A long time ago, in a galaxy not so far away, this author posted a list of some of the greatest heroines in the original Star Wars Expanded Universe (or EU, for short). The list was so long and so detailed that it had to be split in two to give these many characters as much attention as they deserved. This post will follow the same lines, as I have learned more about other heroines in the EU since those earlier posts were released.
Not all the details about these characters will be in order. I may also mix a few items up, the way I did with the previous lists. To quote Mara Jade Skywalker, however, “I was young then.” My skills in research and my experience reading more Star Wars EU material has made it a little less likely that I will bungle my descriptions. At the very least, my mistakes won’t be as egregious now as they might have been had I attempted this list at an earlier time.
Still, be forewarned that this is not a comprehensive or perfect catalog. If you want to know more about these heroines from a galaxy far, far away, I suggest doing your own reading and research. There are plenty of other fans out there who know more about these ladies than I do, and they will be happy to tell you about them!
Now, let’s get started, shall we?
Tash Arranda: An Alderaanian girl with Force-senstivity, Tash and her younger brother Zak were orphaned when Tarkin ordered their homeworld destroyed. Why they were off-world at the time this blogger does not recall, since she has yet to read any of Zak and Tash Arranda’s adventures. I believe that, during the course of their books series, they travel around either with their uncle or with a recording of their uncle’s consciousness stashed in a droid. He may have come back in the flesh, having feigned death, but at this moment I cannot recall for certain which it was.
Both Tash and her brother have an interest in archaeology, just like their parents (who perished on Alderaan). This helps them in their adventures across a war-torn galaxy as they run across ancient terrors and present threats. I am not sure just what Zak did after rising to the rank of Jedi Knight, but Tash focused primarily on archeology. She may have done the occasional diplomatic mission or settled minor disputes, but that was the extent of her involvement with the new Jedi Order. Outside of the big battles, where it was all hands on deck, we didn’t see much of her after this. What a shame.
Xaverri: A stage magician of considerable skill, Xaverri makes her first appearance in A.C. Crispin’s Han Solo Trilogy (which comes with a lot of Warnings for Younger Readers!). Not much is known about her history, as she only shares the bare outlines with Han during their six months together. Even so, we do know that at one point Xaverri had a husband and several children.
Somehow, she or another member of her family crossed the wrong people in the Galactic Empire. Or they were in the wrong place at the really, really wrong time. Either way, the response was swift and horrible; Xaverri’s husband and children were all killed. How she survived is a mystery, but the fact is that she did. And she made the Empire pay repeatedly for robbing her of the most precious people in her life.
After her six month stint as Han’s girlfriend, wherein he helped her grift and hoodwink numerous Imperial officials out of lots of money and into a lot of trouble, Xaverri disappeared from his life. He was able to call on her to help defend Nar Shaddaa, the moon that is a homeworld to thousands of smugglers and other criminals, from an Imperial assault. But she made it clear she didn’t want to get back together with him. In point of fact, she had sworn off marriage and motherhood altogether, determined never to be hurt as she had been before.
The last time we see Xaverri is in Vonda N. McIntyre’s The Crystal Star. In disguise, Xaverri watches the extra-dimensional alien Waru as it heals people with injuries – after devouring other lifeforms hoping for healing. Han watches this happen to an alien child and, as a father himself, is so sickened by the event that it takes Xaverri some time to help him calm down. This leads to an unfortunate misunderstanding between him and Luke, who is already suffering from the space/time warping effects of the titular crystal star.
Leia, thankfully, is only too happy to meet Xaverri when the woman helps rescue Anakin Solo in the novel’s grand finale. Having heard about her from Han already, though their meeting is brief, the two women reach an understanding that requires few words to pass between them.
Where Xaverri goes after this is anyone’s guess, but it is likely that she maintained her one-woman crusade against the Empire for the rest of her life, even after the Imperial Remnant signed a peace treaty with the New Republic. They had to have corrupt and/or bloodthirsty officials still in their ranks, after all. And that means they were perfect fodder for a grifter with nothing left to lose.
