Comics 200 + Marvel Comics - What is your opinion of the state of the line?

I do love the DH omnibuses, but I'm not thrilled with how they split up Empire/Rebellion.

And I'm glad Marvel's EC are collecting the newspaper strips because they were a notable hole in my comics collection that I didn't fill with DH.

Sent from my SM-G386W using Tapatalk

 

We'll have to see how much more story Vos gets in Canon. I imagine he will be a major player in these immediate years following Order 66 though. In regards to some of the series you posted there I don't really consider some of those true ongoings. THey were more or less a collection of minis contained together within one title. And a couple of them stopped entirely for about six months to a year in the middle of their runs.

 

re: TPBs...

The non-SW ones I've bought from Marvel of new content have been absolutely dire. Awful quality, insultingly thin - the package just takes the mick.

The ones collecting older material were much better, but there should be such a wide divergence between the two types.

Which is why OHC remains the option of choice.

 

Agreed.

While Doctor Aphra, BT-1, and 0-0-0 are nice, Dark Horse had many lead characters that received attention and were fleshed out:

Quinlan Vos
Dass Jennir
Cade Skywalker
Ania Solo
Janek Sunber
Zayne Carrick
Jahan Cross
Kaye Galfridian

The above are just some of the many characters Dark Horse introduced over the years. Many of the supporting characters had arcs and were compelling like Aayla Secura. With this last character, Dark Horse achieved something Marvel hasn't yet, get a character they created into a movie. Plus they added depth to existing characters like Wedge Antilles, Asajj Ventress, Dooku, BoShek, etc. I agree with those who say what Dark Horse did during the Clone Wars era was remarkable. Personally favorite characters are Dass Jennir and Janek Sunber.

It took Dark Horse a few years to build up a rich, intertwining tapestry of characters. Some of their characters, like Kir Kanos, Ulic Qel-Droma, and Nomi Sunrider were not as fully realized, but I think those were the exception and not the norm. Marvel will get there eventually.

My only complaint with Marvel is the direction they took with Luke and Leia, because I find them unlikable at times, something I never thought of while reading about them in the EU. Luke is selfish and not at all the Rebel hero he was in the EU and Leia is just downright mean at times. Han I've liked though and it does feel like the current writer on the main title is morphing Luke and Leia into more likable characters. Darth Vader is fine; I just think the character as a force of evil has been ruined by too much exposure over the years, so it doesn't bug me anymore that he is the star of his own book.

The Marvel comics could benefit from more supporting characters for the big three and a compelling, reoccurring villain that isn't named Vader. They introduced Aphra and Starros early and not much since then. Sergeant Kreel and his squad started out promising, but I'm not sure how you can use them again after the shellacking they took in Storms of Crait.

 

The idea that there is as much info on Vos in new canon as there was in the old EU, and that he is a much more developed character in the new canon than he was in the old EU, is so laughably nonsensically wrong that nothing more needs to be said. Only someone who either didn't read the materials, has an agenda to project, or is blind could actually argue that.

 

Steve I don't believe I actually even said he is currently a much more developed character in canon than in legends.

 

The other funny thing I see is the argument that runs along the lines of "Dark Horse never had well developed characters, after all just look at how popular Aphra is!" It seems to be either a confusion or a deliberate sleight-of-hand for those people to use one character as a metric of the popularity of an entire book range's worth of characters. Outside of Aphra and her HK-47 knock-off droids, what stand-outs has Marvel had, let alone ones whose popularity equates to, just off the top of my head, the popularity of Ulic Qel-Droma, Nomi Sunrider, Exar Kun, Quinlan Vos, Aayla Secura, Baron Fel, Kir Kanos, and the entire cast of Legacy? What event from Marvel can match something like "Palpatine comes back from the dead and recruits Luke to the dark side," something that even casual Star Wars EU fans (by which I mean of both old and new EU) know of?

I mean, even Jaxxon from the original Marvel run probably has wider knowledge in the general fandom than most, if not all, modern Marvel characters.

Though to be fair, it's not just a Marvel thing; outside of Aphra and Sloan, there really hasn't been a ton of NEU characters who actually have made the jump outside of their works of origin to the status of true saga characters.

 

Hopefully none. That arc is most widely known just for how incredibly ridiculous and silly the entire premise is.

 

Whether that is or isn't its reception, I see that you don't dispute that it is widely known. Which is more than can be said about "the time that woman claimed to be Han Solo's wife" or "the time Aphra did those totally crazy hijinks with those sarcastic quippy homicidal droids".

Also kind of funny to slag off Dark Empire when it quite clearly was in the minds of many who worked on both the prequels and sequels.

 

The reason why Aphra is so praised in the new canon is that there are very few original main character in the new canon outside of the movies, and thus there is little to no competition for popularity. I do think Aphra is a genuinely fun character and I do like her, but if we got her amidst the Legends golden days of original characters, I don't think she'd stand out as much as she does now.

