For a long time, I swore never again to buy a Marvel comic under their current nonsense. Well, it looks like we all need to make exceptions sometimes.
Star Wars #108 is a special title for multiple reasons. It's a callback to an older era, it's an effort to celebrate a major milestone in a company's history, and it's the first piece of new material surrounding the Expanded Universe for years. Well, besides The Old Republic, of course. While limited in its tenuous link to the larger setting, the comic utilised a number of ideas which would become important much later on, and even a few major characters. #108 serves as a celebration to all of this, and of its more famous sagas.
The Synopsis
The Galactic Civil War is over. After a long and bloody conflict, the Empire has been beaten and the path to finally crushing its remnants can begin. However, such victories are far from easy, and they are never simple. Even as the New Republic assembles its forces, a forgotten threat from a distant corner of the galaxy returns to threaten all living beings. Unless the heroes halt it, everything they battled to preserve will be wiped out in its onslaught.
The Good
First of all, Matthew Rosenberg. Most writers from the modern age would have a natural disconnect to both Star Wars of its time and the original comics. However, Rosenberg captures a more "genuine" feel to the stories that most lack, both in terms of tone and general presentation. It's not even the typical aping 70s dialogue or efforts to emulate the more exaggerated storytelling of the era, it comes across as a genuine extension of what came before. There are many points when he is so spot on that you can easily mistake it for the writing of Archie Goodwin. This makes it all the more effective as a celebration of the old comic, as it feels like such a natural extension.
It also helps that the art is absolutely spot on here. Honestly, while it has clearly been made with modern techniques, the style and design is almost completely exact when it comes to the style and design of older pannels. While the 70s look isn't too hard to emulate, having the same presentation, page structure and composition is much harder to get down. To have a group of such dedicated and talented artists (really just look at a list of the pencillers when you get a chance) work on this comic in order to get this right really helped pay off.
Another point in its favour is how, while the comic is certainly an obvious tribute to the more famous (and infamous) bits of the original run, it's not grandiose about it. You could easily read this as a grand finale for the first run, or even a way to tie together many older elements within the past arcs. This isn't so much a way to resolve possible dangling plot threads (as there were surprisingly few in the whole run) as a way to work older characters and ideas long discarded back into the overall tale. Think of it as how more than a few big franchises resurrect old favourites for their finales and you'll not be far off of the mark.
Yet what proved to be a surprising benefit to the comic was, ultimately, how it ends up throwing a surprising number of shout outs to the wider universe. The change of the Rebel Alliance to the New Republic is a big one, of course, but both in minor bits of dialogue and background events you see no shortage of tributes, references and mentions of other EU ideas. It's an excellent addition as, while it never gets in the way of the story, it ultimately helps to serve as a tip of the hat to the bigger setting. More than a few people are ultimately buying this as a way to support the EU, so it's a great way of rewarding them.
Yet more than anything else, the comic is just good fun. While most of these praiseworthy points have largely sidestepped the story in question, that's just to prevent too many details being offered. While the covers do unfortunately spoil one of its best elements, it's a story that you need to go into blind, as its pacing and engagement works best when you know little of it. While you get drama, actions and character moments, it's the kind of overblown sort that still manages to be fun rather than painful or tedious. In this day and age, that's a rare quality to be found.
So then, what went wrong here as well?
The Bad
Perhaps the biggest negative with #108 is how it, unfortunately, undoes some of the Star Wars' comics best moments in an effort to celebrate them. The big one everyone saw coming was the return of Beilert Valance, or Valance the Hunter, who honestly did not need to be revived. Valance was an excellent character and a great example of what Goodwin and his co-writers could accomplish on the comic. However, while the comic tries to justify his presence, far too much of it comes across as a needless epilogue to an excellent finale for him. That's the case with one or two lesser points as well, where older ideas are reintroduced, but rather than being celebratory, it undermines the value in how their stories ended.
The only other real problem lies with how it seems to often reintroduce the most recognizable bits above all else. It doesn't matter if it's pop culture or simple memory, but the comic has a focus on what people will easily pick up more than what really helped the comic come to life. As a result, you have characters like Jaxxon (a figure who Disney fans derided as a failing of the EU, only to love him once he was in their setting) popping up here. Jaxxon is mocked and beloved at once for his ridiculous design, but he barely showed up in the comic; with appearances six issues, which included him being on a background poster and a one-scene flashback. Yet because he's what stuck in people's heads, he's in here. It feels like a more negative element of pandering which is a flaw to an otherwise great comic.
The Verdict
On the whole, this was an entertaining piece calling back to an older era. It encapsulated much of what made the original comics works, and there was a definite effort not to wink at the audience too many times. Without that need to hint that it was in on the joke - or relentlessly enter the "lol ironic lol" territory of Marvel humour - it came across as something genuine. In that regard, I would definitely call this one a success.
If you're at all interested in the Marvel comics of the older eras, this is well worth picking up. If not, well, I would say buy it anyway. This is a rare chance to prove to Disney that people are willing to buy Expanded Universe material, and the story they demand should stay dead and buried has a fandom willing to support it. For its cheap price, it's well worth an easy buy.
Verdict: 8.2 out of 10
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