I may have to look into the trade paperbacks of the Darth Vader series. I got like two issues into it when I just quit comics altogether. I was getting kinda burned out on the ho-hum marvel Star Wars stuff. I was reading the main series and the first Darth Vader series they did. Finances were tight and it kinda felt exhorbitant spending about $4 per issue. Plus my comic shop is nearly an hour from my house so I’d often let my pull-list build up for 3 or 4 months before I’d go pick it up. Several times doing that, though, they’d have missed an issue here or there and tracking it down after the fact was a real pain (not to mention often more expensive since I’d usually have to order it online and pay shipping). Anyway, it all just built up into me choosing to stop bothering with comics for a while.
And the new Vader series started right after ROTS and was full of prequel junk and “bleeding crystals” and all sorts of stuff that really tempered any interest I would’ve had.
But I’ve heard quite a few good things about it since then. It’s way too late to try grabbing single issues to catch up, and I kinda prefer tpb’s anyway. I dunno though, I’ve been really interested in checking out the Dark Horse X-Wing series ever since Rogue One came out so Vader May continue to wait.
I was quite skeptical about getting into Soule’s Vader series as well (especially after Gillen dull attempt), but I’m obviously very glad I did. To me it has had much the same effect as the Clone Wars series did in that it’s helped “fix” a lot of PT ideas/concepts, and it’s one of a few series that’s helped me keep faith in Marvel’s ability to make a comeback of sorts in the near future. I can’t say much about the whole bleeding crystals thing though as I personally think it’s a really cool idea, but the second story-line is much more focused and the third story-line is absolutely fantastic. The current one has also been pretty great so far (and it ties in to RO and the Lando miniseries).
PS, I’d highly recommend issue 18 as a gauge of sorts to see if the series is something you’d like to re-visit. It’s a standalone story and is IMO the best issue so far. Alternatively you could get the Burning Seas TPB, it includes #18 and what I think is the best story-line so far.