Star Wars Omnibus: A Long Time Ago... Vol. 4

Written by David Michelinie, Jo Duffy,  Bob Layton, Archie Goodwin, Linda Grant, and Roy Richardson
Art by Gene Day, Tom Palmer, Kerry Gammill, Ron Frenz, Luke McDonnell, Bob Layton, Klaus Janson, Al Williamson, Carlos Garzon, Tom Mandrake, Bob McLeod, and David Mazzucchelli

The first comic I ever bought was Marvel's Star Wars #30, and with all of the hype surrounding the upcoming new movies, and the shifting of the license away from Dark Horse and towards Marvel, I've found myself occasionally wondering about those old licensed books, which I remember as being not all that good.  I was at a very good used bookstore the other week, which also carries a lot of remaindered graphic novels, and saw Volume 4 of Dark Horse's Star Wars Omnibus: A Long Time Ago..., their nice thick collections of the old Marvel stuff.  The price was great, so I thought I'd pick this up (mostly because I'm a sucker for Bobba Fett, and the cover made it seem like he was going to be prominent in the volume).

This book contains issues 68 through 85 of the regular Marvel series, an Annual (#3), and the four-part adaptation of Return of the Jedi (by Archie Goodwin and Al Williamson, no less).

Most of the regular comics were written by Jo Duffy (whatever happened to her) and drawn by Ron Frenz, with very strong inks by the wonderful Tom Palmer.  There are a fair number of fill-in issues, some by writers I've never heard of, and a few real surprises in terms of artist choices, like Klaus Janson, and a very early David Mazzucchelli.

The stories varied a lot in quality.  This series was famously hampered by a lack of foreknowledge of what was going to happen in the next film, leaving the writers to find ways of crafting interesting stories that don't really develop the characters at all, and that don't contain information that's likely to be contradicted in the next movie.  For that reason, there is a lot of Chewbacca and Lando looking for the frozen Han Solo, without ever going directly to Jabba the Hutt.  After the events of Return, with Vader and the Emperor dead, the stories shift to Han's misadventures in reclaiming lost money, and having the characters travel around looking for planets to start working with the Alliance.

The focus is largely on the swashbuckling, as bounty hunters are chased, and lost Rebel pilots are hunted for.  There are some very unfortunate characters, such as Plif of the Hoojibs, a cutesy creature race that predates the Ewoks.  There are also some very good comics in here, such as the annual, which has two young boys decide which side of the galactic conflict they are on.

It was a bit of a trip to read these stories, despite the fact that I only ever owned one of them (having moved on from Star Wars comics to almost everything else Marvel published at this time).  There is a sense of naivety to these comics that matches the first Star Wars film, but considering the time period, I'm willing to forgive it.  Now, if Jason Aaron and John Cassaday's upcoming series reads like this...

Star Wars #1

Written by Brian Wood
Art by Carlos D'Anda

If I had to sum up the first ten years of my life in only two words, they would be 'Star Wars'.  It was the first movie I ever saw, in a drive-in at the age of four, and it became an all-consuming passion through the release of Return of the Jedi.  Star Wars is also the reason why I started reading comics.  Star Wars #30 is the first comic I remember buying (again, at the age of four), and that became the impetus for a hobby that has lasted until today.

As much love as I have for the property though, I've never been much of a fan of anything that came after Return of the Jedi.  The prequel movies were a big disappointment, and I more or less ignored the Dark Horse comics until I recently came to realize that John Ostrander had been writing them, and I've read all of his work starting with his wonderful Star Wars: Legacy, and moving on to the equally wonderful Agent of the Empire, and the less impressive Dawn of the Jedi.

Anyway, it was with great excitement that I learned that Brian Wood, a writer I have tremendous respect for, would be given the opportunity to write a monthly comic that features the original, central characters of the first movie, in stories set between it and The Empire Strikes Back.  Wood is best known for comics like DMZ, Northlanders, and The Massive, although he has recently been working on some X-Men titles at Marvel.  Of all his books, I most love his Local, which is about as far removed from Star Wars as you can get, but with his ability to find small, personal stories in large, chaos-ridden backdrops (I mean, that's basically what DMZ, Northlanders, and The Massive are), he struck me as an inspired choice for this kind of comic.

