These past several months, Lucasfilm have been revealing some new characters and details about the forthcoming new publishing initiative Star Wars: The High Republic. This forthcoming new publishing initiative sets the series of adventures 200 years before the event of Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace. With this new era set that far back in the timeline, Lucasfilm's concept artists have gotten creative with vehicles and other ships of the High Republic era, reimagining the Star Wars saga with a more elegant look, thus refining the overall look of the Republic a bit. The best part of this new publishing initiative is that the concept artists are able to bring and use some ideas that were originally created for the Star Wars saga but did not make it to the big screen, such as a new vehicle for the villainous marauders who are known as the Nihil.
Lucasfilm's Pablo Hidalgo had the following to say:
“We all found a lot of inspiration in how the prequels opened up a more refined era of the galaxy, but by virtue of those films’ proximity to the originals, it had to start showing early signs of corruption. By moving further in time, away from that downfall, we’re able to see the Republic at its height in this storytelling. In the Core Worlds especially, that’s reflected in fashion and technology. A lot of the visual exploration in the High Republic is taking what we know, but idealizing it."
Pablo Hidalgo has been working with Lucasfilm since the year 2000. He also published multiple comics until 2011. Hidalgo also often became an advisor to J.J. Abrams, who emailed him up to three times a day asking him questions about the details of the Star Wars universe during the production of Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens because of his insider knowledge of Star Wars canon. Pablo Hidalgo is sometimes called the “Yoda” of Lucasfilm.
Regarding Pablo Hidalgo’s new design of the Jedi Vector, the Starfighters that are used by the Jedi to cruise around during the time period, he explained that the design explorations included a lot of ideas that had a “delicate, streamlined feel that felt relevant.” On this design, Hidalgo and his team wanted to have “an angular and elegant design befitting this gilded age.” The design is purposely meant to be somewhat similar to the aesthetic of Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. In fact, it was derived from the concept art by Warren Fu for a Republic Clone Fighter, an alternate take on the ARC-170 Starfighter. On the new vehicle, the Nihil Tempest Runner, the look comes from scavengers and pirates in Star Wars universe, but of course they are not in the same vein of anything we have seen from the New Republic, Rebel Alliance, Empire, or First Order.
Here is the look of Nihil Tempest Runner.
Regarding Pablo Hidalgo’s new design of the Jedi Vector, the Starfighters that are used by the Jedi to cruise around during the time period, he explained that the design explorations included a lot of ideas that had a “delicate, streamlined feel that felt relevant.” On this design, Hidalgo and his team wanted to have “an angular and elegant design befitting this gilded age.” The design is purposely meant to be somewhat similar to the aesthetic of Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. In fact, it was derived from the concept art by Warren Fu for a Republic Clone Fighter, an alternate take on the ARC-170 Starfighter. On the new vehicle, the Nihil Tempest Runner, the look comes from scavengers and pirates in Star Wars universe, but of course they are not in the same vein of anything we have seen from the New Republic, Rebel Alliance, Empire, or First Order.
Here is the look of Nihil Tempest Runner.
And here is the look of Nihil Stormship.
Since much of the concept art got left behind and did not make it to the big screen, Phil Szostak, creative art director at Lucasfilm, had to put together a “playlist of hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of unused concept art images from across all eras of Star Wars filmmaking” for different Star Wars projects. No concept art at Lucasfilm will go waste, even if they do not make it to the big screen. Szostak explained,
“Due to the sheer volume of unused concepts I was selecting from, I used George Lucas and Doug Chiang’s ‘three second rule’ to choose candidates that clearly and quickly read as potentially appropriate to each High Republic need. And those subsets of art would then get passed along to (Lucasfilm Publishing creative director) Mike Siglain, Troy Alders, Pablo Hidalgo, and myself for further discussion and refinement.”Check out the Republic Longbeam with a design that was originally created as a Resistance bomber for the opening sequence of The Last Jedi.
Another design for The Force Awakens is the one known as the Legacy Run that was originally used by Han Solo and Chewbacca to cruise around. Check out the image below.
Hidalgo explains what is most appealing about this ship design and purposes:
“It tells a story that this isn’t a luxury passenger liner, but it’s all some people can afford. You can tell how it operates just by looking at it. And it isn’t fancy. In this case, it didn’t matter it came from the Resistance/First Order era, because this design is likely hundreds of years old. Star Wars designs are shaped more by culture than they are by innovation, so this is much more a working ship.”In this new publishing initiative, we are going to see a lot of new vehicles and ships from the High Republic era. The purpose of releasing these designs is to give the readers what an idea of what the vehicles of the era look like. The first novels of Star Wars: The High Republic will be released in January.
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