Al Williamson (1931–2010)

I received this as a gift in the fall of 1980, a few months after seeing the newly released movie in theatres. This was significant in two respects, one being my impressionable age (7) and the other being that this predated the ability to re-watch movies at home, in any format. Thanks to this comic I could revisit the most spectacular movie I'd ever seen when I had no other means of doing so.

This is not strictly a scene-for-scene, line-by-line recreation of what you know. Like most adaptations that are composed at the same time as the film is in post-production, it has elements from earlier scripts and features scenes that were later cut, while missing others that were later added. It does not open with a star destroyer, and it includes the wampa attack on the rebel base. Darth Vader requests his ship as he is leaving Cloud City, which we didn't see him do on screen until the 1997 special edition.

Objects are not always accurately scaled (Yoda and the Executor, especially), and the shading gives an odd look to some scenes; as a prisoner of Cloud City, Han Solo looks ready for the discotheque. These are minor quibbles to me. I loved, and still love, every frame of my treasured copy and the fuel this provided to my young imagination. The original film trilogy is a significant memory for me and ESB most of all, in part because of this.… (more)

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/3538739.html

The comic adaptation of Return of the Jedi has only four issues, rather than the six for the two previous films. The action sequences, which are after all the main point, are well done.

In general I approve of the tightening up, yet I felt that we skipped a couple of interesting points here; most notably the ghost scene at the end with the shades of Anakin, Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi is absent, and though it's a bit silly I felt it gave closure to the story.… (more)