Having read this first issue, I am very excited to continue reading this series.  The story opens on Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa, and pilot Wedge Antilles scouting the outer rim of the galaxy for a suitable location for a new Rebel base.  They aren't out of hyperspace long though before a contingent of Imperials arrive, clearly aware that they would be there.  There is some fighting, some crashing, and what have you, and later we learn that Mon Mothma, the leader of the Alliance, suspects that there is a traitor feeding information to the Imperials.  She puts Leia in charge of a small group of rebels that will be working independently and in secret to either flush out the traitor, or find a new home for the Alliance.

It's a nice simple concept that provides Wood with opportunities to usher in the character growth that, between the first two movies, changed Luke Skywalker from the annoyingly whiny farm boy into an ace Rebel pilot, and which brought about a sense of selflessness in Han Solo.

One thing that always appealed to me about Star Wars comics was the opportunity to pour over large pictures of cool space craft.  In that, Carlos D'Anda does not disappoint, drawing some very cool Tie Fighters.  One problem that always exists in licensed comics is that the characters need to look enough like the actors and actresses that portrayed them, without looking overly photo-referenced and stiff.  D'Anda mostly maintains a balance between the two, which is a good thing.

I also enjoyed the fact that, at least for this issue, Wood and D'Anda resisted the urge to over-fill panels with cutesy aliens and funny droids, the two most regrettable facets of the digitally altered more recent DVD and Blu-Ray releases of George Lucas's original work.  This book has a more adult feel to it than the movies do, which is appreciated.

Star Wars Legacy: War #6

Written by John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
Art by Jan Duursema and Dan Parsons

I've been a Star Wars fan for as long as I can remember, but since I was fourteen, I found it to be a guilty pleasure, tempered by my acknowledgment of the corniness and sheer hack-ery of George Lucas's stories.  What I've always loved most about Star Wars was the potential to tell fantastic, sweeping stories on a grand scale.  That each of the movies (Empire Strikes Back least of all) fails in this has always bothered me, and I've tended to avoid the novels and comics that the franchise has produced.

And then I heard about John Ostrander and Jan Duursema's Star Wars Legacy, and decided to give the first trade a try.  This is what Star Wars should have been.  The Legacy book, which lasted for fifty issues before being wrapped up with this six-issue mini-series, is set while after the closing of Lucas's stories.  It has a Skywalker, Cade, who is a roguish pirate, unsure of his connection to the Force.  It has a universe that is suffering under the grip of Darth Krayt and his vision of the One Sith.  Krayt is opposed by Roan Fel, who claims to be the true Emperor, and by Gar Stazi, the last free admiral of the Alliance.

The series was as sweeping as Star Wars should be, and Ostrander took the time to develop a number of characters, each with their own sense of a story arc.  This book delved into politics, and the usual Star Wars theme of good versus evil.  Best of all, this series was completely lacking in cutesy alien races and animals, and only had one droid, who got next to no screen time.  Like I have said before, it was Star Wars done right.

This issue, which wraps up the entire series, brings every sub-plot (except the Mandalorian one) to a fitting close.  Characters act according to their own internal logic, and the end of the book feels very satisfactory.  John Ostrander is a giant among comics writers, and it's great to see him still putting out such good work.  As always, Jan Duursema does a wonderful job working with Ostrander.  The two of them are apparently working on a new Star Wars title; I can only hope it will be as good.

Star Wars Legacy Vol. 9: Monster

Written by John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
Art by Jan Duursema, Dave Ross, and Dan Parsons

As I get closer to being caught up with Star Wars Legacy, I'm increasingly impressed by how well-plotted this series is.  Ostrander and Duursema have clearly organized their entire story, and are steadily working their way towards their conclusion (is this going to happen in Star Wars Legacy - War, or are there going to be more mini-series after this one?).

In this volume, Cade and his friends get lured to the planet of Wayland, the place where Cade's father first started some terraforming experiment using the Yuuzhan Vong (who are an alien race that had invaded the galaxy in another Star Wars series, I assume).  Cade gets captured of course, and there is some stuff with one of the Sith, and Cade's relationships with his friends get tested, and new characters pop up.  This plotline, while being the main one for this book, follows the usual path on this title.

More interesting is the single-issue story of an attack on Admiral Ghazi, and the continuing plotlines concerning a possible alliance between the Jedi and Emperor Roan Fel against the Sith.  These storylines have been my favourite since I started reading this title, and I found them to be pretty exciting in this book.

As I've said before, Star Wars Legacy is Star Wars finally done properly.

