The comic “Star Wars #1”
comes out in January… again. By this I mean this is the 5th comic in history to
launch under the title “Star Wars #1”.
The first “Star Wars #1” was
launched by Marvel in April of 1977, preceding the first Star Wars film by one
month. For the first six issues, the storyline followed the script of the first
Star Wars film, but stuff got weird after that- Giant green anthropomorphic
space rabbits weird. Still, the comic was successful for a long time. It ran 107
issues and Marvel even published a follow-up “Star Wars #108” in the Spring of 2019.
The second “Star Wars #1” was
published in 1998, in the months before “The Phantom Menace” released. By
this point licensing for Star Wars comics had been transferred to Dark Horse,
and even though they had been publishing Star Wars comics since 1991, Dark Horse had
never launched a “main title” Star Wars line. This comic ran monthly for 83
issues until it was eventually relaunched under the title “Dark Times”.
The third “Star Wars” title
was a weird one. It launched in the months after Lucas had sold his franchise
to Disney and the writing was already on the wall: Disney was going to give the comic
licensing rights back to Marvel (which they own). Dark Horse launched a few
different titles in the months before publishing rights expired. They
contracted comic veteran Brian Wood to pen “Star Wars #1” and 19 further
issues. The storyline focussed on Luke, Leia, and Han’s adventures immediately
following the Battle of Yavin (which is also what the same timeframe as the first
“Star Wars #1” and the fourth “Star Wars #1)
The fourth “Star Wars #1” was
launched shortly after the licensing rights had been transferred back
to Marvel. This series tied directly into the new Disney universe canon and all
previous Star Wars comics were moved to the “Legends” canonicity. Just as the
first “Star Wars” comic line ran concurrent with the Original Trilogy, and the
second “Star Wars” comic line ran concurrent with the Prequel Trilogy, this
“Star Wars” comic line ran concurrent with the sequel trilogy. Marvel set to publish the final issue of this series on November 20th, one month before Episode IX “The Rise of
Skywalker”. This series was set in the three years between “A New Hope” and
“The Empire Strikes Back”
The fifth “Star Wars #1” takes place in the aftermath of “The Empire Strikes
Back”, a time period not often dealt with in Star Wars lore. Although the 1970s
/ 1980s Star Wars comic dealt with “Empire Strikes Back” aftermath for 3 years
before “Return of the Jedi” came out and the 1990s “Shadows of the Empire” media
event also was set during this era. The series will be penned by
Charles Soule, who has become a favorite writer of mine after having reading his
various Star Wars comics and his science-fiction-politics series “Letter 44”.
Another comic announced to
launch in early 2020 is “Darth Vader #1” written by Greg Pak. This is Marvel’s
fifth Darth Vader series in just the last five years. Vader, to his credit, clearly has the capacity to sell comics.
With Marvel’s main “Star
Wars” line coming to a close, the company is also ending “Doctor Aphra” which ran for
40 issues and continued a storyline which started with Kieron Gillen's Vader series. Chelli Lona Aphra is probably the most popular character that has ever originated in a Star
Wars comic- highlighted by the fact that her series ran 40 issues.
Other long-running Star Wars titles include the Dark Horse titles “Legacy” and
“Knights of the Old Republic”. Both of these comics enjoyed a 50-issue run and
both also had a short follow-up mini-series which included the prefix “War”.
As we move beyond “The Rise of Skywalker” it will be interesting to keep
following Marvel’s Star Wars lines. Will they continue to churn out series after series devoted to the “Classic” era? Or will we get some sequel or prequel era stuff as well?
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