Comics Join Me In Rereading: Knights of the Old Republic

Thinking on this a bit more, I'm actually surprised that the start of Vector was the highest-selling issue. I would have though either #1, or maybe #7 given it being about the Mandalorian Wars and the cover, and still pretty early in the series run. Vector would have been my thought for third highest, maybe.

I have no idea where to look for this, but maybe some enterprising soul here in the thread could try and find sales number from a decade ago... I'd be interested to see how they add up. Not even every single issue but a few from here and there.

 

As it so happens, if you ever wanna look up comic sales http://www.comichron.com/ is the place, and indeed is run by JJM, lol.

Sales wise Knights of the Old Republic 25: Vector, Part 1 and Knights of the Old Republic 28: Vector, Part 4 are the series' highest-selling issues, with 25,015 and 25,101 copies sold when they were released, and the Flashpoint, Reunion, and Days of Fear arcs sold particularly well, ranging from 23,000 to 25,000 copies sold. The Knights of Suffering arc was the lowest-selling of the series before Vector, and Knights of the Old Republic 40: Dueling Ambitions, Part 2 and Knights of the Old Republic 49: Demon, Part 3 were two of the lowest-ranked issues in terms of sales in the remainder of the series

Kotor sold an average of 21,043 copies in comic book shops worldwide when each issue was released; 2006 yielded an average of 23,256 while 2007 had an average of 22,603 copies. An average of 22,080 copies were sold in 2008, and the remainder of the series had an average of 16,968 copies sold. The series' sales and rankings compared to other issues declined along with the rest of the comics industries over the years, starting around 24,000 and ending around 16,000, but the series in particular began a decline following the Vector arc.

Obviously this doesn't account for trades or digital sales, but sadly I cant imagine late aughts digital sales were ever very high, Comixlogy didn't even exist till July 2007, already 17 issues into the series (Knights Errant on the other hand might have had higher coming in the tens and all). Sadly there are no ways I know of to get an idea of digital sales, really wish that wasn't the case.

 

I'd assume that there's a couple factors to Vector being the highest selling. I remember seeing adds for it, so I feel like they advertised it heavily (though my memory might be playing tricks on me). There's the novelty of a story crossing through all 4 (at the time) comic lines (and several eras). And people who only followed one of the 4 comic lines probably picked up Vector so they'd get the full story.

EDIT: Actually thinking about it, (unless, like I said, my memory is playing tricks on me) I think Vector was the first issue of KOTOR that I read. It was in my High School library, and it would have been a couple of years before I bought the whole series. If my memory is right, it's actually a pretty good introduction to new readers, as Gryph and Zayne have to explain what their deal is to Celest Morne.

 

There were no digital Star Wars comics at all until fairly late in the run. Lucas had not authorized either Del Rey or Dark Horse to do ebooks of everything yet. (Checking, the deal to take Del Rey's library digital was May 2011. I can't remember when Dark Horse's was but their digital site was online for some time before Star Wars was on it.)

Without getting into any information I know from behind the scenes, I've done many analyses on my circulation site showing that January and February are the worst months of the year for sales, because publishers cut back on the number of titles released, expecting that people can't get to stores. As a somewhat contrary corollary, launches in that period tend to have an easier time getting attention in a less-crowded market; KOTOR and Vector both launched in January and did relatively well. KOTOR #1 and #25 had second printings, and I think #1 might have even had a third, but I'm not sure. Vector also had the advantage of basically being a must-buy for readers of Legacy and the other books.

But most importantly -- Vader was on the cover of #25. The opening vision wasn't until my fourth draft of the arc, and it felt heaven-sent, because we'd been struggling with how to get him to appear in the book without actually being part of the events. And then I remembered, "Oh. We have a Covenant." (Say that in a "We have a Hulk" voice.)

"Knights of Suffering" would have suffered because of the lateness of the book that summer, which is always a killer for orders. I am not surprised #49 was the lowest; retailers stop ordering shelf copies as series wind down, but they always order more of the last issue, knowing what happened with the low-circulation Star Wars #107.

In terms of what's been read by the most people, certainly it's "Commencement," which has been in multiple print editions.

