Welcome back to Star Wars Escape Pod, bringing you Star Wars news and headlines in under 15 minutes. This is Lightspeed on Star Wars Escape Pod. We get into all the news from a galaxy far, far away, and it has been a while since we have done one of these Lightspeed episodes. So we're about to dive right in to all the latest. We have new books and comics on the horizon, like what I was saying. You can catch the Bad Batch in Dark Horse's latest Hyperspace Stories comic.
It is part four of a little miniseries that they're doing, where they first encounter Asajj Ventress during the Clone Wars. So this is a bit of a flashback to the past during the Clone Wars era, so any Bad Batch fans out there are going to really enjoy that a lot.
I always had a little bit of negativity towards the idea of bringing Ventress back personally, only because I really loved her outro in the Dark Disciple novel, which is Star Wars canon, and really was some of the best Clone Wars episodes that they ever wrote and really fleshed out her story a lot. Her character had a big redeeming arc in it, and I don't know, I just think it was a bit of a disservice to the character to bring her back in some ways.
But I do look forward to future stories that they tell with the redeemed, resurrected Ventress. But this is a story that takes place during the Clone Wars, so it's actually going back in time. So not the story timeline that I was hoping to see, but kind of cool to see that they are fleshing out that first meeting between the Bad Batch and Asajj Ventress.
New comics on the horizon, January 28th we have The High Republic Adventures Saber for Higher Trade paperback getting released, Jango Fett trade paperback, a miniseries called Trail of Lost Hope gets released January 28th. The High Republic Adventures Echo of Fear number 4 on the 29th of January, with High Republic Adventures Dispatches from the Occlusion Zone issue number 4 also on the 29th. Same day we got Ewoks issue number 4 and The High Republic Adventures issue number 14.
Following that we also have the launch of a single issue comic called A New Legacy. This is a sort of a one, I think it's a one shot comic that bridges the gap between the most recently ended Star Wars ongoing series and what they have planned next for us in the next era of time in which they are telling Star Wars stories in the Marvel comics universe.
So that's going to be a nice one to pick up for the collectors out there or anyone who's really looking for a jumping in point for the comic books. This is it. So look for Star Wars A New Legacy launching January 29th. Star Wars Adventures Annual has come out from 2023 that comes out on the 29th as well. So many things on the 29th. We got Legends Collections republished old non-canon Star Wars books coming out again with the republished Legends banner.
That would include Star Wars Scoundrels, Dark Lord, The Rise of Darth Vader. We also have The Force Unleashed 2 novelization. So those three are coming out on February 4th this year. February 5th we'll see the debut of a comic book miniseries called Legacy of Vader. This is a Charles Soule special. So Charles Soule, if you know the guy, he is a very talented comic book writer. Did the best Darth Vader series out there. The ones that everyone talks about all the time.
So this is a story that will be about the Legacy of Vader. It features Kylo Ren as the main character and is a single issue comic book. So again, for all the collectors out there, for those number ones, for those, you know, one time, one shot stories that you're really looking to maybe pick up one, just a frame on the wall. This one might be a good one. The poster or the cover art is exceptionally well, well, well done. So really cool stuff.
February 12th we'll see the launch of a single issue comic called the Higher Public Adventures number 15. Oh, actually, you know what, Legacy of Vader might be a miniseries. I'll take it back. Higher Public Adventures number 15 will come out on February 12th. And we're also going to see Ahsoka issue number eight, which is part of the comic novelization, I guess, of the TV show. So that comes out on February 19th. I believe that is the finale to the comic series adaption.
And on February 19th, Fear of the Jedi number one from the Higher Public. It's another Higher Public phase three miniseries that they're doing. We do have multiple novels that have been announced that are coming out over the next three years, one each year. The first one called Reign of the Empire, The Mask of Fear being written by Alexander Freed launches February 25th. You can get your hands on the pre-order right now.
It is the beginning of a trilogy of books, which will tell the story of the political side of the rebellion early on, right after episode three, leading up to Andor and Rogue One. The first one is by Alexander Freed, features characters like Bail Organa, Mon Mothma, Saw and will be followed by two more books in the series, each being released in 2026 and then 2027, respectively.
2026's sequel to The Mask of Fear is written by Rebecca Roanhorse, and she wrote Resistance Reborn, and Fran Wilde will follow that up with the series finale in 2027. So we'll have lots to look forward to with the Reign of the Empire trilogy. Another book coming out later this year is The Acolyte Wayseeker, and the story is decades before Star Wars The Acolyte Season 1, about Vernestra Rowe rediscovering her place within the Jedi Order.
