After a little fire alarm called the panel to a quick end, it resumed post-haste with the sly reveal of a Rey/Poe novel, details on the already announced Dark Horse comics, two The High Republic related announcements, the promise of secret projects from select authors, and an intriguing set of photos teasing what other stories are in the mix. Get all the details below, now!
The official site’s round-up of the panel doesn’t even mention this, but it was revealed Roseanne A. Brown will be writing a novel wrote a short story in Stories of Light and Dark about Rey and Poe Dameron that bridges the gap between The Last Jedi and their contentious relationship in The Rise of Skywalker. The author took to Twitter to explain it a tad more, offering the detail it’s a totally platonic friendship she’s exploring. I’m curious why this has flown under the radar, even if it is a middle grade book or something, I’m no longer curious as it wasn’t a book announcement but rather explaining her short story, but regardless as it’ll be interesting to see what other stories they can bring to the gap between films to help give us a fuller picture of the sequel trilogy era.
The two High Republic announcements are one that’s been rumored for awhile and another that’s a surprise. Titan will collect the Star Wars Insider‘s High Republic stories in a collection, due this September 27, which if you weren’t taking advantage of your library card and gaining access to Star Wars Insider monthly for free, will be a perfect way to finally experience these stories; and to add them to your shelf! The next one is a new release called Chronicles of the Jedi: An Illustrated Guide to the Galaxy’s Golden Age, out November 29 (UPDATE: now out in February 2023), this time from writer Cole Horton via Insight Editions, which is a in-universe document about the Jedi of the era, which Lucasfilm Publishing creative director Michael Siglain teased will have hints on Phase 2 and Phase 3 of the era’s story!
Announced just last week, Dark Horse’s return to comics includes the all-ages, 12-issue maxiseries Hyperspace Stories by writers Amanda Diebert, Cecil Castellucci, and Michael Moreci, as well as the Tales from the Rancor Pit miniseries, an all-ages Halloween/horror collection like IDW did every October. An intriguing new detail, alongside some interior art at the panel, was that all 12 issues of Hyperspace Stories will connect chronologically somehow, so it’s truly one big story hiding in there, somewhere; it starts in August. As for Tales from the Rancor Pit, beyond some interior art as well, we have an official cover finally, and we’ll have it in October!
And then it was all teases from there. Confirmed to be working on secret projects are authors E.K. Johnston, whose Queen’s Trilogy just wrapped up this year, Cavan Scott, an always busy man, Delilah S. Dawnson, who hasn’t written beyond anthology works in a bit, and Rodney Barnes, who is writing The Mandalorian comic adaptation. And the last tease was an actually really fun one, as they threw out a giant collage of characters/ideas, saying some of them would have stories in the future, some would not. There’s an image of a podracer there, so hoping we get a podracing book, Dash Rendar (oh please, not that), Qi’ra, Magna Tolvan (YES!), Therm Scissorpunch, REY SLOANE (which we’ve been begging forever for), Sana Starros (!!!), and more. Who do you think will star in a book next? I wish there’d been a little firmer confirmation on what’s to come, but this was a fun way to hint at would could be, at least.
Siglain putting this up after EKJ and Cavan both raise their hands and say they have super secret projects and that these pictures may or may not have something to do with it may be the most spectacular troll move I’ve ever seen and I am DYING pic.twitter.com/YXFbVRsORE
— Bria LaVorgna @ SWCA (@chaosbria) May 26, 2022
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