After over three decades, Star Wars has almost drained the mystery out of the Original Trilogy characters. But there is still a little mystery with Jedi Master Yoda. Not only does his species remain unknown even though there are now three confirmed characters, but as the oldest known member of the Jedi Order, there is considerably more time that we have yet to explore with Yoda. So it is surprising that it took until 2022 to dedicate a canon comic series to the Jedi Master. But, because of Yoda’s long lifespan, it does allow the High Republic era to be incorporated. Unfortunately, nothing here warrants a ten-issue series, and Yoda fans are better off diving into other canon materials for their little green alien fix.

The Stories

During the Galactic Civil War and the Reign of the Empire, Yoda is trying to concentrate on Dagobah when an unknown voice from the Force reaches out to him.

This takes Yoda way back to the High Republic, where members of the Jedi Council, including Pra-Tra Veter, are debating their time and resources. Yoda decides to take a distress call and head to Turrak. A group of native species, the Scalvi, are under attack from a rival group and, despite Veter’s insistence that the Jedi have more pressing matters (there always seems to be some other things to do when it comes to helping others), Yoda sends himself. During his time on Turrak, Yoda learns exactly the problem between the two groups and tries to get Bree Manaren (the young boy who sent the distress call that Yoda answers and who looks up to the Jedi Master) to see. Menaren fails to see why the Crulkon are attacking, so Yoda leaves, returning years later when Bree is an adult and is ready to listen and be patient.

In part two, “Students of the Force,” Yoda tries to temper the conflict between two initiates, a Wookiee (Krrsish) and a Trandoshan (Gheyr), who are friends with the help of his former Padawan Jedi Master Dooku. Dooku connects with Krrsish, who confides in his vision of Gheyr turning to the dark side. Dooku advises Krrsish to treat his vision as a gift, observe Gheyr, and be prepared if the time comes to act on the vision.

Yoda, meanwhile, senses anger and fear from Krrsish and tells the Wookiee that those are paths to the dark side. Yoda tells Krrsish that the conflicts surrounding Wookiees and Trandoshans in the galaxy have no place in the Jedi Temple. Yoda also tells Krrsish that Gheyr was found as a Youngling by a group of Wookiees. 

Ultimately, Krrsish takes Dooku’s advice, leading to an altercation between the Wookiee, Gheyr, and Jak’zin. Much to Yoda’s dismay, Gheyr stops training to be a Jedi, ensuring that Krrsish’s vision does not come true.

The last story revolves around a mission with Anakin during the Clone Wars when Yoda gets intel on a new Separatist weapon. When Anakin commandeers a high-level Separatist ship around the same time, they find that the location of operation is on the planet Ethenium. The two encounter Grevious but discover the weapon and factory location: a Megadroid army on Golatha. The planet is in such an obscure location that the defenses seem small, giving Anakin confidence that they can take out the factory. Yoda, however, warns him not to be overconfident. 

And that lesson flips when the two find themselves in a tricky situation. Yoda enters inside a Megadroid once they discover it is made of Durasteel to try and destroy it from within; however, the Megadroid launches into space, and Yoda needs Anakin’s confidence that he can alter the trajectory of the droid corpse so his ship can get close to retrieve Master Yoda.

But the key is always balance—a balance between cautiousness and confidence. 

Of course, given the timeline, the mysterious spirit could only be one person, and the few Jedi we know can communicate past death. Obi-Wan Kenobi is trying to get Master Yoda’s attention after his death at the hands of Darth Vader to convince the Jedi Master to train Luke Skywalker.

Funny enough, the most to least interesting stories are in the order they appear in the series. The first story, “Light and Life” by Cavan Scott, doesn’t tie Yoda to a legacy character, giving the Jedi Grand Master more to do. Because Dooku and Anakin are involved in the other stories, we spend as much time with their POV as Yoda’s perspective. Bree’s story also ties closer to Yoda’s conflict, which is revealed in the final issue.

The second story, “Students of the Force” by Jody Houser, further proves that subtle references to Dooku’s time as Yoda’s apprentice suffice. We do not need an exhaustive exploration like Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan or Obi-Wan and Anakin. And it is not the best part of the story. The slow deterioration of Krrsish and Gheyr’s relationship is the tragic part of the dark side: the destruction of relationships and bonds that could change the galaxy. The possibility that seeing a Wookiee and Trandoshan fight side by side would change hearts and minds within their respective communities. 

