Contemporary Motivators: Star Wars (1978, Comic Book)

Format: Comic Book
Writer: Linda A. Cadrain
Penciller: Charles Nicholas
Publisher: Pendulum Press
Publication Date: 1978
Reading Time: 24 minutes
Note: This comic originally came with a cassette tape that plays audio along with it. I couldn't find a copy of it so this is just a review of the comic itself. If I ever find a copy of the cassette then I'll give this comic another look.

In my quest to read all Star Wars comics it seems to be taking me to a few weird places like this. Back in 1978 Pendulum Press published this adaptation of the original film. It is different from the comic adaptation in issues 1-6 of the Marvel series. Essentially Pendulum Press sent out this package to schools which contained a few copies of this comic, a cassette tape, a film strip, a poster, and a different cassette to go with the film strip. This comic is pretty hard to find since it was only sold to schools and from what I can tell didn't sell particularly well.

The issue doesn't add anything to the story but instead is a rather compressed retelling of the movie. Much of the dialogue is written to speed through scenes and some scenes are cut out entirely. For example, Ben Kenobi and simply tells Luke that he found some people to fly a ship to Alderaan. From there they go straight to the hanger and meet up with Han and Chewie. The entire scene in the cantina is cut out. This is a pretty standard practice within the issue. Considering that this is taking a two hour movie and compressing it into thirty pages the issue does a good job at hitting the main plot points.

The vocabulary is scaled back a little bit while some of the bigger words (such as "governor" or "route") have an asterisk next to them with a description of the word at the bottom of the page. This is a good way at getting kids interested in reading while also expanding their vocabulary. As an adult it doesn't really do much for me though. Then again, I'm not exactly the target audience here.

Even though the issue is in black and white the artwork here is pretty well done and has enough detail for my liking. Darth Vader in particular looks great but a few of the other characters such as C-3PO just don't look right.

Overall, this is a very odd comic. I feel like it succeeds in its goal for teaching purposes and condensing the movie down. However, I cannot recommend it in 2017. The issue speeds through the plot too fast, it is hard to find, and there are no extra scenes or anything new for Star Wars fans. Give this one a miss.