The lightsaber thing is a good point, but to me personally, that isn't enough to redeem the character. As I said, my problems with him are two-fold: he's annoying, due to his hackneyed "ye olde knight from days of old" shtick and appallingly punning name, but also because his being on the Star-Hopper's team makes no sense. Han essentially recruits him because he feels sorry for the mentally deranged old codger, which seems way out of character for a hardened space pirate like Solo. I mean, yes, he feels the Starkiller Kid is essentially useless too, but he allows the boy on the team because he has a droid, which might prove useful to the Star-Hoppers. Don-Wan Kihotay has no such usefulness to the team, as far as I can see.

Prejudice against droids was, of course, shown in the original Star Wars film, but this was expanded upon in the Marvel series, with prejudice against half-droid cyborgs being established as early as issue #7. It kinda makes sense too: if there are certain sections of the public who despise droids and view them as secondary citizens, then beings who are half-droid would also catch some of that prejudice. I mean, look at how mixed race (or "Mulatto", to use the vernacular of the day) people were treated or viewed in those periods of U.S. history in which institutionalised racism was more prevalent than it is today. The stormtroopers in this issue are clearly bigots, who either view cyborgs as little better than droids themselves or some kind of unholy perversion of nature and therefore worse than droids.




Well, we did have Darth Vader in the comic and he's obviously a major cast member, but you're right about none of the key Rebel characters appearing. I always think it's interesting that Star Wars #16, "The Hunter", also featured none of the regular cast and that too was a cracking issue. It's almost as if Archie Goodwin found it easier to write a SW story using his own characters, rather than George Lucas's (although the restrictions that Lucasfilm placed on what could be done with the main cast characters obviously had some effect on limiting what stories Goodwin could tell).




Maybe to us, but probably not to a Rebel who works around them daily or possibly even flies them. We hear Rebel characters referring to their ships as T-16s or T-47s in the original trilogy, so I guess it's like an "Eagle Driver" referring to his fighter plane as an F-15, rather than an Eagle (or vise versa).




Yeah, I was never a fan of how Carmine Infantino drew lightsaber blades either.




Wermis was indeed the Captain of the Devastator, which Vader is clearly still using in the comic at this time. Admiral Ozzel was in charge of the portion of the Imperial Navy that was tasked with finding the Rebel base after the Alliance evacuated Yavin 4. Obviously, at this point in the Marvel timeline the Rebels are still on Yavin 4, and so presumably the Imperial task force that Ozzel commanded hadn't been set up yet. Since we never get to see the Rebels leaving Yavin 4 and finding Hoth in the Marvel issues, I think that we have to accept that there was an unspecified period of weeks or months between the events of Star Wars #38 and #39 (with the latter issue beginning the adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back). It was presumably during this unspecified period of time that the Executor came into service and Ozzel became Vader's immediate subordinate.




Well, don't forget that we didn't learn that Mon Mothma was the leader of the Rebel Alliance until Return of the Jedi in 1983, four years after this issue came out. Regardless of that though, the Star Wars novelization and, to a lesser extent the first Star Wars film, make it clear that General Dodonna was the leader of the Rebel forces at Yavin base. I'm not sure that the Marvel series ever went so far as calling him the leader of the Rebellion, did they? Unless I'm forgetting something.

#31-32 : First half of the 'Omega Frost' arc

I feel like the series has really hit its stride now.. some of the earlier stuff felt forced to me, like it didn't really belong, but these last couple really feel like they fit.

I love that the dewbacks are in there (We discussed WAY back when you first reviewed this), and even the sand armor. That feels like a SE thing to me, so it was cool seeing it here.

Even cool was the troop transport, which I had as a kid and play the crap out of.. it was my favorite toy by far. Looking at it from a practical standpoint, it seems really, really dumb to have a armored carrier where the guys you are carrying are on the outside, but hey, it was a great toy!

The Tagges are great bad guys... I love that they are sufficiently powerful to make good foes for the rebels, but not as good as Vader... that's hard to balance, but they pull it off really nicely. The Omega Frost weapon feels a little out of place in the Star Wars universe, but I can live with it.

It was also nice to see the Stormtroopers be semi-competent... they disable the speeder, and then follow to confirm, instead of the usual trope 'oh, surely they're dead'. It did look like in one of the blasts they were robots though, which was weird (maybe it's just Infantino's funky art)

I was SO happy Chewie is better! The blasters were pretty weird though... especially since Chewie had the same one, rather than his signature Bowcaster... no reason for him not to have it here, since he and Han arrived leisurely, and of their own free will.

And that comes to my one minor complaint of the issue... my would Luke go to Tatoinne to look for a pilot? We've already had him other places that were bigger and more likely to have candidates.. while I appreciate the excuse to have him go home again, since it made for a good story, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense in the bigger picture. The only way I figure it is if Gen. Dodonna was really just getting him out from underfoot so he wouldn't worry about Leia, which now that I write it DOES make a fair amount of sense .

Ok, I guess that makes sense, and Luke's familiarity give him a leg up.. ok, you talked me into it

Cool fact that this seems like a good place to share. Last Monday I went to see Last Jedi with family in San Francisco (my third viewing) and who was in the theatre by Steve Leialoha!!

Along with his wife Trina Robbins. I was pleased to be able to say hello and shake their hands.

Wow! That is VERY cool. I love Leialoha's inking on the Star Wars adaptation issues -- especially in issue #2. It's no exaggeration to say that he makes that issue. I'd have had a million questions for him if I ever saw him. You guys in the States are so lucky, when it comes to meeting comic book professionals...both at conventions and just by accident, as was the case here.

Happy 2018, everyone.

Marvel Star Wars #28 is one of my favorite issue of this series. As a kid, I remember getting & reading this when it first hit the stands & being both intrigued & extremely disturbed. This was my first exposure to the cyborg Valance the Hunter (hadn't read his previous appearances yet at that point), and his battle to the death with Darth Vader was great & quite chilling. The art by Carmine Infantino was stellar, and I especially liked the scene when Darth Vader was desperately trying to get back onto the dock & his fingers made indentations in the wood - nice detail here.

It was sad to see Tyler Lucien kill himself, and I found this scene quite dark for a Marvel Star Wars comic in the '70's.

In retrospect, it's interesting to see that the penultimate battle between Valance & DV occurred near deadly lava - similar to the battle Obi-wan & Anakin had in SW: Episode III - which led to Anakin becoming Darth Vader.