Korean writer and artist Writer Hong has been working with the Lucasfilm Story Group to create a new, canon webcomic that takes Luke Skywalker’s story as it leads up to “The Force Awakens.” It’s called “Star Wars: Story Before The Force Awakens” and you won’t be able to find an English translation, at least not yet.
It’s a scrolling webcomic and makes elegant use of the medium. Add to that the gorgeous art and coloring, it really doesn’t matter that I can’t read a word of it.
The most amazing part of it, though, is that it’s folding stories from outside of the movies into the narrative. Luke threads the stone needle in Beggar’s Canyon. There are confrontations between Ben and Uncle Owen. It’s bringing in moments from the NPR audio dramas and I hope we see more of this. More than anything, I want to see Leia’s story fold in, especially with all of the Lord Tion business, but this seems to be the story of “Star Wars” almost exclusively from Luke’s perspective.
According to StarWars.com’s liveblog from the canon panel at Star Wars: Celebration Anaheim, Jenn Heddle from the story group is, indeed, working with Hong to make this canon.
New episodes come out every Friday and you can read it on the Korean website Daum.Net.
I’m wondering how far it will go. Will it cross over through “Return of the Jedi” and get into the “Aftermath” era? Only time will tell.
If you’re interested in hearing it discussed in more detail, this was a topic of discussion (brought to us by the redoubtable Bobby Roberts) on the last episode of the Full of Sith podcast.