Star Wars returns to Dark Horse Comics and all-ages storytelling in the anthology Star Wars: Hyperspace Stories #1 written by Amanda Deibert, illustrated by Lucas Marangon, colored by Michael Atiyah, and lettered by Tyler Smith, and Jimmy Betancourt.
It’s good to see the Dark Horse logo back on a Star Wars book.
After all, without Dark Horse, Star Wars wouldn’t be the same today. Even better, Star Wars Hyperspace Stories #1, the issue bearing that logo, is a lot of fun.
Star Wars is one of those concepts that truly is all ages. We can get the slightly more kid oriented antics of The Phantom Menace, standing side-by-side with the darker and more violent themes found in The Mandalorian or Book of Boba Fett. With the hard-canon ongoing comic series at Marvel exploring a little more mature side of the galaxy in serialized stories, a more self-contained, canon-lite and fun all-age series is a given.
Hyperspace Stories is the spiritual successor to IDW’s Star Wars Adventures line of comics, but it’s a very different series right off the bat. Rather than the pair of short stories Adventures usually featured, Star Wars: Hyperspace Stories #1 contains a single 24 page story, with a handful of elements that may return in later stories. And while Adventures was usually nebulous with canon to the point that it was hard to see where many stories fit in (especially if you’re the kind of fan where continuity is important), it’s easy to place this story in the larger Star Wars narrative right away.
Writer Amanda Deibert picked the perfect starting place for the launch issue: an Anakin-Padme-Obi-Wan adventure set just after the Clone Wars began. Her plot isn’t deeply rooted in well known Star Wars history, which makes it easily accessible, both for an all-ages book and for a self-contained one-off story. After the Separatists capture Padme, Kenobi and Skywalker leap into action to rescue her. It’s a plot that’s easily accessible, allowing a younger reader to jump right in. For parents, or even fans without kids, Deibert packs the story full of details for them to enjoy, like the cheeky dialogue between Anakin and Padme the moment after he discovers his wife doesn’t really need rescuing. You can see Deibert’s experience in kids’ TV shine through, but also the understanding that sometimes, a parent needs to be able to enjoy their kids’ media as much as the kiddos do.
Artist Lucas Marangon’s style is perfectly on-model, but he makes a point to avoid mimicking style of Clone Wars or Rebels. He also has a great eye for action, making sure that what’s happening is clear, despite the limited page count, while also making it exciting to a young reader. His character acting is fantastic too – Deibert’s banter between the leads works even better with the smirks and nods that Marangon gives each character as they move through the story.
Beyond that, Star Wars: Hyperspace Stories #1 does two things really well. For one, it proves that these sorts of all-ages stories belong in the Star Wars universe. While I enjoyed the most recent issue of Charles Soule’s Star Wars from Marvel, I had no desire to pick it up and share it with my kids. After reading my digital copy of this, however, I have the itch to purchase a print copy and hand it to my seven-year-old. This is the sort of story that will keep an already generational interest in the Galaxy Far Far Away alive, and I’m excited to share it with my family.
Beyond that, this confirmed to me something I’ve had in the back of my mind for a long time. Even with seven seasons of television, the Clone Wars is still an extremely fertile period for storytelling. This story is set no more than a couple months after Attack of the Clones, and shows our heroes are still growing. Anakin might be a Jedi Knight now, not a Padawan, but he still has a lot to learn. Though we know this series isn’t sticking with the Clone Wars – next issue is an original trilogy-era Luke and Leia story – Diebert planted seeds to revisit. I hope she is able to regularly, because she has a great grasp of these characters. There’s clearly more stories to tell in this setting.
What a great return for Star Wars to the company that once helped bring the franchise back from obscurity. This is a story that I’m excited to share with others – both my own kids, and fellow parents looking for something filled with Jedi to share with their own lightsaber-wielding children.
Tony Thornley is a geek dad, blogger, Spider-Man and Superman aficionado, X-Men guru, autism daddy, amateur novelist, and all around awesome guy. He’s also very humble.