Within canon, Wookiees are often portrayed as benign, while Trandoshans are shown to be ruthless hunters with little regard for life (including within families). Chewbacca’s ever-presence in films and merchandise underscores this versus the most well-known Trandoshan in Star Wars, Bossk, who is only briefly in The Empire Strikes Back. So, to have a Wookiee affected by the dark side (thanks to Dooku’s advice) is refreshing. 

“Size Matters Not” by Marc Guggenheim is an okay story, but there are many of these lessons with Anakin in The Clone Wars. Thus, it feels more forced to include to tie into the framed story of Kenobi asking Yoda to train Anakin’s son. It shows that Yoda had a unique relationship with Anakin that leaned more lightheartedly.

Yoda falls into the trap of showing a lot but saying very little new about the main character. The choice to have the framing story as merely a tease leading into The Empire Strikes Back was a missed opportunity to expand on Yoda’s internal turmoil during this time, hinted at in his section in Age of Rebellion Special. 

But the primary reason this is a letdown is that the framed story in Marvel Star Wars: Yoda is technically a lesser interpretation of “There is Another” in From a Certain Point of View. If it improves character development, there is nothing wrong with reinterpreting an already established event in canon. But “There is Another” by Gary D. Schmidt reveals more about Yoda from his insistence on training Leia instead of Luke. The fear that Luke was too much like his father. Yoda was wrong, but he did not take much convincing to take on Skywalker. His battle in that short story was his increased sadness after sensing Obi-Wan’s death at the hands of Darth Vader and grappling with the fact he might be the last of the Jedi.

While I can see the value in having three different writers in this series, it might be the reason that “Students of the Force” and “Size Matters Not” do not connect to the framed story as well as “Light and Life” and the final issue, “The Cave.”

The Characters

Yoda’s lesson to Bree comes back as Bree’s reminder that failure is the greatest lesson that breaks Yoda out of being overwhelmed in The Cave. Bree represents one of Yoda’s success stories in a lifetime of what Yoda perceives to be failures. 

And one of his biggest failures (according to Yoda) was his former apprentice, Count Dooku. Dooku and Yoda are not on the same page, making me wonder what they were like as master and apprentice. Dooku intentionally undermines Yoda’s teachings by encouraging Krrsish not to tell Yoda and to embrace his concerns about the Trandoshan. The Wookiee, therefore, has no outlet, and his fears fester into an outburst that leads to a permanent rift between him and Gheyr. 

This comic series misses the mark because these stories are never about Yoda but his relationship with former apprentices. And the reveal of who is trying to get his attention and why is predictable. 

Because Yoda is a being who has lived for so long, there have been so many opportunities to explore character flaws—specifically, his tendency to withhold information from his fellow Jedi, despite seeing what that does on a much smaller scale, like in “Students of the Force.” 

And this is the negative side of extending franchises and telling more stories. We have been given a lot more context of the different environments that Yoda has lived in during his time in the Jedi Order. 

So Yoda has been in the Jedi Order for centuries, learning many of these lessons, and still could not foresee someone like Sidious?

These are the questions a series about Yoda should be answering decades after introducing the character. Instead, this entire saga of nested stories is in service to the Skywalkers and, in turn, feels more service-level for Yoda. 

And this leads to another missed opportunity: Obi-Wan Kenobi was the wrong character to interact with Yoda. The Cave of Evil appears in the last issue as Yoda faces some of his fears from the nested stories (and other events canon has yet to reveal), but the Cave could have been the main driver of the narrative structure instead of Kenobi. Per “Emergence” in From a Certain Point of View, The Cave of Evil is an entity that has become familiar with Yoda since he arrived. Having Yoda’s fears from these stories reflected by the Cave would challenge Yoda (and the reader) with a more engaging experience of reality versus perception of Yoda’s past. 

Canon Contribution

One of the few significant revelations is when Jedi Knight Keeve Trennis appears in The Cave of Evil, hinting that Yoda is somehow involved in what happens to her. Trennis is a name listed among the Lost Twenty Jedi Knights and Masters who left the Order (a minimal number considering the number of years the Order was active). This further confirms that Keeve is one of the Jedi, and we will likely discover her actual fate in The High Republic Phase Three.

An excellent canon continuity is Jak’zin from the Age of Republic Dooku comic that recreates the scene of the tiger Jedi seeing Dooku at the Jedi Temple (although Dooku is portrayed with brown hair instead of grey and Jak’zin has blue eyes instead of brown.

Fans who have wondered how Grievous would fare in a fight against Yoda have their answer: not well. Yoda could easily destroy Grievous when the two meet in issue seven of “Size Matters Not.” Grievous has a date with death at the hands of Obi-Wan Kenobi, so the General was never going to meet his end here, but it puts to rest a theoretical fight.