Daily Dispatches from a Galaxy Far, Far Away

A long time ago in a pop-culture galaxy far, far away, Star Wars fans hungry for new stories had very few options. Before the "Expanded Universe" and its hierarchical levels of canon took shape in the 1990s —and long before it was de-canonized in favor of a completely unified continuity—unless you were using your action figures to make up your own adventures, there wasn't much beyond the movies. Outside of a small range of original novels and NPR's excellent dramatizations of the first two films, for over a decade the further adventures of Luke Skywalker and company could only be found in comics.

Marvel Comics' 1977–1986 series —presented monthly in the US and weekly in the UK—was always enjoyable. Featuring stories by some of the medium's leading talents, such as Chris Claremont and Carmine Infantino, it served as a lifeline during the desperately long wait between the Original Trilogy's movies, especially between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi thanks to flashback stories featuring Han Solo. Because the weekly publication schedule in the UK required more material than the monthly issues contained, British readers got even more new adventures, only a fraction of which were released in the US until recently. One consolation for American fans—at least in some cities—was the daily Star Wars comic strip that ran in newspapers across North America from 1979 to 1984.

Of the many Star Wars stories impacted by Lucasfilm's 2014 reset of the saga's continuity, the newspaper strips are among those complained about the least, but this is by no means a reflection of their quality. Though not widely seen, even compared to the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special, they stand among the best of the non-movie Star Wars stories. Like the Marvel series, these stories benefitted from the work of some of the medium's most talented creators. The late Russ Manning, best known for the cult-classic Magnus Robot Fighter and his work on Tarzan, both wrote and drew the first few storylines and continued drawing the strip for the rest of its first year as Steve Gerber and others took over the writing.

Foremost among these other writers was Archie Goodwin, who also worked on the Marvel series. Goodwin's first contribution was an adaptation of the novel Han Solo at Stars' End. With Han Solo at Stars' End being the first Star Wars prequel in any medium, adapting it for another spin-off series is arguably the most meta moment in the ongoing story of Star Wars stories. Other high points of the strip's five-year run include "The Return of Ben Kenobi," in which Darth Vader recruits an actor to impersonate Luke's former mentor, and The Bounty Hunter of Ord Mantell.

While there's a certain appeal to having Star Wars comics treated as part of the official continuity, it seems fitting for these stories to stand outside of it. Here again, this is not a matter of quality but rather what these stories embody. They symbolize a time when the lore of Star Wars was still an open book. The sense of creators working out a vision of this universe that was clearly informed by the movies but not constrained them makes The Kashyyyk Depths' early visit to Chewbacca's homeworld and encountering Boba Fett in The Frozen World of Ota enjoyable on multiple levels.

After the strip ended in 1984, the stories were rarely seen until the late 1990s when Dark Horse Comics reprinted many of them in color with alterations intended to make them flow better. These versions have been re-issued variously in physical and digital form by Marvel Comics, corporate synergy conspiring to return the Star Wars comics line to their stewardship. Unfortunately, while these reprints were a worthy effort for deserving stories, the presentation was less than ideal. The beauty of a well-done daily comic strip is how each installment moves the broader narrative along incrementally but still feels distinct. Sanding down these edges takes something away from these stories, making the telling of them feel awkward.

Fortunately, archival comics specialist IDW Publishing has reissued the whole run, including those not reprinted by Dark Horse, in the original day-by-day format (or week-by-week for the early Sunday strips) in a trio of hardcover volumes. These are beautiful books, filled with both excellent reproductions of the strips and wonderful background pieces. In short, they're perfectly suited for Star Wars fans who are less concerned with whether a story "counts" than how well it reflects the excitement of the movies that inspired it.