 

That was exactly our intention. Glad it worked that way for someone!

 

I can remember purchasing Dawn of the Jedi #0 and Dawn of the Jedi #1 in early-Feb 2012 from the Dark Horse Digital Site. Those were my first digital comic book purchases. KOTOR War 1-6 came out concurrently with DOTJ. Dark Horse did not offer their comics on comixology.com until sometime after 2015 (2016?, 2017?). When I got back into Star Wars comics, it was due to titles like Old Republic, KOTOR, and Dawn of the Jedi. My pull list included Old Republic, Dawn of the Jedi, and KOTOR War. That was a blazing great time for Star Wars comics.

Dark Horse managed to put up digital versions of the entire Knights of the Old Republic run (0-50, Handbook, and War) before the license shifted to Marvel. Marvel started putting Star Wars comics up on comixology.com right away in January 2015. That was when the three digital omnibus editions for KOTOR became available. The Marvel Epic Collections Digital Omnibus editions are now available as well in digital format.

 

Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 12: Reunion, Part 2

Notes: http://www.farawaypress.com/comics/swknights/swkotor12.html

Raana Tey continues to solidify her spot as the most aggressively pro murder Jedi of all time, but now its gone from precautionary vision related murder, to absolutely 100 percent objectively innocent in every way ever murder.

Regardless, Gryph points out what an incredible coincidence it is, which keeps happening to Zayne. Though in this case it was actually the Covenant doing it on purpose, trying to set up a trap. But it is also another example of his "unique" relationship with the Force. One that seems determined to balance his life with equal parts amazing and awful luck, often and especially at the same time.

Gryph putting the schmooze on Dob is great, the fill in artist did expressions super well "Its the only way he'll learn!!" is a highlight. Kotor easily does comedy the best of all the Legends comics. And till this day is still number one overall be it Legends or NEU. Comics wise it doesnt help that most of the other protags are far to broody to ever have any fun.

Then the real meat, Zayne's pop is a good dude who doesn't believe his son is a mass murderer for a single second, nor the rest of his family, he is of course totally right about this, and as I have already stated numerous times, its so nice to have genuinely good parents in SW, and for that to be met with an equally good kid. There a top family all around, something so goddamn rare for star wars and media in general. The Solo/Skywalker clan counted for years to, but well we all know how that turned out. Zayne also uses his big pay day to help a person who thinks he is a mass murderer. Again precious boy.

And finally I adore how Vandar takes in his family, I already went on about how much I like his characterization in this, and this is a big example of why. Its such a nice contrast to have him affably protect innocents in the same issue Raana Tey reveals in the possibility of hurting the very same people.

Obviously he isn't perfect, as the games show us, but he still embodies a lot of good things about Jedi in general and its a nice middle ground, having flaws without being turned into a dumb straw man for everything that wrong with this era's Jedi( That's Vrooks job,and that's not a bad thing in his case, such a thoroughly unlikable Jedi that isn't evil like the Covenant or any fallen members is nice every once in awhile)

 

Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooon!!

 

An aside that's probably not in my notes: to that point, I'd never gotten feedback directly from Lucasfilm before the plot to "Reunion" -- but the comments on the plots for it and the next story, "Days of Fear" were so complimentary my editor shared them with me. They convinced me that I might have a future at this thing at a critical moment, and I started contemplating leaving my job to write full time. So I look at those two stories with particular fondness.

(I did go full-time right as #15 came out, where I've been ever since. The rest of that year I had what I now consider an insane amount of output, as starting out solo I was eager to make sure I filled the time.)

EDIT: Second aside, unrelated: my table at All-Star Comic Con last month was next to Tom Kane, voice of Vandar Tokare; he was kind enough to sign the Vandar pages of one of the Epic collections we sold. Our panel from that event is here; he talks about George Lucas's instructions on portraying Vandar somewhere in there.

 

How involved was the feedback from Lucasfilm and Dark Horse? Did they tend to basically just sign off on stuff or say "no," or did they tend to be more involved on saying what you could or couldn't do? Back when the DH forums were still around, Randy Stradley sometimes gave the impression he would get into the weeds when it came to approving scripts.

