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The old Star Wars comics - general discussion thread

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 (Edited)

So I was cleaning out my basement, which so far is a task that consists of moving a bunch of Rubbermaid containers around. Now, I love looking through old junk, so at one point I found a Wal-Mart bag that seemed to contain some of my old stuff.

I open it up and inside is a bunch of old comics, mostly either Marvel or Scooby Doo, but precisely one of them is part six of Shadows of the Empire.

Oh man, that brought back memories. I’ve only ever owned four Star Wars comics, and I can’t remember what the other ones were, save that one of them had a story involving R2D2 and C-3PO being chased to a planet of trash, trash which came to life and killed all the stormtroopers that followed. All I know is that I got them all on the same day, during my first Star Wars craze. As I’ve said before, unlike most here I didn’t grow up with Star Wars–in fact, the most Star Wars my life had up until about 1995 was the Atari 2600 game and this Yoda puppet my parents had which me and my sis sometimes played with (and I didn’t even know who Yoda freaking <span class=“Italics”>was</span>). I was first exposed to Star Wars through a television airing of the trilogy (before the Special Editions), later bought the “Faces” VHS tapes. I guess my fandom must not have really taken off until the release of the Nintendo 64 and the Shadows of the Empire video game, which was not only excellent but at the time, I had a friend who was obsessed with Star Wars and his obsession kinda rubbed off on me. Didn’t last long though.

Still, looking through Shadows of the Empire, I can safely say that the art makes me feel more confident about my own pithy attempts to make comics–I love how Dash Rendar is blonde in one panel yet has dark gray hair in another–but even though I’m jumping in at what I think is the final issue, it’s a thrilling read (and to be fair, I remember the video game enough to know what the general plotline is).

In all honesty, just reading this makes me wish I could find the rest of my old Star Wars comic collection.

Ahh, memories.
 

I suppose I should top this off with a question. I was wondering if any of these older Dark Horse comics had been collected in trade paperback form? The Shadows of the Empire comic has a timeline and a few titles mentioned there interest me. Here’s the titles listed in that timeline:

TALES OF THE JEDI series:
The Golden Age of the Sith
The Fall of the Sith Empire
Ulic Qel-Droma & The Beast Wars of Onderon
The Saga of Nomi Sunrider
Thre Freedon Nadd Uprising
Dark Lords of the Sith
The Sith War

DROIDS

STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE
Splinter of the Mind’s Eye
Classic Star Wars: The Early Adventures
River of Chaos
Classic Star Wars

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

Shadows of the Empire

RETURN OF THE JEDI

Classic Star Wars: The Vandelhelm Mission
X-Wing Rogue Squadron

Heir to the Empire
Dark Force Rising
The Last Command
Dark Empire
Dark Empire II
Boba Fett
Empire’s End

[Umm… I thought the empire ended when Palpatine died in Return of the Jedi?]

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Originally posted by: JamesEightBitStar
[Umm... I thought the empire ended when Palpatine died in Return of the Jedi?]


He came back as a clone, and ended up getting killed.
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I'm pretty sure almost all of those made it into trade paperback form.

For a moment, I thought this thread would have been about the old Star Wars comics. 1977-1985. One of these days, I need to get around to completing my set. I think I have like six or so left.
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Does anybody know which of the Star Wars comics series are the better ones? I'd love to read about the old (pre-prequel trilogy) days of jedi vs. sith, if those tales are any good.
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Originally posted by: mcfly89
Does anybody know which of the Star Wars comics series are the better ones? I'd love to read about the old (pre-prequel trilogy) days of jedi vs. sith, if those tales are any good.


The TOTJ (Tales of the Jedi) series is one of the best series they've had. It starts out strong and gets weaker as the series continues, but the first 5 issues are very good. The same can be said of Dark Empire. The first 6 issues (Dark Empire I) are very good. DE II and Empire's End get progressively worse (the Emperor keeps coming back again and again and again). DE II and Empire's End are kind of like most of the EU novels, super weapon after super weapon. That gets old after a while.

The X-Wing series is probably the best series they've ever done though. The comics lead right into the novels, which is kind of cool since once you finish the comics, you can go right into the books.
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Once when I was younger i went to the barbers and he had an old esb story of comic and i've still kept it any one have any clue how much its worth? Its not in bad nick, but its not top notch either
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Well recently I discovered there was some spinoff of Shadows of the Empire called SotE: Evolution. What's this about? And is it worth reading?
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It's about Guri and takes place after SOTE.
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Very Cool!!
A former SE and prequel fan who turned OOT.
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A lot of these comics were reprinted in a series of volumes called :
Classic Star Wars Vol 1 In Deadly Pursuit
Classic Star Wars Vol 2 The Rebel Storm
Classic Star Wars Vol 3 Escape to Hoth

Each volume covers about 7 of the original stories. You can I suppose get the individual stores as separate books but that would make for a lot of books and shippings costs. These volumes are about 100 pages or so...

