covertly placed into small groups all over the planet But then they get a message from Admiral Ackbar that they have to take down the Coruscant's planetary defense shields at a Precise time in order for the rebel attack to proceed Wow And I think at first glance at first read that sounds exciting that sounds like a Star Wars book I don't want to read it sounds like a cool Star Wars story And if you go out to Amazon and read some of the people who've read this book and reviewed it They would agree. They would say this is an exciting book, but that book just sat on my Nightstand to be honest. I only got halfway through it. I only got halfway through it and it was forced It was laborious like I had to force myself To read this book like I should have done this review a lot sooner But it just took me so long to get halfway through and I am not the kind of person that likes to give up on a book Like even when a book is bad, I typically finish it just so that I can say I read it or I have an opinion on it But ah, I'm sorry guys. I just couldn't finish this book. So what were some of the things I didn't love? I liked Rogue Squadron. I like that book go back and watch my other review for that book I liked it and I was kind of looking forward to Hearing more about those characters and in my opinion if you're gonna do a sophomore book, right? You're gonna do a second release then the best thing is to continue with the characters that you started with and Go deeper with those people develop them more flesh them out But and that's what I was excited to look forward to but what Michael Stackpole did was he invited a bunch of new people into the book also on top of the old people and then Didn't flesh out anyone and everyone kind of felt the same to me And then when you stick a Star Wars name on somebody, you know No one's named Jeff or Steve or you know, Susie. They all have Star Wars names. So it's hard to then picture Okay, what alien race are they? What do they look like? Where are they on Coruscant? What are they doing? What's their motivation? Like it was just hard to keep track of everybody and every single one of those people had a storyline. So you had five major storylines and then like a dozen or so smaller sub-storylines and so Skipping around like that might work on TV where you can like see oh, yeah I'm in this plot or I'm in this but in a book it was hard to read Stackpole is also really great at doing like dogfights like spaceship fights and like laser battles and gun battles And when you watch a Star Wars movie, I think those are some of the things you really want Like you want to see a lightsaber fight. You want to see laser gun fight. You want to see dogfights in space. However Those are the hard things that translate down to a book like if you're gonna write a book about Fashion the Furious, how do you write a book about a car chase, right? And then you turn left and then you went down the street like it's it's hard to put action into writing and so Again, if I'm reading about characters, I don't Understand or can't fully visualize and then just to then have a whole You know dogfight space battle or a laser gun fight again It's there's not much going on other than the battle So it's it's I think it's hard sometimes to picture that kind of stuff So all in all I was looking forward to reading Wedges gamble didn't love it only got halfway through it and now I'm not as excited about reading the third book in the series. I don't know I mean, what did you did you read this book? Do you like it? Do you have fond memories of it? What's your opinion on Michael Stackpole or the Rogue Squadron? I think in the when I reviewed the first book I asked, you know Does this book fit into Star Wars canon? Does this book fit in Star Wars canon? I mean, I think it does but I didn't finish it But I don't think the timeline or these characters Would ruin the current Star Wars canon, you know, I'm saying like it's an outside story But as far as what I want to see this turned into a feature film. I Don't think so because I didn't like the book I've said it before I'll say it again I think Rogue Squadron would make a great like mini series on like Netflix or Amazon like a small Star Wars spinoff I think that would be cool to take a look back at Wedge and his like little rogues gallery of Fighter pilots. I think that would be a good story for something like that I know Rogue Squadron was turned into a comic book, right? Wasn't it a dark horse comic book? I think it was at least that's what my memory is telling me. So I know I know it's got a fan base But this book didn't do it for me and the subsequent book coming up I'm not excited about but I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong. Tell me if I if I if you think I'm wrong Tell me I am wrong right now. I'm starting heir to the Empire a lot of you have said this is a great book and I'm like three chapters in and So excited this book is so much heir to the Empire so much better Like Timothy Zahn's a great writer and I'm looking forward to reading this next set of books Tell me what some of your favorite Star Wars books are even if they're coming out in Bookshores right now like if they're new releases drop us a note and let us know Thanks guys. May the force be with you. I'll see you next time. Bye