Rillao: Unfortunately, Rillao only appears in Vonda N. McIntyre’s The Crystal Star. A Firrereo, this Force-sensitive alien woman was once a student of Darth Vader. But she was a complete disappointment to him because he could not corrupt her to the Dark Side. Finding the Dark Side repulsive, Rillao used her skills to heal and help others rather than dominate and harm them.
Her Firrereo mate, Hethrir, on the other hand was the perfect apprentice. Vader was able to turn him completely to the Dark Side, to the point that when the Dark Lord told him to prove his “humanity” by destroying his homeworld, Hethrir did so. He loaded all the adults of his people aboard ships to watch their world and their children burn. Then he put the surviving adults in cryostasis and sent them on a silent voyage into the depths of space.
After this event, Rillao fled both her mate and Vader. Due to their strong ties to the Force (both Rillao and Hethrir used the Force rather than khyber crystals to power their lightsabers), Vader had hoped that any offspring they had would be even stronger. However, when Rillao and Hethrir’s son was finally born, he proved to have no Force-sensitivity at all.
Rillao didn’t care about that. She was content to have Tigris and to see him grow up. But she never told him about his father, a mistake that came back to bite her after the Emperor fell. Tracking down his erstwhile mate, Hethrir stole Tigris from her and imprisoned her in a torture web on one of the cryostasis ships holding the remnant of their people. He left her alone there for five years, until Leia discovered and freed her while searching for her own kidnapped children.
Nothing more is known about Rillao and Tigris’ fates after the two were reunited in the final battle of The Crystal Star. Finding his son had no Force-sensitivity, Hethrir abused him by treating him as a servant, promising him power he could never deliver. The five-year separation and the fact that his mother had refused to tell him about Hethrir at all severely strained Tigris’ relationship with Rillao, but Han thought it likely they would find happiness together at some point in the future. I rather wish the EU writers had shown them as a content mother-and-son team in other stories, but unfortunately they never got around to it. Le sigh…..
Cilghal: A Mon Calamari and a diplomat, Cilghal appears in Kevin J. Anderson’s Jedi Academy trilogy. She reappears in a minor role in the Young Jedi Knights series, when Jacen and Jaina Solo and their friends tangle with the Diversity Alliance. And she has a fairly substantial role in the New Jedi Order books as a member of Luke’s Jedi Council, from what I have heard.
From what little this author has read of her, Cilghal is a fairly calm character with a soothing bearing. In some ways, she reminds me of the X-Men’s Storm; motherly, regal, and fierce in defending those who cannot protect themselves. During the Jedi Academy books Cilghal has to use her still untrained healing abilities to save Mon Mothma from a debilitating illness.
She soon finds, however, that this sickness is man-made – literally. Mon Mothma was poisoned with nanomachines that slowly kill her cell by cell. Desperate to save the New Republic’s Chief of State, Cilghal siphons off the microscopic machines with the Force one at a time.
The process takes all night but, in the end, Mon Mothma lives. Cilghal practically has to crawl out of the Chief of State’s hospital room, where she collapses in the arms of a nearby guard with a bowl full of the nanites that she removed. Filling the men in, she staggers off to her quarters and takes a well-earned rest. But this tediously courageous act won her fame and respect across the New Republic, which makes it easy to ignore her lightsaber skills – something the Diversity Alliance discovers the hard way. 😉
Kirana Ti: A Witch of Dathomir, Kirana Ti doesn’t pop up too often in the old EU novels, though she might have been seen more in the comics. We first meet her in The Courtship of Princess Leia, when Han and Leia have their fiery, days-long date on the forgotten world. After the Hapan Prince, Isolder, tries to convince Leia to marry him, a jealous and fearful Han kidnaps her to avoid losing her forever. He brings her to a planet he won in a Sabacc game: Dathomir.