They are not completely trivial to get, but you can get used copies at amazon or TFAW.com.

Darth Lucas: I am altering the trilogy. Pray I don't alter it further.
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There's also the TPB of the old Marvel SW comic run.

A Long Time Ago: volume 1: Doomworld
A Long Time Ago: volume 2: Dark Encounters
A Long Time Ago: volume 3: Resurrection of Evil
A Long Time Ago: volume 4: Screams in the Void
A Long Time Ago: volume 5: Fool's Bounty
A Long Time Ago: volume 6: Wookiee World
A Long Time Ago: volume 7: Far, Far Away
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I used to be really into the SW comic books. In fact my screen name comes from Droids issue 3. One of my favorites was the Boba Fett series. Before you think how lame it was to make a Boba Fett comic series, I must tell you it was really quite cool. They sorta turned Boba Fett into an overly violent superhero for hire. Kind of a mixture of Punisher, Batman and Spidey. I would say. It had a lot of the whole Batman detective sort of thing going on. They didn't over do it either, they really retained the mystery of Boba Fett, never really telling you anything about him or his back story. I liked them alot. I also liked the Tales from Mos Eisley, a collection of short Twilight Zoneish stories that take place in the SW universe. I think only one issue was ever made. Another favorite was Droids. The first Tales of the Jedi issues were pretty cool too. I liked the whole Jedi setup in there better than the EP. 1 setup. I think the ones I read were either Golden Age of the Sith or The Sith War, but I really don't remember. Another thing that stood out that I wanted to read but never did, is the Marja Jade series, Emperor's Hand. Star Wars Tales had some fun things in them from time to time too. I remember there was one that was a court room parody where Greedo's family was bringing Han before court for the murder of their son. Han claims it was out of self defense. They show the video of Greedo shooting first and the Greedo family lawyer points out the the footage appears to have been tampered with.

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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Originally posted by: crazyrabbits
Originally posted by: JamesEightBitStar
[Umm... I thought the empire ended when Palpatine died in Return of the Jedi?]


He came back as a clone, and ended up getting killed.


Sorry to break topic for a moment, but I've read that in the expanded universe section of the official site, and that has got to be the biggest load of bullshit I've ever read. I mean, come on. How anti climactic can you get? Luke and Vader take the emperor down, everyone is happy, but they didn't actually win...c'mon, that's just bad storytelling At least its just EU.
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Yes, the whole cloning thing is extremely lame. However, I have always liked the idea of the Imperial Remnant. With how powerful the Empire was it would stand to reason that its forces reaching across the galaxy wouldn't just say, What? Palps kicked the bucket? Alright, I guess thats the end of it. It would be very unreasonable for the Rebels to march into the capitol and reclaim it the very day after the defeat of the Emporer. It makes sense that people like Thrawn would take on larger roles when they suddenly discovered they were in command of a huge armada and had nobody to answer to. Whether out of patriotism to the Galactic Empire or out of selfish gain. But Emporer clones, that is too Star Trek quality.

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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The only problem I have with it all is the emporer clones, as you said. The rest of it makes sense. I think ROTJ's ending shows that they'd finally won the war, but in a way, it wasn't all over yet. It never says that, but you kind of get that vibe that peace will come most definately, but there's still a few hurdles. That's why the SE f'ed it up so bad with that ending where the whole galaxy is celebrating. Killing the emporer doesn't liberate a galaxy. It's the biggest part, but there's lots left.
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So after forever disavowing any knowledge of the comics, I have had a change of heart.  I recently bought 246 Star Wars comic books for a great price at thrift store.  I am saving these in their plastic envelopes, and decided to download the comics for actual reading to preserve the good copies.

I have to say, I really enjoy some of the old stuff.  It was different and cheesy, but I really enjoy it.  I honestly have come to hate the restrictions of the EU with the requirement that everything must fit together.  Those were the days when we could read Star Wars stories that could have been, but weren't required to be considered equally canonical.  As has been stated in other threads by myself and others, it is nice to simply pay attention to what I like when I like to, and thereafter disregard it if I prefer.  If I like the story of Luke and Leia as little flirts on Mimban with no Solo competing for affection, I like reading that story as a "could have been" story instead of being required to consider it part of a huge, overinflated storyline.  I am now finding a new appreciation for the comics I once wrote off forever for that same reason.

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My favorite Comics were:

TOTJ:

Clone Wars Series

Tales

Shadows of the Empire

Dark Empire

Rouge Squadron

and some of the origin ones from the PT: Grevious, Darth Maul, etc.

I have some more but i'd have to go unload my bookcase in order to find them all.

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I owned:

Zahn Trilogy

Empire's End

Tales of the Jedi - Golden Age of the Sith

Vader's Quest

Phantom Menace

and a few other random ones I'm forgetting

“Grow up. These are my Disney's movies, not yours.”

