STAR WARS: VECTOR, by Dark Horse Comics head honcho Randy Stradley's own admission, was born out of financial concerns: If Marvel & DC were making so much money crossing over their characters, why shouldn't Dark Horse be able to get on board that gravy train themselves? Enter VECTOR, an interesting idea gone horribly, horribly wrong.
The concept of VECTOR is simple enough: A story that crosses over between all four of Dark Horse's STAR WARS books. The problem is, the books take place in different eras, sometimes THOUSANDS of years apart......So how to accomplish the goal without resorting to the dreaded time-travel chestnut....?
I'll give them this much: The maguffin they use to drive the plot is certainly an original one. The execution of the plot, well....that's another story. The bulk of STAR WARS: VECTOR VOL. 1 is comprised of four issues of the STAR WARS: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC SERIES, and as someone who has never read an issue of that series, I was totally lost for the majority of this book. Without revealing the hook upon which VECTOR is hung, there's a massive sub-plot involving "Rakghouls", the outer-space equivalent of Werewolves, and it's just a ridiculously bad device to use in a STAR WARS story. The book picks up considerably in the final two chapters, which are taken from the STAR WARS: DARK TIMES series. The art, by Douglas Wheatley, is staggeringly good, and seeing a familiar face (Darth Vader) certainly didn't hurt any, either. The final two chapters had me intrigued enough that I may return for the finale in Volume 2, but all that went before was just a sloppy, incomprehensible mess.