I’ve been revisiting The High Republic Adventures (the 2021 comic run; not the new one) for some Wook research, and honestly, the more I think about it, the more I appreciate how much it adds to Star Wars as a whole thematically. On the surface, it’s a fun, fast-paced comic, but underneath that, it’s really about identity, belonging, and what it actually means to be a Jedi.

One of my favorite things about this series is the friendship between Lula and Zeen. They come from totally different worlds—Lula is a textbook Jedi, all about following the rules, while Zeen grew up in a culture (the Elders of the Path) that straight-up rejected the Force. When Zeen discovers she has the Force, she’s thrown into a crisis—she’s spent her whole life suppressing something that the Jedi see as a gift.

What’s cool is how this shakes both of them. Lula starts questioning if being a Jedi means shutting off parts of herself (her attachments, her emotions), and Zeen has to figure out if she even wants to be part of the Jedi’s world. It’s classic Star Wars—this push-and-pull between control and freedom, structure and instinct.

The Nihil meanwhile are... absolute chaos, and I love that. Most of the time, Star Wars villains have some kind of order to them—the Empire, the Sith, even the Separatists had a structure. The Nihil? Pure anarchy. They take what they want, they don’t care about honor or ideology, and their leader, Marchion Ro, is just playing the long game, manipulating everyone.

That contrast—Jedi vs. Nihil—isn’t just good vs. evil. It’s control vs. disorder. The Jedi want to bring peace and stability, but how do you do that when you’re up against people who thrive on unpredictability? This is something the young Jedi, like Farzala and Qort, have to learn the hard way. It’s one thing to train with lightsabers; it’s another to be thrown into a war where nothing makes sense.

What I love about The High Republic Adventures is that it doesn’t just tell a "Jedi = good, Nihil = bad" story. It digs into the flaws in the Jedi way—how their strict rules might not work for everyone, how they struggle to adapt when things don’t go according to plan. At the same time, it makes you want to root for them because characters like Lula, Zeen, and Farzala care so much. They’re trying to figure out what being a Jedi should mean, not just what they’ve been told it means.

So while it’s a comic about kids fighting space pirates, it’s also a story about belonging, doubt, and how sometimes, questioning the path you’re on is exactly what makes you worthy of it.