As the Star Wars Rebels moved towards closing its fourth and final season, it nearly blended with its video game canon. This revelation came from none other than the guy who lent his voice to Starkiller, the lead character of the last two Star Wars game published by LucasArts before the franchise was acquired by Disney.
Those who played Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (2008) and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 (2010) on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, are familiar with Starkiller. It was contemplated that he might be featured in the ‘Rebels’ series as one of the force sensitive agents of Darth Vader on a mission to systematically hunt down the Jedi. Sam Witwer, the person who gave voice-overs for Starkiller in the last two video games, spilled the beans in a Twitch stream broadcast a few days back.
Starkiller’s reference can be found in the earliest George Lucas concepts for Star Wars (in fact as far back as the Journal of the Whills). However, there were two major complications with the character. One, he had just too much excessive power; in the video game of ‘Force Unleashed,’ the players embark on a galactic journey eliminating the Jedi Masters and ultimately taking up the mission to destroy Darth Vader and the Emperor.
The story witnessed, Starkiller surviving a Vader stab as well as being tossed into the vacuum space. He ultimately pulls down a Star Destroyer to the ground with his Force mojo.
The story witnessed, Starkiller surviving a Vader stab as well as being tossed into the vacuum space. He ultimately pulls down a Star Destroyer to the ground with his Force mojo.
This first game had two different climaxes. In one the game ends with Starkiller creating the rebellion and becoming a martyr in the process. The other dark peak saw him kill Darth Vader and become the new leading cyborg killing machine for Palpatine. That was the reason why he featured in the Ultimate Sith Edition, wherein he went on a massacre, slaying reputed Star Wars characters on various DLC missions.
The video game scene where a mutilated, tortured Starkiller who almost resembled Kylo Ren, softly whispers “Thank you Proxy”, on seeing his droid in the Jawas scavenger facility during the Tatooing mission of the ‘Ultimate Sith’ DLC, is in my opinion, the most haunting and saddening video game scene ever.
Proxy looked ready to serve, even when he had been decapitated and his legs chopped off from the rest of his body. However, Starkiller realized how terrible things were, and his voice revealed his sadness. The main reason was his extreme powers that were simply too much for the narrative. This and the presence of Anakin, Luke and Rey in the three episodes left not even a guest performance scope for him. I believe though, that if given a cameo, he would have only enhanced the value of Star Wars Battlefront 2.
