www.starwarsfanworks.com/timeline/

The pre-and-post-Disney timelines are kept separate, though.

The Tagge family was a great creation of the Marvel run, and built on that mix of fantasy/politics that was hinted at in the original movie. It sent the message that all of the galaxy's big players cannot just be the Empire, and possibly a few crime groups like the Hutts. Of course, once the adaptation of ESB hit, it was all about the Empire (understandable), but after, it was not long before the comic started brining in more of the galaxy's colorful characters.




Personally, I believed that during the Infantino period, the effect of the lightsaber (left) gave the impression of active energy--power. The blade seemed dangerous and from a visual standpoint, gave the comic version the closest suggestion that it was as threatening as its movie counterpart, as opposed to the jagged, scalloped-edged version seen during Infantino's brief return to the series (middle) or another, "soft flashlight beam" version during his original run (right).

I think the "go-go check" version looks good in B&W, but not so much in colour.

I've not been able to chime in on this thread lately, what with work and being buried under a mountain of paperwork doing my tax bill. Anyway, I'm back now, so just wanted to give my tupence worth on Carmine Infantino's depiction of the lightsaber. Myself, I prefer the first example that tarkintino posted above -- the classic Zip-a-Tone blade (it's not Go-Go checks, people!).

Really though, I find the way that Infantino rendered the lightsabers one of the least offensive or annoying aspects of his work on Star Wars. Later artists, like Walt Simonson, Al Williamson, Tom Palmer or Ron Frenz did a much better job of depicting the lightsaber blade, in my opinion. In particular, I always really liked Williamson's use of parallel lines behind the blade, as it sliced through the air, which gave the saber a flowing, slicing sense of movement, as well as a cool after-image or tracer bullet-like effect (see below)...




So, I basically agree that Infantino's lightsabers looked good, but not as good as later artists on the series depicted them.




As a kid, back in the late '70s and early '80s, I used to absolutely hate Infantino's stormtroopers. As an adult, I've become rather fond of them. His troopers are highly stylised, for sure, and they suffer from all of the overly angular harshness that all of Infantino's characters do, but they are so closely associated with my early comic reading memories that they elicit a cosy nostalgia in me now, rather than the hair-pulling annoyance that I felt as an 8-year-old.




Yeah, I agree -- with both the positives and the negatives you've noted. This arc really is action-packed and full of intriguing plot twists. It's also quite a dark tale, perfectly in line with the mood of the up-coming Star Wars sequel. Domina Tagge is a great addition to the Marvel comic and, I think I've said before that, she's probably my favourite member of the Tagge family. She's a wonderful mixture of seductress, priestess, and femme fatale, with her desire to see both Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader dead for what they did to her brother, Orman.

As for sending Luke on a diplomatic mission, yeah, that does seem a bit silly -- especially while Princess Leia stays in orbit above Monastery in the Millennium Falcon. But there is an in-story explanation, I think (it's been over two years since I last read this arc, so cut me some slack if I'm remembering wrong). Wasn't Luke specifically requested to be the Rebel Alliance's representative by Domina? Of course, that's all part of Darth Vader's plan to capture young Skywalker, which Domina is playing along with, but it at least provides something in the way of explanation. We're told early on that The Order of the Sacred Circle carries a lot of influence in the galaxy, so you could see why the Alliance would be keen to send the delegate that was preferred by those parts of the Order that are sympathetic to the Rebellion.

On the other hand, it's almost as if Archie Goodwin momentarily forgot that Leia was actually a former Senator.

The idea that the Imperials might not recognise the Falcon is a bit far fetched, I agree. I mean, sure, there are a lot of YT-1300 freighters about in the galaxy, but Vader and the Empire know the Falcon, not least because the ship's markings were logged in the Imperial files when it blasted its way out of Mos Eisley in the first SW movie. However, it would've been more problematic for continuity if Han's ruse had actually worked. As it is, in the comic, I can write it off as an example of Solo's overconfidence.




You're right that it would've been Day, along with the other regular inker on the series, Bob Wiacek, who was responsible for depicting Infantino's lightsabers with the distinctive Zip-a-Tone effect in the past, but Day depicts them both ways in this particular arc. So, I think we have to assume that it was Infantino who was playing around with how he drew the lightsabers at this point. Transitioning from the straight-beamed, Zip-a-Tone style, to the more pointed, "flaming" style which he adopted in his post-Empire Strikes Back issues.




What about it?




Ha ha...Luke is wearing the clothes he wore during the medal ceremony at the end of the original Star Wars movie. That outfit includes black trousers with piping up the leg.




Well, three years are supposed to have elapsed between the destruction of the Death Star and the beginning of The Empire Strikes Back. Of course, that doesn't mean that three years of Marvel continuity have elapsed by the time we get to the Red Queen arc because, in the Marvel comics, we never actually get to see the Rebellion set up their new base on Hoth. The story goes straight from the end of the Red Queen arc to the beginning of ESB, with only one fill-in issue between (Star Wars #38). Personally, I've always felt that there was probably six months or so between the end of this story arc and the start of The Empire Strikes Back, but I have little or no proof to support that, just a general gut feeling.



Yeah, that's Goodwin scrambling to rectify the continuity gaffs he'd inadvertently created for himself and getting everything in line for The Empire Strikes Back.




Actually there was a fourth set of stories set between ANH and ESB -- the Russ Manning newspaper strip continuity.

My feeling is that anyone would be a fool to try and reconcile all four of these timelines. They were all created independently of each other -- even the original Marvel comics and the newspaper strip, which were published concurrently. The Dark Horse continuity was always, right from the start, meant to be separate from the old Marvel comics, although they did consider the newspaper strips as quasi-cannon, most likely because they secured the rights to reprint them early on in the 1990s. The current Marvel line regards all of three of the earlier comic timelines as "Legends" and simply ignores them.

Of course, in my mind, the original Marvel Comics continuity is the way that things really happened between the movies.

Well, to be fair, Mark Hamill's haircut in the original movie was kinda Beatlesque. I think his hair is drawn way better by this point in the run than it was earlier, when Infantino insisted on giving him a Conan the Barbarian-esque mane.




I think the Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson strips and the adaptation of Han Solo at Stars End fit in OK with the original Marvel run, but I would think making the inter-ANH/ESB stuff by Russ Manning fit would be problematic. For one thing, straight off the top of my head, the Tatooine Sojourn storyline would be hard to reconcile with Marvel's Omega Frost arc, since they both feature Luke Skywalker returning to Tatooine for the first time since the events of the first movie.

I agree; if matching the white-ish core/colored outline of the movie lightsaber effect was not an option, then something that says "energy" and "danger" is the next best thing.



While I would never criticize Williamson's SW work too much, I still found his lightsaber blades leaning toward the jagged edge side of design, as if it was more flaming stick than "laser sword" (as George Lucas refers to it). To me, it loses the appearance of being a dangerous weapon when it looks too much like the way comic book illustrators in the 1930s would have visualized the weapon.




Good point. By the and of Star Wars (1977), the Falcon has to be on the Empire's most wanted / most known ships, which is--apparently--the case, as its instantly recognized by Vader and his Imperial underlings in The Empire Strikes Back.