Hey guys, I wasn’t sure where to put this so figured I’d create a specific topic for it – It’s my first time doing this so I hope I won’t mess it up. I don’t think this has been discussed yet in the forums.
I recently stumbled on an article on CBSI stating that Die!Die!Die! #14 was Grogu’s first appearance in a comic book. I had initially bought two copies of this book because, you know, Obama+aliens, so I took one of my copies to check it out and lo and behold, there is is! Well, kind of… in all is 1 cm tall glory. I’m learning the ropes of flipping comics and I wanted to tap CHU members wisdom on this one because I am wondering if this could really be considered a legit cameo given the weird circumstances of it.
Now, here’s where I wonder if this cameo has any weight to it:
First off, this is an image comic book, not a Marvel book, and it feels weird considering he was put there just for the fun of it and has nothing to do with the story.
Then his very small size – about 1 cm tall…
And finally, the release date was March 24, 2021. The exact same day, as per DrunkWooky.com, of the release date of the Star Wars Mandalorian Sceen Comix trade paperback (which may or may not be considered a comic book).
So, how do you feel about this so-called first appearance? Heresy? Or do you feel it has some weight to it and should be considered as such?
Falls into the category of non-canon/spoof appearances. Cool, but unlikely to sway enough Star Wars fans to make it valuable (at least for this reason).
Dont care either way. Grogu was only a baby for 2 seasons of Mandolorian. Im guessing he/she/it will be grown up in season 3. Then you’re stuck with “baby specs”…
I think MAD magazine is the primary reason any sort of spoof, non-canon, or outside of IP appearances don’t count.
For decades MAD was pumping out spoofs of pop culture properties long before they ever had a chance to appear in official publications. If you accept one spoof, you unravel the whole first appearance definition for hundreds of characters.
Ordinarily I would put it as a cameo because he doesn’t have any lines…but he didn’t really speak in the show either. So…first comic appearance…sort of. If the first appearance of Groo the Wanderer can be in Destroyer Duck, then why not. It should be considered a spoof though otherwise Disney could claim copyright infringement.
For completionists, I guess it would have some collectibility, but it may have more collectibility as an Obama piece, so I guess you get two for one.
How can we even say its Grogu and not some random baby yoda? Kirkman can never say its him, and its non canon so Disney/Marvel would never acknowledge it. Maybe a Star Wars completionist would want it, but I don’t see how it can be counted as an official appearance.
I’d go back to my personal favorite distinction, “Issue of Primary Significance.” It frees you from chasing fleeting cameos just because they are first.
I am arguing today that the answer to which appearance of a character was published first in time is often the right answer to the wrong question. The comic collecting community has become so singularly focused on identifying and hunting the “first appearance” of a character, however you wish to define that for your purposes, that it has lost track of the purpose behind this significance of that title as “first”. And, alternatively, the community has now started valuing issues of little importance to a character’s significance in the cultural milieu, merely due to a cold, clerical determination that such issue was first in time and ergo first in right. First appearances are not an ends to themselves. I argue today that the proper question that should be asked to evaluate a comic book issue’s desirability is whether that issue is an “Issue of Primary Significance”
