It's a fascinating theory to contemplate, and Dark Horse has discovered that it's an amazingly fertile and mind-expanding angle from which to explore the already incredible stories told each month in Dark Horse's Star Wars comic books. Dark Horse's intrepid pop culture reporter Ivana Fanboy recently spoke with Chris Warner, writer of this first Infinities tale, about what it was like to tell a very different version of everyone's favorite science-fiction story.
Ivana Fanboy: Before we get started talking about the specific story you've written, please tell me the basic concept of the Star Wars: Infinities line ... what's going on here?
Chris Warner: The basic concept is pretty simple: what could have happened had certain key events in the Star Wars mythos turned out differently? I've always found the idea fascinating that our lives are constructed of a series of hugely significant and often seemingly insignificant events that somehow miraculously lead us to our unique present. Pull any key moment, and your present potentially changes radically. I mean, I'm probably in the career I am today because Randy Emberlin turned me on to Marvel Comics after we became friends in the second grade. Had he been assigned to the other second-grade class in my school before he moved across town the following summer, who knows where my future might have headed? And what about his career? I helped him get his first ink job at Marvel!
IF: The first series in the Infinities group is a re-imagined version of A New Hope, which you're writing. How did you approach thinking about this task? Did you watch the original movie again? Read the books?
CW: I'm a longtime fan of the Star Wars films, and I'd rediscovered them in recent years when my son became old enough to watch them and he became a confirmed Star Wars nut. So, I've watched the Star Wars films more times than I can count in the last three years! I've only a cursory knowledge of the Star Wars continuity outside the films (with the exception of the Star Wars comics Dark Horse has produced), and in the case of this particular series, I think that's an asset. I'm really trying to write something that's 100% referential to the films, which is the Star Wars experience for the vast majority of folks out there. While I'm fascinated and awestruck by the sheer size and complexity of the Star Wars universe, I wanted this Infinities storyline to refer only to the films and the characters introduced there.
IF: At some point you had to choose the exact point at which the story would turn in a direction that the original story didn't. What were some of the options you considered for this that you didn't use?
CW: Actually, the idea for the divergence I'm using was the first one that came to mind and the only one I really considered. This was a story I wanted to do, and I was lucky enough not to have to consider alternatives. Whew!
IF: Ultimately, which turning point did you choose and why?
CW: From the beginning, I developed criteria that I felt were necessary for this idea to work: first, the divergence had to be at a critical point in the film to begin the story with dramatic impact; second the divergence had to be caused by something not too much of stretch of possibility from what happened in the films (as an example, though not mine, what if the Empire had shot down the pod carrying the droids from the Rebel blockade runner); and third, whatever changed could not be caused by a key character acting differently than he or she did to the same circumstances in the film. I also felt the need
to choose a break point that could then be carried to the conclusion of the "classic" Star Wars arc. In other words, I didn't intend to block the story as part one of three, but basically I posited a change of events that altered the destiny of the characters and then followed that destiny to a conclusion. By choosing a moment near the end of A New Hope, the reader still gets to "keep" the vast majority of the film and all the characters and conflicts it introduced, but essentially, a new Episode V and VI spin out of the divergence, this particular divergence being "What if the attack on the Death Star had failed?"
IF: That seems like a logical and potentially very turbulent event to use for this. I think a big part of what makes the "what if" thing work is that within a matter of seconds, everything changes -- and in this case, things change dramatically for an entire intergalactic power struggle. So things are instantly different across the board -- but which character do you think is most affected by this as an individual, and what does this do to that character?
CW: Let me point out that by using my criteria, I couldn't allow Luke to fail. The failure had to be along the lines of the "For want of a shoe, the horse was lost" paradigm. As for who is affected the most, that's hard to say. Everyone is affected in fairly significant ways, since clearly, if the Death Star attack fails, the Empire triumphs, right? That pretty much changes the entire landscape for everyone in the galaxy.
IF: Obviously, since this affects more than just one character, practically each character in the story gets reinvented. How did you approach the individual character developments (or re-developments, as the case may be) that resulted from the failed attack on the Death Star?
CW: The real challenge was to try to dig deep and figure out who the characters really are and keep them true to their natures while reflecting those natures in vastly different circumstances. While I was pretty certain that a lot of Star Wars fans would get a kick out
of the "What if...?" speculation, I was just as certain that NOBODY would buy into what I was doing if the characters didn't ring true. Heck, I wouldn't buy into it either! Would Han Solo suddenly become a selfless altruist or Luke become a coward? No way! But these
characters could still take radically different paths than we might imagine. It's like the old saying, "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
IF: Did you have to amend any of your original ideas for the story because they were deemed too far-fetched or inappropriate for the characters by our Lucas Licensing counterparts?
CW: The folks at Lucas Licensing wanted some minor changes, but I think I had the bases pretty well covered. Again, in a sense, this project was easier than some Star Wars comics projects, since if the timeline diverges, the following continuity never happens! As long as the characters stay on the mark, there isn't as much to trip over. To be honest, I'm not sure I'd know where to start in writing a traditional in-continuity Star Wars story!
IF: Given Lucas Licensing's approval and the fact that the script is a fantastic read, I'd say you've done a pretty good job making this "What If?" story play out in a way that Star Wars fans should appreciate.
CW: I think so. The ultimate determining factor in judging that will be how our readers respond, but if our fans enjoy this story half as much as I enjoyed dreaming it up, we'll have some happy readers.
Don't miss the incredible Star Wars: Infinities -- A New Hope, written by Chris Warner and featuring phenomenal art by Drew Johnson and Jim Royal. The first issue of this four-part series debuts May 2.