Alien designs in the TV series

I'm interested in hearing everybody's thoughts on the various new or re-imagined aliens in TCW, Rebels, Droids, Ewoks, etc. What designs have you liked the most? Which did you think we're particularly lame or quirky? This can be a general discussion thread for all matters concerning alien portrayals on the little screen.

ib4 Trench

Some of my personal picks are as follows:



The Zillo Beast. A nice take on Godzilla, an enormous creature that wreaked havoc on the galactic capital and had nigh impervious armour plating. Pity it never showed up again.



While it's not a new species, I liked the new designs for the male Togruta, with the "bull horns" look for their montrals. It fits nicely with their predator origins and also plays off our observations of sexual dimorphism.



Originally just a McQuarrie concept art for Chewbacca, Rebels has done a good job with Zeb of fleshing out some interesting backstory (with plenty more on the way I'm sure) for the Lasat people.



The Convor. It's so cute!

Now for something I didn't like so much:



The image is of a Karkarodon but really it can be expanded to all the anthropomorphic animals we've seen. Just seems lazy or uninspired in my opinion.

 

I didn't mind the Karkarodon. Yeah, it was clearly just a case of "take a Great White and give it arms and legs," but the Geonosians are just bugs that underwent the same idea; the Aqualish are spiders; there is a giant praying mantis in the cantina; there's dog men; Jabba's a turd with arms and a face; the Lurmen are talking lemurs; the Ithorians are slugs with arms and legs.

The aliens that I dislike the most are the "Star Trek" aliens (take a human, give them a different forehead texture or skin color, and call it an alien).

E.G.

Mirialan
Togruta
Zabrak (especially the non-Dathomir ones like Sugi and Eeth)
Dathomirian witches
Pantoran
Sakiyans
Tholothian
Cerean
Twi'leks
Whatever Quinlan Vos is
Whatever Aurra Sing is

I don't hate the characters, but I think the designs are just really lazy. Especially giving an actress of African decent a headdress and calling her an alien (Adi Gallia), giving a human model an olive complexion with somefacial designs and calling her an alien (Barriss; Luminara).

Aliens like the Kel'Dor; Wookiees; Lasat; Gotal; Kaminoans; Pau'ans; Sugi (from the unfinished Utapau arc of TCW); Nautolan; Weequay; are designs that I prefer.

The Weequay were a species that IMO were just ugly (which is fine). I rather liked that they made Hondo one and gave him a funny personality.

 

I'd forgotten how much the zillo beast resembles a tapeworm!

I liked whatever species Tera Sinube was. He was pretty cool, what with his beaked mouth and Dark Crystal look to him. Also liked the nelvan from the 2-d cartoon.
The aliens that seemed silly to me were those braniac guys, can't remember their names, there was a couple of them. I wish the lurmens had bit more 'alien' biology to them (so they didn't look exactly like lemurs)

And I agree, Star Trekesque humanoids are oftentimes uninspired and boring. Unless they are Klingons or twi'leks.

 

I like the Zillo and seriously Filoni we need it back.

 

Most aliens in any sci-fi or fantasy are anthro in aspect. I like it. Just because they share animal traits doesn't equal they are animals though.

I love the canid ones like the blue-furred anthro wolf-like ones from one of the cartoons and the Bothans. I always think the Ithorians are sharks and that's great! I can understand both sides of the Human in all but colour thing. I love the Chiss look but they are basically Humans.

 

Return of the Zillo Beast needs to happen. No questions asked.

As for near-human species, I can tolerate them as long as they have at least one trait that clearly says they're not human (for a not so good example, Tholothians and Kiffar just look like plain humans with a headdress and tattoos respectively; as for Mirialans, I like it better when the green skin tone is more pronounced.). For good examples, I'd point to Aurra Sing's freakishly long fingers, the dimorphism between female and male Twi'leks, and Togrutas. The Chiss also look cool (that species needs to become a canon immigrant, especially since Agent Kallus was depicted as one once); they may just look like humans with blue skin, but they've also got monochromatic eyes (and if they do become canon again, I'd like to see Chiss with eye colors besides red).


Back to the subject of more alien species.

For Karkarodons, I didn't really think much of them until I saw Tamson actually fighting like a shark. But I'd like to learn more about them.

The Kyuzo definitely need to be expanded upon since we've only seen one in both canon and Legends. For example, is the hat trick restricted to Embo or is that a technique they can all do? Are they naturally that acrobatic? What is that mask for (Since it's obviously not a gas mask, I like to think it's an artificial voice box similar to the Anomids)?

Species we also need to see more of from that originated in the films? Skakoans. Not only do they need to reestablish that they could explode if their suits get damaged, we need to confirm if they have legs or not.

Parwans are very original and a good way of bringing in that plant cantina alien concept. The idea of a gas-filled, sapient fungus with bio-electric energy is just all sorts of unusual.

