A New Look Inside the Latest Thrawn Book Reintroduces a Familiar Chiss

Timothy Zahn’s two Thrawn trilogies have completed loads to casually re-integrate parts of his extremely influential work within the Expanded Universe again into Star Wars’ modern canon, particularly with regards to the internal workings of the Chiss Ascendancy. But after books of teasing, the writer is placing the highlight on a extra emotional bond for the longer term Grand Admiral.

Revealed by StarWars.com in a brand new excerpt from the ultimate e-book within the Thrawn Ascendancy trilogy, Lesser Evil, is a new flashback chapter that marks our first prolonged time with Syndic Mitth’ras’safis, and his first encounter with Thrawn as a younger benefit adoptive into the Mitth Family, one of many 9 ruling households of the Chiss Ascendancy. Mitth’ras’safis—Thrass to his associates—has already been re-inducted into Star Wars canon, however solely by way of informal asides in prior books within the Thrawn Ascendancy sequence. We know sufficient that a number of particulars across the character have since been modified in comparison with the Thrass of the EU: he’s not Thrawn’s brother by blood, however they have been shut, and Thrass was finally killed as a result of an unsanctioned motion by Thrawn in a battle with alien pirates. The circumstances round his demise within the present canon are left imprecise sufficient to loosely allude to, however in a roundabout way join to, the way in which he died within the EU, however apart from that up till now Thrass has solely been flippantly talked about in passing, and the way his demise created a political nightmare Thrawn continues to be feeling the ramifications of by the point of the Ascendancy trilogy.

But within the EU, Thrass (primarily launched within the novel Outbound Flight in 2006) and Thrawn have been extraordinarily shut, a uncommon level of true emotional connection for the latter. Choosing to navigate the political facet of Chiss society as a Syndic as Thrawn rose by way of the army ranks, Thrass’ arc after we have been correctly launched to him was typically about having to navigate his love for his brother together with his obligation to their adopted household within the Mitth—and the trials and tribulations that come from all sibling relationships, Chiss or in any other case. But he additionally had an important connection to the galaxy past the Ascendancy’s attain within the Unknown Regions, dying to assist save the crew of the Old Republic colony/exploration ship Outbound Flight, a vessel operated by the Jedi Order (and extra particularly, the unique, pre-crazy-cloned-version Jedi Master Jorus C’baoth) on an ill-fated quest to map out the sting of the galaxy and uncover extragalactic life. Thrass’ position within the EU may need been small—we have been actually launched to his unidentified bones earlier than we really met him as a dwelling being—however nonetheless necessary, and it’s good to see a personality that opened up one other facet of the infamously guarded Grand Admiral Thrawn get some extra exploration in Star Wars’ present continuity.

Thrawn Ascendancy: Lesser Evil is about to hit cabinets November 16—head on over to StarWars.com to learn the total excerpt.