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Okay, I’m not pointing fingers, but who let that samurai into the bamboo forest? Now it’s RUINED.

I’m sure everyone’s seen the newest Rogue One trailer. Still looking super swanky! And sure, there are plenty of reasons why this movie might end up being terrible, I’ve certainly been burned by great trailer for sub-par movies before (Man of Steel), but for Rogue One I WANT TO BELIEVE. The trailer has a far more oppressive weight to it than any of the other films, the Empire exudes an overpowering presence, which I love. Also, and maybe these are hand picked for the trailers, but every shot looks like a painting pulled from conceptart.org. This movie is looking visually fantastic, and not just in a ‘nice special effects’ sort of way, but in terms of shot composition and lighting. Also I don’t see any silly cartoony action sequences that break my suspension of disbelief, which is SO refreshing. At this point all I want is for the movie proper to replicate the tone and pace of the trailers and I’ll be a happy fanboy.

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  • TheMaskedFerret

    First!

    Oh, those poor little shoots. He is practicing for when he meets up with Yuri.

    I like the snarky gardening commentary.

    • Kid Chaos

      You mean Yori…but otherwise, spot-on. :)

      • TheMaskedFerret

        Well, this does look like it might be a budding bromance.

        I plead ‘I was at work when posting’

        • Kid Chaos

          Or you were just channeling Ken. 😜

  • cu

    NNFB’s anti-vegetalism agenda is relentless. No plant is ever safe.

    • tyersome

      I’m generally pro-plant, but in this case I feel no sorrow. I think this stems from Bamboo’s shoot first, ask questions never habits …

      • Kid Chaos

        BAMBOOVENGE!!!…No, it doesn’t work; sorry. 😉

        • Xinef

          REBAMBGE!!!

      • Xinef

        So Han Solo was a bamboo? In that case I’m pro-bamboo.

    • Jake

      Disclaimer: No real trees were harmed in the making of this comic…. unless the guys used paper at some point to draw this. then yes, real trees were harmed in the making of this comic. we no return you to your regularly scheduled comic/ comments section.

      • clogboy

        Unless they wee using cotton- or henp based paper.

  • Flaming Squirrel

    “I know what you’re thinking. Did I swing six times, or not at all? In all this confusion, I kinda lost count myself.”

    • Flaming Squirrel

      Alternatively,
      *Tadashii pulls out an inch of blade*
      Bamboo: “WE GIVE UP!”
      *Falls to pieces on its own.*

      • Turul

        This is likely what happened.

    • Kid Chaos

      “But since this is .44 Magnum katana, and can cut your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself a question; ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well do ya, punk?”

  • Turul

    So! Apropos Uso, it’s one more to go before Demons of Sorrow gets downgraded to Demon of Sorrow.

    • Kid Chaos

      No more Ryoku, no more Uso…Hirotomo’s running out of crazy badasses to throw at Yorikiro (unless he drafts General Nataku, and I wouldn’t put it past him). :)

      • Xinef

        I got the impression it’s usually Nataku who is a master of “make my superior fell like he is making the decision, when I’m actually the one choosing the course of action”.

        Although Nataku has so many things to do right now… deal with Genchu, deal with Indigo, play with Ken, he’s got unfinished business with so many people it’ll be hard for him to decide in what order to punch them!

  • Hfar

    Turns out Tadashi’s not actually training but just really wants one of those bamboo water clappers that are all the rage these days. He couldn’t decide on a size so he just said “Screw it! I’ll get one in every size!”

  • Da’Zlein

    Don’t worry, Uso’s just hiding in the grass. He’s a trickster, after all!

  • KungFuKlobber

    Tadashii puts the BAM in bamboo!

  • Sunwu

    The Ken goes: Kadoosh!
    The Tadashii goes: Whoopash!
    The Yori goes: Holy flipping Shnikies of death!

    • Flaming Squirrel

      He’s gonna open up a can of Whoopash on you, boy!

  • Sunwu

    One day we’ll see a flashback of young Honou-ko getting new armor and a tricycle for his birthday! one day!

  • David

    I just hope that Rogue One has Bobba Fett to give us an IN-CANNON reason to like him.

    • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

      Empire gave us a good reason to like him, because he looked cool and said very little, and acted competently. Then Jedi gave us a reason to not like him because he acted like an incompetent moron and had a slapstick jokey death. But much of Jedi was slapstick and jokey outside of the throne room scene and the space battle, whatcha gonna do. Considering a lot of people still like Darth Vader after the prequels, Boba Fett’s cult following shouldn’t be that shocking!

