Solis Obscuri, on 08 September 2016 - 12:51 PM, said:
I haven't read a lot of those, but wasn't it mostly that Star Trek Into Darkness/Star Wars Attack of the Clones cop-out that all along there were super secret programs within already super-secretive Comstar hoarding resources to build super secret super armies at super secret bases to sweep in as a deus ex mechina Big Bad... In turn forcing the Successor States, non-homeworld Clans, remnant forces of Comstar, etc. to actually have to pull together for once and therefore pave the way for unification under the Republic of the Sphere and Emperor of Mankind Devlin Stone? Seemed kinda forced.
Somewhat. The Manei Domini were the result of a decades long power struggle within comstar and the WoB between the real Thomas Marik and the less insane members. The Word of Blake Militia beyond the first 10 divisions drew a lot of its funds from the FWL and Capcon which allowed them to make about 20 additional divisions over 20 years. The warship fleets were ex-star league era ships that Comstar originally mothballed back after the fall of the Star League to keep them out of the hands of the House Lords, or just as often, compromised FWL and Comstar ships.
But all of this was originally designed to destroy all the clans (especially the MD). When the IS decided to disband the Star league, they set their angst on the IS instead.
I'll grant you the "EVERYONE BANDS TOGETHER TO FIGHT THE BAD GUY" & Devlin Stone thing were very forced though.
The Jihad does have highlights though: the Wars of Reaving are very interesting (though the outcome is not). The eventual fall into the DA is what makes the Jihad a hard pill to swallow. If DA had been ignored then a more sensible plot could have taken place after the end of the WoB.
But I'll give them credit in that they retconned as much of DA as they could and filled the gap between 3081-3130 as best they could. It could have been a lot worse, and there wasn't much they could have done to make it better given the destination.