Convorees and tookas (and loth-cats by extension) are kinda cute, no doubt about that. Even though the puffer pig is basically just a puffer fish combined with a pig (and similar to a few other creatures, a possible carryover from Filoni's time working on Avatar: The Last Airbender), the idea of combining those two is just so out there (that, and I like the description of it being a living metal detector).

I also like the wildlife of Umbara. Not only do they all have a Metroid-level of creepiness to them, they also emphasize that Umbara is just not a safe planet to be on. Other animals I really enjoyed were Mastiff Phalones (vulture-tiger things), Gutkurrs (raptor-fleas), Insectomorphs (unusual-looking Dug mounts), the Blixus (scorpion-squid hybrid), Millodons (who wants to ride a giant millipede?) and Rupings (I like how their wings also function as hands).

 

^ That to me is one of the most interesting alien designs to come along in canon IMO. Hoping for more and different aliens that aren't necessarily bipedal in the future of the franchise.

 

As for more non-humanoid ones, I almost forgot about the Anacondans.





Yeah, they're just giant talking snakes, but they're sapient beings and some live on civilized worlds like Coruscant (though the ones we've seen are living in the Underworld). I'd like to know what some of the more civilized ones are like and whether it's only Morley (and maybe a few others) that resort to sapient-on-sapient cannibalism.

 

Gascon for the win.

 

I mostly agree, I don't mind if there are a couple like that, but there are a lot that follow this pattern. The "headdress" is kind of Star Wars' version of the forehead in Star Trek.

 

I really loved the Diathim lady It's a shame we didn't see them more.



I also want to see this Jabba the Hutt concept on Rebels. It's gross, but I found it neat.

 

I'm not a big fan of Robonino, but I do like his species design.

 

I had so nearly completely erased the memory of that episode... so very nearly.

I enjoyed this species' design. I feel like the mushroom head was thrown on there as a response to the lack of pants

 

I agree, Mushroom people are love, Mushroom people are life.

 

I find many Alien designs from TCW to be creative and great.
Rebels might be doing it too Mcquarrie-ish (Zeb,Azmorigan) but I don't complain.
What I want to add is a design , coming directly from George Lucas and that made it's first appearance in the phenomenal Season 5 The Shadow Collective arc (the race already appeared in Star Wars The Clone Wars Darth Maul Shadow Conspiracy novelization of the events of this arc) : ...
Underworld spice dealers ...


The Pykes !
This design while resembling the infamous/famous ( whatever your stance at it is)Grey Alien concept and while having some simplicity strikes as me as really cool.
Their weapons are also quite neat.

I also like the planet of them , Oba Diah and the desert moon.
It was interesting to see their involvement in the Sifo-Dyas conspiracy as well.
As of Star Wars Darth Maul Son of Dathomir we know that they are again on their own and even have links to the Kessel mines.

From the species that I would like to be , in Star Wars (along with Wookiees ) these are the species that I would like to be.

This was certainly a long and maybe unconventional post , I agree and you can call me a Pyke fanboy if you want , but I just wanted to point that out .

Edit : I know they smuggle spice and all , but it could also be used in other circumstances than Drugs.
Besides : a beloved character used to smuggle spice as well :

So your point is invalid.
BTW it is odd how I find water species like Quarrens,Mon Calamari,Gungans,Melkath and Nautolans as one of the most interesting species as well even when I wouldn't like to live underwater. ( I'm no speciest )

Jo

 

Although many have posted they dislike the trek like species that are just humans with something slighty changed it actually makes more sense for these near human species to exist in star wars then in star trek. In star wars humans have been capable of interstellar travel for millenia, and per the old EU they used sleeper ships To travel even before that. In star trek they have only had interstellar travel for 2-3 centuries and only had sleeper ships starting in the 1990's(per TOS episode space seed Khan disapeared from earth sometime in the 1990's).

Having human offshoots makes sense in star wars because after several thousand generations the colonists would adapt to there enviroment. Also star wars has other species that also have offshoots, Nute Gunray and the Neimodians are offshots of the Duros, there are others as well but I can't remember then right now.

Also if they recanonize the Chiss it would be cool if they made them decendants of Pantorans or Wroonians who got lost in the unknown regions during the early hyperspace exploration area and adapted to there new enviroment

 

To start there is an explanation as to why all of the species in Star Trek look so similar.

I agree that it makes sense there would be some divergence in species that have been genetically isolated, but I do think it is taken too far at times. When they look identical they should be considered the same species still, and if the only difference is skin color they should be considered a sub-species not a separate species all together.

 

They explained Trek's prevalence of human-esque species in the Next Gen episode "The Chase"--a nearly-featureless (almost "Changeling"-style in simplicity) species arose first in that part of the galaxy, and was entirely alone--so they seeded countless worlds with life, and the genetic potential to evolve into sentient forms similar to the original.

I'd be more on-board with Chiss being offshoots of Pantorans or Wroonians than, as was suggested in the EU, humans. They'll be canonized again...Kallus was almost a Chiss, and even if Thrawn himself doesn't show up in some canon project in the next few years (I expect he will), someone will work an homage to him in there and it'll likely be a Chiss.