What comes as no big surprise and something that was inevitable when Disney acquired the Star Wars franchise. Disney has announced that it will not renew its Star Wars comic book rights with Dark Horse Comics but instead be making them in house with Marvel Comics which Disney owns. This is an end of an era as Dark Horse Comics has been making Star Wars comic books since 1991. Marvel which had the rights before from 1977 when the first movie came out will now be producing Star Wars comic books sometime in 2015.
Here is what Marvel Worldwide
Publisher and President Dan Buckley had to say about the announcement.
"We here at Marvel could not be more excited to continue the publication
of Star Wars comic books and graphic novels. The perennial brand of Star Wars
is one of the most iconic in entertainment history and we are honored to
have the opportunity to bring our creative talent pool to continue, and
expand Star Wars into galaxies far, far away."
Dark Horse Comics owner Mike Richards sent out this letter about the announcement.
The End of an
Era
All things come to pass. So
too, do all licensed deals. I am sad to report that Disney, the new owner of
Lucasfilm, has notified us here at Dark Horse of their intention to move
the Star Wars publishing license to another of their recent
acquisitions, Marvel Comics, beginning in 2015. This will end a partnership that
has lasted more than two decades.
For those who are new to the
industry, Dark Horse revolutionized the treatment of comics based on films.
After a history of movie properties being poorly handled with little regard for
execution and continuity, Dark Horse took a new approach, carefully choosing
licenses and approaching them with excitement and creative energy. Our goal was
to create sequels and prequels to the films we loved, paying careful attention
to quality and detail, essentially treating those films as though they were our
own. Star Wars has been the crown jewel of this approach. We began
chasing the title as far back as 1989, and with the launch of Tom Veitch and Cam
Kennedy’s Dark Empire, a new era in comics was born. I’m not ashamed to
admit that we were Star Wars geeks, and we have been determined to spare neither
effort nor expense in the pursuit of excellence.
It is ironic that this
announcement comes at a time when Dark Horse is experiencing its most successful
year ever. For obvious reasons, we have prepared for this eventuality by finding
new and exciting projects to place on our schedule for 2015 and beyond. Will
they take the place of Star Wars? That’s a tall order, but we will do our best to
make that happen. In the meantime, 2014 may be our last year at the helm of the
Star Wars comics franchise, but we plan to make it a memorable
one. We know that fans of the franchise will expect no less. The Force is with
us still.
So Star Wars has a new home in 2015 to coincide with a new movie and a new era for Star Wars has begun.
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