      I dunno if we need a Fett cameo in Rogue One, but he’s getting his own movie! And I hope it’s not about Boba Fett’s history and it’s just about Fett ruthlessly hunting down a difficult bounty and bringing in his target (maybe with the occasional disintegration). I would be super down for that!

      • David

        I’ll give you he looked cool. but I’ll disagree with everything else. by “he said little,” you mean he only had 1 line and 3 scenes. by “he acted competently,” you mean he did nothing. He didn’t even catch Han, Vader did and just gave Fett the credit. and yeah…a Fett movie would be pretty cool. Maybe a Suicide Squad-esque thing where he’s forced to work with other bounty hunters to bring in a huge threat to the Empire?

        • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

          That would be cool. Maybe going after some rebellion general, or maybe just some big crime boss encroaching on imperial territory.

          • David

            or maybe even one of the last Jedi. we’ll have to wait and see.

        • Gillsing

          As far as I know Fett ‘acted competently’ when he followed the Millennium Falcon in the trail of dumped garbage. I guess that was the ‘hunter’ part of ‘bounty hunter’. I assume that once he figured out where his prey was heading, he told Vader so that Vader could get there first. If Fett didn’t do anything of value I don’t see why Vader would’ve given him Solo. Vader doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who rewards people for no reason.

          • David

            Yes…Fett was totally such a good bounty hunter he somehow managed to track them to the planet and managed to inform Vader that they were there before they landed so that Vader could be waiting at his complete ease seemingly hours in advance…

      • David

        also, I’d have edited this in but I figured this would be better, but…as for why Vader still has a fan base. Vader had 3 whole movies before the Prequels ruined Annakin. Not Vader. Annakin. Bobba Fett had one scene that was kinda decent, and Darth Vader was in it telling him not to disintegrate anyone.

        • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

          Well then Boba Fett’s relatively small fan following compared to Vader’s pop culture phenomenon makes perfect sense! Also I don’t know why we’re arguing about this!

          • David

            well, art is something that’s supposed to be argued about for one thing. And as long as we’re not insulting each other and only debating opinions, there’s nothing wrong with arguing.

  • clogboy

    Rogue One? That’s Disney. This will be Pirates of the Caribbean with ray guns. tbh no Star Wars franchise is complete for me without light sabers or force chokes (read Jedi). This has to bring something awesome or it’ll be a subpar sci-fi movie.

    • Xinef

      For me Star Wars is not complete without Jar Jar Binks.

      • Kid Chaos

        Don’t make me blast you, Xinef. 😠

      • HoleyMolehills

        Please, allow me to correct your grammar. The proper sentence construction would be:
        “without a Jar-Jar Barbecue.”

      • clogboy

        Who is (according to a fan theory) actually a very powerful sith lord…

        • Xinef

          I like the theory where he’s a jedi master, and died on purpose in order to haunt sith lords as a force ghost, so that they can’t get rid of him.

    • Drunken Nordmann

      You know, I’m actually fine with a Star Wars movie not having Jedi in it for a change. A lot of the good stuff in the EU was non-Jedi stuff, too.

      • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

        *high fives*

      • HoleyMolehills

        I’ll drink to that.

    • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

      When I was growing up with Star Wars in the 90’s, the franchise’s games and books were all about the Empire vs Rebel/New Republic vs Imperial Remnant conflict, with Jedi being an ancillary part and not the overwhelming focus. I know I’ve said it before, but Rogue One looks like the Star Wars movie I’ve been waiting for since I was twelve. Not that I dislike Jedi and lightsabers, I’m excited that classic Vader is in Rogue One to some extent and I love the flavor or mystery and magic they add to the universe.

      But the prequels just over saturated the franchise in the worst way. It sucked all the mystique out of Jedi and the Force and replaced it with inane/offensive nonsense that also contradicted what we thought we already knew!

      • clogboy

        Have to say though, that arena fight was all kinds of awesome.
        Like said in another reaction, there is a fan-edit on Youtube that solely focuses on the political aspect, leaving out the majority of action- and romantic sequences. Showing the gem in the rough that it really is and it could’ve been a great story.

    • Dorje

      Star Wars can stand just fine without overt use of the Force. If you think about the Original trilogy there actually wasn’t much Force at all. A New Hope is virtually Force-less. In Empire most of the key action happens around the Leia & Han crew, and mostly Force-less.

