CUCKOO FOR COMIC STRIPS

For some reason, lately I've been almost infatuated with newspaper action/adventure strips of yore. If you'll pardon several paragraphs of self-indulgence, I'm going to try to figure out exactly how I got to this point.

I think I can pinpoint the kernel of when it started, at least. At some point about five or six years ago, I was, "researching" sword-wielding barbarian gals in the mold of Red Sonja (as you do), and I came across a character named Axa, the heroine of a post-apocalyptic wasteland who starred in a strip for Britain's Sun newspaper back in the early eighties. The strip, created and illustrated by Enric Romero with scripts from Donne Avenell, had been released in the United States many years earlier, but those collections were long out of print. However I found some scans online and read nearly the entire Axa canon in short order. I really liked Romero's mostly realistic artwork in the black-and-white format, and I found the daily newspaper strip format pretty interesting. It didn't hurt that the strip was "mature" (i.e. juvenile) in nature, with the title character constantly losing her top in battle.

Somewhere around that same time, circa 2009/2010, Marvel released two volumes collecting the original Spider-Man newspaper strip run by Stan Lee and John Romita. However these books were panned by critics for their presentation of the material, so I skipped them -- but they stuck in my mind as something I might be interested in checking out someday. (And, as noted a while back, I have in fact gotten into these strips by way of IDW's more recent Library of American Comics reprints of the same material.)

CLASSIC STAR WARS PART FOUR - ESCAPE TO HOTH

The final volume of Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson STAR WARS newspaper strips begins with Luke Skywalker and Vrad Dodonna, son of rebel General Jan Dodonna, about to attack Darth Vader's flagship Executor with the power gem procured previously by Han Solo and Chewbacca. However, Luke has learned that Vrad is a coward who deserted his unit during the previous battle he was involved in.

Vrad ditches Luke after the attack begins, but ultimately has a change of heart and makes a suicide run against the Executor, weakening its shields and allowing the Milennium Falcon to score a hit against its engines. The damage is minor, but keeps the super star destroyer occupied with repairs long enough for the rebel evactuaton to take place.

The following sequence drips with tension and excitement as the Mon Calamari create a diversion, attacking the Imperial blockade while the rebels exit the Yavin system via a route that takes them past an unstable star. The Executor is repaired and Vader moves to intercept, but the overly anxious Admiral Griff -- originally introduced as Vader's subordinate during the arc where Luke infiltrated the Imperial construction yard some time back -- brings his own fleet out of hypserspace too close to Vader's, resulting in the destruction of Griff's ships and the ultimate escape of the rebels.

CLASSIC STAR WARS PART THREE - THE REBEL STORM

The Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson run proceeds onward as Luke, Leia and Han continue their quest to return R2-D2 to Yavin 4. Their mission is temporarily thwarted, however, as the moon comes under bombardment by Imperial forces. Why the Empire waited so long to attack Yavin following the Death Star's destruction is not explained here. Han simply notes that the place was blockaded -- though even that didn't stop the Milennium Falcon and other vessels from coming and going at will. Perhaps there was some political reason for the Empire holding off until now. But for whatever reason, our heroes now find themselves unable to return home. They seek sanctuary with a rebel sympathizer, a sexy pirate captain named Silver Fyre -- an old acquaintance of Han's.

After baiting Silver's gang with the information Artoo is carrying, Han ferrets out a traitor in their midst. Silver then agrees to aid the rebels in bypassing the Imperial blockade and returning to Yavin. Back on the planet, in another filler adventure, our heroes encounter a creature called the night beast beneath their headquarters in the Massassi temple. The beast is eventually lured aboard a ship and sent away from the moon. Even though this reads as a throw-away tale, the story allows Williamson to draw several interiors for the temple, a location barely glimpsed in A NEW HOPE. Williamson uses the opportunity to instill the haunted rebel base with some personality.

CLASSIC STAR WARS PART TWO - IN DEADLY PURSUIT

The Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson run on the STAR WARS strip began officially on February 9th, 1981 -- about six months after the end of Russ Manning's final story arc. In the interim, the strip had featured a storyline by Russ Helm and Alfredo Alcala, followed by HAN SOLO AT STAR'S END by Archie Goodwin and Alcala -- an adaptation of the pre-A NEW HOPE novel of the same name by Brian Daley. Neither of those storylines is reprinted in the CLASSIC STAR WARS trade paperbacks.

Even though they've picked up the strip several months after the release of THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK in theaters, Goodwin and Williamson choose to tell more stories set between the first and second films -- a wise move, in my opinion. THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK ends on a cliffhanger which would rob the creators of Han Solo -- and while great STAR WARS stories have certainly been told without Han, if including him is an option, it should be exercised -- even at the cost of including the likes of Lando Calrissian and Yoda. Thus, the first Goodwin/Williamson story features Luke and Leia, soon after the Battle of Yavin, scouting potential locations for a new Rebel base, now that the Empire knows they hang their hats on Yavin's fourth moon. But their mission is interrupted by the Empire, leading to a rescue by Han and Chewbacca, and a side trip to Ord Mantell, where the group encounters a bounty hunter named Skorr, out to collect the contract on Han's head.

CLASSIC STAR WARS PART ONE - THE EARLY ADVENTURES

Art by Al Williamson

I have this peculiar interest in early fiction based on licensed properties, before all the mythos have been properly defined and sorted out. The original MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE mini-comics, for example, produced by DC Comics for Mattel, were a far cry from what that property would eventually become. And the early years of the STAR WARS newspaper strip definitely fall into that category as well.

Working with little more than the original 1977 film and probably some production notes as his only reference, Russ Manning was tasked with creating some of the very first "Expanded Universe" material for STAR WARS, and he did a mostly admirable job of it. Manning's starships and interiors are derived from those seen in the movie, helping to make his version of the STAR WARS universe resemble its on-screen counterpart. His characters may not be photo-realistic likenesses of the actors they represent, but the wardrobes and certain details like hairstyles work well enough to convey a sense of who is who.

CLASSIC STAR WARS

Several years ago -- I'm guessing ten, but it could have been eight or nine -- on the last day of the San Diego Comic Con, I came across a dealer unloading random Dark Horse STAR WARS trade paperbacks for five dollars a pop. I was (and of course still am) a huge STAR WARS fan and had read several of the novels, but I had never explored the comics. The Marvel series predated my interest in the franchise, and the contemporary Dark Horse stuff was too much to deal with on top of the many Marvels I bought every month.

So, for such a steep discount, I figured -- why not? I grabbed three trades titled CLASSIC STAR WARS, and left the convention with them. I assumed, without taking a close glance at the contents, that they were collections of the Marvel series. However, they turned out to be collections of the STAR WARS newspaper strip, which ran from 1978 to 1984. I wound up with volumes 1 and 3, plus a separate book titled THE EARLY ADVENTURES, which, while published last by Dark Horse, actually collected the first couple years of the strip.