Jason Aaron

Marvels' Star Wars line has gotten off to a strong start, with the first two powerhouse installments of Jason Aaron and John Cassaday's Star Wars offering up some of the most exciting issues of space wizard comics we've read in a long time. If that wasn't enough, the premiere issue of Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca's Darth Vader drops today, promising even more thrills, spills, chills and black-armored grills in that galaxy far, far away. As great as other Star Wars comics have been, these issues have felt the Star-Warsiest in a long time, prompting us to launch this new feature, All For the Wookiee, where we take a look at the recent Star Wars universe offerings from Marvel and pick the most Star Wars-ish moments to share with you, dear reader. Spoilers follow. You have been warned.

Star Wars and Marvel Comics have a long history. A Marvel adaptation of the original sci-fi-fantasy film appeared in April 1977, a month before A New Hope dominated multiplexes in May of the same year. The success of the film as well as the comics led to a volume of over 100 issues over a nine-year span, featuring stories about what happened to the heroes of the Rebellion between their big screen adventures. Following Marvel parent Disney's acquisition of Lucasfilm, this week sees the return of the Star Wars Universe to the Marvel banner, with a new ongoing series from Jason Aaron and John Cassaday launching on Wednesday. It's a strong debut from an A-list creative team who manages to capture the feel of George Lucas's film A New Hope while still taking advantage of the entirety of the Saga.

We're less than a week away from the launch of Marvel's Star Wars line with the first issue of, hey, Star Wars, by Jason Aaron, John Cassaday, and Laura Martin, so Marvel has put out a couple of sneak peaks of the issue -- one lettered, one unlettered. We've helpfully brought them together so you can enjoy more of the story of fan favorite character Overseer Aggadeen and... the cast of Firefly, I think? I don't really know Star Wars; sorry. Star Wars #1 is an officially in-continuity comic (for now, anyway!) that picks up directly after the end of Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope, following the adventures of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia, Cowardly Lion, Tin Man and Scarecrow in the wake of the destruction of the Death Star. Finally, a sequel to Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope! I can't believe they've never done that before.

I'm not really a beer drinker, but that has never stopped any of my friends who do enjoy the bitter taste of malt and hops from trying to convince me to give it a shot. "Oh, this one's pretty sweet, it's like chocolate" they'll say, giving me something that doesn't taste anything like a milkshake, or "it's an acquired taste." I have never acquired it, but really, if they actually wanted to get me interested in beer, they should've probably told me there's one out there that comes with a story by two dudes who did that issue of Ghost Rider about demonic truckers. That, at least, is the strategy currently being employed by Chicago's Arcade Brewery, who have released a new six-pack called Festus Rotgut Black Wheat Ale, in which the labels tell a six-part story by Jason Aaron and Tony Moore.

If you've been wondering why people have been asking you "a/s/l?" all day and then following it up with a friendly "haha nice," it's because it's Cyber Monday! Today, we all set aside a little time for the tradition of shopping as our ancestors did so many snowy winters ago: on the internet in pajamas. Truly, it is the most wonderful time of the year. To that end, a lot of your favorite online retailers are having sales today, including the digital comics retailers at Comixology! In fact, there's so much on there that we have decided to take it upon ourselves to guide you to the best of Comixology's Cyber Monday Sale!

Here's the good news: According to some recent research by FiveThirtyEight.com, the website that applies data to just about everything -- most notably, US elections -- the ratio of female to male characters in mainstream superhero comics is improving, and more LGBT characters are showing up in Marvel and DC's pages. That said, the numbers still aren't great. "Female characters make up only 30.9 percent of the DC universe and 30.6 percent of the Marvel universe," the site's report states. In a world where women are 51 percent of all people, that's not so representative.

Image Comics' Southern Bastards has a lot to offer people who enjoy a good crime/revenge comic like I do. There's palpable tension, a sense of some serious wrongs that need to be righted, and people fighting each other with bats (one of them the remnant of a tree that grew out of a grave and was struck by lightning) in the middle of the street. But, you might say, there are lots of crime comics out there. Heck, Jason Aaron, the writer of Southern Bastards, has penned a good many himself. Scalped and his Punisher run, to name a couple. Southern Bastards is something really special, though, because of the way Aaron and artist Jason Latour embrace its setting so deeply and wholeheartedly.

If there's one problem that we as comics readers all share, it's that we just have too much money. Sure, we keep trying to give it to publishers and creators, but sometimes there just aren't enough comics to buy, and that's why we always need more great books out there to pick up. Fortunately, the good folks over at Comixology are doing their best to make that as easy as possible, and this week, those efforts are taking the form of the Image Comics "New Hits" Sale. A ton of great new Image books like Southern Bastards, The Wicked + The Divine, Velvet, Burn the Orphanage and more have seen their first few issues dropped down to 99 cents each, and on top of that, there's a bundle of 20 first issues for just fifteen bucks.

If you're picking up Thor #1 this week, by Jason Aaron and Russell Dauterman, to see the much-hyped new Thor in action, you're going to be a little disappointed. While it's a very good comic that promises great stories to come, the new Thor only appears in two pages that you might already have seen floating around online. Rather than launch straight in to the new Thor's adventures, this first issue teases her arrival, leaving the action for next month -- presumably in an effort to hold as much of the first issue readership as possible. As a result this issue feels more like the end of the last Thor title than the start of a new one.

It's over. Original Sin, by Jason Aaron, Mike Deodato, and Frank Martin, is finished. Everyone go home and hug your children. But not before one last pulse-pounding Original Spin recap -- the only comic event recap that digs through the trash and uses the really long lens to find out what's really going on the comics. Previously: The Watcher died; a truth bomb detonated; Nick Fury picked out random entries from the Official Handbook to investigate; they investigated; they found out Nick Fury killed a lot of E.T. dudes. Now: Everyone is on the moon, which sounds like a party, but it's seriously lacking in atmosphere. (Um, actually, it's well-established that the Blue Area of the Moon has its own atmosphere in Marvel comics continuity, thankyou.) This report exclusive to ComicsAlliance. Spoilers follow.