Mark Newbold

I have a bad feeling about this…

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Mark Newbold (born on March 31, 1971, in Edgbaston, England) is a British writer who has contributed to the magazine Star Wars Insider since 2006. He has frequently contributed to the "My Star Wars," "Red Five," and "Launchpad" sections, as well as numerous feature articles and interviews. He is a featured blogger on StarWars.com and has also written for De Agostini's Build The Millennium Falcon partwork, the Spanish version of the Star Wars Fact Files (Star Wars Encyclopedia).

He has hosted the Podcast / HoloNet News Stage at four Star Wars Celebrations (Celebration Europe 2016, Celebration Chicago, Celebration Anaheim and Celebration Europe 4) and is the only podcaster to have appeared onstage at every Celebration since the inception of the podcast stage in 2015 at Celebration Anaheim (three times with Jedi News and three times with Fantha Tracks). The Ravager Mechanics "Changeling" Mark 71NB Racing starfighter flown by Bo Keevil in the animated television series Star Wars Resistance was named after Newbold by author Adam Bray in the 2019 edition of the reference book Ultimate Star Wars, New Edition.

Biography[]

Fandom journey and fansite contributions[]

Mark Newbold was born on March 31,^[1] 1971, in Edgbaston, England.^[2] He was first introduced to Star Wars as a child. at a cinema in 1978 and continued to enjoy releases from the franchise—including Star Wars Weekly comics, Palitoy figures, and read-along adventures. He also has worked on several fan projects inspired by the franchise, the first fanfiction of which was the story Quest for Freedom.^[3] Alongside Jonathan Hicks, he helped spawn the creation of the Sedapard Cluster through twenty audio stories recorded between 1986 and 1988.^[2] The Cluster was first canonically introduced^[4] by Newbold^[2] in the 63rd issue of the Star Wars: Build the Millennium Falcon magazine,^[4] alongside that the engines of the Imperialis were built there by Desando Dynamics.^[2] Thirteen of those short stories were released in a self-published 2014 collection, Tales From From the Setnin Sector, featuring cover artwork by Star Wars artist Paul Bateman.^[3]

Yellow Ace — A "Changeling" Mark 71NB, the model of which was named after Newbold

While running the website Lightsabre with colleagues starting in 1998, Newbold was able to interview numerous Star Wars creators, serving as an editor from 2000 and 2009, as well as hosting the Setnin Radio Podcast from 2005 to 2006. He later was a significant contributor to both the Jedi News website from 2010 to 2017, and Fantha Tracks, the latter of which he was part of launching and remains as daily content manager. He also worked as host of RADIO 1138, formerly part of Rebel Force Radio, alongside James Burns, as well as the Take Cover podcast for Jedi News Network until 2017. As of 2024, he co-hosts weekly news show Making Tracks with Rebel Legion UK CO Mark Mulcaster, literature show Canon Fodder and vehicle podcast Start Your Engines with Paul Naylor.^[2]

Mark Newbold first printed appearance was in the letters page of Return of the Jedi Weekly 11 on August 31, 1983, where his fan-fiction character "Jan Lomona" appeared.^[5] The model of the racer Bo Keevil's starship from the animated television series Star Wars Resistance—"Changeling" Mark 71NB—was named by Adam Bray in reference to Mark Newbold, with "71" referencing his birth year and "NB" referencing "Newbold."^[6]

Insider and StarWars.com[]

Star Wars Insider[]

Newbold's role as a freelance contributor to Star Wars Insider began with Star Wars Insider 90 in September 2006, where he wrote the article "The 2006 Artoos Awards Ceremony." Newbold submitted the article for inclusion in the magazine, and editor Frank Parisi, a recent guest on Newbold's website Lightsabre, published the piece.^[7] From Star Wars Insider 130 to Star Wars Insider 167 he wrote most of the "My Star Wars" entries and was the primary contributor to the "Red Five" section. In Star Wars Insider 138, he began contributing to the "Launchpad" section of the magazine. As of 2024, including original articles and reprints, he is approaching 200 contributions to the magazine.^[2]

StarWars.com[]

In April 2009, Newbold contributed to the official Star Wars site with a piece on the opening night of Star Wars: In Concert.^[8] He then went on to be a Featured Blogger on the site, and one of the very first non-Lucasfilm employees to contribute to the official websites blogs, with over 100 contributions to the official site.^[9]

Other blogs and magazines[]

In December 2012, he was the third guest blogger on the Dark Horse Blog leading up to the release of first issue of the new Star Wars title by Brian Wood.^[10] He wrote eighteen articles for Geeky Monkey and the worlds longest running fantasy and since 2017 has written for sci-fi magazine Starburst, contributed forty-five articles to Build The Millennium Falcon partwork where he added two pieces of canonical content (the engines of the Imperialis being built in the Sedapard Cluster by Desando Dynamics). He also wrote in ten of the ninety books for Star Wars Encyclopedia.^[2]