STAR WARS #40 (1980) — KEY — 1ST TEAM APPEARANCE OF ROGUE SQUADRON IN A STANDARD U.S. COMIC
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Up for sale is a highly collectible copy of Star Wars #40, published by Marvel Comics in 1980. This important early Star Wars key features the first team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic book and continues Marvel's original adaptation of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back with the legendary Battle of Hoth.
Rogue Squadron would grow into one of the most recognizable and beloved military units in the entire Star Wars universe, becoming closely associated with Luke Skywalker, Wedge Antilles, the Rebel Alliance, X-wing combat, novels, comics, and the enormously popular Rogue Squadron video-game series.
For collectors, there is an important first-appearance distinction:
Marvel Super Special #16 — 1st team appearance of Rogue Squadron
Star Wars #39 — 1st mention of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic
Star Wars #40 — 1st team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic
That makes #40 the regular comic-book key for collectors following the squadron's earliest Marvel appearances.
Star Wars #40 features:
• 1st team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic book
• Part Two of Marvel's The Empire Strikes Back adaptation
• Legendary Battle of Hoth
• Luke Skywalker leads the Rebel pilots against Imperial AT-AT walkers
• Wedge Antilles appearance
• Rogue Squadron in action
• Imperial assault on Echo Base
• Darth Vader appearance
• Han Solo appearance
• Princess Leia appearance
• Chewbacca appearance
• C-3PO and R2-D2 appearances
• Archie Goodwin adaptation
• Al Williamson artwork
• Carlos Garzon inks
• 1980 Marvel Comics
• Major Original Trilogy storyline
This is an issue where an important Star Wars team key intersects with one of the most famous battles in the entire franchise.
The primary collector significance of Star Wars #40 is its designation as the first team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic book.
The wording is important.
Rogue Squadron had already appeared in Marvel Super Special #16, the oversized magazine-format adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back.
Then Star Wars #39 provides the first Rogue Squadron mention in Marvel's standard U.S. comic format.
Here in Star Wars #40, collectors get the team's first appearance together in the regular U.S. comic series.
That makes #40 an important book for collectors specifically interested in the publication history of Rogue Squadron.
Few military units created for Star Wars have developed the following of Rogue Squadron.
The Rogues represent the elite pilots of the Rebel Alliance.
They aren't Jedi Knights.
They don't possess supernatural abilities.
They climb into starfighters and combat vehicles and face the Empire with training, courage, teamwork, and extraordinary flying ability.
That grounded quality helped make Rogue Squadron enormously popular.
During this era, Luke Skywalker is closely associated with Rogue Squadron.
Luke has come an extraordinary distance since the young farm boy readers first encountered on Tatooine.
He destroyed the first Death Star.
He became a hero of the Rebel Alliance.
He continued developing his abilities with the Force.
And by the time the Rebels establish themselves on Hoth, Luke has become an experienced combat pilot and leader.
But Luke's journey toward becoming a Jedi is far from complete.
That makes #40 an interesting snapshot of Luke at the intersection of his two identities:
Rebel pilot and future Jedi Knight.
Rogue Squadron's history is also inseparable from Wedge Antilles.
Wedge first appeared in Marvel's adaptation of the original Death Star battle and survived an engagement that killed many Rebel pilots.
He continued serving the Alliance.
He fought at Hoth.
He would later fight at Endor.
And his association with Rogue Squadron eventually became one of the defining elements of his character.
For many longtime Star Wars fans—particularly readers of the Expanded Universe—Wedge Antilles and Rogue Squadron are virtually inseparable.
Rogue Squadron's appearance in #40 occurs during one of the most iconic battles in Star Wars history:
The Battle of Hoth.
The Rebel Alliance has established Echo Base on the frozen planet.
But the Empire has discovered them.
Darth Vader's forces arrive with overwhelming military power.
Imperial troops.
Star Destroyers.
Ground forces.
And the enormous armored walkers known as:
AT-ATs.
The Rebels cannot realistically defeat the Imperial invasion.
Their objective becomes survival.
They need enough time to evacuate Echo Base before Vader's forces overwhelm them.
Luke and the Rebel pilots climb into their snowspeeders to confront the approaching Imperial walkers.
Visually, it becomes one of the most unforgettable sequences in The Empire Strikes Back.
Tiny Rebel speeders race around enormous mechanical war machines.
The size difference is almost absurd.
The AT-ATs tower above the battlefield.
Their armor can withstand tremendous punishment.
