Star Wars: Darth Bane: Path of Destruction
by Drew Karpyshyn

Publication Date:
September 26, 2006

Timeframe:
1003 – 1000 BBY

Synopsis:
Once the Sith Order teemed with followers. But their rivalries divided them in endless battles for supremacy. Until one dark lord at last united the Sith in the quest to enslave the galaxy—and exterminate the Jedi. Yet it would fall to another, far more powerful than the entire Brotherhood of Darkness, to ultimately realize the full potential of the Sith, and wield the awesome power of the dark side as never before.

GUEST REVIEW!

Special guest reviewer Davey “Shovel Head” Pawlowski!

How’s it hangin’, butt cunts? Don’t call me “Shovel Head”. Only my mom can call me “Shovel Head”.

Let me start by saying what a pleasure it is to review Darth Bane: Path of Destruction!!! HAAA!!!! JUST KIDDING, PUBE NUGGETS!!! I HATE READING!!! I had to read this for school when Mr. Potts (MORE LIKE MR. POOPS!!) told us to pick a banned book for our report project and I rifled through my friend Aidan’s collection of nerd shit and I picked a book with a white guy on the cover. I DIDN’T KNOW THAT STAR WARS BOOKS WERE BANNED FROM OUR SCHOOL!!! Mr. Poops gave me a fucking D- and told my I was supposed to read something like Catch-22 or that book where they lynch the black guy or the one where the kids eat each other on the island!! IT TOOK ME FOUR MONTHS TO READ DARTH BANE!!! AND IT SUCKED!!! Fuck you, Mr. Poops, you shit-ass cracker!!!

Path of Destruction is about a guy who works in the stinky mines on the Planet Whatever. He hates his job and his dad whooped his ass on the regular and he beats people up for fun!! He bites off another dude’s thumb within the first 15 pages, so I was like “COOL!!” but then it got really fucking boring! This Bane guy kills a dude and needs to run away from his planet so he can go on another planet and learn to how be a Sith Lord, who are the bad guys but I think they’re way cooler than the faggoty Jedi!! The Sith get laid and the Jedi wear brown robes and speak too softly. Aidan thinks the Jedi are sweet, but that shit is sus! I think Aidan needs to go find a nice man to bone!!! GAYWAD!!

There’s this total hot chick in the book named Githany. Black hair and green eyes and titties out to here! That’s what I’m talking about!! She’s cool as shit too, she defected from the gay ass Jedi and is probably the best Sith Lord in the academy. Even better than Bane! They make Bane out to be this tough fucking steel fucking strong ass fucking unstoppable dude, but he gets mesmerized by pussy and it’s like WHOOPS I’VE BEEN BETRAYED!!! I don’t blame the guy, though. That girl is FINE. I would like to stick my PENIS into her BUTTHOLE if you catch my drift!!! HIGH FIVE!!!

In the end, the Sith explode a thought bomb and it kills literally everyone including the hot chick, but except for Bane. Actually, they don’t really die but those motherfuckers’ souls get sucked up and trapped for eternity or whatever. Biggest orgy of all time! I want in on that action AS LONG AS THERE ARE NO DUDES!!! But Bane lives and he’ll be in the next book, but you can bet your stupid fuck face that I won’t be reading the next one. This was too long and Aidan kept bugging me to finish so that he could reread it for the billionth time. Aidan is such a hosebag dumbshit shitfuck fuckbag.

TOM’S REVIEW!

Tom, the Cool Guy

MY FEELINGS ARE MIXED. I think this book is very uneven, alternating between scenes of excitement and intrigue with scenes of mind-crushing boredom. Sometimes setups are hastily pushed through, sometimes too much time is spent on one idea. I was excited at first when they set up Bane’s depressing existence: back-breaking work mining cortosis, unhealthy working conditions, shitty commune living, 24-hour government surveillance, and and overall angry, discontented population. Karpyshyn does a great job painting the bleak picture of life on the desolate, hopeless planet Apatros. Then, all of a sudden, there’s a pointless card game at the local watering hole that lasts about 800 pages that’s supposed to be suspenseful but ends up being mind-numbing. And all for what? This game doesn’t matter halfway through the book, when you remember that a card game happened and it was stupid. All it does is allow Bane to verbalize his dissatisfaction with the Empire, but they could have been more concise with it.

Then later, after a very hurried plot device to push him off of Apatros (accidental murder whoops), he enrolls in Sith Academy which starts off quite promising. But we’re expected to believe that this guy, who starts his Sith training about 30 years later than most, rises the ranks to be the best Sith lord in the school? Better than the masters? All because he reads a few books? All because he believes a tenet of Sithology that no one else adheres to? Rule of Two? Is that really the key here? Did I need thousands of years of Star Wars lore to catch up on first to understand the nuances of this particular revelation? Seems heavy-handed.

It takes about half the book or so, but things pick up when they introduce Githany — the smart, stunningly attractive, manipulative Jedi turncoat. I’d like to read a whole book about her story, which they only touch upon briefly. The idea of a woman becoming increasingly disengaged with the Jedi sounds a bit like Claudia Gray’s Lost Stars, which dealt with two fresh recruits and relationship partners becoming jaded with the Empire at different rates. That side of it seems a lot of fun. But, since Githany’s body puffed into a cloud of ash and dust as her spirit got absorbed in the terrifying thought bomb at the end of the book, something tells me that she’s not important enough to the overall lore to focus on any longer.

What I did like was that there was complexity to Bane’s character, even if it did lean too much toward “Me = Evil” a lot of the time. Bane grew up with an abusive alcoholic father who, as it is later revealed, Bane accidentally killed with the Force without his knowledge. This revelation wracks him with guilt, a weak emotion for a Sith lord. I know with the other side of the coin that Jedi resist emotions like anger and hate, and it’s interesting to see the opposite with the Sith — that they need to resist any emotions or feelings associated with a moral compass. However, that being said, there are times where Bane just coldly destroys or kills with no remorse. As if there’s merely a switch being flipped. The family he kills at the very end of the book is a great example. Guilty about cutting down his shitty dad, but a whole family he doesn’t know is met with apathy? INCONSISTENT! *pushes up nerd glasses*

Inconsistent all the way through. Man, I’m tired of writing. All I ever do is write. Leave me alone once in a while.

WORTH A READ?

It’s the first in a trilogy. I liked it enough to keep going with the next book, but as a work of art it’s lacking. The story wasn’t written very compellingly, honestly, and it was the first book in Star Wars Storytime that wasn’t a complete joy to read. It won’t be the last either, I can already tell.

If you like overpowered characters with conflicting actions and thoughts, then watch 24 with Kiefer Sutherland! Also, read this book.