Star Wars comics

Marvel (1977–1987)

Charles Lippincott, Lucasfilm's publicity supervisor, initially approached publisher Stan Lee at Marvel Comics in 1975 about publishing a Star Wars comic book prior to the film's release as a means to appeal to its most likely audience. Lee initially declined to consider such a proposal until the film was completed, and was only persuaded otherwise in a second meeting arranged by Roy Thomas, who wanted to edit the series. Since movie tie-in comics rarely sold well at that time, Lee negotiated a publishing arrangement which gave no royalties to Lucasfilm until sales exceeded 100,000. At that point, legal arrangements could be revisited. Issue #1 of Star Wars was released for sale on April 12, 1977, and Marvel published the series from 1977 to 1986, lasting 107 issues and three annuals. According to former Marvel Editor-In-Chief Jim Shooter, the strong sales of Star Wars comics saved Marvel financially in 1977 and 1978. Marvel's Star Wars series was one of the industry's top selling titles in 1979 and 1980. The only downside for Marvel was that the 100,000 copy sales quota was surpassed quickly, allowing Lippincott to renegotiate the royalty arrangements from a position of strength.

Issues #1–6 featured an adaptation of the events of Star Wars by Roy Thomas and artist Howard Chaykin. Original stories began appearing as of issue #7 (January 1978) by the same creative team. Writer Archie Goodwin and artist Carmine Infantino took over the series as of #11 (May 1978). A six-issue adaptation of the 1980 sequel film The Empire Strikes Back by Goodwin and artists Al Williamson and Carlos Garzon appeared in issues #39–44 (September 1980–February 1981). Writer David Michelinie and artist Walt Simonson became the new creative team with issue #51 (September 1981). Ron Frenz became the regular artist of the title starting with #71 (May 1983). As of 1984, the Star Wars series was primarily written by Jo Duffy, and art for the final year-and-a-half of the series was by Cynthia Martin.

Original Star Wars comics were also serialized in the Marvel magazine Pizzazz between 1977 and 1979. The 1977 installments were the first original Star Wars stories not directly adapted from the films to appear in print form, as they preceded those of the Star Wars comic series. The first story arc, titled "The Keeper's World", was by Thomas, Chaykin, and Tony DeZuniga, and was later reprinted by Dark Horse Comics. The second story arc, entitled "The Kingdom of Ice", was by Goodwin, Simonson, Klaus Janson, Dave Cockrum, and John Tartaglione. The final two chapters were scheduled to be printed in issues 17 and 18, but the magazine was cancelled after the 16th issue. Marvel UK reprinted "The Keeper's World" in Star Wars Weekly #47–50, and "The Kingdom of Ice" (including the previously unreleased chapters) in Star Wars Weekly #57–60, between 1978 and 1979.

Marvel's adaptation of Return of the Jedi (October 1983–January 1984) appeared in a separate, eponymous four-issue limited series as well as in Marvel Super Special #27 and in a mass market paperback.

From 1985–1987, the animated children's series Ewoks and Droids inspired comic series from Marvel's Star Comics line.

Marvel's Star Wars comics were also reprinted in the UK as a weekly black and white comics anthology by Marvel UK which, in addition to the Star Wars strips, included other Marvel strips such as The Micronauts, Deathlok, Star-Lord, Warlock and Tales of the Watcher. The weekly UK issues split the stories from the US monthly issues into smaller installments, and it usually took around three weekly issues to complete a US monthly issue. The UK comic also published original Star Wars stories by British creators. Star Wars Weekly #1 was published with a free cut-out X-wing fighter on February 8, 1978. It became The Empire Strikes Back Weekly from issue #118 in May 1980, and then became a monthly title from issue #140 in November 1980, reverting to the title Star Wars with issue #159 in July 1982. The monthly comic ran until issue #171 in July 1983, when the numbering was reset at #1 for Return of the Jedi Weekly, which was the first time the UK comic had been printed in color. This is the title and format that remained until the last issue (#155) was published in June 1986. Further original content was published in issues #94–99, #104–115, #149, #153–157. Throughout this eight-year period, Marvel UK also published several Star Wars annuals and specials.

