- Today we're discussing "Spark of the Resistance"
by Justina Ireland.
And after we light that fire, stick around,
because the luminous author will join
me to answer some of your questions about the book.
The "Star Wars Show Book Club" is a series
where we gather friends and fans to read Star Wars books,
examining how they relate to all of the Star
Wars films, live action shows, animated series, comics,
and games.
Through these stories, we enrich our understanding
of the galaxy far, far away.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Hello, Kristin Baver here, ready to burn the First Order down
with a few new friends.
Our story begins when the resistance is rebuilding itself
after the debilitating battles of D'Qar and Crait
in "Star Wars, The Last Jedi."
Rey, Poe, Rose, and BB-8 are making supply runs
with the Millennium Falcon, as the Rogues desperately
try to find the allies they'll need for the battles ahead
in "Star Wars, The Rise of Skywalker."
During the mission, they answer a distress
call on the jungle planet of Minfar
and end up fighting the First Order
and thwarting the infamous regime in an attempt
to find the mysterious Echo Horn,
a legendary imperial invention that was able to enslave
those who heard its call.
And of course, the Millennium Falcon
is in need of the repairs again, if they
hope to rejoin their friends in the future
to fight the final order.
Set of course for Minfar, and let's meet our book club crew.
First up, we have Mollie Damon, a Star Wars trivia expert who's
won half of the team behind the daily fan videos
at Star Wars Explained.
Mollie, I always want to call you Mollie
Dameron, every single time.
- I'll take it.
- Next, we have Suzie McGrath who gave
- Tam Ryvora on "Star Wars Resistance" her voice
and her heart.
- Hello, hi.
- And we're also joined by a man that I
like to think of as one of BB-8's dads,
puppeteer Brian Herring.
- Hello, hello, good evening.
- So to start us off, I would like us to settle a debate.
It came up at the beginning of the story.
So who's really the best pilot in the Resistance?
Is it Rey, or is the Poe?
- I think pope thinks he is, for sure.
- I'd like to see them put that to the test at one point.
- I mean, I would gamble and say almost Rey would definitely
give him a run for his money, at least,
which we see very early on in the book.
- In fighters or freighters, though?
That's the thing.
I think Poe might have the edge in small ships
and Rey in big fast ones.
- They should put them up against the Ace pilots
from "Resistance." - Yes, yes.
- Then we'll see.
- Absolutely.
- Poe has very good hair.
- That's the real question.
Who has the best hair?
Is it Rae or Poe?
- Well, there's a lot of mention of Poe's hair in this book.
- Yeah, his hair does come up an awful lot in this book,
doesn't it, yeah?
- I'm noticing in every book that Poe is in,
it's like the best running joke that they
always talk about his flowing, luscious locks now.
And I'm like, yeah, no, of course you do.
- Though Oscar Isaac does have very good hair.
- Yes.
- All right, but enough with the shenanigans.
Let's dive in.
So this story is the adventure between "Star Wars,
The Last Jedi," and "Star Wars, The Rise of Skywalker,"
so I think of this story, for me, really highlighted
how important every single member of the team
is at that juncture.
Did you all have kind of the same feeling with this story,
in terms of it really kind of highlighting the strength
of individual characters and how combined,
they can really start to solve some of these bigger problems?
- Yeah, I definitely loved seeing this particular trio,
Rey, Poe, and Rose get to go on their own little adventure,
and BB-8, of course.
It was really nice to see the three of them
get to connect a little bit more.
- Yeah, it was no it was nice to see Rose as part of that team
and play her role within that.
And each character, I liked about this story
was each character did have their own moment to kind
of play their part and shine.
And Rose got to do her mechanics thing and the thing with the--
I'm not going to talk too much about it,
but the thing-- the thing in the lab that she does.
- OK, spoiler alert, spoiler alert.
It's fine.
- OK, right, the thing with the walker in the lab.
And she got to kick some ass.
And that was just good fun.
- I think they called it a cannon with legs.
- Best moment of the book.
- Yes.
- It was-- yeah, in my head, it looks like
a lot like a scout walker with a chair, and just really big fun.
- I enjoyed Rose, because she was very kind of a stable type
of character and very pleasant.
And I think when we get to that point
where she's saving, essentially saving the day, it was fun.
I was like, this is the best bit of the book, because, you know,
you don't expect it.
And you kind of hope, like, is she going to be OK?
Because it's going down here, and then boom.
- Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, and it was one of those like,
I don't know how they're going to get out
of this one kind of moments.
And then it's just like, OK, Rose has this.
It's fine.
How do you think that the Zixon feel the force?
This is something Rey asks, and I don't think she ever
really gets it answered, at least
not in the context of the book.