So any Acolyte fans out there, The Wayseeker will be released on May 26th, 2025. That is only two days after Star Wars Day, but it is available for pre-order right now. Alright, so last thing on the literature list here is the big news of a number one ongoing series, that is Star Wars 2025. So this is now the third Star Wars series, simply called Star Wars Marvel Comics series that they have launched.
And each of these Star Wars ongoing series have usually been, I guess, counter-parted with a Darth Vader series, although in this new time period, which takes place after Return of the Jedi, Darth Vader is no longer around. So I think that is why it is being substituted for this Legacy of Vader series. So, you know, that's going to be interesting to see whether or not it really does fill that void. But hey, it's a Charles Soule series either way. So I guess we'll see what comes out of that.
But Star Wars number one 2025, that launches on May 7th, and this entire series will be ongoing and is in the conclusion of the Battle of Jakku. So just because the Battle of Jakku event just finished with those three miniseries that summed up Battle of Jakku, being a counterpart to the Aftermath books and the Battlefront 2 campaign and Star Wars Squadrons, so many other stories that take place during this time period.
Star Wars number one will follow the events of the most recent Marvel Star Wars Battle of Jakku storyline and will be a counterpart to a new Legacy issue number one. And it'll just launch the Star Wars Marvel stories into the New Republic era with writers Alex Segura and artist Phil Noto helming the project. So this is really cool news for all those of you who have been following the Star Wars Marvel storylines ever since the launch in 2015. I think it was.
So it's been a little while, but this is now the third ongoing series. The first one took place between Episode 4 and 5. The second was between Episode 5 and 6. And that one just ended with 50 issues on the Darth Vader and on the Star Wars lineups. So we can expect this one to go about 50 issues as well. And this is going to be in the wake of Return of the Jedi. So I don't really know what they're going to do after this.
I mean, maybe as they approach on the sequel trilogy stories, maybe we'll see more things kind of like the Legacy of Vader pop up, except maybe we'll see another Poe Dameron line or something like that. But we want to hear what your thoughts are on the Marvel comics. Anyone who's really well versed in all those stories, send us an email with your analysis on what you would like to see from ongoing series with Star Wars Marvel and your suggestions.
We would love to just read through those and hear your thoughts on it. Big news on the podcast. We are launching a second show. A sister show to our own. We are calling it Star Wars Launch Pad. This show blasts off on all podcast apps everywhere and YouTube next Friday on the 31st. So we will leave a YouTube link in the description below to go and subscribe to that right off the bat.
For all the podcast apps out there, you'll have to wait until the first episode drops on the 31st, but we will be talking about it and leaving links in our description on a SkatePod going forward as well for that show. So it'll be pretty easy to find. Look for a logo very similar to our own, except it's blue and it's called Star Wars Launch Pad. And this show is very different. It's very experimental. And I say that because we don't know how it's going to go.
We don't know how many episodes we'll run it for. So many possibilities with how this show could wind up and, you know, it could be a success, could be a failure, but it is completely AI driven. And before you roll your eyes and write it off, we do encourage all of you guys to give it a try and to, you know, I guess support the experiment, you know, have fun with it. It is to fill the void when it comes to frequent Star Wars news podcasts.
And I guess no one really out there is doing this in a fun, stylized way. And I think that's sort of the reason why we wanted to try it out. So Star Wars Launch Pad launches next Friday. And I'll just read you the description of the show. Star Wars Launch Pad represents a pioneering initiative from the creators of Star Wars Escape Pod, harnessing the power of AI to redefine Star Wars news consumption.
Through meticulously crafted Star Wars flashcasts, listeners are immersed in ad-free audio experiences that explore noteworthy developments drawn from StarWars.com and other reliable sources. Of course, because it is AI driven, as far as our hosts on the show goes, some things that may come across as facts may actually be the AI's own opinions. But a lot of the things are also going to be facts because we are only using official news sources.
So in all of the flashcasts, we're coining the word flashcast here on Star Wars Escape Pod, by the way, we're calling them flashcasts because they are basically like Lightspeed. There are many podcast episodes all suited for you for Star Wars news. So we will leave all of the links that we generate the discussions for in the description. So you can check them out for yourself. That way, if you have the time to verify something, the links will all be there.
