The Road to Episode Infinity: Top Ten Lightsabers

Lightsabers are just plain cool and Star Wars wouldn’t be Star Wars without them. Audiences usually can distinguish lightsabers by their colors, but if you examine the hilts, you will find a tremendous amount of detail and variety. Here I rank the top ten sabers from the films and the top five from “Rebels”.

#10 – Old Ben’s Lightsaber
Obi-Wan Kenobi built this lightsaber during the beginning of the Clone Wars and it served him until his dying day. One has to wonder what Vader did with this saber after he destroyed Kenobi. Was it aboard the first Death Star when it blew up? Or did Vader take it with him? Something for the Expanded Universe to explore I suppose.

#9 – Palpatine’s Lightsaber

I’m not sure why Palpatine’s lightsaber looks so much like a sex toy. Palpatine used this saber to slay members of the Jedi council, including Kit Fisto, Saesee Tiin and Agen Kolar. I don't think Palpatine's character needed a lightsaber, he seemed to me like someone who manipulated other people to fight for him, but Lucas get's the final word on this, so what can you do?

#8 – Yoda’s Lightsaber
Yoda’s lightsaber first appeared in the 1999 Phantom Menace visual dictionary and then onscreen in the 2002 film Attack of the Clones. The origin of Yoda’s lightsaber is revealed in the 2017 Marvel comics Star Wars: 27 and 28. It was a short weapon for a short being. Yoda lost his lightsaber whilst dueling with Palpatine on Coruscant and he probably never built a new one considering the lengths he went through just to acquire his first kyber crystal.

#7 – Dooku’s Lightsaber
According to Wookieepedia this “gracefully curved hilt enabled the wielder to utilize greater finesse when slashing and lunging at an opponent”. Dooku's apprentice Asajj Ventress also chose curved hilts for her sabers. It’s worth noting that Christopher Lee who played Dooku was an accomplished swordsmen.

#6 – Mace Windu’s Lightsaber

The Episode I Mace Windu Kenner action figures features Mace Windu with a blue lightsaber. Apparently Samuel L. Jackson was not satisfied with this because he somehow convinced George Lucas to give him a purple one. At first George told Sammy J. that Jedi lightsabers only came in Blue or Green, but by post-production Mace Windu had his purple lightsaber. The props department made the saber even cooler by carving the letters “BMF” on the switch. If you want to know what “BMF” stands for watch Pulp Fiction.

#5- Darth Maul’s Lightsaber
Maul’s saber wasn’t the first double-bladed saber in the Star Wars universe (see Exar Kun) but it's certainly the most iconic. The Episode I Visual Dictionary notes that a double-bladed saber is traditionally used for training and that it is quite dangerous to its user if they are not careful. Maul’s weapon has two internal kyber crystals, so that it can be used as a single bladed if need be. The Darth Maul FX lightsaber from Hasbro was sold as a single blade that could be combined with a second if you were willing to fork out the dough for two of them.

#4- Kylo Ren’s Lightsaber
There is no finesse to this saber. It is clunky, clumsy, and random. The ancient design is powered by modern tech and a single cracked crystal powers the weapon. It will forever be remembered as the weapon that killed Han Solo. We will certainly see a lot more of this saber in future episodes.

#3- Luke’s Lightsaber
This saber resembles Old Ben’s Lightsaber and in fact it is. Obi-Wan’s lightsaber from “A New Hope” was repurposed as Luke’s Lightsaber from “Return of the Jedi”. The expanded universe tells us that Luke pillaged Obi-Wan’s hut for the parts and there is a fan theory that the green kyber crystal inside this saber was the same found inside of Qui-Gon’s saber. Afterall, Qui-Gon’s saber was in Obi-Wan’s possession at the end of “The Phantom Menace”. Early art for “Return of the Jedi” showed this saber was supposed to be blue, but the effects department discovered that the blue did not show up well against the Tatooine blue sky. So we get Green.

#2- Darth Vader’s Lightsaber
This is the only lightsaber featured in all the films in the original trilogy. It slew Obi-Wan Kenobi and took Luke Skywalker’s right hand. It’s also the saber that possibly killed Ahsoka Tano, his former apprentice. Most recently we saw the saber take down multiple Rebel troopers in “Rogue One”.

#1- Anakin Skywalker’s Lightsaber
The ownership of this lightsaber passed from Anakin to Obi-Wan to Luke to Maz to Rey. It was the first lightsaber seen in the 1977 film and has been seen in four total films. The question of how Maz Kanata came into possession of this saber is quite mysterious, but certainly if this isn’t explained in the films it will be explained in the Expanded Universe. In 2007, the actual prop travelled to space aboard Space Shuttle Discovery in honor of the 30^th anniversary of Star Wars.

Top Five Lightsabers from Rebels

#5- Kanan Jarrus’ Lightsaber
Kanan’s lightsaber has appeared in television, books, comic books, and video games. It was built while he was a Padawan under Jedi Master Deppa Billiba. The lightsaber had a special feature which allowed him to control the length of the blade.

#4- The Grand Inquisitor’s Lightsaber
The Grand Inquisitor’s spinning lightsaber is an interesting design. One feature even allowed it to automatically rotate. Other inquisitors used their weapon to propel themselves like a helicopter and fly through the air, which is rather silly. Ultimately this rather large weapon, had a large weakness, which led to the demise of The Grand Inquisitor himself.

#3- The Darksaber
The Darksaber is a Mandalorian weapon first seen in Clone Wars Season 2. It was built 1,000 years before the fall of the Republic by Tarra Vizsla, a Mandalorian Jedi. Recently the Darksaber has fallen into the hands of Sabine Wren, who hopes to use it to unify Mandalore. The Dark Saber was created in 2010 when George Lucas saw some Clone War footage of a vibroblade-wielding Mandalorian dueling with a Jedi. Lucas correctly surmised that a vibroblade would be cut in half by a lightsaber and therefore the “Clone Wars” creative team invented the Dark Saber instead.

#2- Ezra’s Lightsaber Blaster
Ezra’s first saber (seen in Rebels Season 1 and 2) was a hybrid between a lightsaber and a blaster. It served him well until Darth Vader destroyed it. Ezra later built a new, green lightsaber- but let’s face it, the lightsaber-blaster makes a better toy.

#1- Ahsoka Tano’s White Lightsabers

During the Clone Wars, Ahsoka fought with a green lightsaber and a green “shoto” lightsaber. Shoto is Japanese for “short sword”. In “Star Wars: Rebels” Ahsoka wields two white lightsabers, one being a shorter “shoto” lightsaber. Ahsoka was wielding these twin blades in her duel with Darth Vader, which is probably the coolest scene in the first two seasons of Rebels. Whether Ahsoka survived this encounter is still hotly debated in the Star Wars fan community.

Two More Lightsabers

Though not a part of this list, I thought I’d give a shout out to both Young Obi-Wan’s and Master Qui-Gon Jinn’s lightsabers. The designs are pretty silly. They both feature a giant red button, Qui-Gon's looks like a Toblerone bar, and who knows what that spherical thing on the end of Obi-Wan’s is for. Since these are the first lightsabers you see if you watch the films in episodic order, they at least deserve a mention.