The Origin of Species: How to Design a Star Wars Alien
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- Опубликовано: 28 май 2024
- Ever wondered why some Star Wars aliens look better than others? Me too! That's why I made this video.
Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
00:53 - The Original Trilogy
21:49 - The Prequel Trilogy
32:54 - Episode VII & VIII
43:17 - What We've Learned
46:37 - Reassessing The Creatures
If you'd like to dive deeper into the Star Wars Saga's development history yourself, here's all the behind-the-scenes sources I usually pull from:
pastebin.com/NthWEvbG
The Empire Wreckers actual play podcast:
www.buzzsprout.com/141856/
Or Elsewhere on the internet:
/ empirewreckers
/ empirewreckers
/ empirewreckers
/ empirewreckers 
Кино
Or how to design your own 'Glup Shitto'
The evolution of the Glup Shitto
Then give them some gloriously insane Lore
@@llewelynshingler2173 we dont need to anymore. Disney will soon run this IP to ground. It is IP to be milked, not grown. As they literally stated.
@@janvrabec3401 I don't care how much you love despair and its spreading.
Repairs the Millenium Falcon whilst having no arms
*Refuses to elaborate*
This thig doesnt even look like it would survive a hour on its homeworld. They might be literally crafed by some bio engineer species because otherwise their exsistence doesnt make sense.
Klaude has telekinesis confirmed.
*LIVE SLUG MAINTENANCE*
@@juliancaraveo5700his superior brain power is what makes him a homophobe
I think ending on Klaud being actually good alien design is a wonderful stroke of genius.
Too bad he's a homophobe. 🤣
Too bad he's a homophobe
LIVE SLUG REACTION LETS GOOOOO
👎
This might be the best video talking about Star Wars outside of a strict plot discussion I have ever seen.
agreed, fantastic history lesson of the movies w tons of info i hadn’t heard yet
true
Millions of children didn't think of Yoda as alien. They just thought he is a really old man.
Nah, I always knew he was an old space goblin man.
"900 years old you reach, look as good you will not." Pure gold.
Looked pretty small and green to me
Who's to say humans that old aren't that shrunk down? And there are various compounds that are able to colour one's skin. Now the ears...perhaps he was just into body modification?
Millions of children are dumb as bricks
6:29 "Emperor, a second Y-Wing has hit the Senate building!"
😭😭
wow. too soon. smh
😂
@@jap7384It's been 23 years.
@@optillian4182That was the joke
I think why the aliens in the ST stand out so much is because they stand completely alone. I feel like in every film after A New Hope, you'll still see Rodians, Bith, Ithorians, and all the rest running around the galaxy. When the original two trilogies introduced an alien, it instantly became part of the universe existed in perpituity. The ST however, for some reason, decided to feature basically no OT or PT aliens.
Like, what happened to all the Twi Leks and Rodians in the galaxy? they're two species you see all over the place in the OT, PT and EU, but like, they seem to all vanish in the ST. I think it makes the ST aliens feel like they're trying to replace the classic designs, and it draws a probably unfair amount of scrutiny to them.
For less work they coulda just had half the aliens be old designs and it probably woulda looked better.
On the other hand, it makes the Galaxy feel less expansive if there’s only like 10 or maybe 20 species we ever see.
@@Legomyegoorj, yeah. But when it's established that there are certain species that are basically EVERYWHERE, having them conspicuously not show up anywhere in the Sequel Trilogy feels very off. Especially when most of the "new" aliens created for the Sequels are either blatant rip-offs, or just not very interesting.
That's exactly what I think.
@@Legomyegoorj ❌
@@Legomyegoorj while i get where youre coming from you see humans everywhere in star wars so, i dont see why you wouldnt see some of the other ones
I love that Chewie's initial concept came back again in Garazeb Orrelios.
And then that bounty hunter armour led to a whole historically important society.
