If you pay attention to any of my Star Wars rantings on here, you’ll know I love the weird and obscure background guys. Hasbro and Kenner’s Star Wars figure output over the years trained me to want figures of everything I saw on screen and I’ve translated that to all the myriad ways we consume Star Wars stories. From books, to comics, TV, games, and even Theme Parks. Today I’m thinking about some more obscure areas of Star Wars I’d like to see represented in Black Series form.
The Black Series line has done a good job at incorporating characters introduced in the Star Wars canon that isn’t the films. There are comic-book characters like Aphra, game characters like Iden Versio, and cartoon characters like Ezra and co. from Rebels and I’m all for more of that kind of thing, In fact, I’d like to expand it into some non-canon, more obscure areas. Here’s a top 5:
5. Older Video Games.
We have got a few figures from Battlefront II and a couple are on the way from Jedi Knight: Fallen Order, but I’m thinking more along the lines of older, pre-Lucasfilm sale stuff.
I know KOTOR is super popular and has enough characters to fill several toy lines, but it’s not my thing. What I would buy is a Masters of Teräs Käsi Arden Lyn, Thok or Hoar. Yeah, you heard me. I could also go for a Kyle Katarn and Jerec from Jedi Knight, some Republic Commandos, Nym from Jedi Starfighter, or even a Dash Rendar. Dash has grown on me over the years in the way a lot of stuff I couldn’t stand from the ’90s has.
4. Ewoks/ Droids Cartoons
I’ll admit that Ewoks is a bit of a tough watch and it has almost all of the tropes and pitfalls of ’80s cartoons that make you cringe as you watch them as an adult, there were some cool ideas and designs in there.
First and foremost for me would be Princess Kneesaa. She made for an excellent figure in the 3.75 inch line and those colors would look great on a larger figure. I also fell in love with the art by Jenny Parks in Women of the Galaxy that shows a more realistic Kneesaa in action against Stormtroopers that makes me really want a figure.
I also find the design of the Duloks really appealing.
They were these Grinch-like monkey guys that were always trying to mess up the Ewoks day. Cavan Scott recently used them in this super cool horror comic set on Endor.
Their vintage figures look amazing, but are crazy expensive on the secondary market.
Droids was a bit bit better than the Ewoks show due to some more compelling design work reminiscent in part to the work of comic book legend Moebius.
There were also a lot of straight up action-adventure stories that featured a rotating cast of characters, usually different people who owned the Droids at one time or other.
Thall Joben has a somewhat Mad Max inspired look that I need in action figure form. I also love the absolutely bizarre look of Kleb Zelloc.
He’s this rotund little dude with vampire teeth, a tight cowl, and a visor that also serves as his nose? He looks very Star Wars to me, but at the same time maybe something out of Heavy Metal magazine.
There’s also Jessica Meade who seemed way ahead of her time as a rough and tumble freighter captain, presaging the current crop of female leads in Star Wars. Boba Fett also appeared in the opening credits and an episode or two and a Droids color repaint would be an easy buy for me.
3. Ewok TV Movies Caravan of Courage and The Battle for Endor
I think going through this list is really making me appreciate the product coming out for Star Wars now, but I still have nostalgia for these, let’s say, not as prestigious projects and want some figures of key characters like Cindel.
There was also a tough guy Ewok in Caravan of Courage that I particularly liked. He was a woodsman named Chukha Trok and wielded an axe. I think I’m ready for Black Series Ewoks in general, but Chukha Trok was one of the cooler ones.
Teek superficially resembles Ewoks in build, but has a weird little scrunched up monkey face that teeters between cute and creepy.
He also has super-speed powers for some reason and I’ll always love him because of his appearance in the Star Tours safety video. In Battle for Endor, the Ewoks fight a group known as the Marauders and the design for these guys always seemed like they would make cool toys.
It’s very much of the same vein of Jabbas palace guards and the main bad guy, Terrak, looks like a mix of a Weequay and Frankenstein’s Monster.
The Battle for Endor also was the first appearance of my beloved Blurrgs, scheduled to appear in The Mandalorian, so hopefully we’ll see them due to that.
2. Old Comic Books
Of course, one of my evergreen most wanted weird figures is Jaxxon from the original Marvel Comics run. That book had a few other characters I’d be interested in, including the rest of Han’s “Magnificent Seven”, Lumiya, Skorr, and Valance the Hunter.
The Darkhorse books have a treasure trove of cool characters, especially Jedi from the prequel era like K’hruk, Quinlan Vos, Zao, A’Sharad Hett, and Micah Giiett.
One of my most wanted obscure characters is a bit character from Shadows of the Empire, a swoop pilot named Spiker.
Swoop bikers captured my imagination back then and he had the best look of the bunch. I was also really enchanted by the Bounty Hunter Furlagg from that book.
He was basically a big mutant bat in a space suit, but that aesthetic is one of my favorite things in Star Wars.
- The Freemaker Adventures
This is a weird one because it’s a Lego show and it’s fairly recent. It follows Star Wars canon, but isn’t canon because it has to make allowances for the comedy and fun of a Lego style show. The creators described it as “canon adjacent”.
That said, it’s also has some great action, humor, and the most heart of any of the new Star Wars stuff I’ve seen. I have figures of these characters in Lego form, but I really want to have figures of the Freemaker family that I can put right next to my Rebels family.
One of the main antagonists on the show is Jabba’s cousin, Graballa the Hutt, who is especially hilarious and saddled with two dim-witted Iktotchi henchmen Baash and Raam. Dengar is Graballa’s most competent minion and I’d love Black Series Baash, Raam and Graballa to go with that excellent Black Series Dengar figure.
So that’s my list of obscure places I’d like the Black Series to go. I realize it could also be titled Top 5 most unlikely places the Black Series will ever go, but that’s cool. The heart wants what the heart wants. What’s your most obscure or unlikely Black Series figure want? Let us know in the comments below!