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Marvel Star Wars (1977-1986) #39-53
Star Wars: A Long Time Ago... Vol. 3: Resurrection of Evil
Dark Horse Comics presents the latest volume of Star Wars: A Long Time Ago... featuring classic Star Wars stories not seen in over twenty years! Originally printed by Marvel Comics, these stories have been re-colored and are sure to please Star Wars fans both new and old. Volume 3 collects issues #39-53 of the original Marvel run and begins with a re-telling of The Empire Stikes Back and continues past that to adventures such as "Droid World" and "The Last Jedi." Before midi-chlorians... Before Jar-Jar Binks... These are the continuing adventures of Lucas's first star-faring team in a freshly imagined universe.
376 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
2 people are currently reading
77 people want to read
About the author
Archie Goodwin
972 books70 followersArchie Goodwin was an American comic book writer, editor, and artist. He worked on a number of comic strips in addition to comic books, and is best known for his Warren and Marvel Comics work. For Warren he was chief writer and editor of landmark horror anthology titles Creepy and Eerie, and for Marvel he set up the creator-owned Epic Comics as well as adapting Star Wars into both comics and newspaper strips. He is regularly cited as the "best-loved comic book editor, ever."
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 28, 2016
Despite the first fifth or so being devoted to the outstanding Goodwin/Williamson/Garzon adaptation of "The Empire Strikes Back", this is one of the weaker volumes in this series. The stories, perhaps a little punch-drunk after "Empire" are lame affairs, recycling some of the stuff from the movies and previous story arcs (a monstrous probe droid; rebellious robots and a cyborg; a giant super-lasered battle station that must be destroyed...) There's a few little moments that make it worthwhile:
1) Lando's betrayal. Lando and Chewie spend much of the next three years worth of comics looking for Han. And no one lets him forget why.
2) Leia gets deeper. Leia is forced to come to terms with losing shit (Alderaan, Han, the war?). In fact, the volume ends with a story arc that served as introduction to the richest era of this Marvel comics incarnation when she crash-lands on a barbaric (sort of) planet, falls in love with Conan, and gets involved in local political intrigues.
3) Luke is tormented. Is Darth really his father? We tend to forget, but there were three long years of Luke wondering if Darthy was really his dad. And Yoda and Ben are liars, too.
These three undercurrents don't get a lot of play, but it gives some depth to the characters while they're meeting assholes like the all-powerful pacifist Cody Sunn-Childe, battling crystal-borne plagues that turn you red, and bumping uglies (Luke) with Imperial vixen-captains.
1) Lando's betrayal. Lando and Chewie spend much of the next three years worth of comics looking for Han. And no one lets him forget why.
2) Leia gets deeper. Leia is forced to come to terms with losing shit (Alderaan, Han, the war?). In fact, the volume ends with a story arc that served as introduction to the richest era of this Marvel comics incarnation when she crash-lands on a barbaric (sort of) planet, falls in love with Conan, and gets involved in local political intrigues.
3) Luke is tormented. Is Darth really his father? We tend to forget, but there were three long years of Luke wondering if Darthy was really his dad. And Yoda and Ben are liars, too.
These three undercurrents don't get a lot of play, but it gives some depth to the characters while they're meeting assholes like the all-powerful pacifist Cody Sunn-Childe, battling crystal-borne plagues that turn you red, and bumping uglies (Luke) with Imperial vixen-captains.
May 4, 2018
This volume includes the adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back as well as several new stories. A few of them are some of my favorite of the entire series but others start to drop in quality. I think after having a few years of total freedom the Empire Strikes Back threw a monkey wrench into things and confused the series somewhat. There was now more continuity to keep up with as well as some pretty major plot twists they needed to work around. The series also seemed to get more serious, unfortunately to its detriment in most cases. There's even a story where Leia ends up on a planet that is an obvious homage to John Carter of Mars and it just doesn't fit the Star Wars Universe well.
Overall still a good, enjoyable volume, but not quite as good as the first two.
Overall still a good, enjoyable volume, but not quite as good as the first two.
August 3, 2021
Star Wars Legends Project #282
Background: Resurrection of Evil, released in November 2002, collects the issues #39-53 of the original Marvel run of Star Wars comics (originally published from June 1980 to November 1981). Over half of the issues were written by Archie Goodwin. The art is split fairly evenly between Al Williamson, Carlos Garzon, Carmine Infantino, and Walt Simonson. J.M. DeMatteis, Larry Hama, Mike W. Barr, and Chris Claremont each wrote a single issue, and David Michelinie wrote two. Goodwin was doing a ton of writing for Star Wars throughout this time, but this collection concluded his regular run on the series, along with his frequent collabotors Williamson, Garzon, and Infantino. Michelinie became the main writer in his place with Simonson doing most of the art. Claremont did a little more Star Wars work and Barr went on to work on some issues of X-Wing, but these are the only Star Wars credits for DeMatteis and Hama.