Also, I think that outside of the movies and TV shows, the new canon is very limited creatively. I wonder what we would have gotten if Marvel was allowed to go wild with ideas. And yes, I find it hard to believe they aren't restraint by LFL in what they can and can't explore in the canon.

 

@spicer we know they are restrained. If they weren't restrained and they were being allowed to tell stories within any time period they wanted to the complete blank slate of the post ROTJ time period would be where they would probably go.

@Dr. Steve Brule I realize some people are still sensitive about the subject of Darkhorse but there is nothing wrong with making comparisons. I was making a comparison of what I felt the differences were between Marvel and Darkhorse. And I know for myself if Darkhorse still had the license it would probably be difficult for me to get into it. With their wait times and how they focused more on minis than anything else (even several of their ongoings were just mini arcs compiled together within one title. I like the true ongoing books that Marvel has where it follows one particular character (or set of characters) throughout its entire run. I tried to read one of Darkhorse's true ongoings in Legacy II and couldn't even finish it because I felt the characterization of the main characters was very vague compared to what we have gotten so far with Marvel.

 

I think you have an inaccurate impression of the Dark Horse Star Wars comics. First, the wait times - that has been a thing with only two of their titles and only every now and then, not regularly. Those were some issues of Dark Times and some issues of Dawn of the Jedi. That's it. Sometimes, the dissatisfaction with those delays is overexaggerated on the internet, as a lot of things are unfortunately. Every other series had every issue published on schedule, i.e. once a month like most of the current Marvel issues. It should be noted however, that Dark Times and Dawn of the Jedi had some of the best artwork in any Star Wars comic, be it Marvel or Dark Horse. And yes, the delays for those series were because of the artists. Again, we are talking about some of the issue in those series, not all of them.

Second, the "mostly minis" is also not entirely true. The mini-series format was a thing in the last three years IIRC of the Dark Horse era, and they had the license for 23 years. Dark Horse had a lot of ongoing series published concurrently. They switched to a mini series format for some of the ongoing titles probably to boost sales. And in my opinion that was a bad idea. So, if you want to make sure you are reading an ongoing series from Dark Horse or not, just check Wookiieepedia (most of the titles were unambiguously ongoing though, so there is little room for confusion, especially with the help of the internet ).

Third, I don't know what else aside from Legacy II you have read, but Legacy II is not the best series to start with. Legacy II is a sequel to Legacy. You should read Legacy before Legacy II. Another thing to consider is that Legacy II was one of the very last series to be published by DH, and suffered greatly due to the license loss, so it never got time to shine.

 

Is it not possible to enjoy Dark Horse, Marvel, and IDW?

I have very fond memories of picking up issues of Knight Errant from the comic shop when I was just getting into the fandom, not understanding a bit, but enjoying it immensely. It helped to cultivate my love of the series and dig deeper into eras I hadn't previously explored with the Knight Errant novel and Lost Tribes of the Sith collection. Now, as a young adult, i'm enjoying getting the marvel comics digitally for largely the same reasons. They only serve to grow my love of a series I've become so deeply engaged with. No, not every comic released by these companies is great. But they all have a place with me as pieces of my personal Star Wars fandom.

 

@spicer Probably true that I should have started with Legacy. I was interested though to read about Ania because she seemed to be similar to Rey in a lot of ways. I looked at a review of someone on youtube about Legacy I and they said Cade Skywalker's characterization is all over the pace. One issue/arc he will be one way and the next arc he will be something completely different. Is that true? Is Cade not really the best developed character?

 

After a couple decades of novels being the primary (and best) point of engagement with the Star Wars EU, I have been surprised that in this new era the comic books are, for me, much more entertaining than the novels (Bloodline is pretty great though. Thrawn was awesome.). I cannot praise Dr. Aphra and most of the Vader comics enough. I always enjoy reading these. The main Star Wars line is a bit hit or miss, but there are occasionally some good stories there. I give nearly everything else mostly an "okay."

My biggest gripe, and yes I know there is an entire thread for this, is the incredibly poor quality of the art in the main Star Wars book. The most recent books are just very, very bad. I like the art in Aphra and Vader and I very much hope that we'll see a change going forward. These books are expensive (maybe not individually...but it adds up fast) and I am getting to the point of not being able to justify the purchase price for a book that I don't like to LOOK at. I really enjoyed the art of the book way back when Luke & Co. were on Nar Shadda (Immonen). More of that, less of what we currently have.

That said, Marvel is still telling better stories more consistently than Del Rey. I don't think it's Del Rey's fault -- they seem a little hamstrung by their new place in the telling of Star Wars stories. Can't wait to see the comic books begin to move beyond ANH.

 

What heresy is this?

Yeah, it's amazing how people feel a need to be tribal about this stuff. Arguably there are more comic companies active, producing more material across various genres than ever before, while translated material is also up, so why can't we just enjoy it all? Too much good stuff and not enough money? Meh, it's terrible but I can live with it!

