5. Galen Marek
(Starkiller)
A few years back, I was a huge Star Wars fanatic and I was even one of those rare guys who knew
Leia’s cell block number on the Death Star in A New Hope. I read many an Expanded Universe novel (X-Wing series was my favorite) immersing
myself in the universe; but, that was before the dark time, before the Empire
(prequels). When I first saw the prequel trilogy, I didn’t think it was too
bad; however, repeated viewings have shown me the error of my ways. I stopped
caring about the Star Wars universe
altogether and starting getting back into superhero comics, the Halo series, and Star Trek. In 2008, my outlook on the series changed with the release
of a game called Star Wars: The Force
Unleashed.
The game was one of the best written I have ever played as
it really made you care about the story and the characters. It also helped that
each character in the game was played by and resembled a real life actor. The
Force Unleashed instantly made me a fan of Sam Witwer, a prolific genre
actor, as he portrayed my fifth favorite Sci-Fi character of all time, Galen
Marek or better known as Starkiller. Marek also happens to be my favorite
character in the whole Star Wars saga.
Why would a video game character beat out movie and book
characters such as Wedge Antilles, Kip Durron, Mace Windu, or Luke Skywalker?
Well, as I mentioned before, the writing in the game is superb, but that is
only half the story. The Jedi in the movies tend to be very weak with special
pathetic focus on those in the prequels as the Sith seem to outsmart them on
every turn. In addition, their rules were very strict and were broken by almost
everybody. Gelen Marek is a Jedi who just let loose and was extremely powerful
and this is what attracted me to the character.
Marek was a Jedi who had to find his own way to light side
of the force because he started out as Darth Vader’s apprentice and ended up
founding the Rebel Alliance (I am following the canon story, the good ending). His history turned out to be beneficial
because Galen was able to harness powers from both sides of the force. Let’s just forget about the sequel.
Best portrayal: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Greatest moment(s): On
Raxus Prime, Starkiller takes down a Star Destroyer with the force.
He beats the crap out of Darth Vader in one of the final
boss fights of the game.
I too loved the writing and even enjoyed the characters progression, I have many things to say about that whole "finding his way to the light side" but otherwise, it was a great game. It's too bad the gameplay was so blatantly sub par, it was like playing an old PSX game rather than a PS3 title.
ReplyDeleteStill, that aside it was a good run with good characters.