Marvel is celebrating Pride Month with a new variant cover series for a number of upcoming Star Wars titles.
Marvel unveiled a new collection of stunning Star Wars variant covers for Pride Month. Starting in June, the covers showcase LGBTQIA+ characters from throughout the galaxy. The covers come from a lineup of LGBTQIA+ talent, with each variant featuring a special Pride version of the series’ title and the official Star Wars Pride logo.
Star Wars: Bounty Hunters #24’s pride variant (on sale from 15 June) comes from Jan Bazaldua and shows T’onga, a former bounty hunter now being pulled back into the action, alongside her wife, Losha. Kho Phon Farrus, Doctor Aphra’s self-proclaimed arch-nemesis, takes the spotlight in Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi #2’s cover (on sale from 22 June) by Derek Charm, followed by Sabé, Saché and Yané, three former handmaids of Padmé Amidala, in Kei Zama’s Star Wars: Darth Vader #24 cover (on sale from 22 June).
Resistance spy Vi Moradi shines in Phil Jimenez’s Star Wars: The Mandalorian #1 variant (on sale from July). Moradi is followed by Resistance Commander Larma D’Acy and pilot/D’Acy’s wife Wrobie Tyce in the Star Wars #25 variant (on sale from 20 July) by JJ Kirby and Jedi Padawans Lula Talisola and Zeen Mrala in Javier Garrón’s Star Wars: Han & Chewbacca #4 variant (on sale from 20 July). Rounding out the series is Doctor Aphra, herself, in Paulina Ganucheau’s Star Wars: Doctor Aphra #22 cover.
“For me, it’s one of the greatest honours and pleasures to highlight the wonderful diversity of characters in comics,” Garrón told StarWars.com of working on the series. “Maybe we come to stories because it’s sci-fi, or action, or thriller, or whatever, really. But if we stay in them, if those stories stick with us, it is because of the characters. Lula and Zeen have a beautiful story, as epic as any starfighter battle, and I wanted to showcase that. An intimate, tender and quiet moment together. A loving hug looking at the stars, their destiny! Because in the great scheme of things, even on a galactic level, it’s the small human things that really matter.”
Jimenez agreed, “Star Wars and Marvel are about as culturally relevant as it gets, and to see the support they’re giving the LGBTQIA+ community during Pride Month is something special. I didn’t know much about Vi Moradi before I started researching her for this piece — and I’m hoping now even more people will recognise her and the important role she plays in the Star Wars universe!”
The Star Wars Pride variant covers start going on sale on 15 June from Marvel.