As fans on Disney+ explore the eras between well-established Star Wars movies, the written word is working on a completely different timeline. For the past two years, popular Star Wars authors have been building out an era called The High Republic, which takes place centuries before the events of the films. And though most of that is in novels with no pictures, a new book is flipping that on its head, and we’ve got an exclusive look.
The Art of Star Wars: The High Republic by Kristin Baver is out Tuesday, November 8, and it shows just how much time, effort, and care has gone into crafting an entirely new era of Star Wars most audiences will only see in their minds. (That is until it actually comes live-action with The Acolyte, a fact which was just announced today.)
It’s a time of relative peace for the Jedi until a new sinister, powerful, and unpredictable evil called the Nihil decide to assert their dominance. Jedi Knights such as Avar Kriss, Loden Greatstorm, and Stellan Gios battle back, only to find that not even the Force can defeat an evil like this.
At least, that’s the story of Phase 1 of the storytelling, which has been explored over the last two years in novels, children’s books, and comics, and is the focus of this art book. Below, you can see an io9-exclusive glimpse of this in the form of a series of progress drawings building up to Marvel’s Star Wars: The High Republic #8. And even if you don’t know the characters on the cover, you recognize the alien races and get an idea of just how much Star Wars lore and mythology builds out this hugely exciting and new era of storytelling.
Much of Phase 1 of The High Republic centers on Starlight Beacon, a massive, highly advanced space station spearheaded by the Jedi as a place for the galaxy to meet in peace. It soon becomes more than just a target for the Nihil—it becomes an obsession. And while places in books are usually relegated to our imaginations, here you can see an example of just how much detail went into designing what Starlight looked like, to create consistency between the stories.
That’s but the tip of the iceberg. The 300-page book has so much more and you can order a copy here courtesy of Abrams Books.
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