Their weapons can destroy Rebel positions with devastating force.
The Rebels have to improvise.
The Hoth battle demonstrates exactly what makes Rogue Squadron appealing.
The Rebels don't possess superior equipment.
They don't have overwhelming numbers.
They have pilots.
And those pilots have to find a way to turn skill and ingenuity into an advantage.
The snowspeeders maneuver around the massive walkers while the Rebels desperately search for weaknesses.
This isn't a battle fought from a position of strength.
It is a delaying action against a vastly more powerful enemy.
One of the most memorable solutions involves the snowspeeders' tow cables.
If the Rebels cannot simply blast through the AT-AT armor, they can attack the walkers another way.
The speeders circle their enormous legs.
Tow cables wrap around them.
The legs become entangled.
And the massive Imperial machines can be brought crashing to the ground.
It is one of the most inventive battle sequences in the Original Trilogy.
And Rogue Squadron is directly at the center of it.
The Rebel pilots pay heavily for the time they buy.
The Empire's forces are overwhelming.
Pilots and gunners are lost.
Vehicles are destroyed.
Echo Base cannot be held.
But every minute the Rebels delay the Imperial advance gives more people an opportunity to escape.
That gives Rogue Squadron's actions at Hoth a heroic quality different from the Death Star battle.
At Yavin, the Rebels are trying to win.
At Hoth:
They are trying to survive.
Meanwhile, Darth Vader is determined to reach Luke Skywalker.
Vader's obsession with the young Rebel has become increasingly important.
He knows Luke is connected to the Force.
He knows Luke destroyed the Death Star.
And he has learned something that changes the nature of his pursuit completely.
Luke isn't merely another Rebel.
Vader wants him personally.
That turns the Imperial assault on Hoth into more than a military operation.
Star Wars #40 is Part Two of Marvel's adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back.
The adaptation runs through Star Wars #39–44, making those six issues another natural Original Trilogy collecting set.
The structure parallels Marvel's original six-issue adaptation of A New Hope in #1–6.
For collectors, that means #40 has appeal on two levels:
It is part of the complete Empire Strikes Back adaptation.
And:
It has an individual Rogue Squadron key designation.
The Empire Strikes Back dramatically expanded what audiences understood about Star Wars.
The original movie introduced the galaxy.
Empire made that galaxy deeper.
Audiences encountered new worlds.
New characters.
New Force mythology.
And one of the greatest revelations in movie history.
The Battle of Hoth is the spectacular opening movement of that larger story.
The roots of Rogue Squadron stretch back to the Rebel pilots who fought during the attack on the first Death Star.
Red Squadron participated in the Battle of Yavin, with Luke Skywalker and Wedge Antilles among the pilots who survived.
Rogue Squadron would evolve from that Rebel starfighter tradition.
That lineage gives the unit enormous symbolic importance.
The pilots who fought the Empire at Yavin helped establish the foundation for the elite squadron fighting again at Hoth.
The name would eventually gain even deeper significance within modern Star Wars continuity.
Modern canon established that Luke chose the name Rogue Squadron in honor of Rogue One, the group of Rebels who sacrificed themselves to obtain the Death Star plans.
That creates a direct symbolic connection between generations of Rebel heroes.
Rogue One steals the plans.
Luke uses those plans to destroy the Death Star.
And later:
Rogue Squadron carries the name forward.
That connection adds another layer to the squadron's mythology.
Rogue Squadron's importance didn't end with the Battle of Hoth.
Over time, the unit became one of the most recognizable pieces of Star Wars military mythology.
The name expanded into:
Comics
Novels
Video games
Expanded Universe stories
and generations of Star Wars merchandise and collectibles.
For many fans, Rogue Squadron became almost a franchise within the franchise.
Rogue Squadron became particularly important through the enormously popular X-Wing novels.
Those stories expanded the lives of the pilots far beyond what audiences had seen in the films.
Wedge Antilles became a major central character.
New pilots joined the squadron.
The stories explored military missions, friendships, rivalries, losses, leadership, and the continuing war following the Original Trilogy.
For readers who grew up with those books, Rogue Squadron occupies a place in Star Wars history far larger than its screen time might suggest.
The name reached another generation through the Star Wars: Rogue Squadron video games.
Those games put players directly into the cockpit.
Instead of simply watching Rebel pilots fight the Empire, players could become them.
X-wings.
Y-wings.
Snowspeeders.
TIE fighters.
Imperial installations.
Famous battles.