Unknown to Han, though, the planet is ruled by women. Since most men cannot wield the Force and a fair number of women can, the women rule by rite of being able to fend off the natural threats of Dathomir with their “magic.” More disconcerting for the stranded Rebel hero and Princess, however, is the fact that the Empire has a base on Dathomir – a base run by Warlord Zinj, who has it in for Han Solo!
Kirana Ti is among the warrior women of the Singing Mountain Clan, which takes Han and Leia in after they are shot down over Dathomir. She helps pull the Millennium Falcon into the clan’s mountain abode. Later on, she helps her clan deal with the Nightsisters, the Dathomirian Witches who have gone over to the Dark Side and now seek a way to get off planet to spread their evil. When Teneniel Djo, mother of future young Jedi Knight Tenel Ka, uses the Dark Side in a fit of rage Kirana is there to see her do it. She bursts into tears at the sight of her sister warrior’s actions, jolting Teneniel back to her senses.
Sometime after this, Kirana Ti joins Luke’s first class of Jedi hopefuls. She leaves behind a daughter and a husband on Dathomir to do it, and I do not know if she continues to live on her homeworld or if she only visits it occasionally after completing her training on Yavin IV. My money is on her leaving home from time to time to attend to Jedi and galactic business. From what I can tell, the Witches of Dathomir like staying on their planet more than traveling around the galaxy. After a few missions Kirana Ti probably went home, where Luke or another Jedi could come by any time and pick her up for a mission if they really needed her.
Gara Petothel: Gara Petothel has a complex history. Born on Coruscant to Imperial intelligence operatives, when they died on a mission the Empire took her in and trained her in the same art. After the fall of Coruscant (or Imperial Center, as it was known under the Empire) to the New Republic, Gara decided to find a new career with one of the Warlords that had risen up to claim power, fracturing the Empire into dozens of little territories run by them.
After one of these battles saw Imperial Admiral Trigit betray his crew to save himself, Gara activated an escape plan to protect herself and the others on board. Furious that an Imperial officer and captain of a Star Destroyer would do this to his people, she leaves him and his command crew to die at the hands of a Wraith Squadron pilot. She ejects in an escape pod and is picked up by the New Republic, which she plans to stay in until she can get a job with Warlord Zinj.
In the process, though, she is hired by members of Wraith Squadron to clear a female squadron mate’s record. This woman is being blackmailed by a member of the New Republic military. Her male compatriots want him gone and their friend freed. At first Gara wants to say no, but she suddenly realizes this would be a great way to get into Zinj’s good graces. So she says yes – on one condition. If she pulls this mission off, she has to be guaranteed a place in either Rogue or Wraith Squadron.
The boys aren’t happy about this, but they can’t use official channels to help their friend. It’s Gara or no one. So they accept and, after she pulls it off (and ends up in the infirmary because the bad guy punched her hard), Gara is accepted into the Wraiths under her false name.
At first it’s just another mission. Just more data to compute. But then Gara soon becomes attached to her squadron mates, developing a sense of loyalty to them. She also starts to fall in love with fellow Wraith Myn Donos – the shell-shocked leader and sole survivor of an X-Wing squadron she helped destroy while under Admiral Trigit’s command.
These competing signals nearly drive Gara insane. When her identity is finally revealed she swears loyalty to the Wraiths and the New Republic. But Myn blanks out in a blind rage and nearly shoots her down. Only the speedy, smart actions of another Wraith pilot and her quick hand on the hyperdrive lever lets her escape.
Joining up with Zinj at last, Gara maneuvers herself into a position to beam information on his movements to her squadron mates. She escapes Zinj’s embarrassing defeat with a group of aliens he had modified mentally and physically. Once secure in a new identity to avoid prosecution (former spy and all that; the New Republic can’t just let her go, even if she did help them out…), she makes contact with Myn and invites him to come visit her to see if there’s still a chance for them to have a relationship.
According to later material, there was more than a chance. Gara and Myn got married and had a family. During the Second Galactic Civil War they managed to rescue some of their former squadron mates. Though Gara is happy to see them, she insists they not try to recruit her children into their ranks to fight in the war.