Pendulum Press (1978)

In 1978, Pendulum Press, under their educational series Contemporary Motivators, also published a 31-page loose adaptation of Star Wars by Linda A. Cadrain and Charles Nicholas. Produced as part of a package which included an audio tape and a film strip, the comic was specifically designed for classroom use, with typeset instead of hand lettering, and vocabulary appropriate for children.

Blackthorne (1987–1988)

Blackthorne Publishing released a three issue series called Star Wars 3D from December 1987 to February 1988. The comics were later reprinted in a black-and-white, non-3-D format by Dark Horse in their 2013 Star Wars Omnibus: Wild Space, Volume 1.

Dark Horse (1991–2014)

In the late 1980s, writer Tom Veitch and artist Cam Kennedy secured a deal to produce a Star Wars comic for Archie Goodwin at Epic Comics, a Marvel imprint. After the project was announced, Goodwin left Marvel, which dropped the comic. Dark Horse Comics subsequently published it as the popular Dark Empire sequence (1991–1995). Dark Horse subsequently launched dozens of series set after the original film trilogy, including Tales of the Jedi (1993–1998), X-wing Rogue Squadron (1995–1998), Star Wars: Republic (1998–2006), Star Wars Tales (1999–2005), Star Wars: Empire (2002–2006), and Knights of the Old Republic (2006–2010).

Knights of the Old Republic and Legacy ended in 2010. Instead of publishing ongoing series, Dark Horse began publishing "series of miniseries", including:

From 1998 to 1999, Dark Horse produced Star Wars manga, adapting the original trilogy and Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace as manga with all the typical narrative and stylistic characteristics of the form. Dark Horse also published miniseries adapting The Phantom Menace, Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and The Thrawn Trilogy.

Return to Marvel (2015–present)

In October 2012, The Walt Disney Company announced that they would acquire Lucasfilm for $4 billion. In January 2014, it was announced that in 2015, the Star Wars comics license would return to Marvel Comics, whose parent company, Marvel Entertainment, Disney had purchased in 2009. Meanwhile, with the sequel film The Force Awakens in production, most of the licensed Star Wars novels and comics produced since the originating 1977 film Star Wars were rebranded as Star Wars Legends and declared non-canon to the franchise in April 2014.

Early reports in May 2014 suggested that Marvel would announce two new ongoing Star Wars comic series at the San Diego Comic-Con. In July 2014, Marvel announced three new series at SDCC: Star Wars, Star Wars: Darth Vader, and the limited series Star Wars: Princess Leia. The initial series, Star Wars, was released in January 2015, with Darth Vader debuting in February, and Princess Leia in March. Several other limited series followed, including Kanan (April 2015–March 2016), Lando (July–October 2015), Shattered Empire (September–October 2015), Chewbacca (October–December 2015), and Obi-Wan & Anakin (January–May 2016), as well as the one-shots Vader Down (November 2015) and C-3PO (April 2016).

The ongoing series Star Wars: Poe Dameron was announced in January 2016. Featuring X-wing fighter pilot Poe Dameron introduced in The Force Awakens, the series debuted on April 6, 2016. A six-issue comic adaptation of The Force Awakens by Chuck Wendig began publication in June 2016. A new and ongoing Marvel Darth Vader comic series is coming in June 2017 from writer Charles Soule and artist Giuseppe Camuncoli.

In mid-2014, Marvel stated that it would publish collected volumes of past Star Wars comics, beginning with Volume 1 of Star Wars: The Original Marvel Years in January 2015, and Volume 1 of Star Wars Legends Epic Collection: The Empire in April 2015, which reprinted Dark Horse's Star Wars comics.

Collected editions

The comics have been collected into a number of trade paperbacks:

Darth Vader (Marvel)

Star Wars (Marvel)

Agent of the Empire

Blood Ties

Classic Star Wars

Clone Wars

Crimson Empire

Dark Empire

Empire

Invasion

Jedi

Knight Errant

The Old Republic

Omnibus

The Star Wars Omnibus line of trade paperbacks is a program for collecting series in larger and less expensive collections. This section includes series that are collected elsewhere.

Republic

Tales

Tales of the Jedi

The Thrawn Trilogy