Star Wars Legacy Vol. 8: Tatooine

Written by John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
Art by Jan Duursema, Kajo Baldisimo, and Dan Parsons

As much as I usually praise this series, this particular volume is perhaps the weakest in the run so far.  It feels, in many ways, like it is an interlude volume, giving Cade Skywalker and friends something to do while Ostrander works to set things up for the next big storyline.

For the majority of the book, Cade and his crew are running scams on Tatooine (always Tatooine, the most pivotal backwater in the galaxy) and attacking Black Sun pirates who attack Imperial weapons shipments.  The Empire sends a fighter pilot we've seen before to arrest Cade, and pairs her with Morrigan Corde, a special operative and Cade's mother.  There are also some vampires pursuing Cade, and this is where things all start to feel a little forced.

First, two of the bounty hunters are of a vampiric race that like to refer to the emotions and/or luck they drain from their victims as soup.  It's hard to deliver threatening dialogue that way.  I don't know if these are Ostrander's creations, or if they are from some other aspect of the Star Wars universe, but they're silly.  Also stretching credibility is the revelation about Corde that kind of slips out but isn't used much.  What I love most about this series is the way that Ostrander has been playing with George Lucas's creations, but ignoring much of the overly melodramatic or cloyingly cute crap that chokes the films.  Now, learning what we do about Corde, we're back into the overly complicated family ties that irritated me so much when I was a kid.  Not everyone in the comic has to be related.

Finally, there is a one-off story featuring the Rogue Squadron of the Rebel Alliance.  This is what I usually like most about this comic, but this time around, I got a little lost.  One of the characters is revealed to be Mandalorian, which seems to me to mean being part of a samurai-like warrior tribe that wears Bobba Fett's armor.  Perhaps these guys have been around before (a quick Wikipedia search reveals that these guys have had a long history - who knew?), but nothing is done to introduce them to a new reader.  It's all good, but it threw me a little and made me wonder if I'd just forgotten something important.

In all, I'm still very impressed with this title, but I hope the remaining two trades in the run are better than this one.

Myspace Dark Horse Presents Vol. 4

by a lot of people

My thoughts on this volume of Dark Horse's on-line comic collection are basically no different from my thoughts on the previous three.  Dark Horse is putting together a very mixed bag with this series, and while I appreciate diversity in story content and art, I don't like it when there is a lot of diversity in quality.

There are some very good short comics in this book, but there are a lot of plain old mediocre ones too.  The mix is about 50/50.  As I prefer to accentuate the positive, I should talk about what I like.

I think my favourite story in this book David Malki's 'The Catch!: A Wondermark Tale.'  I think there may have been a Wondermark story or two in previous volumes, but they didn't catch my notice the way this very funny story about a Victorian man who brings home an early computer to helps him find things, only to discover that it's part of an ingenious marketing ploy.  The story is funny enough on its own, but when you start to accept the weirdness of people dressed in Victorian clothing talking about their TV remote, the story takes on a new level of enjoyment.  Very cool stuff.

I also loved the Achewood story, and really liked Matt Kindt's Giant Man piece.  There are stories that didn't do much for me but that had some very pretty art, contributed by people like Farel Dalrymple, Jim Rugg, and Kristian Donaldson.

As usual, most of the licensed stories (Star Wars, Buffy) were weak, and the stories that were effectively trailers for minis (like The Rapture) were pretty ineffective.  I keep holding out hope for more, but am increasingly disappointed.  I am now in the market for some of the Wondermark books though...

Star Wars Legacy Vol. 7 - Storm

Written by John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
Art by Jan Duursema, Omar Francia, and Dan Parsons

I'm starting to worry that all of my reviews for this series are going to be completely interchangeable, as the book is so consistently impressive, that I find it hard to say many new things about each subsequent volume that I read.

The seventh book in this series checks in on three (or four, if the state of Darth Krayt and the Sith count as their own story, instead of being a part of Cade Skywalker's) running stories in separate chapters.  I much prefer this approach to having each individual chapter check in on each separate story for a couple of reasons.  First, it allows for time to pass in Cade's story, which is the main one, and it allows the different series artists to work on their own set of characters and settings.

This book opens with a story set on Dac, the homeworld of the Mon Calamari, who are currently being hunted to extermination by Krayt's Empire.  A group of resistance fighters are working with an Imperial Knight, and their story features some amazing design work by regular fill-in artist Omar Francia.  One of the appeals to me of the Star Wars series as a kid was the diversity and ingenuity of ship design (before I realized more stuff meant more toys), and so I thought the underwater AT-AT Swimmer was very cool indeed.

