Cover: Al Williamson & Carlos Garzón

Star Wars #42

Dec 1980 · Marvel · 0.50 USD

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“The Empire Strikes Back Chapter Four: To Be a Jedi!”

About this Issue

Star Wars #42 stands as the first standard-format American comic book to feature Boba Fett — a character who parlayed a handful of screen minutes in The Empire Strikes Back into decades of pop-culture dominance, his own animated segments, novels, and a Disney+ live-action series. Beyond Fett, the single issue simultaneously delivers the first full comic book appearance of Yoda, the first cameo of Emperor Palpatine (rendered in shadowy hologram, exactly as in the film), and the debut of an entire gallery of bounty hunters — Bossk, Dengar, IG-88, 4-LOM, and Zuckuss — making it arguably the densest single issue of first appearances in the whole original Marvel run. The fact that all of this happens inside a movie adaptation, rather than an original story, underscores how the Bronze Age film-tie-in format could be just as historically momentous as any standalone superhero debut.

writer Archie Goodwin · artist, inker Al Williamson · artist, inker Carlos Garzón · colorist Glynis Wein · letterer Rick Veitch · cover Al Williamson, Carlos Garzón

ComicBooks.com Value

Our Model is In Beta

Raw (Fine) $105

CGC 9.8 · 601 in census $2,079

CGC 9.6 · 1197 in census $704

CGC 9.4 · 1264 in census $461

CGC 9.2 · 964 in census $461

CGC 9.0 · 902 in census $415*

CGC 8.5 · 812 in census $333*

Show all 22 grades ▾

CGC 8.0 · 607 in census $249

CGC 7.5 · 423 in census $231

CGC 7.0 · 364 in census $194

CGC 6.5 · 226 in census $177*

CGC 6.0 · 152 in census $172*

CGC 5.5 · 122 in census $149*

CGC 5.0 · 106 in census $146*

CGC 4.5 · 62 in census $124*

CGC 4.0 · 48 in census $114*

CGC 3.5 · 42 in census $95*

CGC 3.0 · 26 in census $91*

CGC 2.5 · 8 in census $72*

CGC 2.0 · 5 in census $64*

CGC 1.5 none in existence

CGC 1.0 none in existence

CGC 0.5 · 2 in census $31*

* estimate — limited direct-sales data at this grade

Our model’s value — refined as new sales data arrives · CGC census counts shown where available

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History

The story, titled 'To Be a Jedi!', was written and edited by Archie Goodwin, with interior and cover art by Al Williamson and Carlos Garzon, colored by Glynis Wein, lettered by Rick Veitch, and published under editor-in-chief Jim Shooter. It is the fourth chapter of a six-part serialization of The Empire Strikes Back that ran across Star Wars #39–44, and the interior artwork is itself a reprinting of pages originally prepared for Marvel Super Special #16 — the magazine-format adaptation released in spring 1980 — with Yoda's likeness redrawn to more closely match the finished film puppet rather than the gnome-like concept-art version seen in the earliest printing. Because the adaptation was running concurrently with the film's theatrical release, Lucasfilm placed creative restrictions on the team: the space slug lurking inside the asteroid cave was forbidden from being fully illustrated, as the studio wanted its screen appearance to remain a surprise for moviegoers.

Trivia · 8 facts

First standard-format American comic book appearance of Boba Fett, who appears on both the cover and the interior splash page, and even speaks dialogue not in the final film.
First full comic book appearance of Yoda; he made only a brief cameo introduction in the preceding issue, Star Wars #41.
First comic book cameo of Emperor Palpatine, appearing only as a shadowy hologram in transmission to Darth Vader — mirroring the scene as shot for the film.
First comic book cameo appearances of the bounty hunters Bossk, Dengar (Dengar Roth), IG-88, 4-LOM, and Zuckuss, all assembled by Vader to hunt the Millennium Falcon.
Debut of Slave I, Boba Fett's pursuit craft, which is named in this issue as he begins tailing Han Solo toward Bespin.
Written and edited by Archie Goodwin; art by Al Williamson and Carlos Garzon; cover also by Williamson and Garzon; published December 1980 with a 50¢ cover price.
The interior story is a reprint of pages from Marvel Super Special #16 (Spring 1980), itself the fourth printing of the same artwork — making Star Wars #42 the first time this material appeared in standard comic book format in the United States.
The issue includes a five-page bonus British cover gallery showcasing the UK variants for Star Wars #39–44, with art by Carmine Infantino, Gene Day, and Dan Green — a nod to the parallel Marvel UK weekly serialization that had already run this material months earlier.