Dark Horse Answers A Few Burning Questions About ‘Star Wars’ Moving To Marvel

Following last week's statements regarding the transition of the Star Wars comic book license from Dark Horse Comics to Marvel, the biggest questions weren't whether Darth Vader would meet Doctor Doom or who The House of Ideas would hire to helm its presumed projects in 2015. Many were curious about Dark Horse's backlist -- some 20 years of comic book stories by hundreds of prominent writers, artists and other creators --and the continuity they'd built outside that of the canon established in Lucasfilm's six features and related tie-ins (those two Ewok movies were wild, man). Also in question was the future of Dark Horse Comics V.P. of Publishing and Star Wars editor Randy Stradley. Now, thanks to a response from Dark Horse, we have at least a few more answers.

When asked whether it would retain its publishing rights to its backlist and keep re-issuing previous material or if Marvel would be absorbing its backlist, Dark Horse stated "All rights go to Marvel." Dark Horse has said that Star Wars Comics purchased before 2015 on Dark Horse Digital will remain on its cloud afterward, but print copies of existing material will not continue. Marvel hasn't announced any of its publishing plans yet and declined early comment, so its still unknown if they'll pursue collecting seminal works like The Dark Empire Trilogy or even its own previous 114(ish) issue series that was published between 1977 and 1986 (which, of course, Dark Horse recollected during its time with the license).

As to whether there are any plans for Marvel to continue stories started at Dark Horse, the publisher could only say, "We have no idea." ComicsAlliance also asked Marvel, which wasn't able to provide comment yet.

Dark Horse did confirm that Stradley will be staying at the publisher after 2014. His new editorial (or perhaps non-editorial) duties will be announced soon.

Finally, when asked whether Dark Horse will use 2014 -- its final year with the Star Wars license -- to produce storylines that effectively conclude its various Star Wars sagas, the publisher's official line was, "Only the stories initiated by Dark Horse."

There are still a small galaxy's worth of questions that remain regarding the transition, but for now the conclusion seems to be that Stradley is set at Dark Horse for the time to come and that after 2014 all of the, well, whatever ball sports they play in the Star Wars universe will be in Marvel's court.