A Green Lepi, Boba Fett and Han Solo Race for Jabba's Bounty in Star Wars' New Kids' Graphic Novel
Star Wars: Smugglers and Scoundrels Vol. 1 — The Race for Jabba's Bounty reached comic shops on September 15 from Mad Cave Studios' Papercutz imprint: a 112-page middle-grade graphic novel by Cavan Scott and Christian Colbert that sends Han Solo, Chewbacca, Boba Fett, Aurra Sing, Greedo and a six-foot green Lepi smuggler after a missing family heirloom.
Jabba the Hutt has lost something precious, and instead of sending one hunter to get it back, he sends all of them. That's the entire engine of Star Wars: Smugglers and Scoundrels Vol. 1 — The Race for Jabba's Bounty, which landed on September 15 and which I'm only getting to now, a couple of weeks late.
The Book
Per CBR's coverage and TechTimes' write-up, this is a 112-page graphic novel written by Cavan Scott and drawn by Christian Colbert, published by Papercutz, the children's imprint of Mad Cave Studios, and aimed at readers roughly seven to twelve. It comes as a $19.99 hardcover or a $14.99 trade paperback (TechTimes also lists a $9.99 digital edition). It's the first volume of a new Smugglers and Scoundrels line, part of the all-ages graphic novel partnership between Lucasfilm and Mad Cave announced earlier this year.
The premise is clean: Jabba's family heirloom has gone missing, he puts out the word, and a crowd of competing scoundrels races to recover it. The cast list is the real draw. Han Solo and Chewbacca lead; Boba Fett, Aurra Sing and Greedo are in the field against them; and standing in Han's way is Jaxxon T. Tumperakki, a six-foot green Lepi smuggler the coverage describes as Han's old rival.
Jaxxon Is a Deep Cut Worth Cheering For
If Jaxxon sounds like a joke, he sort of is, and that's why I love him. He's a holdover from Marvel's original 1970s Star Wars comics, the same wild early run that gave this galaxy characters nobody on set had planned for. I mentioned that run when I wrote about the Star Wars and Marvel crossover coming in January, and it's a pleasure to see one of its stranger inventions get a proper role in a 2026 book rather than a footnote. Cavan Scott has made a career of mining exactly this kind of corner of the franchise, and putting a giant green rabbit-smuggler opposite Han Solo is the right instinct.
The Game Theory Hiding in the Plot
The most interesting analysis I've seen of this book isn't a review at all. TechTimes frames the structure as an all-pay auction: every participant pays real costs chasing Jabba's prize whether or not they win it, but only one of them gets paid, a setup that makes double-crossing the rational move. I'm passing that along as their reading rather than a claim about Scott's intentions, but it fits. Jabba's palace has always run on this logic. In Return of the Jedi everyone who works for him is one bad day from the Sarlacc, and the smart play is always to betray first. A kids' comic that quietly teaches why Greedo, Boba Fett and Han can't all trust each other is doing something sharper than most all-ages books bother with.
Why This Counts as News
It's easy to wave off middle-grade graphic novels as a side shelf, but this one matters for two reasons. First, it reads to me like part of the run-up to the 50th anniversary: more formats and more entry points, including all-ages books that can bring in readers who've never touched a Marvel or Dark Horse series (that's my interpretation, not a Lucasfilm statement). Second, a book that puts Han, Boba Fett and Greedo in the same chase is a gift for the fans who grew up on the Original Trilogy and now buy these for their own kids.
I haven't read it, so this isn't a review. What I can say from the creators, the cast and the premise is that it's a smart, funny-looking way to spend an afternoon in Jabba's neighbourhood. May the Force be with whoever gets the heirloom. Based on the incentives, it won't be the one who plays fair.
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