The second story checks in on the new partnership between the Alliance and Roan Fel's Imperial Forces.  The writing in this story is among Ostrander's best, as the two sides test the other.  The final story brings us back to Cade and his crew, none of whom are in a particularly positive place right now.

This series continually amazes me in its ability to like a Star Wars comic.  I'm really happy to hear that the title is not canceled after issue 50, but is merely getting rebranded, and that Ostrander and Duursema are staying with it.

Star Wars Vector Vol. 2

Written by Rob Williams, John Ostrander, and Jan Duursema
Art by Dustin Weaver, Jan Duursema, and Dan Parsons

While I've been enjoying reading John Ostrander's wonderful Star Wars Legacy series, I got a little confused when it came time to find a copy of volume six.  As it turns out, it's because volume six is really volume two of Star Wars Vector, a novel crossover idea that was tried out in all the Star Wars series a couple of years ago, and which is sure to confound new readers.

Vector is about Celeste Morne, a Jedi who has become bonded to a Sith artifact known as the Muur Talisman.  It holds the spirit of an ancient and long-dead Sith named Karness Muur, who is in constant battle for control with Morne, and also gives her the ability to turn any creature into a Rakghul, a mindless monster.  Volume One of this series contains the Knights of the Old Republic and the Dark Times issues, whereas this book covers off the Rebellion and Legacy legs of our tour.  Not being too interested in Star Wars books not written by John Ostrander, I just picked up volume one.

The Rebellion story is okay.  It seems to take place between the first and second Star Wars movies (Episode 4 and 5, for people that want to acknowledge the newer films), and features a still-green Luke Skywalker, and all the rest of our favourite characters.  What is most notable about this story is that the art is by Dustin Weaver, who is currently doing very impressive work on Marvel's oddball SHIELD comic.  Everything else is pretty forgetful.

Then we get to the Legacy part of things, and it all takes a turn for the better.  Ostrander integrates Morne and her story with his ongoing plot perfectly.  We meet up with Cade Skywalker and his crew as they make their way into the Galactic Core to set up their assassination of Darth Krayt, the Sith Lord that has been plaguing the galaxy.  On the way, they come across Morne in a stolen Imperial Destroyer.  They get her on-side in their mission, and lots of stuff happens.

Legacy has to be the best Star Wars comic ever written (and drawn - few artists are as consistently great as Duursema), and I love the attention to detail, both in terms of character and in terms of providing a consistent and interesting setting for these stories that the creators bring to this book.

Star Wars Legacy Vol.4 - Alliance & Vol. 5 - The Hidden Temple

Written by John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
Art by Omar Francia, Alan Robinson, Jan Duursema, and Dan Parsons

I thought it would be a good day to read a big chunk of Ostrander's excellent Star Wars series, and polished off two trades, Alliance and The Hidden Temple.

This is basically the Star Wars that I wanted after I turned fourteen.  There is a rational attempt to understand galactic politics, and the droids and other cutesy creatures are kept to the barest of minimums.  Legacy is so much more than Cade Skywalker, and the Alliance trade is the best example of that I can think of.  I'm not sure that Cade is in it at all beyond in flashback.

Instead, Ostrander focuses on other goings on in the galaxy.  Most of Alliance is taken up with the plan of Admiral Gar Stazi, the commander of the final remnants of the Galactic Alliance to steal a new Advanced Star Destroyer from Darth Krayt, the Sith leader of the Empire.  To tell this tale properly, Ostrander develops a large number of characters, and fills in the story of what happened to the rest of the Alliance fleet.  There is also a story about the consequences of these actions on the Mon Calamari, and another one-off tale that has Darth Wyyrlok, Darth Krayt's aide de camp, as he tries to research new methods of healing his master.

The Hidden Temple, on the other hand, is all Cade.  In it, Cade and his friends turn to Cade's uncle for help (yes, yet another Skywalker), and he in turn, takes them to a secret Jedi temple.  They get followed by some Imperial Knights, and all these factions sit down to discuss a course of action to put a stop to the Sith.  This gets a little heavy in terms of Force-based mumbo jumbo, as once again, the Jedi are portrayed as being reluctant to act.  These scenes may have become too much to handle, except that Ostrander wisely intersperses them between scenes that have some of the secondary characters interacting.  Most interesting are the scenes where Cade's friend Syn reveals the root of his hatred to the Jedi.

