Pilots: The Evolution of the Human and Not-So-Human Background Characters from Star Wars

The X-Wing pilots of the Star Wars films are often the unsung heroes of the franchise. Everyone knows characters such as Luke Skywalker, Poe Dameron, and Lando Calrissian, but what of the pilots that get significantly less screen time? Blink-and-you'll-miss-them pilots from The Force Awakens such as Snap Wexley and Jessika Pava have captured the hearts of hardcore fans. Let’s explore the history of these heroic pilots.

Wedge Antillies

The most famous secondary character from the original trilogy is X-wing pilot Wedge Antillies. Most Star Wars fans know Wedge by name, but many do not realize how much the character evolved during production of the original trilogy.

Denis Lawson is now famous for portraying the Wedge in the OT, but this almost wasn’t so. In fact, Lawson isn’t even the first Wedge to appear on screen in the film.

During the Death Star briefing scene actor Colin Higgins portrayed Wedge (the fanbase now refers to this character as “Fake Wedge”) Higgins apparently did not memorize his lines and was fired after only a day. That’s when Lawson (who had originally lost the part to Higgins) was brought in. Yet the portrayal of Wedge gets even more confusing. You see, American actor David Ankrum’s voice was used to dub over the lines of BOTH Lawson’s “Wedge” and Higgins’ “Fake Wedge”. But why bring in a third actor to dub over the lines of the original British actors?

Lucas’ original idea for the films was that all the good guys would have American accents and that all the bad guys would have British accents.  Even his initial idea for C3-PO was “a sort of a used-car dealer: a fast-talking guy with an American accent".

         Since Star Wars was filmed in London many of the “good guys” were British actors having to fake American accents. A good example of this is Garrick Hagon who plays Biggs Darklighter. Though he didn’t have many lines in the original cut of the film, if you watch the missing “Tatooine Scenes” you can hear a lot more.

One of the "Lost Tatooine" scenes with
Luke and Biggs bumming around their home planet

         Lawson reprised the role of Wedge in Empire Strikes Back, (even though he hadn’t realized the character of Wedge survived the first film). This time around Lawson’s voice was dubbed over again by another American actor. It wasn't until Return of the Jedi that you can hear Lawson’s real voice faking his way through an American accent.

    

Nien Nunb

Nien Nunb

Another famous pilot is Nien Nunb, the Sullustan who co-pilots the Falcon during the Battle of Endor. The history of Nien Nunb’s character can be almost as confusing as the history of Wedge. Nien Nunb is named for the fact that the character was “number nine” on the creature packing list. Ten Numb, a character of the same species, is presumably named because he was “number ten” on the packing list.

The puppet Nien Nunb was performed by Mike Quinn and Richard Bonehill in Return of the Jedi and voiced by Kenyan actor  Kipsang Rotich. In the film Nunb can actually be heard speaking  Kikuyu, a Kenyan language.

Ten Numb

As far as Ten Numb is concerned, there is a debate whether he actually made the final cut of Return of the Jedi, but he is supposedly there. Preproduction images show him wearing a white B-Wing jumpsuit, which definitely did not make it into the film, but Ten Numb shows up in a lot of merchandise including Lego minifigs and Hasbro figurines.

Evidence for Ten Numb & Mon Cal fighter pilots

(2 minutes 39 seconds)

When "The Force Awakens" went into production J.J. Abrams asked Denis Lawson to return to the role of Wedge Antilles. Lawson declined saying "they asked me but it just would have bored me." Fortunately J.J. was able to put one of the Original Trilogy pilots into a role. Mike Quinn was more than happy to reprise the role of Nien Nunb. Nunb returns, not in the Falcon, but as an X-Wing pilot who is involved at the Battle of Starkiller Base.

Rey's X-Wing Pilot Doll from TFA

The Assault on Starkiller Base

In “The Force Awaken” Poe Dameron leads the assault on Starkiller Base, piloting “Black One” his customized X-Wing. The lesser known pilots include Ello Asty, Snap Wexley and Jessika Pava.

Snap Wexley is portrayed by Greg Grunberg, who is a childhood friend of J.J. Abrams. Grunberg has been in practically every project that Abrams has helmed including Felicity, Alias, Lost, Mission Impossible III, and Star Trek. Grunberg was asked to say multiple lines during the filming of “The Force Awakens” but he refused to say the line “I’m hit!” when prompted by the crew. Grunberg obviously plans to return to the role in future films.

Ello Asty (apparently named for the Beastie Boys album “Hello Nasty”) is a Abednedo pilot with the words “Born to Ill” written across his helmet (apparently a reference to the Beastie Boys album “Licensed to Ill”. Asty was not as lucky as Snap Wexley during the battle and was shot down in the conflict.

Not much is known about pilot Jessika Pava, though she does appear in tie-in media including some novels. The most notable thing I can say about her is that fanfic sites often “ship” her with Rey (because who else are you going to ship with Rey?)

It's interesting to note that The Force Awakens has the best survival percentage for these pilots. J.J. really leaves the door open for these characters to become more active in future films or the expanded universe. 

There is a lot that I would love to elaborate on in regards to this topic. There are the astromech droids who are the pilots constant companions and there are also the starships themselves, but in the interest of keeping this blog relatively short I will stop typing and just let you enjoy some Jessika / Rey fan art.