Star Wars Insider Review: Star Wars The High Republic – Tales From The Occlusion Zone: Family Ties
Share the Force:
Max Nocerino 
Max detours into the galaxy far, far away to review the latest short story from the pages of Star Wars Insider.
Star Wars Insider 226 hit shelves on June 25, 2024, and delivered the latest “Tales from the Occlusion Zone” story.
When we last saw Joss and Pikka Adren, they found the barely alive body of Ghal Tarpfen on a deserted Nihil prison ship, suffering from a horrible plague most High Republic fans know as the Blight. Ghal was a main character in the Insider story arc predecessor, “Tales from Starlight Beacon.” In that adventure, she is kidnapped by the Nihil, and her fate is left unknown. Time has passed, and the Stormwall is up, cutting off part of the galaxy from the rest of the Republic in a sick version of a fiefdom for the Nihil.
HIT AND MISS ADVENTURES…
These “Tales from the Occlusion Zone” stories were a hit and a miss for me. The previous ones were okay. Joss and Pikka got stranded in the Occlusion Zone and met other RDC officers who were stranded as well. We have the straight-laced, disciplined Arkanian woman Visma Tarko, the optimistic and friendly former ecologist young human Elping Tsoo, and the stereotypically annoying protocol droid C-06N. They have rescued Ghal, but the Mon Calamari soldier is in rough shape. The makeshift team has limited medical experience. So, they plug C-06N into the ship to get a sort of “Googling a Youtube video” to figure out how to help her.
I was initially surprised at how Visma (generally very cold and calculating) seemed anxious to save Ghal. That isn’t her M.O., but thankfully, the connection was explained in this story. Ghal is a very likable character. She is brave and cares about other beings, and even while near-comatose, she is worried about the safety of the Republic. She tries to warn them that Ghirra Staros (the evil senator) is in cahoots with the Nihil. But unfortunately, the Republic is way past that. The traitorous senator is now well known as the “ambassador” to the Nihil, trying to mask her cruelty and greed with the promise of diplomacy with the Republic.
Ghal also has another disturbing secret about Nihil’s Stormwall. In classic “cliffhanger culture” storytelling, we don’t know what the Nihil have planned next when they jump into the system. The unlikely crew has another disaster on their hands. Even though they saved Ghal’s life, they may have to save all their lives again.
VERDICT
There wasn’t much meat to this story. It was kind of what I’d like to call a filler sequence—a story that acts as a vehicle to get to the good stuff. The cliffhanger is very exciting, though, and I am excited for the next tale premiering in Insider 227, “The Chronicles of Corellia” (which presumably deals with the planet Corellia in some way).
The story deals with Ghal’s infection with the Blight, similar to that of the Cair San Tekka. Amputation seems to be the key to stopping the spread. However, the main highlight of the story is Ghal putting Visma in her place (albeit professionally). She reveals that she was the one who cleared Visma to be promoted to lieutenant. Ghal does not mince words, and I like her character very much. This story had nothing wrong with it and not much to report.
Star Wars Insider 226 is available in stores now and is published by Titan Magazines. Subscribe now!
FORCE FACTS
-
When a Mon Calamari is in medical distress, they can create a hibernation shell around themselves and enter a state of biostasis NATURALLY. The Mon Cal have been part of Star Wars since at LEAST 1983, and we have never seen or even heard of such a radical ability. Lydia Kang is playing fast and loose with her worldbuilding, and while I find this ability quite interesting (from a medical-scientific standpoint), it does not fit what we have known about the Mon Cal, and I hope this bit of lore does not come back to bite us in the butt. The bite is that it never appears again.
-
C-06N reveals that he once served the Tarkin family. Yes, you heard that right. Tarkin. As in Grand Moff Tarkin’s ancestors. Tarkin was (arguably) the main villain in the original Star Wars, and his Canon backstory was shown ten years prior in his eponymous novel, Tarkin. The Tarkins were a rich and powerful family on their homeworld of Eriadu, and much like the San Tekka and Grafs, they likely held some sway of power in the galaxy at this time.
-
Some excellent medical tools used to help Ghal include a biosensor (which we are slowly inventing on Earth) and a nifty medical instrument that can simultaneously amputate AND cauterize fingers. I don’t know if we have such a device on Earth, but it is exciting and must use some quickly generated heat to cauterize after it cuts things off. Cauterization (for those unaware) is using heat to seal a wound instantly. Lightsabers flash-cauterize on impact with (most) flesh, so we rarely see beings bleeding from lightsaber wounds.
-
The crew gives their location as 300 parsecs away from Valo. Valo was the central location in the Escape from Valo middle-grade reader of High Republic, and 300 parsecs (for all you astronomy nerds out there) is about 900 light years away. To put this into perspective, the nearest star to our sun, Proxima Centauri, is about four light years away, and with our current technology, it would take 70,000 years to reach. Valo is 225x more distant than that. Well, darn….
Max Nocerino is a regular Staff Writer for The Future of the Force. He is a passionate Star Wars fan and loves the literature of the galaxy far, far away. Follow him on Twitter where he shares his love of the Force frequently!