This series tells a massive, and very involved story.  It is science fiction just as I like it, with big space battles and really strong character work.  Duursema is always excellent, as are the other artists that provide work on this title.  I regret not having gotten on board with this sooner, but who knew that Star Wars comics could be this good?

Star Wars Legacy Vol. 1: Broken

Written by John Ostrander
Art by Jan Duursema and Dan Parsons

I've avoided Star Wars comics since about the second Dark Horse series, as I'm not usually a fan of licensed comics, except where the original creators are involved (ie. Farscape, Firefly/Serenity).  Recently though, this comic was featured in Brian Cronin's A Year of Cool Comics column at the Comics Should Be Good blog, and it piqued my interest.  I saw this first volume (I believe there are eight so far) on Ebay, and quickly made the purchase.

I should have expected I'd enjoy it - John Ostrander is one of my favorite comics writers, with his Suicide Squad being one of the best superhero (okay, villain) comics I've ever read.  I also really liked his runs on Firestorm and The Spectre.  Duursema has always been a capable artist as well, so I wasn't too worried diving in to this.

And the book is really quite good.  The story is set about 125 years after the original Star Wars movies, and the Empire has returned, although just as it begins to consolidate power across the galaxy and wipe out the Jedi, the new Emperor is betrayed by his Sith allies (shocking, I know), and they take control of things.  During the final battle between the Empire and the Jedi, before they are betrayed, we are introduced to young Cade Skywalker, the descendant of Luke, who is still a Padawan.  He watches his father get killed, taps into the Force to revive his own master, and then appears to sacrifice himself so his friends can escape.

Of course, Cade is not dead, he just spends the next seven years getting increasingly bitter and working as a bounty hunter. When we rejoin our cast of characters, we find Cade hunting down scum with a couple of semi-trusted allies.  We also find Darth Krayt, the Sith Lord, still hunting for the former Emperor, Roan Fel, and Sazen, Cade's old Master, is looking for him.  It doesn't take long for them to all meet, along with Marasiah, the Imperial princess, and some Imperial Guards, as well as a small squad of Sith lords who are heavily tattooed.

This volume is all about the set-up, so it's no surprise that a lot of time is spent on fleshing out some characters and their relationships to one another, although there were a few particular items that needed further explaining I felt, such as why Imperial Guards appear to have Jedi powers and lightsabers, but are not Jedi.  Maybe this has been explained somewhere else in the Dark Horse Star Wars books, I don't know.

Ostrander has set up his cast along the usually accepted Star Wars lines: Cade is an interesting mix of both the Luke Skywalker and Han Solo archetypes, while Marasiah is clearly filling in for Leia (ie., needing to be rescued a lot).  Thankfully, there are no annoying droids or furry creatures yet, so my annoyance level is kept to a minimum.  There are a lot of characters with tentacles coming out of their heads though - I don't understand why.

I will definitely be hunting down the rest of the trades for this series.

Raiders of the Lost R2

by Jon Mooallem

Star Wars was the first movie I ever saw (or at least, remember seeing), in the back seat of my parents' Volvo at a drive-in, some time in the fall of 1978. I was three, and it became a life-altering event. Throughout my childhood, I breathed Star Wars, through to the release of The Return of the Jedi, and I still have great affection for the early trilogy (and have tried to convince myself that the property was left untouched into the 1990s, and can therefore ignore all that came since).

That said, the part of me that would venture into a federally-managed desert that is also a crossing point for drugs, illegal immigrants, and other smugglers from Mexico to look for shards of painted foam from the Return of the Jedi set, is not the part that loves the Star Wars franchise - it's just the part of me that would be up for that kind of adventure regardless of the cultural touchstone it's attached to.

Mooallem journeyed into the Buttercup Valley region of The Imperial Sand Dunes with a trio of Star Wars obsessives to hunt down any remaining set pieces from the Sail Barge scenes in the third movie. His accounting of this trip, and the sub-culture of fans who seek out similar sets, is fascinating. It reflects strongly on our post-theologic world that so many hunt relics of different kinds, and really, build their lives around them. The journeyers in this article do not come back empty-handed, but I'm sure there are very few people that they interact with in their everyday lives that they can impress with their findings. Now, finding Bobba Fett - that would have been cool.