- I think they're very attuned to nature,
specifically when they're fighting the grobel,
and they know that the only thing that can affect them
is the dust of this flower that blooms on the planet.
- There's something about being deep underground, in the roots,
in the core of something, that kind of feels like you're
inside of the heart, like, the beat of the universe,
whatever, or their planet.
I definitely think that the nature
is how they feel the force.
- They're definitely living with nature and so with the force,
but by utilizing the way that the flowers changed
the light they go through different places,
and how they are using nature around them,
and nature is helping them as well.
- And I'd love to that part where the Zixon were
talking about their friend.
And this friend has no name.
And Rey, and Poe, and Rose are all talking about later.
And they're like, is that Luke Skywalker?
Do you think that was Luke Skywalker?
I think that was probably Luke.
- That just feeds into, for me, what
was so great about the last scene of "The Last Jedi"
with the kids in the stable playing Star Wars,
but being in Star Wars, Luke's standing against the First
Order, and that word getting out from those kids around
the galaxy and how that spread.
That feeds into that Luke Skywalker was everywhere.
- We know that the First Order, for the most, part
they don't believe the story of Luke on Crait,
and Commander Spiftz in this book
says he doesn't believe that that happened.
He doesn't believe in the Force.
He doesn't believe in Darth Vader.
- He also doesn't like to read.
I have a lot of judgment for this character.
I don't like him.
- So he's a leader with very few leadership skills.
He just wants to be in charge.
He doesn't like to read.
He likes to have information told.
- We are not about that here.
We are all about the reading.
You know, he's the kind of first order bad guy
that I love to hate, because he makes it so easy.
It's hard when a character has those redeeming qualities,
and you're like, oh, they're doing bad things,
but they're doing them for the right reason.
- Everything starts with him having breakfast or having, you
know, in his methodical way.
- Yep, yep.
- I actually found him to be a really
interesting character, because he was
so, you did love to hate him.
And he would go back, and he would say--
he would put his foot in his mouth, and he was really--
but, just the way he observes professor Glenna Kip.
- Oh, and just keeps messing up her name.
Like, he knows her name.
But he keeps messing up her title.
And that was also just like, come on, dude.
- And completely underestimated her as well, which is
a-- this is a fantastic thing.
And he underestimated her.
He underestimated the wild life, the planet,
the entire situation.
He just completely misread it.
- I love that Glenna, on the other side of that,
refuses to call him by his official title and calls him--
- [INAUDIBLE] yeah.
- Branwayne.
- I loved that about her, because I
was like, that is how I would respond in this situation.
If someone just kept messing up my title,
and I had spent so much time with them on the ship,
I would just keep doing the thing that just poked at them
a little bit.
- Very interesting character.
I didn't know how I felt about her for most of the book
until things started to be revealed.
And even when I started to know a bit more about her,
I still was a little bit skeptical,
until right at the end, and I was like, OK,
you're doing the right thing.
- Oh, yeah, well, when you knew that she
had the Leia Organa seal of approval,
I was like OK, she's fine.
She's fine.
I trust Leia.
But I trust Leia's instincts.
She's been through this so many times.
So if she's not skeptical of Glenna anymore,
I was like, all right, she must be OK.
- Yeah, when Glenna first kind of reveals herself
to Rose, and Rey, and Poe, I remember Rose thinking of DJ
and being kind of like, suspicious of a stranger,
kind of like just messing things up for them again.
- Well, thank you all so much for joining our chat today.
This was super fun, so many good insights.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Thank you so much for joining us today,
Justina, super excited to talk to you about "Spark
of the Resistance."
- I'm always excited to be here.
I'm so happy to be here.
- This is more of a comment than a question, but I love it,
so I'm going to tell it to you anyway.
This one comes from @Poesgucciscarf, which
is really just a great handle.
- Yeah.
- Poesgucciscarf writes, "It's not really a question,
but I wanted to say that I adored
the part where Poe and BB-8 had matching purple crowns."
- One of my favorite parts is always
when you go, when you have the celebration
moment before everything goes sideways in Star Wars.
And was just like, what can I do that we haven't seen before?
And I was like, well, obviously, everyone wants to Poe and BB-8
in flower crowns.
And so, yeah.
- Obviously.
- That's the obvious choice.
- This one comes from Yananiris.
"There's a disconnect within first order officers
like Spiffs that believe in the force,
even when Kylo Ren is the supreme leader.
Is this a reflection on how spread out and secretive
the First Order is organizationally,
a self-imposed ignorance via propaganda?"
- I mean, I think so.
I think part of being part of an organization
is you bring your own prejudices and beliefs with you.
So just because-- I mean, we even see it in "A New Hope,"
right?
