Boba Fett’s Iconic Starship Has A New Name Because Of Political Correctness
Lucasfilm has changed the name of Boba Fett's ship to something more Disney friendly.
This article is more than 2 years old
You can’t slide anything past Star Wars fans without them noticing. Disney knows this. Even with a small detail change, fans are bound to notice immediately. It’s probably the only thing that has limited the number of changes the mouse house has made to Star Wars since they first purchased Lucasfilm. Now though, they’ve made one adjustment to the life of Boba Fett, bounty hunter, beloved classic character, and owner of a ship with a name that may have offended some. Or at least, he used to be. Now, the bounty hunter’s ship will only be known as Boba Fett’s Starship. This change didn’t come from marketing for the upcoming Disney+ series for the character. Instead, it came by way of a new LEGO toy launching soon for the bounty hunter.
Boba Fett’s Starship used to be known as Slave I. The name change became clear based on the new toy, but was confirmed to be how the Star Wars franchise is moving forward by Jens Kronvold Frederiksen, the design director for LEGO Star Wars. The design director did an interview with Jedi News. They said simply, “It’s probably not something which has been announced publicly but it is just something that Disney doesn’t want to use anymore.”
While Disney may have made the decision to quietly change the name, naturally, the LEGO toy isn’t yet available to ship, and fans noticed. Making changes to the franchise must be something the studio has to heavily debate before moving forward. Guessing how fans may react to any and all changes is a difficult job.
Was the original name of Boba Fett’s Starship important for Star Wars fans? It’s not a be-all-end-all detail, but it did matter. For the bounty hunter, and clone, the ship has a long history. It used to belong to Jango Fett, the clone’s DNA source, and sometimes considered to be his father, in terms of how close the pair were.
Just recently, Disney+ gave Boba a bit more history on their new animated series, Star Wars: The Bad Batch. While the character wasn’t in the series, another character says that Boba’s name used to be Alpha. It seems that with this change from LEGO, and with the new name established on The Bad Batch, Lucasfilm is gearing up to expand the character’s backstory and give him more roots throughout the Star Wars franchise. This is all leading up to this coming December’s release of their new series, The Book of Boba Fett, which is said to share with us the full book that tells the story of his character.
This is far from the biggest change Disney has attempted to make to established facts in the Star Wars franchise. The name of Boba Fett’s ship is one thing. It was entirely another thing when fans began to suspect that the family-friendly brand has been attempting to phase out Princess Leia’s iconic slave outfit. While it may be one of the things most fans remember from the movies, it isn’t a very Disney-friendly detail. Moving forward, the Star Wars projects are looking to be more in line with the Disney brand, but the company still has to deal with the established facts, and apparently, change them there they can get away with it.
As for the Slave I, the new LEGO name seems to be a permanent change fans can likely expect to see apply to future Disney+ projects for Star Wars. LEGO’s Boba Fett Starship launches on August 1, 2021.