And to a group of people in the roleplay community who only know said society as a extremisy cult of underworld dwelling warriors... which are infact, outcasts of said important society
@@acidp0p Death Watch or the Children of the Watch?
@@acidp0p, I almost thought you were talking about the 501st Legion for a second. Then I realized, "Nope. That can't be right."
I thought the design was used for Jaro Tarpal, Cal Kestis' Jedi Master in Fallen Order..?
@@DarthWall275, Zeb and Tapal are both Lasats, which are inspired by the original design for the Wookies. But Zeb was created first.
I think a large part of the forgiveness for the "human but with X" trend in the prequels, is that it has an extensive tradition in live-action sci-fi media, to the point tvtropes calls these types of creatures "rubber forehead aliens", and the reason they are so ubiqutous, is precisely what you describe: the actor can still give a performance, and the audience can easily read it.
There's also the fact, that to make two "humans with horns" designs that are clearly distinct species, rather than just different individuals of the same species, demands it's own kind of creativity.
And specifically in relation to the Jedi, most would be required to be either highly active due to lightsaber fights, meaning they’d either need to be CGI or human enough to allow the actors or stunt doubles to properly fight. In other cases, like the druggy in the bar, they just wanted some expressiveness without spending tons of money on a one off CGI alien
And that’s actually where most of the human like designs come from, the Jedi, with only a small handful being no Jedi actors that require a bit more expressiveness, which also occurs in the OT with the cantina barkeep
Fantastic video. Nice to see someone in good faith criticize something without needless complaining. Also loved the history lessons in here.
Not the live slug reaction 😂
Gotta say, the Duros, Rodians, the Kel Dor, and the Skakoans have always stood out to me design wise; I love them so much.
23:08 "...they're amphibious...which likely comes from 2 places..."
That made me chuckle.
How did a concept that I though sounded kinda boring make me sit in my chair for the whole time desperately needing to go take a piss but still staying seated throughout the whole runtime.
Now that I've commented I need to go take that piss.
Was it a good piss?
@@noahkelly7742 7/10
this short story was better than the entire seqel trilogy@@thecringeexterminationservice
Literally me rn
@@manisahota6437seems like he piss was rated higher than those movies
Great video. Cool to see how the design philosophy for the movies changed over time and how the thought process of "make a star wars alien" screwed the sequels. It's kinda the opposite of how I feel about the aliens in the last Men in Black movie where they made all the new aliens look like they weren't even from the same franchise
I think thats a general problem with some (but not all) of Disney Star Wars, trying to make more Star Wars instead of adding something new to Star Wars.
@@Marvin-sj9lrthe problem is that’s what people have shouted at them they want. They don’t want any variation to man with laser sword does backflip.
@@creed8712 This is both correct and incorrect. People hear those statements and think that people want a retread of everything before. Or people think that Star Wars fans will never be happy because they complained that TFA was too much like ANH while TLJ was too different. The problem is that it's not a black-and-white issue. TFA had the story and feel of an already existing Star Wars film. TLJ had neither the story nor the feel of anything that came before it. Both are bad. You have to have the feeling, the tone of Star Wars while it being its own thing. Every Star Wars movie was its own kind of movie but it all felt the same. TPM's story was a children's fantasy, AotC was a noir-ish political mystery, RotS was an apocalyptic opera, ANH was a serial adventure, ESB was a dream-like tragedy, and RotJ was a classical morality play. Every single one of them had a vastly different kind of story, but they all felt unified. That's what people wanted from the sequels. They wanted the stories to all be vastly different kinds while all feeling congruent.
@@alexkay6676 "TPM's story was a children's fantasy, AotC was a noir-ish political mystery, RotS was an apocalyptic opera, ANH was a serial adventure, ESB was a dream-like tragedy, and RotJ was a classical morality play."
...You got that from So Uncivilized, didn't you?
@@occam7382 Absolutely. He managed to put something I knew into words far better than I could. That video is also a fantastic video. Good eye, by the way.
