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Star Wars Omnibus: A Long Time Ago... Vol. 2 Paperback – September 29, 2010

by Archie Goodwin (Author), Chris Claremont (Author), Others (Author, Artist),
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 86 ratings
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Collecting issues #28-49, and the first King-Sized Annual, from the Marvel Comics Star Wars series that launched in 1977 (the same year as the first film), this second volume of Star Wars Omnibus: A Long Time Ago.... is a must have for any Star Wars fan.
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  1. Part of Series
    Star Wars: The Rebellion
  2. Print length
    480 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Publisher
    Dark Horse
  5. Publication date
    September 29, 2010
  6. Grade level
    7 - 9
  7. Dimensions
    6 x 0.84 x 8.99 inches
  8. ISBN-10
    1595825541
  9. ISBN-13
    978-1595825544
  10. See all details
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Dark Horse; First Edition (September 29, 2010)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 480 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1595825541
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1595825544
  • Grade level ‏ : ‎ 7 - 9
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.75 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.84 x 8.99 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 86 ratings

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
86 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Bob with two o's
5.0 out of 5 stars May the force be with you
Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2022
Verified Purchase
Excellent reproduction of comic books I used to have back in the '80s I definitely plan on buying the rest of them although they are not exact comic book size they're a little bit smaller but I still love it perfect for on the road reading for me
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W. D. Preece
4.0 out of 5 stars A good value.
Reviewed in the United States on December 30, 2012
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As for the publishing = This is a second run of Dark Horse reprint volumes of the 1977 series from Marvel Comics. Each run has the heading "Star Wars: A Long Time Ago..." but this run refers to each volume as an "omnibus." These Dark Horse volumes (both runs) are a low cost alternative to buying the original comics (which I have, and in excellent condition often run over $10 each), and have much better coloring and production quality than the original comics. My only real negative on this "omnibus" run is the smaller size. These feel more like manga books than true comic TPBs. If that's okay with you, then these are the way to go. But if you can afford the first run of Dark Horse trades, I would recommend those instead. They look better, have brighter and more attractive covers.

As for the content = The Marvel series was a bit of a mess. Most of the run does not feel like Star Wars material. The best issues are from the Empire era, from about issue #39 to #81 or so. Issues from the Episode IV era (#1-#38) feel like standard science fiction stories that don't quite fit into the Star Wars franchise. Some are good despite this, but most are odd. This happened largely because Marvel writers were not given much to work with, but that doesn't excuse artist Carmine Infantino's blatant disregard for technology designs. It's not much to ask for him to draw blasters and ships as they appeared in the movies. And the art of the first movie adaptation, done by an otherwise well respected artist, is utterly abysmal. But the art and stories get much better with Empire Strikes Back. The ESB adaptation was drawn by one of the best in the business, Al Williamson. The art and stories beginning with issue 49 actually feel like Star Wars stories. Well worth reading. I didn't like the new species of Hoojibs, however. I thought they were too silly. But after Phantom Menace and the Gungans, I cut the Hoojibs some slack. After Return of the Jedi (also done by Al Williamson), the series declines. They keep a Star Wars feel as long as Tom Palmer and Bob McLeod handle the art. By issue 101, the series is unrecognizable. Cynthia Martin's art is wholly inappropriate for this franchise, and Jo Duffy's stories drift into silliness.

I cherish this series out of nostalgia. This was a long time before Dark Horse brought the best SW comics I could ever hope for. Novelizations (Han Solo and Lando Calrissian each had three book series) weren't really much better than the Marvel comics, being written as general sci-fi with Star Wars players. It seemed hopeless to expect any better. So if you're not coming from a position of nostalgia, these might not be worth your time.

