September of 2004. Dark Horse releases their Star Wars: Panel to Panel book. This large format book focuses on the beautiful artwork produced by Dark Horse artists over 13 years worth of comics. The first volume focused on the characters of the films.

This spring, Volume 2 of this series focuses on the original characters from Dark Horse. The Expanded Universe. Organized in a slightly different manner from Volume One, this issue still presents the comic art in beautiful, full page reproductions of covers and panels.

Besides showing of the most stunning art from recent series (such as Rebellion and Legacy) and favorite EU characters (like Villie and Quinlan) writer Randy Stradley adds notes and errata to a majority of the artwork. This text puts the art in perspective, plus allows readers unfamiliar with the events to catch up.

The book breaks itself down into six sections: "The Old, Old Republic", "Countdown to Empire", "The Dark Times", "The Rebellion", "Return of the Sith", "Wild Space", plus a Galaxy Map, an index of artists, and a timeline.

Each section focuses on a group of Dark Horse created characters. "The Old, Old Republic" looks at the Jedi from Tales of The Jedi including the Qel-Droma's and Daragon's, plus the newer characters from Knights of the Old Republic—Zayne, Gryph, and Jarael.

"Countdown to Empire" shows the many facets of Quinlan Vos and Aayla Secura, two EU characters that have done very well for themselves. Quin was, of course, supposeed to die in Revenge of the Sith but was able to survive given the impact of his characters on fans. And Aayla made her big screen debut in Attack of the Clones. Quite a step for an original comic character.



"The Dark Times", "The Rebellion", and "Return of the Sith" focus on the other three, current series from Dark Horse, Dark Times, Rebellion and Legacy respectively. Here readers get a chance to see some of the newer characters presented within the original Saga timeline such as Janek Sunber, Daas Jenir, or Deena Shan as the interact with the characters from the films. The biggest plus in this area is the four-panel gatefold combining all the character covers that Adam Hughes created for issues #1-3 and #5-7.

Finally "Wild Space" makes room for those parts of Dark Horse publishing that fall outside of the continuity of the Expanded Universe. The Inifinites issues. Here, readers can see Tag & Bink working as Imperial Guards, or Leia battling Vader in an Infinites version of The Empire Strikes Back.



As with the original, there is a frontpiece by Japanese artist Tsuneo Sanda (which will be given away as a poster at Celebration IV) which features 110 characters, creatures and vehicles from Dark Horse. The key for this art is listed in back, in case you can't figure out what everything is.

Star Wars Panel to Panel: Volume 2 – Expanding the Universe is scheduled to be released on May 30th and retails for $19.95. You can see a preview here.