      If the writers/directors for Rogue One have any sense of what’s available, there are ways to inject mostly Force-less space high fantasy into the movie. A core trope for Star Wars is “there is no such thing as luck”, luck is inherently the Force. Institution is guidance from the Force. You find the Force in split-seconds actions. Just because there isn’t Jedi and laser swords, doesn’t mean the Force won’t make itself felt.

      What worries me more is this is, once again, another writer/director trying to take a slice of the “no my character stole the Death Star plans” pie. At this point now, including EU, how many different characters and groups have “stolen” all or some of the Death Star plans?

      • Kid Chaos

        Use the Force, Luke Dorje. 😎

      • HoleyMolehills

        Kyle Kataarn, Bria Tharen, Garm Bel Iblis (via Moranda Savich), the Partridge in the Pear Tree, Sir Robin of Camelot, and P.D.Q. Bach.

        • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

          Don’t forget Rianna Saren from that PSP game Star Wars: Lethal Alliance! And the nameless X-Wing pilot you play as in Lucasarts’ X-Wing spacesim. BUT ALL THAT SHIT’S OLD CANON NOW!! It’s actually kind of hilarious to me how many times the death star plans have been obtained, and we’re finally getting a live action film about it. Gotta be honest, based solely on the trailers this version’s looking to trump all the others by leagues.

          Or it could end up sucking big time, ya never know.

          • Flaming Squirrel

            My question is, how many bothans had to die in the process?

        • Xinef

          I’d also add the Darlok from Master of Orion. Others tend to just research their own death stars, but Darlok just prefer to steal the research from others.

          And I think there are a few more 4X space games with death stars, so apparently they also stole death star plans, right?

          Although they tend to do it right… build entire fleets of death stars, and none of them have weak ponts for massive damage.

      • SlugFiller

        The bigger question isn’t how many characters stole the Death Star plans. It’s who, among them, were bothans. And what are bothans in the first place?

        Honestly, if I don’t see any bothans in this movie, I’m going to be severely disappointed.

        • http://www.fennecfoxpress.com David A. Tatum

          Wrong Death Star. The Bothans stole the plan for Death Star II; this is Death Star I.

          • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

            At this point I assume anyone who makes a joke about Bothans regarding the first Death Star is doing it to troll or doesn’t care enough about Star Wars to want to be corrected on it!

    • HoleyMolehills

      Ok…
      a) Disney has a pretty good track record of late: Step 1: acquire franchises with well-established fanbases, Step 2: put together halfway-decent. Step 3: Profit!!!

      b) The best parts of Star Wars (original trilogy) were the military fiction, the Western aspects, and the appeal to classic myth (see “Hero’s Journey”). None of that requires the Force, irregardless of whether you measure it in Newtons, Dynes or Midichlorians.

      c) Don’t call Star Wars “science fiction”. It’s focus is neither the science nor the sociology. It’s a fantasy story, only with spaceships instead of triremes. That doesn’t make it any less entertaining… just not true s/f. File SW alongside John Carter of Mars, Riverworld, and Coldfire; not Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein.

      • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

        I don’t disagree on any particular point!

      • clogboy

        I stand partially corrected. It is indeed closer to magic than speculative fiction. Although I would counter that jedi and light sabers are the iconic, defining features of the franchise.
        Speaking of military fiction, I saw a fan-edit of the prequels that only focused on the political aspects and left out the romantic subplots and swashbuckling for the majority. It was very watchable.

        I am looking forward to Rogue One. But I’ll consider it a sideshow.

  • Xinef

    Gardening? I call it BONSAIFICATION!

  • SKy

    Finally a character who feels about the “samurai practices cutting in an almost surreal bamboo forest” cliché the same way I do.

  • HoleyMolehills

    Arg. It looks like Taidashi will be the next Demon of Sorrow to confront Yori. That’s unfortunate… I had hoped that the antagonist with whom Yori had the most rapport (aside from his dad) would be the last to fall, rather than the one-dimensional Dragon that is Honou-Ko.

    • http://www.nn4b.com suburban_samurai

      methinks you assume too much.

  • clogboy

    I hopped in the time machine (well… clicked through the pages) and it’s fun seeing the art style progress over time. Also the story telling gets slower and slower while there’s time for character development (which is just good writership IMO).. There’s definitely the ‘before’ and ‘after’ a moment when this comic started taking itself seriously and stopped goofing around…
    But anyway, now that you guys enlisted the help of a colorist, both the art and the ink took a big leap forward! It’s like Alex has more time for cleaner lines and details.

    Just saying, awesome job guys, keep it up!

  • RobinGoodfellow

    …. Uh. Do you know how fast bamboo grows? Pretty sure the forest will recover from those few cuts.

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