On the whole, Gara is probably one of the most interesting heroines in the original Expanded Universe. Her story is fantastic, a must-read for any Star Wars fan. You can find her in Aaron Allston’s Wraith Squadron books, which carry next to no Warnings for Younger Readers. The books are some of the best in the original EU, and Gara is a big reason why. Don’t take my word for it – pick up the Wraith Squadron books and read them to meet her “in person”!
Dia Passik: A Twi’lek from Ryloth, Dia Passik (or Dia’passik, as the Twi’leks spell it), was a slave for many years. Coaxing piloting lessons out of men who would stop off at her master’s pleasure barge, she eventually stole a ship and blew up said barge – with her owner on it. Eventually, she worked her way to the New Republic military and got accepted to Wraith Squadron.
During an undercover mission to Zinj’s Star Destroyer, one of her fellow Wraiths was caught and killed. To keep up the disguise for the rest of the team, Dia shot his dead corpse in the throat – and smiled like a predator when she did it. On the way back to the base she had a psychological meltdown as the enormity of what she’d done hit home. She’d shot a dead friend, someone they should have fought to bring home in one piece. And she did it without remorse or hesitation.
Garik “Face” Loran
Coupled with all the fighting she’d done beforehand and the abuse she’d received as a slave girl, Dia’s distress at this action led her to try to kill herself. Garik “Face” Loran, an actor turned New Republic officer and Wraith, was able to prevent her from committing this heinous act. The two entered a relationship thereafter that lasted at least as long as their stint fighting Zinj. After the Wraiths were disbanded, they apparently split up amicably.
That was Aaron Allston’s intent, anyway. Later writers had the two married. Dia had a daughter by this point (though apparently this girl wasn’t Face’s biological daughter – don’t ask me how that works), and they were very happy together. Dia had to take their daughter on the run when assassins came after them to get to Face, but by the end of the adventure the family was reunited and safe once more. Not a bad ending, all things considered.
Rhysati Ynr: Rhysati was a human woman introduced in the X-Wing novels. She joined the Rebellion after the Battle of Endor and became a member of Rogue Squadron when Wedge Antilles re-assembled it to fight the campaigns that would eventually win Coruscant for the fledgling New Republic.
Almost as soon as she joined the Squadron, Rhysati began a Romance Reel with fellow pilot Nawara Ven. Trained as a lawyer, the Twi’lek was an average pilot, but he definitely won her heart on the first go around. The two were an item not long after signing on to the Rogues, and this helped them infiltrate Imperial-held Coruscant more easily.
During a battle, however, Nawara lost the lower part of one leg when he was forced to eject from his X-wing. Though outfitted with a prosthetic, this severely limited his already standard flying and fighting capabilities, reducing him to a position in the administrative side of the Squadron. He and Rhysati still saw each other a lot during this time, and after a while they decided to quit the Rogues to get married and start a family.
Whether or not Twi’leks and humans could have children in the old EU, I do not know. Given how the new timeline treats the subject, I wouldn’t be surprised if Rhysati and Nawara did have children of their own at some point. In either case, ten years after Admiral Thrawn’s campaign against the New Republic, Nawara and his wife were happily helping smuggler and professional pirate Booster Terrik run his Star Destroyer-turned-casino, the Errant Venture.
Rhysati and her husband seem to disappear after this, but that might be a good thing. Considering how much of a mess the Yuuzhan Vong invasion made of the galaxy, this author prefers thinking that they found a nice, safe place to raise their family while all the fighting occurred somewhere else. Still, I expect they made an appearance or two at the Rogue Squadron reunions later in life!
These are all the heroines I have for you today, readers. If you can, check out the books in which they appear or read their files in the “Legends” section of Wookieepedia. These are ladies who deserve to be remembered – especially since Lucasfilm would rather they stay forgotten!
Until next time, readers:
“The Force will be with you, always.”
The Mithril Guardian
Thoughts on the Edge of Forever 