Like, everyone's like, blah, blah, blah.
And then Darth Vader's took somebody out,
and they're still like, uh, uh, uh,
and they're still talking back to him, because they're still
like, the Force, whatever.
So I think you're going to bring your own prejudices.
And if you're really self-involved, and you're like,
I know everything, like of course
you're not going to believe in something like the Force.
- This one comes from Yananiris.
"Is getting eaten the biggest danger
First Order troopers face?
It seems like it is."
- It's not my fault they're tasty.
- If you want to remove a number of troops in a kids book,
and you don't want to keep shooting people, being eaten
is a really great way be like, and then they
were eaten, because do you know what kids love?
Kids love when things get eaten, people eaten.
Like it's just a fun-- - They do.
They do. - Right?
Like, especially like, oh, no, they're getting eaten.
And it's also kind of funny that like, you're
just like walking along, and all of a sudden,
you're a cheeseburger.
- Next up we have Kanjichris Standor.
"How did you approach writing the scenes with Rey, Rose,
and Poe altogether, especially since we've never seen the trio
work together onscreen before?
Was it difficult at all to figure
out how their personalities would bounce off one another?"
- Yeah, it was actually harder than I thought it would be,
because you don't see them on screen together.
So what I ended up doing was letting
myself watch "The Last Jedi," like, a whole bunch of times.
And then I was like, maybe I should go back and watch
"Force Awakens" too, because I haven't
watched that one in a while.
So then I went and watched that movie.
And then I kind of, at that point,
had enough of their personality from what we've seen on screen.
I also written back and read Elizabeth Wein's YA book,
"Cobalt Squadron," which introduces
Rose and Page kind of before the events of "The Last Jedi."
And so I just kind kept--
I read those books.
I read the "Poe Dameron" comic.
I read some other things.
And I was just kind of like, OK, these are the what I
know about their personalities.
What would it be like to work together?
We both know Ray's used to working by herself.
She's got a lot of time better stuff on Jakku.
So then we know she's maybe pretty strong willed.
We know that Poe is used to being the guy in charge.
It's kind of like he shows up, and he's like, I'm in charge.
- Right, yeah.
He's like, do you see this hair?
This hair is in charge.
- And we know that, because he's like, yo Leia, I got this.
And you're like, you're talking back to--
I mean, she's been through some things.
Like, she knows some stuff. - Yeah.
- And so we know the personality,
and we know it Rose is like, generally, at her heart, kind.
And she's going to be kind of the peacemaker.
So when we got those two together,
we have two really strong personalities,
and then you have Rose, who is kind of like,
hey, guys, let's work together and make things work.
And so it was fun.
- All right, this one comes from my personal reader
of the week, Carl Meow.
"Hi Justina.
What is your favorite part of Star Wars?"
- It's a big question with a pretty easy answer.
And my answer is always, I like that Star
Wars is for everybody.
I like that no matter what kind of story you want to read,
there are stories there.
If you want to read fun stories, you have all the kids
stories are really fun.
If you want to read dark and brooding things,
we have a lot of comics that are really dark.
If you want to read about the dark side, we have those.
If you want to read about the Rebels or Resistance,
we have those.
And that's one of the things I do
love about the storytelling in Star Wars
is that it takes everyone into account,
and it welcomes a lot of different people.
And I also think that's why the new trilogy, especially, I
like it so much, because we're seeing lots of different kinds
of people coming together.
And I feel like that, to me, has always
been the hallmark of Star Wars, is lots of different kinds
of people coming together.
It's like, sure, we might not agree on whether reading is fun
or not.
But we can all sit back and enjoy a Star Wars movie
and let it take our imagination someplace else new.
So I do think that's my favorite thing about Star Wars
is that it is for everyone.
- What can you tell us about Your next book coming up for
"Star Wars, a Test of Courage?"
- Yes, so there's a sample up on StarWars.com,
which is probably the best thing I can tell you about it,
because then you can read it.
But it comes out in January.
It features Vernestra Rwoh, who is a young Jedi, Avon
Starrow, who's the daughter of a senator,
a few other characters.
They crash on an abandoned, like,
a moon, where it's unsettled.
But it turns out that they're not as
alone as they think they are.
- Well, I'm super excited for "A Test of Courage,"
and I'm also really glad that you were able to join us today.
This was so much fun.
- Yes, it was great.
- And thanks to all of you who joined us from home
and sent in your questions.
Come back next time, when the "Star
Wars Show Book Club" explores "Dooku Jedi Lost" Cavan Scott.
And while you're listening to the audio drama,
tweet your questions using the hashtag Swsbcjedilost.
And we'll ask some on the show.
Until then, may the Force be with you.
[MUSIC PLAYING]