Fallen Order – Living History in the Star Wars Galaxy

Galactic Style Guide – Ponchos II

Welcome back to another installment of the Galactic Style Guide, the bimonthly series where we break down the ‘Star Wars aesthetic’ in order to help you create a more authentic ‘outer persona’! In this entry, we’re continuing our look at ponchos, focusing on examples from the prequel era! (As a reminder: for our purposes, we’re defining a poncho as a garment worn as an outer layer for protection from the elements, which covers the front of the body).
Let’s keep things rolling with the poncho I think I would most want to curl up in:

Qui-Gon wears this poncho when venturing into Mos Espa in Episode I—the script specifying that he is “dressed as a moisture farmer”. Trisha Biggar notes that the coarse-weave is a silk/linen mix and that the border is “printed”—though I’m not sure what exactly that means (Dressing A Galaxy, p20).

Take a good look at that beautiful nubby texture!

keep reading for many more examples

Galactic Style Guide – Aurebesh II

Welcome back to another installment of the Galactic Style Guide (where we break down the ‘Star Wars aesthetic’ in order to help you create a more authentic ‘outer persona’) and the end of Aurebesh Month! In last week’s installment we showed how before the Disney buyout, Aurebesh words on clothing were incredibly rare. This week, we’re taking a look at some places where using in-universe lettering IS appropriate!:

**Tattoos or scarification:** Force Hounds (26,000 BBY), Morlish Veed (Legacy), Kaddak (Cry of Shadows), Enviro-suit (FFG), Sketch, Kix (The Clone Wars)

Note that while there are plenty of tattoos in-universe, these were the Only examples of letters-as-body-art I could find in the rather complete listing of Aurebesh appearances.

My worry for The Mandalorian Season 2

(Don’t worry folks, your regularly-scheduled Saturday post is still coming, but since everyone and their mother is watching DisneyPlus today, I had to get this out there and off my chest)

After first approaching it with caution, by the end of its first season, I was 90% on-board with The Mandalorian…all the way up until the last shot with that stupid ‘darksaber’ (Pete the Retailer agrees). Then earlier this year, I started seeing second season rumour-mill headlines that Lucasfilm was bringing in Temuera Morrison to play Boba Fett, while all signs were pointing towards Rosario Dawson (of all people) playing a live-action Ahsoka Tano. A few weeks later, a rumour that they were also looking for a live-action ‘Ezra Bridger’ (whose SWarsy naming-game I’ve always thought was amazingly weak) from Rebels. WHY?

Galactic Style Guide – Comm badges

Welcome back to the Galactic Style Guide, the monthly series where we take a close look at the elements that make up the ‘Star Wars aesthetic’ to help you build a more accurate ‘outer persona’!
In this installment, we’re focusing on the little doodads that everyone seems to have on their vests and jackets nowadays. Official sources can’t agree on what they are—the Complete Visual Dictionary refers to them as a ‘rank plaque’, ‘rank insignia’, ‘communications badge’, or ‘command insignia’, while I believe the RougeOne reference guide calls them ‘personal transponders’, so who knows? Despite not appearing in the original Star Wars ’77, these devices have gained in popularity (especially among the ‘Batuu-bounding’ crowd) after frequent inclusion in many post-Disney materials. Since 9 times out of 10 they’re worn by Rebel Alliance characters, we didn’t see Any in the Prequel era (I could be wrong, though; leave a comment below if you know otherwise!)

Only two styles of badge are seen in Episode V. These use easily-castable or vacuformable shapes and components with brightly colored buttons. The first (we’ll call it Hoth #1) is worn by our three lead characters and the hangar technicians, suggesting they are transponders and not related to rank.

Hoth #1: worn around Echo Base by Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Leia Organa, and hangar technicians

Continue reading “Galactic Style Guide – Comm badges”

Galactic Style Guide – Belts of the Galaxy

Welcome to the first installment of the Galactic Style Guide, a monthly series in which I will be collecting and curating many visual examples of a single type of in-universe item. Why am I doing this, you ask? Besides having a lot of time on my hands in quarantine, too often when we think of ‘Star Wars’, we limit ourselves to thinking only of the main cast of characters, with secondary or background characters falling by the wayside. In this series, I hope to turn an analytical eye towards the incredible variety that collectively creates the larger ‘galactic aesthetic’. To my knowledge, this sort of project has never been done before, and I suspect will likely prove very useful to those of you heading (once they reopen, post-pandemic) to Disney’s Galaxy’s Edge parks, which are becoming very accommodating of GFFA-style outfits (provided they don’t stray too close to those of main characters). By shining a spotlight on previously-overlooked designs, I hope OC cosplayers and potential ‘Batuu bounders’ will see that there are many more options for Star Wars style beyond copying Han, Luke, Leia, Lando, etc.
With that out of the way, for our first installment, we’re looking at BELTS. Let’s get started!

Rectangular plates:Ben Kenobi, Shaak Ti (22 BBY); Luke Skywalker, ‘Galen Erso’; Dannik Jerriko

Galaxy’s Edge merch: Jedi & Sith Holocrons

SWGE Holocrons I don’t have a ton to say about the Jedi and Sith holocrons ($50) offered at Galaxy’s Edge, because such items were extremely very rare in the Galaxy, and not something your regular Jedi—let alone average citizen—would ever have access to:

“…the deepest secrets of the great Masters of the Force were stored in restricted holocrons; since the Lorian Nod affair, some seventy standard years before, access to these holocrons was denied to all but Jedi Masters.” (Matthew Stover, Revenge of the Sith, Chapter 10).

While some further research revealed that the Jedi Temple archives probably held more holocrons than I had originally understood, I still don’t think they would be the kind of thing that any random Jedi or citizen could pull out of their backpack. (Disney!Canon has made it pretty clear through their various properties–Galaxy’s Edge, the recent Jedi: Fallen Order game, probably Rebels (I haven’t seen it), likely Marvel comics as well–that in their Canon, holocrons are widespread. I’ll just have to agree to disagree. Continue reading “Galaxy’s Edge merch: Jedi & Sith Holocrons”