Resurrection of Evil begins with an adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back, three years after the Battle of Yavin. The main characters are Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, Lando, Threepio, and Artoo, with occasional appearances by Darth Vader and a few recurring characters.
Summary: The Empire strikes back hard at the Rebel Alliance, throwing them on the defensive, splintering their forces, and even taking some of their central heroes out of play. But there's no time to mourn, as the Imperials continue to press the attack on all fronts, with Darth Vader as determined as ever to capture Luke Skywalker. And a terrible force, once thought defeated, stands poised to threaten the galaxy once more!
Review: As Goodwin concludes his run with a retread of Empire, the overall quality of this volume represents a huge step down from the previous one. Goodwin ends with a bit of a whimper . . . a dull one-off starring the droids and then a special double-issue that recycles ideas from earlier stories and adds some really silly new ones of its own (though it does at least feature a very welcome appearance by the long-absent Han Solo in an extended flashback sequence).
The smattering of random stories bridging the gap before a new regular writer steps up are mediocre at best, and DeMatteis's contribution (Issue #46: The Dreams of Cody Sunn-Childe) is easily one of the worst Star Wars stories I've ever read. It manages to be even dumber than its title, which is impressive. Lando got saddled with all of the stupidest stories during this era of the EU and it really seems unfair. Though, I have to say I almost hated Claremont's Star-Wars-by-way-of-Conan-the-Barbarian take in Issue #53 even more. It leans really heavily into the goofiest '80s fantasy tropes, with the worst being our roided out macho POV character, Aron Peacebringer.
It doesn't help that Michelinie's run gets off to a weak start in a Rebel encounter with yet another Imperial superweapon, awkwardly wedged (in hindsight) between the first and second Death Stars. It would have been a bad idea if it hadn't just been a rip-off of part of A New Hope, but knowing that Lucas was already in the process of ripping himself off for the forthcoming Return of the Jedi just makes it worse.
Probably the only bright spot in the entire volume is Hama's Issue #48: The Third Law. It features Darth Vader and Princess Leia matching wits over the Crown Jewels of Alderaan and a much-needed infusion of credits for the Rebellion. It's packed full of fun twists, surprises, and sudden reversals as the two outwit each other back and forth. But other than that, the whole thing is pretty much a loss. I found this one very difficult to get through.
D
Background: Resurrection of Evil, released in November 2002, collects the issues #39-53 of the original Marvel run of Star Wars comics (originally published from June 1980 to November 1981). Over half of the issues were written by Archie Goodwin. The art is split fairly evenly between Al Williamson, Carlos Garzon, Carmine Infantino, and Walt Simonson. J.M. DeMatteis, Larry Hama, Mike W. Barr, and Chris Claremont each wrote a single issue, and David Michelinie wrote two. Goodwin was doing a ton of writing for Star Wars throughout this time, but this collection concluded his regular run on the series, along with his frequent collabotors Williamson, Garzon, and Infantino. Michelinie became the main writer in his place with Simonson doing most of the art. Claremont did a little more Star Wars work and Barr went on to work on some issues of X-Wing, but these are the only Star Wars credits for DeMatteis and Hama.
Resurrection of Evil begins with an adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back, three years after the Battle of Yavin. The main characters are Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, Lando, Threepio, and Artoo, with occasional appearances by Darth Vader and a few recurring characters.
Summary: The Empire strikes back hard at the Rebel Alliance, throwing them on the defensive, splintering their forces, and even taking some of their central heroes out of play. But there's no time to mourn, as the Imperials continue to press the attack on all fronts, with Darth Vader as determined as ever to capture Luke Skywalker. And a terrible force, once thought defeated, stands poised to threaten the galaxy once more!
Review: As Goodwin concludes his run with a retread of Empire, the overall quality of this volume represents a huge step down from the previous one. Goodwin ends with a bit of a whimper . . . a dull one-off starring the droids and then a special double-issue that recycles ideas from earlier stories and adds some really silly new ones of its own (though it does at least feature a very welcome appearance by the long-absent Han Solo in an extended flashback sequence).