5:52 I just know this piece of information is gonna live in my head rent free for the rest of my life
Great content, would love to see a similar episode for droids
I watch an embarrassing amount of RUclips videos. This is the best one I’ve seen in a hot minute. Thank you good sir!
Excellent research and presentation! I would note, related to the discussion on Lucas' intentions with Jabba, that the 1976 novelization describes him as a blob-y alien and the 1977 Marvel Comics adaptation of the film reuses the film's Nimbanel design for him, so that indicates that Lucas probably did already want Jabba to be an alien during the production of the first film. Also, love the CRC dating reference in the news screen at the very end! What a nice obscure reference, and dated accurately too!
Lol, imagine how different Star Wars would be if Jabba ended up being a yellow Walrus?
One of the best Star Wars essays out there. So refreshing for a video about the series to not be toxic.
Very entertaining and informative. I have been a Star Wars fan for 16 years and I can still hear new things and examine the films from new perspectives. Thanks for this video, I hope it will do well.
Nice profile picture 😂
There were a lot of really good alien designs in the sequel trilogy, especially in The Force awakens like the a little fuzzy twinkies that have murderous intent. I think the problem is less the designs of the creatures and more what the filmmakers chose to work on. Can really see that when you look at the behind the scenes pre-production art books that they had so much interesting creative ideas and then it seems that the studio chose the most blandest things to feature.
Not the studio, JJ. JJ wanted to be George Lucas making Star Wars, but he was never going to be, the films and creatures would’ve been better had he fully done his own thing
38:07 fun fact: Kieran was also the size double for Frodo in Lord of the Rings. Throughout the movie when you see Frodo next to a human sized character but can’t see his face very well, it’s Kieran.
One species the Sequels did good on? The Anzellans. Babu Frik was so good he was brought back in "The Mandalorian".
Meanwhile, The Mandalorian claimed the "New Yoda" with Grogu, but Grogu wasn't reinventing the small wise figure, but is being absolutely Yoda's Species.
🤮
Great video. It's really fascinating to see the origins of these different designs, especially when born out of cost cutting measures.
Another Empire Wreckerds certified banger
While I find the writing and direction of the Sequels absolutely abysmal. I'm happy there were a small ,but welcome few alien designs those films gave us. I'd welcome seeing klaud's species and more Ovissians in Star Wars media. Prequel oriented or in the OT Era stuff. Which seems to be the case because they gave us another of Klaud's species and an Ovissian or two in the Jedi Survivor game.
This video was pleasant to watch. It was nice to see valid criticism given towards the recent films Species art direction. It was also just fun to see all the familiar concept art from the OT or Prequels that was instantly recognizable as being later characters in The Clone Wars series or Rebels.
Fun fact Duros and Nemoidians actually are the same Species. There are only minute differences between them like different skin and eye color as well as a different facial structure. Duros just don't like to be thrown together with Nemoidians because of their cultural differences.
It’s the same facial differences between a Japanese guy and an American guy
@@M4gicMark exactly :)
huh? i thought Neimoidians were an offshoot of the Duros species, so they're not the same species anymore.
@@Spooglecraft They're two different races of the same species. As someone pointed out, it's like Asians and Caucasians. Are they both human? Yes. Are they similar overall because of this? Yes. Do they look identical to each other? No. And even then, there are different sub-races within the races, each looking different from each other.
Weren't they supposed to have broken off too long ago to be considered the same species?
Dude Klaud is the best design out of TROS. Also those horse thingies they ride on Exegol aren't to bad either.
Nah. Babu Frik is the MVP of that film.
Love the movie specific score transitions .. Bravo
the news segment at the end was gold.
Been watching a lot of Star Wars content lately, but this is definitely my favorite essay so far 🥰
I dont usually comment on videos but as a star wars creature lover i must say this video is truly phenomenal! Inmense effort and meticulous research poured into it. It is evident how much passion and dedication went into such an informative and engaging piece. Keep up the incredible work!
