A vengeful Darth Vader confronts the Emperor as the Dark Droids set their sights on Coruscant

Art from Star Wars: Darth Vader #40
(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

The Dark Droids arc has seen an ancient Sith weapon known as the Scourge spread its malign influence throughout the galaxy. It's turning droids against their organic masters and leading to a wave of murder across numerous worlds. And now it has its eyes set on the jewel in the Empire's crown: the planet Coruscant. 

The Scourge has already tried to possess Darth Vader - himself a cyborg - but he has a more immediate problems in the form of his rival, Mas Amedda, who tried to assassinate him. Now, in Star Wars: Darth Vader #40, the Dark Lord of the Sith is out for revenge and that means confronting Amedda - and Emperor Palpatine himself.

We have a preview of the new issue, by writer Greg Pak, artist Raffaele Ienco, colorist Federico Blee and letterer Joe Caramagna, in the gallery below.

Marvel's synopsis for the new issue reads:

"SCOURGE OF CORUSCANT! What greater prize could the DROID SCOURGE imagine than CORUSCANT, an ecumenopolis filled with millions of droids? And what greater TERROR could the people of Coruscant imagine than a horde of scourged droids…led by LORD VADER himself?"

Here's the issue's main cover by artist Leinil Francis Yu and colorist Romulo Fajardo Jr.

The cover for Star Wars: Darth Vader #40

(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

From here the Dark Droids arc continues in the main Star Wars comic, as well as the Doctor Aphra and Bounty Hunters spin-offs. It concludes on December 20 with the publication of Star Wars: Doctor Aphra #39 and Star Wars: Darth Vader #41.

Stars Wars: Darth Vader #40 is published by Marvel Comics on November 8.


The Star Wars comics are full of interesting characters that didn't start out on the big screen. Check out our list of the ten best Star Wars comics characters.

Will Salmon
Comics Editor

Will Salmon is the Comics Editor for GamesRadar/Newsarama. He has been writing about comics, film, TV, and music for more than 15 years, which is quite a long time if you stop and think about it. At Future he has previously launched scary movie magazine Horrorville, relaunched Comic Heroes, and has written for every issue of SFX magazine for over a decade. He sometimes feels very old, like Guy Pearce in Prometheus. His music writing has appeared in The Quietus, MOJO, Electronic Sound, Clash, and loads of other places and he runs the micro-label Modern Aviation, which puts out experimental music on cassette tape.

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