Star Wars has introduced a new Jedi character shown to be the ultimate master of the mind trick. No, really — and stop looking at my hand as I try to convince you.
Today’s Star Wars: Legacy of Vader #7 focuses on Grandea, yet another Jedi survivor of the Order 66 purge, who has lived on in secrecy for another 50 years by honing her skills of mental manipulation.
While the list of Jedi now known to have survived the Clone Wars seemingly grows longer by the day, Grandea’s backstory at least provides a good reason why she has been able to escape the Empire for this long — by focusing all of her Jedi abilities on perfecting the mind trick, to the exclusion of pretty much all else. Imagine drafting a D&D character and putting all of your stat points into Persuasion. It’s a bit like that.
Legacy of Vader is the ongoing Star Wars graphic novel series from Charles Soule and Luke Ross that’s doing a good job of fleshing out the character of Kylo Ren. Set between The Last Jedi and Rise of Skywalker, this latest issue sees Ren meet Grandea as he seeks to grow his Force powers.
Through flashbacks, we see Grandea testing out her powers on progressively more difficult species, from weak-minded humans to the tougher Hutts and Toydarians (with apologies to Qui-Gon Jinn, who failed to trick Watto back in The Phantom Menace).
Grandea’s powers are strong enough that she is able to deceive a pair of Jedi hunting Inquisitors and trick them into believing they have bested her in battle. So deep is their confusion, that even after their minds are then read by Darth Vader, the pair honestly reply they believe Grandea is dead, and her body burned to remove all trace.
So, how does Kylo Ren’s encounter with Grandea play out? Well, we won’t spoil Legacy of Vader #7 here. Suffice to say, though, that Grandea’s introduction is already going down well with fans, as the angsty young Sith lord’s journey to redemption in The Rise of Skywalker continues.
“I’m glad they clarified Hutts and Toydarians can in fact be mind tricked given the user [being] strong enough to do so,” wrote one fan on reddit. “Never liked the idea of any species being completely immune.”
“This was a perfect issue, and completely addressed my concerns about where the story was going,” wrote another. “Grandea is a legend in my books, and all of that achieved in one comic issue!” said a third.
“This book is about Kylo Ren’s struggle to define himself, and it is not easy for him,” Soule previously told IGN, in our interview about his plans for the Star Wars: Legacy of Vader series. “Some fans would say that’s because he is not himself as Kylo – part of him knows he’s truly Ben – and the story can be viewed through that perspective. But I think it also works if you know nothing about Kylo Ren other than what you see in these beautifully-drawn pages – that he’s searching for himself, like many younger people do. Of course, he’s also a dark space wizard with a laser sword he loves to use to deadly effect whenever he feels like it.”
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