I always felt there was something a little off about the creatures on Canto Bight. So many of them, simply in their design, seem implausible. Too silly. Too cartoony. Almost like they were a joke, just not a funny one.
One of my favorite sequel alien designs is Derla Pidys, the wine seller from the casino. She has the same brown-yellow-white palette, but her four eyes, glossy skin, and head shape make her look pretty cool IMO. She evokes an octopus or other cephalopod without looking like a “Dollar Store Cthulhu.”
I never thought I would need this video in my life. And now that I have it, I don't wanna go on without it. Super impressive research work you did there! Great job!
this is so much detailed research!! can’t imagine how much work went into it but keep it up dude! loved the vid
This is one of the most fascinating Star Wars vids I've ever seen, and I've seen a lot. Wonderful research and visuals!
Incredible video. Your channel is quickly becoming one of my favorites on the platform. Great analysis, funny, and most importantly: not blinded by irrational hate and giving credit where credit is due to things like the Sequel trilogy and even Bay's Transformers. We need more people like you on RUclips!
The thing about the running themes in the creature designs of the OT and PT is that they both have a positive quality to them besides practical consideration:
The OT designs being masked and obscured in various ways makes them mysterious, while the prequels' colorful humanoids are just that- colorful. Plus, making your alien a colorful human forces you to think of non-visual ways they'd differ from humans.
While these two alien races aren't from the prequels, the Chiss and the Zeltron are the first examples of what I'm talking about regarding the prequel alien template: The Zeltron have two livers and pheromones, making them uniquely suited for characters who are endearing towards others in-universe- and not just in sensual ways, though that obviously is *a* use for the Zeltron. And the Chiss lend themselves well to all sorts of stoic characters, especially villains and anti-heroes.
And the color of said humanoid also creates a very different impression, uniquely suited to the particular character of that species.
Nothing beats having an hour essay from one of my favorite youtubers on a topic that interests me really much!
Another thing is that I love how many times you can see them recycle unused designs or whatnot.
The superb script speaks greatly to the creator’s intelligence and observational skills. Great job :)
This channel deserves to blow up (in a good way), looking forward to you hitting over 100k subscribers!
Someone talking this passionately about Star Wars takes me back to high school, and makes me reconsider certain aspects of the sequels in a less entirely negative light. Keep it up!
Thanks for being extra in-depth as always. Going into the origins of the designs helps explain a lot.
In particular, I think the mindsets and preferences of people behind designing these plus the overall direction decided everything. As you said, Lucas-era things mostly pulled from a vast variety of sources deliberate and accidental, and so ended up with more sheer variety and striking designs, to the point where designs for extras made for important character material. They wanted to be cool and fun a lot more, even when it came to humans with rubber bits.
With sequels, the designers had too much of an overriding preference (wide-set eyes, elongated face, nostril eyeholes, almost equine mouth) and tried to force a "new standard nonhuman" with it (made more egregious because of not having been common in past entries), on top of the overall direction trying to ape the OT while lacking its design philosophy. There are far fewer standout cool designs, those few are mostly deliberately designed to be standouts, and none of the extras would make for cool main characters.
This is my favorite Star Wars content. Thank you and good work.
I might love this stuff more than actually watching the films at this point. The history of props, character, sound design, and other details behind the scenes are just so fascinating and it's amazing how all these elements (especially in the making of ep IV) came together so perfectly. Also good work keeping the jizz wailer jokes to a minimum lol
I appreciate the informative take on exploring and examining the designs across the different eras.
I see so many trash and belittle and trash various creature designs, worthy of it or not, that often doesn’t make for good examination.
28:06 Barris went full circle.
fantastic research! would love to see one about droids in the future
Hell yes, it brings me so much joy to see you continue to post content. One of the few channels for which I have notifications enabled!
I know he's from a game but I absolutely adore Turgle
halfway through the video i realized this channel only has 30k+ subs? this video is fucking amazing bro, keep going, you will be huge.