The smattering of random stories bridging the gap before a new regular writer steps up are mediocre at best, and DeMatteis's contribution (Issue #46: The Dreams of Cody Sunn-Childe) is easily one of the worst Star Wars stories I've ever read. It manages to be even dumber than its title, which is impressive. Lando got saddled with all of the stupidest stories during this era of the EU and it really seems unfair. Though, I have to say I almost hated Claremont's Star-Wars-by-way-of-Conan-the-Barbarian take in Issue #53 even more. It leans really heavily into the goofiest '80s fantasy tropes, with the worst being our roided out macho POV character, Aron Peacebringer.
It doesn't help that Michelinie's run gets off to a weak start in a Rebel encounter with yet another Imperial superweapon, awkwardly wedged (in hindsight) between the first and second Death Stars. It would have been a bad idea if it hadn't just been a rip-off of part of A New Hope, but knowing that Lucas was already in the process of ripping himself off for the forthcoming Return of the Jedi just makes it worse.
Probably the only bright spot in the entire volume is Hama's Issue #48: The Third Law. It features Darth Vader and Princess Leia matching wits over the Crown Jewels of Alderaan and a much-needed infusion of credits for the Rebellion. It's packed full of fun twists, surprises, and sudden reversals as the two outwit each other back and forth. But other than that, the whole thing is pretty much a loss. I found this one very difficult to get through.
D
May 4, 2020
That was an odd collection. The Empire Strikes Back adaptation was really very good. The art was well done and the story had the pace and intrigue of the film. Odd that they skipped over Leia and Luke being siblings. None of the other stories in the collection played with this too.
The remaining stories are very poor. Painful to read or look at aside from a few gems. The Sunn-Lord and Tarkin stories. The other highlight being the attention Lando gets. In terms of imagination, I was expected these stories to really push the limits of space and galactic warfare to new heights. Instead, the characters and typical, the plots more so. This was the most puzzling part as Chris Claremont and David Micheline penned a few. Micheline's storyline about the Tarkin battleship was a nice return to the New Hope era.
Also, for the first time, i couldn't stomach finishing the last Claremont story. Not often that I give up but trust me, it needs a health warning.
The remaining stories are very poor. Painful to read or look at aside from a few gems. The Sunn-Lord and Tarkin stories. The other highlight being the attention Lando gets. In terms of imagination, I was expected these stories to really push the limits of space and galactic warfare to new heights. Instead, the characters and typical, the plots more so. This was the most puzzling part as Chris Claremont and David Micheline penned a few. Micheline's storyline about the Tarkin battleship was a nice return to the New Hope era.
Also, for the first time, i couldn't stomach finishing the last Claremont story. Not often that I give up but trust me, it needs a health warning.
May 10, 2015
This book contains the comic adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back, as well as several other stories that take place after it before Return of the Jedi.
I assume that they were made aware that the next movie would deal with the rescuing of Han so that these comics would not step on that movies territory. This unfortunately causes the characters to appear quite stupid, as they don't immediately head to Tatooine to look for Han. Due to this the first couple of stories just aren't satisfying for me, but later when they move away from mentioning the hunt for Han the stories become much more interesting again.
The artwork and especially the colors in this volume are superior to those in the previous two. The latter stories are definitely good and worth a read.
Unfortunately the volume does end in the middle of a story arc.
I assume that they were made aware that the next movie would deal with the rescuing of Han so that these comics would not step on that movies territory. This unfortunately causes the characters to appear quite stupid, as they don't immediately head to Tatooine to look for Han. Due to this the first couple of stories just aren't satisfying for me, but later when they move away from mentioning the hunt for Han the stories become much more interesting again.
The artwork and especially the colors in this volume are superior to those in the previous two. The latter stories are definitely good and worth a read.
Unfortunately the volume does end in the middle of a story arc.
September 5, 2012
It has been far too long since I last read this book, but I remember being equal parts interested by the weird stories and unhappy with them because they were not really 'Star Warsish'. Still they are quite fun and if you like comics from the time period and Star Wars, I'd strongly suggest giving this read.
May 25, 2017
This is a collection of cheesy/wonderful Star Wars comics from the 1970s and 1980s. They are just as goofy and fun as they were back then, too. Some of the stories are corny, but that's part of the fun.
May 17, 2012
These comics, originally published by MARVEL comics in the mid-1980's are a wacky glimpse at an alternate STAR WARS universe. This volume includes the adaptation of THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Wacky stories, gorgeous art, and lots of childhood memories make this a light, but entertaining read.
Read
July 5, 2010SW alta v.3
August 30, 2012
Worth reading for Star Wars fans.
August 26, 2015
Loses it a bit... http://gnomeship.blogspot.com/2015/08...
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews