Star Wars: 10 Best Parts of Legends That Are Now Canon

After Disney bought out the Star Wars franchise, that galaxy far far away seemed to grow a bit smaller. This sci-fi series which had begun as three films written and directed by George Lucas, had long outgrown the scope of Lucas’s initial vision. Video games, comics, novels, and other media expanded the lore, filling in the unnamed planets among the stars of that distant galaxy. When Mickey’s media empire acquire the rights to it all, they decided to do away with all of the material outside the movies (known as the Star Wars Expanded Universe, or Star Wars Legends).

Fans were naturally upset. Many had fond memories of the Legends material that was now discarded. Thankfully, Disney listened to these opinions. Here are the 10 best parts of Legends which have been returned to canon.

10 Sabacc

This was the card game of choice in the cantinas and gambling dens of Star Wars. This game existed for millennia and was one of those great rare past times which was as rooted in skill as chance. Many gamers know sabacc from Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, while the game was also featured heavily in such novels as L Neil Smith’s Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu (where it debuted).

While sabacc has appeared many times in canon since Disney acquired the franchise, the most famous example was in Solo: A Star Wars Story in which Han and Lando gambled for the Millennium Falcon.

9 Thrawn

Of all the villains introduced in Star Wars Legends, none stands out quite like Grand Admiral Thrawn. The character made his first appearance in the novel Heir to the Empire by writer Timothy Zahn–the first of the books in the Thrawn trilogy. He was a member of the alien Chiss, the only alien given the rank of Grand Admiral in the xenophobic Empire.

In recent years, Thrawn has appeared in the TV show Star Wars: Rebels, where he supervised the development of the TIE Defender (more on that later). He also oversaw the occupation of the planet Lothal. However, it was when Disney tapped author Timothy Zahn to write a whole new trilogy about the Grand Admiral that he really was able to shine.

8 Noghri

These brutally efficient alien warriors were another creation of Timothy Zahn’s which debuted in his novel Heir to the Empire. The noghri were beholden to Vader and upon the Sith Lord’s death, began serving Grand Admiral Thrawn. One noghri named Rukh was particularly notable for her service to Thrawn, working as both a bodyguard and assassin.

Rukh returned to canon in the final season of Star Wars: Rebels, where he was part of the Imperial force that occupied the planet Lothal. One problematic aspect of the noghri was that they were inspired by some very dated racial stereotypes of the noble savage archetype — something not seen yet in the canon material.

7 Jedi Temple on Yavin IV

The Rebel base on the moon of Yavin 4 is one of those rare places in the Star Wars galaxy that’s been around since A New Hope. In fact, Yavin is so important that all events are measured by fans as occurring either before or after the Battle of Yavin. One detail that was worked into the lore later on was that the ruins the Rebels used for their base of operations was actually an ancient Jedi temple.

The temple was reintroduced in canon as the Great Temple once used by the Jedi in a 2015 book for young readers, Journey Through Space. More recently, the Doctor Aphra comics have also shown the Great Temple’s ancient Jedi connections.

6 Malachor

The video game Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords (known also as KOTOR 2) is one of the best Star Wars stories ever told. It took place thousands of years before the events of the original trilogy, at a time when the Jedi Order had nearly been wiped out by powerful Sith. The story’s main character had been exiled from the Jedi for his association with the Sith Lord Darth Revan. KOTOR 2 explored the nature of both Jedi and Sith as it built to a dark climax on the ruined world of Malachor V.

In Star Wars: Rebels, the Jedi Ezra Bridger accompanied Darth Maul to the Sith Temple on the planet Malachor, a devastated world in the Outer Rim. Like with KOTOR 2, the events on Malachor are climatic, dark, and tragic.

5 Holocrons

Holocrons have been a part of Star Wars since the Legends comic Star Wars: Dark Empire. Holocrons were powerful (and usually ancient) artifacts created by either Jedi or Sith to store secretive important information and sometimes to share it with others.

Technically, there was a holocron in The Clone Wars TV series, so this example may be a little bit of a stretch, as The Clone Wars is one of the only pieces of media besides the movies made before Disney bought out the franchise which is still considered canon. However, holocrons were created in Legends comics and almost exclusively appeared in Legends material like comics and video games. Now, however, there have been holocrons practically everywhere. Solo: A Star Wars Story, the Darth Vader comics, and even merchandise sold at the Galaxy’s Edge amusement park all feature these Force-activated artifacts.

4 Alternate Dimension

The events of Star Wars may take place a long time ago in a twice-distant galaxy, but they’re still at least within this dimension. At least, mostly. There were a handful of other dimensions in the Legends material, including one that could only be accessed by traveling through Hyperspace.

The possibility of alternate dimensions was alluded to in Star Wars: Rebels, but never confirmed. However, in the 2016 Han Solo comic, Han participated in a race across the galaxy and one of the other racers turned out to be from an alien species who left this dimension through a portal, briefly returning at the story’s climax.

3 Rakata

This is some ancient Star Wars lore. However long a “long time ago” actually is, the alien Rakata formed an empire roughly 35,000 years before that. The Rakata used the Dark Side of the Force to power their technology and enslaved other races. It is even believed they warred with the godlike Celestials. Then their empire collapsed and they seem to have gone extinct long before the events of the films.

While the Rakata themselves have not appeared in canon, there were Rakatan Wraith Boxes in the criminal Dryden Voss’s treasure collection in Solo: A Star Wars Story, confirming the existence of these ancient aliens.

2 Dark Jedi Quinlan Vos

Quinlan Vos was a Jedi who operated from the shadows. He made his debut in The Phantom Menace, where he was seen in the background on Tatooine. In Legends, he infiltrated various black market groups and even worked his way into Dooku’s inner circle of Dark Jedi as he spied for the Jedi Council during the Clone Wars. Gradually, he began to fall to the Dark Side, a sad inevitability as he had to work with the Dark Side to help the Jedi.

Vox’s story was both tragic and intriguing. Thankfully, the canon novel Dark Disciple by Christie Golden follows Vos as he teamed up with the Dark Sider Asajj Ventress to take down Dooku.

1 TIE Defenders

This last entry concerns what is perhaps the coolest TIE fighter around, the incredibly fast TIE Defender which had a hyperdrive and enhanced shields, as well as a unique third wing which–in addition to whatever functional purposes it had–just looks really cool.

TIE Defenders first appeared in Legends in the 1994 video game Star Wars: TIE Fighter. More recently, Grand Admiral Thrawn orders his troops to oversee the construction of these versatile TIEs in the Rebels TV show, seeing the craft as essential for the Empire to maintain its tactical superiority in the galaxy.

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