Ships are an important part of the Star Wars universe, transport, protection and sometimes even a home. You’re no one in the galaxy if you don’t have something to cruise the stars in. I got to thinking about the fighters, cruisers and blockade runners after I saw the newest Star Wars trailers, with The Mandalorian’s Razorcrest, Cal Kestis’ Stinger Mantis and of course the massive flotilla of ships shown in the Rise of Skywalker trailer. With all these epic vehicles flying around I thought I’d make a list of a few of my favourites. With that in mind, it’s time to jump straight to the first on the list and the most obvious pick…
The fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy, passing through several hands over the years and being the prize for one fairly legendary game of Sabacc, The Falcon is an iconic image of the entire franchise, ferrying the heroes through 2 of the 3 eras and always pulling through, This YT-1300 freighter is like everyone’s first car, a reliable workhouse that sometimes just needs a good solid hit to the dashboard to make it work! She’s been across the maw and completed the Kessel run in 12 parsecs, helped in the destruction of two Death Stars AND has a hologame table! The Falcon has been one of my favourite things about Star Wars entirely and even with its changes over the years I still love it, with its shiny and pristine white look under Lando Calrissian’s ownership, to the rectangle dish and laser burned appearance when Rey finally takes to the controls. Even people who hate the adventures in a galaxy know all about the Falcon and could recognise it from a single image. Glad we got that moment of fanboying out of the way and now we move on to the rest of the ships!
*Imperial March plays as a gigantic shadow passes over a Star Destroyer*
We all remember that moment, we all assumed the Empire’s fleet couldn’t get more impressive along comes the 19km long Executor. Flagship of Darth Vader’s Death Squadron, The Executor is a terrifying centre piece to the fleet and brings with it thousands of Stormtroopers, Walkers and TIE Fighters. Any planet sorry enough to see this monster appear in its orbit is in for a world of hurt! It’s almost like this thing blares out the Imperial March wherever it goes, and is a symbol of the Empire’s might designed to make the rebels flee before it ever even opens fire with its 5000 turbolasers! You want to end someone entire family line? Bring this giant to bear and wipe out their entire planet’s surface for good measure, and you’ll look awesome doing it!
A symbol of rebellion across the galaxy, the jack-of-all trades multi-role fighter and a successor to the fighter that destroyed 2 Death Stars. The T-70 takes the spot on this list over the classic T65 from the Glatic Civil War, for no better reason than the split wing design of the newer model makes everything look a lot more sleek and faster. Watching ace pilot Poe Dameron perform a sweeping pass on 10 TIE fighters in The Force Awakens and then drift one of these bad boys during the opening battle of The Last Jedi, it’s hard not to love it a little more than the original. Maybe is Wedge Antillies had managed to pull of something similar then I’d love the Death Star killer a little more, as it stands though I love the Starkiller…killer…more… Is anyone else as confused as I am right now? Basically new can be better than old, though of course a classic from an earlier era is exactly what you want, so with that in mind…
Sure I only recently wrote an entire article besmirching the younger Fett, but there’s no denying that his strange looking ship is still incredibly cool. During the original trilogy Slave 1 didn’t actually do much besides sinisterly follow the Falcon to Bespin and then take off and leave Cloud City, all that really showed was its unique method of take-off and landing switching between the horizontal and vertical. Luckily 22 years after it was first introduced, Attack of the Clones gave us another, more comprehensive look at the bounty hunters vessel. After being followed to Geonosis by an inquisitive Obi-Wan, Jango Fett ambushed the Jedi master using the massive arsenal of this modified Firespray-31. With rapid fire laser cannons, Seismic charges and concussion missiles, Slave 1 dominates the smaller Jedi Starfighter. I had a toy of this thing as a kid, it was huge, it rattled all the time because it was full of deployable charges and it was the best thing in my collection for quite some time. The only real question I’m left to ask myself about it is, what colour scheme do I want? The Jango Fett blue? Or Boba Fett green? And does it come with floor mats?
Battlefront 2 might not have been everyone’s favourite game in the franchise but there were plenty of new characters introduced, chief among which was the leading lady Iden Versio, The commander of the Empire’s Inferno Squad. To get around the galaxy Iden and her special forces team were issues a Raider II christened The Corvus. The Corvus is best described as a smaller Star Destroyer, with the ability to land and deploy forces and equipped with a small hanger bay which can hold 2 TIE fighters. Later in the story The Corvus is taken by Iden when she joins the Rebellion so the ship goes through a refit and gets a new set of engines and a sleek red paint job (which I’m sure makes it go faster, or was I lied to as a child?); the Corvus survives some huge battles without any issue so its speed and agility sets it apart from the bigger vessels with more tonnage. An incredible moment is shown right at the start of the story where The Corvus jumps in from hyperspace alongside a Rebel Mon Calamari cruiser, collects Iden from space, and then immediately jumps back into hyperspace. Not even the Falcon has pulled off a jump that fast yet!
So that’s it for my favourite ships in Star Wars! Let me know your faves down below!
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