60 Fun Facts About Star Wars Legends

On what date did Lucasfilm rebrand the Expanded Universe as Star Wars Legends and declare it non-canon?

Disney had bought Lucasfilm in October 2012; the reset freed the planned sequel trilogy from decades of continuity.

Which pre-2014 non-film work stayed in canon when the Expanded Universe became Legends?

The franchise's creator co-created that series, which is why it kept its 'T-canon' status while everything else went to Legends.

Which 1991 novel is credited with jump-starting the Expanded Universe after four quiet years?

It hit number one on the New York Times list, and the period before it, 1987 to 1991, is nicknamed the 'Dark Times'.

Who wrote the Thrawn trilogy?

Zahn returned to write new canon Thrawn novels after the character was revived in Rebels in 2016.

What are the titles of the second and third Thrawn trilogy books?

Specter of the Past and Vision of the Future are Zahn's later Hand of Thrawn duology; the others are Anderson and Allston books.

Thrawn belongs to which blue-skinned species?

His full name is Mitth'raw'nuruodo, and Lars Mikkelsen played him in live action in Ahsoka.

What Force-repelling creatures does Thrawn use to subdue the mad clone Joruus C'baoth?

The salamander-like animals create bubbles where the Force does not exist; the vornskrs of Myrkr hunt by sensing it.

What is the lost fleet of automated Dreadnaughts, the 'Dark Force', called in Dark Force Rising?

A virus drove the crews insane before the Clone Wars, and a smuggler found the ships years later.

Mara Jade was introduced as the second-in-command of which smuggler?

She had secretly served Palpatine as a special agent and was compelled by his dying command to kill the last Jedi.

What title did Mara Jade hold under Palpatine before his death?

Zahn created her because he felt the saga lacked a strong, complex female character.

Whom does Mara Jade marry, becoming the mother of Ben?

The wedding happens in Michael A. Stackpole's graphic novel Union, and Ben is born during the New Jedi Order series.

In which Legacy of the Force novel is Mara Jade killed?

Her nephew Jacen, by then a Sith apprentice, kills her; she returns as a Force ghost to Ben and later to Luke.

The Dark Horse comic Dark Empire resurrected which villain in a succession of cloned bodies?

The Thrawn trilogy's author objected that cloning the Emperor undermined the ending of Return of the Jedi.

Which bounty hunter, seemingly killed in Return of the Jedi, returned in Dark Empire?

The comic also had Luke briefly turn to the dark side and introduced Han and Leia's youngest son, Anakin Solo.

Which Zahn-created planet made its film debut in the Return of the Jedi Special Edition?

Lucas then made it the centre of the prequels, one of the biggest Expanded Universe ideas to enter the films.

Which extragalactic invaders were the villains of The New Jedi Order series?

They were invisible to the Force and worshipped pain; the canon later reworked the idea as the Grysk.

Which major film character was killed in Vector Prime, the first New Jedi Order novel?

A moon was pulled onto the planet Sernpidal; editors had sent Lucas a wish list of characters to kill with Luke at the top.

Who wrote Vector Prime?

Mark Hamill even voiced Luke in a TV commercial for the book.

How many novels made up The New Jedi Order, the longest-running Star Wars book series?

It ran from 1999 to 2003 and ended with James Luceno's The Unifying Force.

Under what Sith name does Jacen become the antagonist of Legacy of the Force?

Han and Leia's son had been a hero of the Vong war before Lumiya turned him.

Which three authors wrote the nine Legacy of the Force novels in rotation?

Karen Traviss also wrote the Republic Commando novels; the series ran from 2006 to 2008.

Kyle Katarn debuted as the player character of which 1995 game?

LucasArts considered making Luke the hero but invented Katarn so the plot would not be tied to a film character.

In Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy, Kyle Katarn is replaced as the playable hero by which student?

Raven felt Katarn was too powerful for a game about slowly learning the Force, so he became the instructor.

Splinter of the Mind's Eye, the first original Star Wars novel, was written by whom?

Foster had ghostwritten the 1976 film novelisation; the book was designed as a cheap sequel in case Star Wars flopped.

On which swampy planet are Luke and Leia marooned in Splinter of the Mind's Eye?

Mimban finally reached the screen in Solo: A Star Wars Story, forty years after the novel.

Steve Perry's 1996 'movie without a movie' multimedia project is set between which two films?

It was a 1996 'movie without a movie': novel, comic, N64 game, soundtrack, toys and trading cards.

Which crime lord in Shadows of the Empire plots to replace Vader at the Emperor's side?

Xizor headed the Black Sun syndicate; smuggler Dash Rendar was the project's Han Solo stand-in.

Which studio developed Knights of the Old Republic, released in 2003?

Obsidian made the sequel, The Sith Lords, at LucasArts' request the following year.

Roughly how many years before the films is Knights of the Old Republic set?

Dark Horse's Tales of the Jedi comics opened up that era in 1993 and the game grew out of it.

In Knights of the Old Republic, the amnesiac player character turns out to be which Sith Lord?

The Jedi wiped Revan's memory after an ambush; the twist is regularly cited among gaming's best.

Which space station is the site of the final battle in Knights of the Old Republic?