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i just found out i've some of the "Early Adventures" Comics. Vaders Quest, Splinter of the mind's eye, etc.

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ronlaw said:

A lot of these comics were reprinted in a series of volumes called :
Classic Star Wars Vol 1 In Deadly Pursuit
Classic Star Wars Vol 2 The Rebel Storm
Classic Star Wars Vol 3 Escape to Hoth

Actually these are the compilations of the reprints of the old newspaper strips. They're awesome stuff but I think James was more interested in Dark Horses' original works like Tales of the Jedi.

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JamesEightBitStar said:


I suppose I should top this off with a question. I was wondering if any of these older Dark Horse comics had been collected in trade paperback form? The Shadows of the Empire comic has a timeline and a few titles mentioned there interest me. Here's the titles listed in that timeline:

TALES OF THE JEDI series:
The Golden Age of the Sith
The Fall of the Sith Empire
Ulic Qel-Droma & The Beast Wars of Onderon
The Saga of Nomi Sunrider
Thre Freedon Nadd Uprising
Dark Lords of the Sith
The Sith War

DROIDS

STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE
Splinter of the Mind's Eye
Classic Star Wars: The Early Adventures
River of Chaos
Classic Star Wars

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

Shadows of the Empire

RETURN OF THE JEDI

Classic Star Wars: The Vandelhelm Mission
X-Wing Rogue Squadron

Heir to the Empire
Dark Force Rising
The Last Command
Dark Empire
Dark Empire II
Boba Fett
Empire's End

[Umm... I thought the empire ended when Palpatine died in Return of the Jedi?]

Your best bet is to check out the new Dark Horse Star Wars Omnibus editions for most of these.  There are a lot already out and they're still coming.

Tales of the Jedi if available in full in two volumes:

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Tales-Jedi/dp/1593078307/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1317185387&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Tales-Jedi/dp/1593079117/ref=pd_sim_b1

Splinter of the Minds Eye and River of Chaos are both collected in one volumes along with Tales of Mos Eisley and Shadow Stalker.

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Early-Victories/dp/B005DI8RXQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317185572&sr=1-1

Shadows of the Empire is available by itself in an older edition...

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Shadows-Empire-Horse/dp/1569711836/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317185724&sr=1-3

...but for just a few dollars more you can get a collected edition that contains the sequel, Shadows of the Empire Evolution and Mara Jade, by the Emperor's Hand which is a great companion to both Shadows of the Empire and the Thrawn trilogy.

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Shadows-Empire/dp/1595824340/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317185887&sr=1-2

X-Wing is availabe in it's entirety in 3 volumes.

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-X-Wing-Squadron/dp/B005DI8AXI/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317186016&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-X-Wing-Squadron/dp/B005DI8DSU/ref=pd_sim_b1

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-X-Wing-Squadron/dp/B005HKM0HY/ref=pd_sim_b1

The Thrawn trilogy and Dark Empire trilogy are both available in two respective hardcover editions.

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Trilogy-Mike-Baron/dp/1595824170/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317186214&sr=1-4

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Empire-Trilogy-Horse/dp/1595826122/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317186239&sr=1-1

I'm not sure which Boba Fett series you are referring to but he has a nice collection as well which contains all the old mini series and a few one shots from Star Wars:  Empire.

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Boba-Fett/dp/1595824189/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317186594&sr=1-4

The Entire Marvel series is collected in the multi-volume A Long Time Ago Omnibus.  The original movie adaptation is in volume 1, Empire Strikes Back is in either volume 2 or 3 (not sure which) and Return of the Jedi is in volume 4.  5 and up are all the post Jedi Marvel comics.

If you aren't interested in getting the Marvel series but just the movie adaptations, Empire and Jedi are collected in one edition along with the prequel adaptations and the special edition version of A New Hope.  A New Hope is entirely different from the old Marvel version as it was done as a tie in to the re-release in 1997, but I'm about 90 percent sure that Empire and Jedi are unchanged. 

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Long-Ago/dp/1595824863/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1317187475&sr=8-2

http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Omnibus-Episodes-Complete/dp/159582832X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317187514&sr=1-1

 

"George, we hate you for making more Star Wars movies.  Please make more Star Wars movies."

-The Internet

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What's the coloring like in the Marvel reprints? I recall Dark Horse reprinted the Star Wars adaptation a short time before their own SE versions came out, and they were recolored in an almost totally bland palette compared to the originals.

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Where were you in '77?

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SilverWook said:

What's the coloring like in the Marvel reprints? I recall Dark Horse reprinted the Star Wars adaptation a short time before their own SE versions came out, and they were recolored in an almost totally bland palette compared to the originals.

They look pretty good to me but I have nothing really to compare it too.  I suppose if I were feeling really ambitious, I could take one of my Omnibus editions over to my brothers house and talk him into digging out his original issues for comparison.  

"George, we hate you for making more Star Wars movies.  Please make more Star Wars movies."

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