Star Wars: The Marvel UK Collection (2023 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Reading Challenge)

Marvel UK's Star Wars comics of the 1970s and 80s were quite a bit different than their American counterparts. For one thing, they were released on a weekly basis. Each issue only had about 8-10 pages of Star Wars story. So it might take 6-8 issues (2-3 months) for a storyline to resolve itself. Stories starring Star Lord, Alpha Flight and a segment called 'Tales of the Watcher' were comic segments that filled the rest of the weekly series.

More of a magazine than a traditional comic book, Star Wars Weekly would also include articles, interviews, contests and games, and activities for fans. Free gifts such as cut-out models of X-wings, attached sticker sheets and magic tricks meant that it's nearly impossible to find issues 100% intact. 

Most of the stories were reprints of the American Star Wars comic stories. But for one reason or another, the adventures often were released out of order. Often, shipping delays of the print plates were the result of the tales being published differently from that of the American run. However, the British version was also where rejected Star Wars tales got a second chance at life.

The frigid story 'The Kingdom of Ice' was originally slated to be published over a half dozen issues of the youth magazine Pizzazz. However, the publication's cancellation resulted in the story never reaching a conclusion, unless you happened to be a reader of Star Wars Weekly!

From early on, George Lucas put severe limits on Marvel's Star Wars titles. For one thing, none of the major characters could die (or if it appeared that they had died, it couldn't be permanent). There were a few other restrictions based on Lucas's plan for the sequels. The most important rule the publisher could not break was that Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader were forbidden from meeting each other in print!

Most of the rejected stories happened within the first year of the series. Once Marvel had a good idea what Lucas was looking for, the rejections ceased. Yet, it's not like these rejected tales never saw the light of day. Aside from appearing across the pond in Star Wars Weekly, the discarded tales were collected in a pair of Marvel Illustrated paperback books in the US. These collections now command a hefty price tag, generally with a current asking price of $40-100 each. 

Shipping delays from the American office would force Marvel UK to come up with some original material of their own. Alan Moore (Saga of the Swamp Thing) cut his teeth on no less than 3 shorts. They show flashes of Moore's genius as well as love for complex storylines that were very much not typical for a galaxy far, far away. Moore's 'Tilotny Throws A Shape' is a metaphysical piece where main character Princess Leia barely has anything to do with the plot. Yet the unexpected conclusion ranks up there with some of the greatest twists endings ever created by the staff of the legendary publisher EC Comics who made such finales an art form!

The Marvel UK Collection is over 750 pages and when it sold new in 2017, it retailed for $100. Ollie's would end up selling copies of this book for $29.99 in 2021. This anthology is massive, but as Star Wars Weekly (later going to monthly) ran for 171 issues plus and sister title Return of the Jedi Weekly squeaked out another 155 editions, it would be impossible to reprint all of the contests, articles and IQ quizzes that were included in these comics. That's probably a good thing as many of the pieces are repetitious to an ad nauseam degree. Plus a lot of this material has typos, erroneous facts and answers to solutions that are just plain wrong. 

At least fans can rest assured that all of the comics that ran as first run material in the UK are present in this gigantic tribute to Episodes IV-VI of the Star Wars trilogy!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars.

Completing this review completes Task #31 (Book over 500 Pages) of the 2023 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.