 

That was a very good series. Dark Horse, John Jackson Miller really hit it off.

 

The editors were generally the filters, so you couldn't tell what recommended changes came from them and what came from the studio (which is why it was unusual and memorable the first time I had that direct feedback passed to me). In more recent years, with word-processing programs able to show comments from multiple people, it's not uncommon to see the licensors' notes directly; it's just easier to send them on. There wasn't much in the way of things we couldn't do; it was more coordination kind of things, like alerting me when I was plotting the Kenobi graphic novel that A'Sharad was going to be relevant to Legacy.

Randy edited Vector through Vindication and definitely sent the most notes; a lot of his pointers I use when I teach scripting seminars. Particularly helpful mechanical things like making sure characters are named in the art descriptions in the order in which they speak, because artists will more often than not place the first named character to the left in any panel. I still live by that one.

 

This might have been the first monthly issue I picked up, I think I started around this point (the first TPB had come out so then I started subscribing to this series too). Its too bad the artist just did this one issue, I liked his art a lot, he really nailed it with Gryph's expressions and even the Moomos too, they're probably the most memorable Ithorians ever.

I love that we saw both of Zayne's parents, even for just a little bit, (though we wouldn't see his sisters until later), its rare to have fictional characters having two parents with full names and even faces. That and they even survive the full series (compared to say Luke's Aunt and Uncle, and Leia's adoptive parents, where I'm not sure Breha has said 20 words across both old and new EU).

Huh, a military phase was planned for Zayne? I guess the last War miniseries had some of that, I wish we could have seen more of his career, such as it was. I'm glad the Vindication arc wrapped up the initial Covenant plot by the mid-30s though. I can see why Vector gave KotOR a big boost, that's usually one reason for crossovers (and while I'm sad Dark Horse ended both series at #50, its better than just rebooting to new #1s every year). That and Zayne only had five major "bosses" to face, as it were, and running into all five out in the galaxy would have taken a while. And as Reunion showed, Zayne was starting to get indirect contact with Vandar, so I'm glad the cover-up wasn't dragged out too long.

I remember the pre-digital days. I think I still have quite a few issues in the Dark Horse app, although its not the most convenient to use, to be honest.

 

Thanks for all the insight, John. Behind the scenes stuff is always fascinating, and it's damn generous of you to be so candid about plans that never happened.

A question that you can hopefully answer --- was there anything you originally had planned for KOTOR that eventually ended up in Knight Errant? Character types, broad plotstrokes, etc?

You've mentioned that you were plotting an Obi-Wan graphic novel pretty early on in KOTOR's run. Seems like if it had ended up happening as a graphic novel, we may not have gotten Knight Errant at all. Was KE something you were planning in parallel with Kenobi, or was it a concept whose genesis came from above, and you were the one recruited for the job?

 

You're welcome -- this is mostly stuff that previously came up in interviews or is in the notes on my site.

Nothing planned for KOTOR wound up in KE. There were basically no Sith in KOTOR but lots of Jedi; KE was the reverse. KE was also about survival in a civilization that had collapsed; no time for comic relief or romance. Very different approaches to the the two projects.

Kenobi as a graphic novel was a proposal I had been developing in late 2006 into early 2007; we'd gone through three drafts, but it was finally shelved at Celebration IV when my editor told me he was switching to Indiana Jones, so the graphic novel I did for him that fall was Crystal Skull instead. KE came much later. I was asked to wrap the regular KOTOR and begin work on a new series in the same phone call: the suggestion was for a lone Jedi, possibly set in the Sith Wars. Who Kerra was, what she was doing, and all the Sith came from me. The novel offer came in the middle of the initial planning. More about both on my site, links to the two projects at the top of the page.

 

Man going from being surprised with direct feedback to being trusted with being the launching point for a fully brand new EU has to be satisfying. Made me think about how the IDW Transformers comics are rebooting and how all the fans are worried about who they might pull to write, but the first thing I thought of "But what if its JJM tho". Ha, not likely, but fleeting thoughts are fun.