 

Yes it is, I'm one example.

I don't think Ania is similar to Rey in her characterization. The only parallel I can think of between them is that Ania and Rey start as scavengers, but that's it. Ania is more similar to Aphra than Rey (but only slightly similar!).

Once you read Legacy from start to finish, I think Cade is an interesting character, with all fluctuations making sense. But that's just my opinion.

 

Not to mention, they explicitly moved away from the "series of miniseries" format the last year or so they had the license, although because of the impending sale, Legacy II and Star Wood were the only series that came from after this change.

 

The problem with the miniseries move DHC did was, by that point, fans had had 50 issues of Legacy and KOTOR and were already cheesed off by the arbitrary axing of both at #50. Following that up with the less than great minis was DHC's biggest howler in the entire time they had the licence.

What irks with Marvel, for me, is they were all: "Yay, bro, we got the licence back!"

When it was pretty much like a guy going: "Yeah, I'm chief exec of a company!", cue the retort: "Because yer Mum bought it!"

Had there been a competitive tender for the licence and Marvel won that, then DHC would likely have the first to congrat them, but as it was? It was Dad Disney just giving Marvel the licence.

 

Anything but more Han, Luke and Leia for a kickoff. Love them, but enough is enough.

Pre TPM stories about the Sith, for example, would be cool. Or even a Plagueis series leading into TPM. Stuff about less popular, yet darker characters would be great.

 

Completely agree with the above as a general assessment on Marvel. TBH, Doctor Aphra is the series I look forward to the most as it just seems to be a fresh take on SW and it gives me the feeling that anything can happen kind of like in the old EU...unrestricted by the films as the main characters' fates are still unknown. The sense of humor is fantastic and the art has been great. I hope this series lasts for a long, long time as it has a ton of potential to reveal some history of the GFFA. Plus, I just love the character. Aphra has been my favorite ongoing by far.

Also, the Han Solo mini and the Kanan series were stand-outs for me. Wished Kanan lasted longer. Loved both of those.

I hate to admit it, but the main SW series has lost my interest. I hope it gets back on track some day.

Ashley Witter's covers have been a real joy with Doctor Aphra 16 being a masterpiece.

 

I haven't read much. So far I've read:

1) C-3PO: The Phantom Limb = I loved it. Might be my favorite SW comic ever.
2) Princess Leia 1-5 = Which were completely forgettable, despite a promising premise.
3) Star Wars 1-12 (Skywalker Strikes and Showdown at Smuggler's Moon) = Awesome so far. If there was no time jump between ANH and ESB, and this was where the film series picked up after the first film, it would feel mostly appropriate.

And I've got Darth Vader left to read, which I hear is terrific.

Considering I've soured on Marvel printings in general (You made Cap a Nazi? Screw you!), I'd say at least I'm enjoying most of the SW material, though I am very selective about what I read. I don't dislike the characters, but the chances of me going out of my way to read Kanan and Poe Damereon stand alone tales are slim to none.

 

I'm definitely getting more entertainment value out of the new canon almost entirely from Marvel's output than the novels or the two videogames. Rebels comes close at times but Marvel lets Darth Vader be more murder-y. Like the hallway slaughter in Rogue One was amazing but Vader Down had him take out almost 3 times as many Rebel scum. Also there Vader at least got in a great smacktalk line with "I am looking at Dead Men." But at least Vader in Rogue One let the lightsaber sit there for a few seconds so they let it sink in. Kind of the same thing without having to say it.

 

Looking at January's comichron sales list all the latest issues did their normal deal. Three in the top 20 and the rest within the top 100. What is interesting is that several of the issues that are now a couple years old re-entered the list. Issues #1 and 2 of the Shattered Empire series sold enough to make the list last month. As well as one of the Vader Down issues and one of the early issues of the Poe Dameron series.

Don't know how normal it is for issues that are two+ years old to go back into a list like comichron. Obviously it would have been because of the movie but still seems pretty impressive.

 

I think the difference between Dark Horse and Marvel is primarily this....... the unknown content of future movies.

DH wouldn't touch anything prior to Ep IV before the prequels due to not knowing exactly what Lucas has in mind. However, they were not afraid of moving the timeline forward in conjunction with the Bantam timeline. After Episode III came out, and Lucas said there were no more movies, they really did have free reign, and I think the quality of their output during those years is up there with the best of their back catalogue.

But it's worse for Marvel. There are currently only 2 confirmed movies on the horizon.....Solo and Ep 9, but we also know that Rian Johnson has his trilogy in the pipeline, as well as the new movie series being written by the GoT guys, rumoured Obi-Wan and Fett stand alones, the likely tv series as well as rumoured animated show to replace Rebels.

With all of this output, there is very little room for either the comics, or the books, to have a significant contribution or impact on the new Canon.