I’ve noticed a disturbing trend. People, it seems, just don’t care for Dengar. People seem to love Star Wars, and people — the people that have taste, that is — love bounty hunters, but for some reason, Dengar is the old maid among Star wars bounty hunters.
I don’t get it.
Is it because he doesn’t have the slick mask and mysterious nature of Boba Fett? The robotic cool of IG-88? The reptilian charm of Bossk? Who knows. At least Dengar doesn’t get confused as to whether he’s 4-LOM or Zuckuss. I’m still trying to rewire my brain over that one.
Dengar often gets a hand-wave of condescension as a fat guy with a diaper on his head. But think of how many bounty hunters there are in the Star Wars galaxy. I mean, galaxy is a big place. I’m sure with complicated math I can tell you just how big the Star Wars galaxy is, but for brevity’s sake, let’s just say it’s “damn big.” So in an entire galaxy full of all sorts of scum and scum-chasers, Darth Vader — one of the most powerful and feared men in this galaxy — chose only a very small, elite pack of bounty hunters to chase down his boy. That is A-list bounty hunting. That is Dengar.
Dengar figured prominently in my Star Wars bounty hunting playtime as a kid. There was something about him that looked like he could handle himself. Sure, the robots and aliens were all badass, and Boba Fett… well, who know what the hell he really was (until the prequels, that is) underneath that mystery. But Dengar was just this regular guy. He wasn’t an alien insect with a breathing mask or a killer death machine or something that looked like it ate people as a light snack. He was just a regular dude with the meanest scowl ever, holding a big honkin’ gun. If you asked little me, Dengar was the guy who could take on entire platoons of Stormtroopers just with his body odor alone. He was a dead-eyed, merciless killer who could go toe to toe with anybody.
Dengar ain’t afraid of no Jedi. And he’d spit in the Emperor’s eye if he had a mind to.
Maybe it was the fact that his figure came with a giant gun — a giant gun that he could only hold with one hand, but a giant gun nevertheless. Maybe it was the fact that he was a bit larger than all the regular human characters. He looked big enough to toss guys around, and I was always a fan of the strong guys on teams.
I don’t know. Who knows what goes on in your head when you’re young. Or young at heart. But at any rate, I still dig him. I wouldn’t say he’s my favorite bounty hunter; that spot is reserved for Boba. But Dengar doesn’t rank last for me. No, the bulky dude with old rusty armor and battle weary scowl is high on my list, and I wouldn’t shed a tear if he beats out IG-88 as the next bounty hunter we get after the upcoming Bossk. And I’m a man who loves IG-88 as much as it’s possible for a man to love a machine, which is slightly less than Summer Glau’s Cameron, but slightly more than Data from Star Trek. There was way too much geek piled into that sentence…
So please, tell me I’m not the only one out there. I mean, I seriously considering buying this Gentle Giant vintage recreation to commemorate my fondness of the big lug. There has to be a silent majority out there that digs Dengar as much as I do. This kind of love may not be healthy, but it’s pure. And it’s for a man with a diaper on his head and a bigass gun in his hand. And that, friends, is never wrong.