Also a side effect of being so well known for well received expanded universe work. Tends to make the brain jump to any property they care about and go "Put the writer I really like on the thing I really like"

 

Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 13: Days of Fear, Part 1

Notes: http://www.farawaypress.com/comics/swknights/swkotor13.html

The sparring scene and everything surrounding it is easily one of my favorite moments in the entire comic. Zayne finally gaining a cool item unique to himself, Jarael winning the spar, Camper being able to build the vambraces at all and the final talk between Zayne and Jarael. The talk is so good man, transitioning from light fun banter to a bittersweet heart to heart goodbye. The panel work by Dustin on Jarael as she walks away and then stops when Zayne asks if she will miss him is fantastic, especially her expressions.

"The Force is fine. But I would have preferred come company"

What a great line and melancholy subversion of how the phrase is always used. Seriously one of my favorites.

People shipped Z/J together from her first appearance, but this is probably the first "If you squint moment.Though as much as I love it, imo the first "real" romantic moment happens in Exalted. This one works just as well as just friends, which they obviously are at this time.

After that some more Gryph shenanigans and we get to finally meet Slyssk who joins the majority of the cast in being another major subversion of what you would typically expect from the archetype his race usually is. A weak bumbling softy, who is so excited somebody "cared" enough to save him he leaps into a life debt happily. Its also nice to get to see Zayne laugh at other peoples misfortune and not his own for once. Well, for a moment till they get drafted by way of stealing a military chow ship.

Funny how both Wookiees and Trandoshans have life debts, you could probably make a great story out of one owing a debt to the other.

Good guy Camper continues the theme of acknowledge what poor Elbee went through was horrible. And then we get to meet a proto HK. At the time some people weren't happy with HK's before 47, but I was always fine with it. 47 is still the only 47, a true one of a kind, and a big thing in Kotor 2 was him bagging on all his inferior successors. This is just his inferior predecessors, though I have to wonder if he would have liked the 24's better. I mean, at least they had the right color scheme.

 

Let me tell you a story. When I was a kid I loved reptiles, especially lizards. I eventually owned a Bearded Dragon. I didn't care that other people thought reptiles were creepy, or that lizard people were always the bad guys in fiction, they were (and are) still cool dang it!

Eventually I started getting into the Star Wars expanded universe and reading all the lore. As someone who thinks lizards are cool, you can imagine how disappointed I was with the depiction of Trandoshans, the most prominent example of Lizard Men in Star Wars. Hey kids, you see that cool looking Raptor Man in ESB? Well he's a slaver. Most of them are slavers, mercenaries, or knock offs of The Predator. In fact, they all have a religion whose sole deity and sole tenet is all about racking up the most kills before you die. And do you know who they enslave, and who they have a grudge with? Wookiees. Probably one of the most beloved and iconic Star Wars aliens of all time . . . are the arch enemies of Trandoshans. If you like Trandoshans, you like the mean lizard aliens who enslave Chewie and his friends!

Now Rodians also started out as one of the "default bad guy aliens". But as time goes on we've seen more sympathetic Rodians, Rodians in the Rebellion even. You know how many Good Guy Trandoshans we've got? TWO. One was Sish Sadeet from Crimson Empire. He was a Trandoshan on the side of the New Republic (although even then they had to say a NR soldier saved his life, because it's impossible that a Trandoshan would support the ideals of the Good Guys on his own, right?). And the other . . . was Slyysk. Now Slyysk wasn't a soldier like Sish was. But he was adorable. Like most of Zayne's associates, he was a missfit looked down on by others, kicked around by life, who found a new family.

So thank you JJM, for adding another Good Trandoshan to the universe.

 

I remind you sir, we have Barabels!

FOR ALL YOUR DINO-PEOPLE NEEDS!

 

What about Qyzen Fess?

I mean Wookiee pelting aside, the guy was pretty much a big softie inside.

 

Knights of the Old Republic 14: Days of Fear, Part 2

Notes: http://www.farawaypress.com/comics/swknights/swkotor14.html

Poor Elbee, HK is a big meanie and all Elbee gets for trying to help Jarael and Camper is shot a bunch. So he has been pushed off a cliff, lost a hand, and shot by an inferior HK. Again, poor big blue boy. Of course Demagol saves the day and spins a decent tale about how much medical knowledge a mando solider would have.