I give this volume an inflated FOUR STARS because (1) most of it is post-ESB; (2) the production is excellent, especially the coloring and slick pages; (3) reasonably priced at $25 retail; and (4) because Dark Horse is really doing longtime Star Wars fans a favor by keeping this historic run in print. I could not give it a fifth star, however, because of the smaller page size and unattractive cover design. The manga-size pages really bother me. It will keep me from buying other DH omnibus editions (it'll have to contain material I can't find otherwise).
3 people found this helpful
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C. Gregory
5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome followup...
Reviewed in the United States on October 26, 2013
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It's great to have this series collected and reprinted in a form everyone can enjoy. For those who do not want to hunt down the 100 plus issues, this is the best place to go. The stories are fun, the art is great and well this is a must have for all star wars fans, you won't be disappointed. Just ignore the small inaccuracies you might find while these books may go astray from the established canon of star wars, as stand alone stories, they are great and enjoyable.
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Kletter
5.0 out of 5 stars Great memories1
Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2013
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I order all 4 volumes for my husband's birthday! He loved them! He said he had so many memories from his childhood reading these!
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John Nulph
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on January 30, 2016
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Awesome read!
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H
3.0 out of 5 stars Nostalgic
Reviewed in the United States on April 20, 2017
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This was a nostalgia purchase. Read these when i was a kid and had to have another look.
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Samuel B. White
4.0 out of 5 stars Love these old comics
Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2013
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These old "Star Wars" comics are still my favorites. The newer ones, by Dark Horse, may fit better into the soon-to-be-rewritten-so-it-doesn't-matter canon, but these take me back to the days when I was waiting for each issue because it was the only Star Wars I could get between movies. [Note to kids: this was back during the dark ages, when I couldn't just put in a tape or DVD of the movies.] Looking back now, some of the stories seem goofy, and Jabba the Hutt has changed in both appearance and demeanor, but the stories are just fun! Plus, I like having 24 comic books in a volume like this so I can read them one after another instead of having to wait a month between installments.

Just kinda miss the advertisements for X-Ray glasses and Sea Monkeys.
8 people found this helpful
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Babytoxie
5.0 out of 5 stars More forgotten classics
Reviewed in the United States on November 7, 2010
Dark Horse continues to make me happy with their release of STAR WARS OMNIBUS: A LONG TIME AGO... VOLUME 2, collecting issues 28 - 49, plus Annual #1 of the Marvel Comics series in beautiful remastered color. This is one of my favorite series of all time, and considering that the stories were regarded less and less as canon as time went on, it's a wonder that they are even being acknowledged, much less collected. Still, Lucasfilm will do anything to make a buck these days, so thumbs-up to them in this instance.

At the time issue 28 saw print, the release of The Empire Strikes Back was on the horizon, and series regulars Archie Goodwin and Carmine Infantino were taking the occasional break, allowing for other talents, such as Chris Claremont, Michael Golden, Mike Barr, Larry Hama, JM DeMatteis, and Mike Vosburg, to provide some variety. Even with these other creators joining in, the stories seem more tight as we get further into the series. The volume begins by concluding some earlier storylines featuring Valance the bounty hunter, Baron Orman Tagge, and that yellow-skinned Nimbanel who goes around calling himself Jabba the Hut - that's right, only one "t". Infantino's art still looks great, but Vosburg provides some absolutely beautiful pencils for Annual #1, and Goodwin and Golden squeeze in perhaps the most highly-regarded story of the series, "Riders in The Void", right before Goodwin and Al Williamson begin their exceptional ESB adaptation. As Williamson had passed on the opportunity to illustrate the Star Wars comic strips years earlier, to finally have him illustrate these characters on the comic book page was a real treat. You'll also see new colorful characters such as the conflicted Baroness Domina Tagge; Kharys, the Majestrix of Skye; the lost Rebel hero Cody Sunn-Childe; and the reclusive cyborg Kligson. It appears that after the ESB adaptation, there was an effort to make the main characters in the comic look more like the actors, perhaps due to heavier involvement from Lucasfilm. While Infantino returns to pencil several of the later stories in this book, his standard faces have been heavily altered.