The games helped cement Rogue Squadron as one of the most recognizable names associated with Star Wars starfighter combat.
That history gives Star Wars #40 an unusual collector reach.
Someone who grew up watching The Empire Strikes Back recognizes the Battle of Hoth.
Someone who read the X-Wing novels recognizes Rogue Squadron.
Someone who played the video games recognizes Rogue Squadron.
A Wedge Antilles collector recognizes the team's importance to his history.
A Marvel Bronze Age collector recognizes the early 1980 Star Wars series.
Different generations can arrive at this book for completely different reasons.
The adaptation was written by legendary comics writer and editor Archie Goodwin.
Goodwin had already become one of the defining creative voices of Marvel's original Star Wars series.
Adapting The Empire Strikes Back required taking one of the most visually ambitious science-fiction films of its era and translating it into sequential comic-book storytelling.
The Battle of Hoth alone presented a major challenge.
The artwork comes from legendary artist Al Williamson.
Williamson was extraordinarily well suited to Star Wars.
His career was deeply connected to science-fiction and adventure artwork, and his detailed, elegant linework gave the adaptation a cinematic quality.
For many collectors, Williamson's Star Wars artwork is itself a major attraction.
His ability to capture recognizable characters, machinery, alien environments, and enormous science-fiction settings made him an ideal artist for The Empire Strikes Back.
Carlos Garzon provides the inks, complementing Williamson's detailed pencils and helping give the adaptation its polished appearance.
The Williamson/Garzon art team became strongly associated with some of the most beautiful Star Wars comic artwork of the era.
Writer: Archie Goodwin
Penciller: Al Williamson
Inker: Carlos Garzon
Colorist: Glynis Oliver
Letterer: Rick Veitch
The creative pedigree gives #40 another layer of appeal beyond the Rogue Squadron key designation.
One thing I especially like about Star Wars #40 from a collecting standpoint is that the key event isn't isolated inside an otherwise ordinary issue.
The first regular U.S. comic team appearance of Rogue Squadron occurs during:
The Battle of Hoth.
That's exactly where a Rogue Squadron collector would want an early appearance to occur.
They're not standing around in the background.
The Rebels are fighting one of the most recognizable battles in Star Wars history.
The publication year also matters.
1980 was the year The Empire Strikes Back reached theaters.
Star Wars was still a young franchise.
There were only two theatrical films.
Many characters and concepts modern fans consider fundamental had only just been introduced.
These comics come directly from that original moment.
They weren't produced decades later as nostalgia.
They were being published while the Original Trilogy itself was still unfolding.
Star Wars #40 offers several strong reasons for collectors to take notice:
• 1st team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic
• Key Rogue Squadron issue
• Part Two of The Empire Strikes Back adaptation
• Battle of Hoth
• Luke Skywalker appearance
• Wedge Antilles appearance
• Rogue Squadron vs. Imperial AT-ATs
• Darth Vader appearance
• Han Solo appearance
• Princess Leia appearance
• Chewbacca appearance
• C-3PO and R2-D2 appearances
• Archie Goodwin adaptation
• Al Williamson artwork
• Carlos Garzon inks
• 1980 Marvel Comics
• Original Trilogy collectible
• Important early Rogue Squadron comic
• Connection to one of the most enduring Rebel units in Star Wars history
For collectors of Rogue Squadron, the publication sequence is especially useful:
Marvel Super Special #16 — 1st team appearance
Star Wars #39 — 1st Rogue Squadron mention in a standard U.S. comic
Star Wars #40 — 1st team appearance in a standard U.S. comic
That makes #40 the regular-format Marvel comic collectors commonly associate with the team's early appearance.
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Star Wars #40 is an important early Marvel Star Wars key featuring the first team appearance of Rogue Squadron in a standard U.S. comic book, while simultaneously adapting the legendary Battle of Hoth from The Empire Strikes Back.
Rogue Squadron would grow far beyond this early appearance, becoming one of the most recognizable units in Star Wars history through movies, comics, novels, Expanded Universe stories, and video games.
With Luke Skywalker and Wedge Antilles, the Battle of Hoth, the Imperial AT-AT assault, and beautiful Al Williamson / Carlos Garzon artwork, #40 combines a legitimate character-team key with one of the defining battles of the Original Trilogy.
For a serious Rogue Squadron, Wedge Antilles, Luke Skywalker, Empire Strikes Back, Marvel Star Wars, or Original Trilogy collection, Star Wars #40 is an issue with a clear and legitimate place among the important books of the original Marvel run.