Anything that we use in generating those podcasts will leave the link in the description below. So you can be sure that even if it is 97.5% accurate, you can always check up on that last 3% by hitting the sources in the description. But it might just be a fun way to explore some headlines and news from StarWars.com and other sources that we just don't have time to get to in our Escape Pod weekly releases. I mean, sometimes there's just so much to get to and so much to cover.
And during the weeks that we have an after show like Skeleton Crew, it can be a real challenge to, I guess, talk about updates on news and announcements and stuff like that as we go along because it is one of those things that it just, you know, it escapes from us. No pun intended, but yeah. Alright, the last bit of news here is Skeleton Crew did wrap up and we did enjoy the season very much.
It doesn't sound like Season 2 is going to happen, but due to viewer count, we did talk about that in the finale to the Skeleton Crew after show. But we enjoyed it very much with an average, a team average of 1.5 Pablo points to 2. And that is significantly higher than our average, which was ranging all over the place on the Acolyte. We've only been tracking our Pablo points and Pudu's ranking system here on the podcast ever since the Acolyte.
We also have ratings for Plagueis and Jedi Lost as far as novelizations goes. So you can check all those scores out using the description link below called Star Wars Podcast Archives, or it's found on our link tree. All is in the description. So everything we talk about is usually down in the description. But just, you know, you can find that and view it for yourself as well as the true runtime tracker, where we talked a lot about runtimes on the escape pod during the Skeleton Crew show.
So you can see proper runtime for yourself on our new spreadsheet. One more piece of news here. Ryan Gosling is rumored to be in an upcoming Star Wars movie helmed by Sean Levy. So that could be really interesting. And I don't really have too much more to say on it other than the fact that, you know, lots of Star Wars projects get announced or not announced or rumored about and then they just never happen.
So, you know, maybe take it with a grain of salt as far as whether or not that show will actually end up coming to be in existence. But, you know, it is exciting news for sure. Definitely go check out Star Wars Bucketheads Part 3 on YouTube. And we really enjoyed our chat with them. We have the final after show or the, I guess, the Part 3 behind the scenes, if you will, dropping on, let's see, this would be January 27th.
So you can look forward to that as well as this recent Lightspeed episode that we just published out. We'll have the Living Force book review coming up. Star Wars Podcast Day is February 7th. So you can look for a special episode from us on February 7th. Drop it on that day. We're going to have Ultimate Trivia and some other fun activities. And then also, of course, as I mentioned earlier, Star Wars Bounty Hunter, the retro video game review will be dropping on February 20th.
Sorry, February 17th. So lots planned from us. Escape pod is not going anywhere despite launching our AI based show. The reason why we don't want the AI episodes showing up in Escape pod is because we fully respect anyone who doesn't wish to consume AI material. That is the reason why we have a second show that we're launching. And it might be a bit of work to keep up with. So again, call it an experiment. No idea how long it will last. But we encourage you all to try it out.
Subscribe to the YouTube and keep an eye out for it on Spotify and other podcast platforms out there. We're definitely running over time. One more note to our dedicated listeners on Podbean. This second show, unfortunately, will not be available on Podbean only because I think Podbean only takes in podcasts that are hosted on their platform. Whereas other podcast apps out there are fed from RSS feeds. So we only have our main show hosted with Podbean. So it's available everywhere on everything.
But Escape Launchpad will only be, I think, available on the majority of platforms minus the platforms that exclude RSS feed for their directory. So unfortunately, you may have to go to YouTube or another podcast app source to listen to Star Wars Launchpad if you are an active Podbean listener. But that's an if and a maybe because I don't really know if it'll get through or not. But that is just the most likely scenario. So very sorry to all of you guys.
One last big thank you to everyone who did and has joined our Discord in the last few years. That was an experiment as well in itself trying to build a community there. And the sun has set on our public Discord access. We do really appreciate those of you who decided to message us and request to stay in the Discord server and in the forums. So we look forward to chatting with you. But to everyone else who joined due to our giveaways and just ghosted in there for the longest time.
We appreciate your company. But now we have closed the doors on that experiment. And we're moving on to other things to consume our limited amount of time and resources that we have. So hopefully, Launchpad fills the void when it comes to what you'd rather have for content from us. But again, it's all ad-free, non-monetized stuff here. We're doing this as a hobby. We're doing this from the heart of a fan. So we hope you all have a great 2025 ahead. We look forward to many great things this year.
We didn't even have time to get through Celebration Guest. But we'll hit that up, I think, on Podcast Day. So something we'll get to in the future. May the Force be with you. We will see you in the next episode of Star Wars Escape Pod, Lightspeed, or Star Wars Launchpad.