Volume 2 contains some real continuity flubs that provide the occasional laugh, but I can't hold it against the writers, as they were simply working with what they were given at the time (if George Lucas truly had a grand plan from the beginning, as he claims, we see none of it here). So, kudos to Dark Horse for reprinting these stories, especially in an affordable digest format. It just goes to show that Marvel knew what they were doing when they took on this license. I'm hoping that we'll soon get to see some of the early non-Marvel material in these volumes, as promised by Dark Horse.
19 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

Mr. J. B. I. Allen
5.0 out of 5 stars Loved the first
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 12, 2017
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Loved the first, and this one too-reading it is easy and a pleasure even on my 4" phone screen. And at the kinde price one can't go wrong. A nostalgic treat!
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Helmut Lichtenegger
5.0 out of 5 stars Fun to read
Reviewed in Germany on April 7, 2016
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It is not the offical storyline. But as real Star wars fan a look back in history is great. Interesting storys,typical adventures of all well knowh heroes ans a few others as well. Just read ans enjoy😁
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Harmony K.
5.0 out of 5 stars very enjoyable
Reviewed in Canada on April 15, 2012
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A large part of this volume is a novelization of The Empire Strikes Back. The rest is original material. On the whole, I enjoyed the book very much.

The only complaint I have is that some things are not very logical.

For example there's this death ray that kills by producing cold... Fine, but how is that supposed to be even noticed when used in outer space, against spaceships, where normal temperatures are already as low as it gets?

Or the human-sized shape-shifter who turns into a butterfly (normal-size butterfly, mind you). No way could a butterfly of that weight fly with wings of that size.

Or Lord Vader, who suddenly becomes totally harmless because Aargau's laws don't allow him to carry a weapon. What happened to his Force-choke skill for example? Or why can't he just lift Leia 100 metres up with the Force and let her drop? Or why not drop a landspeeder on her with the Force? Or maybe use the Force to move her head to the left and her body to the right? So many possibilities, and he can't think of one? A Sith Lord with 20 years of experience on the job?
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Andrew
4.0 out of 5 stars Great fun
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 11, 2020
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Shows it's age with some of the artwork but still great fun. Looking forward to volume three. The post Empire stories were classics
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turtlesedge
4.0 out of 5 stars This volume contains the six issue adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back
Reviewed in Canada on April 24, 2015
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The second volume in the A Long Time Ago series features the issues that lead up to the Marvel adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back, which is the core of this book, and the first issues that directly followed it. The general awesomeness of the Empire Strikes Back comics is both a good thing and a bad thing: the art on Empire is such a faithful reproduction of the film, whereas the art in the adaptation of the first Star Wars film and the issues that followed differed greatly from George Lucas' vision. Here, the contrast is somewhat problematic, since, with Empire, we finally get drawings of Darth Vader, R2-D2, C-3PO, as well as the various iconic space ships, that are exactly like those in the films, which makes the post-Empire switch harder to take in, since there was no effort to maintain that specific aesthetic, and the reader must accept that the stories that follow the classic film feature art that approximates the imagery of the films, but remains quite different. That "alternative" visual context worked better in Volume 1, where all the issues included featured the same artistic approach, which made it easier for the reader to accept it for what it is and engage in it. Here, after reading the six issues that constitute the Empire adaptation, one can only wonder why the editors chose to go back to the cheesy, "Flash Gordon" type approach that characterized the first issues of this comic book series.

Of the issues that serve as bookends to Empire, the first part of this Omnibus is the most interesting. As those who followed the comic book series from the beginning know, the Marvel team had complete freedom to do what they wanted with the characters from the original 1977 Star Wars film. A direct consequence of this was that the direction taken by Marvel differed radically from where Lucas was planning to go in his 1980 sequel, hence the incredible amount of contradictions (Jabba the Hutt as a humanoid dog-like alien, for example, or the fact than Han Solo actually pays his debt to the famous gangster in one of the early issues). Here, since The Empire Strikes Back was released before the comic book adaptation, the people at Marvel had a few months (and a few issues) to correct their "mistakes" and try to link their story arc to the beginning of Empire as best they could. Considering how little time they had to turn this thing around, one can only be amazed at the story ideas they rapidly came up with to plausibly set the stage for the beginning of the sequel, where the Empire finally catches up with the Rebel Alliance on Hoth.
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