Players reach it via the freighter Ebon Hawk after training on Dantooine and visiting the Sith academy on Korriban.

Darth Bane is credited with creating which Sith doctrine?

Lucas invented Bane for prequel backstory; Drew Karpyshyn's 2006 novel fleshed him out.

What is the given name of Starkiller, Vader's secret apprentice in The Force Unleashed?

Lucas personally spent hours briefing the developers because the story changed continuity so radically.

Starkiller's ship in The Force Unleashed is called what?

The Ebon Hawk is KOTOR's freighter, the Outrider is Dash Rendar's and the Moldy Crow belongs to Kyle Katarn.

Star Wars: Legacy, set over 130 years after the Empire's fall, follows which descendant of Luke?

John Ostrander and Jan Duursema's Dark Horse series pits the pirate-turned-Jedi against Darth Krayt's One Sith.

What is the callsign of RC-1138, the squad leader you play in Republic Commando?

Scorch is the explosives expert, Fixer the hacker and Sev the sniper; the '1138' is a nod to Lucas's THX 1138.

Star Wars Galaxies, the 2003 MMO, was developed by which company?

Its servers went dark on December 15, 2011, days before The Old Republic launched.

Marvel's original Star Wars comic ran from 1977 to 1986 for how many issues?

Jim Shooter said its sales saved Marvel financially in 1977 and 1978, and Marvel revived it for one issue in 2019.

What kind of creature was Jaxxon, the Marvel comic character the franchise's creator reportedly disliked?

Roy Thomas had been told not to use Vader, the Clone Wars, or a Luke-Leia romance, so he improvised a Seven Samurai plot.

Kevin J. Anderson's 1994 Jedi Academy trilogy features which superweapon stolen by Han Solo?

Kyp Durron uses it to destroy Carida, and the ancient Sith spirit Exar Kun haunts Luke's new academy on Yavin 4.

Which continuity database, run by Leland Chee, tracked the Expanded Universe before 2014?

It held more than 55,000 entries and ranked material into tiers from G-canon (Lucas's films) down to N-canon.

In the old five-tier system, the 'G' in top-tier 'G-canon' stood for what?

T-canon was The Clone Wars, C-canon was most books and games, S-canon was contradicted material like the Holiday Special.

Which 2012 James Luceno novel told the story of Palpatine's Muun master?

It was among the last major Legends novels and its version of the character was later contradicted by The Acolyte.

Which Thrawn trilogy officer, played by Xander Berkeley, appeared in The Mandalorian season three?

Pellaeon captains the Chimaera in the novels; Rukh, Thrawn's Noghri bodyguard, reached canon in Rebels voiced by Warwick Davis.

Del Rey's 2021 Essential Legends Collection launched with Thrawn, Shatterpoint and which Darth Bane novel?

The line marked the franchise's 50th anniversary and proved the old books still sold.

In which year did the Thrawn trilogy conclude with The Last Command?

The trilogy sold a combined 15 million copies.

Which author wrote The Han Solo Adventures trilogy (1979-80) and the radio dramas of the films?

His radio adaptations of the original trilogy aired in 1981, 1983 and 1996, with Perry King voicing Han.

Who wrote the Dark Horse comic sequence Dark Empire, drawn by Cam Kennedy?

Timothy Zahn disliked its cloned-Emperor premise, feeling it undercut the ending of Return of the Jedi.

Which 1993 novel is set in the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Endor?

It opens with the Rebels answering a distress call from an Imperial world under alien attack just after the second Death Star falls.

From which publisher did Star Wars novels move to Del Rey in 1999?

The switch coincided with the launch of The New Jedi Order, which opened by killing off Chewbacca.

What was the rejected working title of Heir to the Empire?

Lucasfilm thought it sounded too much like Bantam's Wild Cards anthology series.

The mad Jedi clone Joruus C'baoth was originally written as an evil clone of whom?

Lucasfilm asked Zahn to invent a new character instead, and also made him rename Rukh's species.

What had Zahn originally named the Noghri species before Lucasfilm made him change it?

The word was reserved, so the grey-skinned assassins became the Noghri instead.

Roughly how many copies did the Thrawn trilogy sell in total?

Zahn was given only two rules: set it three to five years after Return of the Jedi, and bring back no one killed in the films.

Who kills Grand Admiral Thrawn at the end of The Last Command?

The Noghri had just learned the Empire deceived them; Thrawn's last words were that it was 'so artistically done'.

Why do the Noghri serve the Empire in the Thrawn trilogy?

Leia, Vader's daughter, convinces them they were deceived and enslaved, and the assassins switch sides.

Which actor voiced Thrawn when he was re-canonized in Star Wars Rebels?

Warwick Davis, the original Wicket, voiced Rukh in the same series.

Which studio developed Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords?

BioWare declined the 14-to-16-month schedule LucasArts wanted, so the newly founded studio took the sequel.

What is the freighter the player travels in throughout the Knights of the Old Republic games?

The ship is a playable location itself, though combat aboard happens only in a few scripted moments in the sequel.

Which company was announced in 2021 as developer of the Knights of the Old Republic remake?

Bloomberg reported the project stalled in 2022 after the art and design directors were fired, and Saber later took over.