But back with Zayne Gryph has spun stealing a mess ship into a very profitable business with the help of Slyysk's cooking, and of course Zayne gets stuck being the bus boy. And Carth gets introduced for real, and just like Alek, its really good characterization.

Its's nice to see Carth in his "prime" so to speak, people bag on him a lot for his portrayal in the first game, but by then he has gone through hell a couple times over, and his paranoia is very justified in general, after all even on a LS path being left out of something so big by Bastilla and the Council for the reasons they were is really dangerous and shady. His portrayal here before all the betrayal and trauma still feels like the Carth we know, just not yet dragged down by all the **** to be thrown at him yet.

Lots of exposition on the state of the war, Republic, Mando's, planet etc, and Zayne again shows off what a good person he is giving the Stereb food.

Of course this leads into Zayne getting his first force vision, and it's all very fitting. He beat Lucien to one without trying, and it involves the murder of an incredible amount of innocents. And immediately he sets out to save as many of them as he can. Knowing full well of course that going to the Fleet will spell his doom. But he's Zayne, more then anything else he is a fundamentally good person no matter what the galaxy throws at him. So he does it.

And of course we see how that turns out next issue

 

I've been doing a sort of chronological "farewell tour" through the EU, and finally got around to reading this series--over a decade late, but better late than never? I'm really enjoying the comedic timing in the writing and layout--it's just a joy to read. The ancillary stories are fun too--I can't help but wonder what Sabine's reaction to Gryph's description of Mandalorian art being limited to "stickers on armor" in Labor Pains would have been.

And even though the writing, art, and storytelling style of Tales of the Jedi is worlds apart from this series, I like how the specter of Exar Kun and the Sith War drive the storyline of Lucien's group and their Padawan massacre--great use of continuity there. I'm excited to finish the series and play the original KOTOR--I've heard it's pretty good too.

TC

 

You vastly underestimate my dino-people needs.

 

Knights of the Old Republic 15: Days of Fear, Part 3

Notes: http://www.farawaypress.com/comics/swknights/swkotor15.html

Greedy Gryph deciding to stay a little longer to make a little extra dosh, how mean to Zayne, poor kid is always getting punished by other peoples actions.

Zayne pulling a sneaks onto Carth's ship and the ensuing convo they have is fun, especially his hesitancy regarding visions, for rather obvious reasons. But its another great contrast with his Masters, they get one and immediately treat it as hard fact that justifies any action they take to stop it and preserve there own lives, which to them means jumping straight to child murder. Zayne know visions arent set in stone, and yet jumps to try to save others, even with the full knowledge it will probably lead to his death.

Karath of course actually knows who he is and blows him off as a Mando spy. TBF in this case a Jedi named "Squint" is a bit much to believe. Of course he is telling the truth, and Serroco gets nuked right in front of there eyes. The panels showing the shock of it reverb through the Force and out to the rest of the cast are great, but whats even better is Zayne's reaction, he just willingly put himself into the Republic's hands, has no real way to avoid the Covenant getting there hands on him, and that isn't at all what causes him to break down crying, its all the innocent people who just got murdered.

Also from a game perspective what happens here is really interesting, because Karath and Malek, who are reacting to it with horror will of course go on to basically do the same thing to Telos and Taris in the future. The former of which of course makes Carth the man he is in the first game.

Speaking of Carth his actions here are a highlight, taking a leap of faith by believing in Zayne and getting at least 17 cities warned in time, adverting extinction at the least. Like I said last time his characterization is so good in this, you can really see why he would be so well regarded by the time of the games, and how Telos specifically would be able to break him. And it just feels so vindicating to see that whatever else happens to him, Zayne risking this wasn't pointless.

-Also the Exile was at Serroco, and gets mentioned without being named in the admirals list next issue, and also in 2 were we first heard about the battle obviously. So I think Serroco is the "closest" Zayne gets to the games in terms of being involved with the game characters, in terms of numbers. As it deeply effected him just as much as it did Carth, Karath, Revan, Malek and Meetra.

 

"You called a city?"
"No . . . I called seventeen."

Gets me right in the feels.