Can I just say how much I love that limitations borne from circumstances and sudden creative whims apropos of nothing ended up inspiring so many people to create? Look at "T-Head" at 4:25 for example: despite being a creature who shows up only for a second or two, its species would later be given a proper name (Arcona), culture, and unique biology. At the time of release, when extended lore didn't exist, it was just a creature, but now, if you go back knowing more about Arconans, you'd know that this Arconan is actually tripping balls on salt.
I will also say, that in the designs made when searching for Maul, I love that one of them was brought back and made into Mother Talzin, a member of Maul's birth people. The same thing also drew in a Legends race, the Dathomiri, and made Maul a part of them.
I thought I’d seen everything - but I had never seen that clip of Akbar singing before. Amazing.
I know it would be an absolutely insane task but I almost wish the weird graphic you were going off of included more aliens, even without the comparisons it was cool learning all the history behind them as well as the mindsets behind each of them. Even though it’s like the biggest franchise ever I’ll always appreciate Star Wars designs taking from a lot of different areas of real life instead of strictly trying to stick with “sci-fi” technological aesthetics. Completely random aside but I find it funny Plo Koon has no (recorded anyway) history on his inspiration or design aside from the final product yet he might be one of my favorites and is kind of the main reason the CG Clone Wars exists
5:36 The best sentence I’ve ever heard
Yeah, just chiming in recognition of the quality and presentation.
excellent editing and presentation cant believe how underrated your channel is!!!!
Great video and nice editing, it really shows how good of a research you have made!
Great channel, and awesome video. Straight to the point and great research without any unnecessary flashy editing or narrator cutaways to take away from the content. Definitely subbed now.
22:05 *THAT* is absolutely, positively HI-LARIOUS!
This was an amazing video. Would love to see more videos from you about creature design. The way you include the names and creators of the creatures and go into details about each one is great. Unfortunately a lot of creators would just go “this one is ugly and this one looks cool” instead of actually doing the work, as you have.
This was a super interesting video. Plus, your voce is very clear and easy to listen to. Great work!!
Excellent video, incredibly well made!
Crazy good video! Love to see someone who put in the time, and addresses this stuff in good faith!
I honestly love every Star Wars alien from every piece of media lol
If you never played the d20 RPG from the early aughts, look up the alien Anthology. I used to spend hours looking through it even if you never play the game.
👆🏳🌈
@@thisismyname3928 I am gay thank you!
@@meswoopnoseenothing 🤮🤮🤮
@@thisismyname3928 cry about it
Amazing video, a pleasure to watch!
I hope to see more of this stuff in the future :)))
This is right up my alley, great work!
Masterfully written video!
The amount of research to get this all right must have been quite something, huh.
The humor was point as well.
Another great video, man, can't wait where it takes you next !!
Amazing video! Very cool very few characters missed and amazing! And the backstory on all the characters is really cool!
So glad someone made a video on this topic.
shaak ti being used to cover a character in post and then getting killed three times in revenge of the sith might make her the funniest fill-in jedi in these movies
Please make a video this detailed about the droid designs!
This video is absolutely incredible. Truly just jammed packed full of so much amazing stuff
all hail Therm Scissorpunch
🫡🦞
Prequels had the best alien/creature designs, no contest. Terryl Whitlach, Doug Chang, Dermot Power, and Ian McCaig are absolute design gods. I never get tired of flipping through the prequel concept art books. Pure creativity and iconic designs that stand on their own. I think the OT had stronger costume design. I wish I could appreciate what I saw in the sequels more, but the scenes jump so fast it's like the directors didn't want you to invest any time in the world. They just wanted the audience to go from plot point to plot point. The worlds don't have that lived-in feeling like the previous films because you never say long enough in one place to appreciate the environment. I really enjoyed the first 15 minutes of The Force Awakens, but after that everything started moving at breakneck speed.
Awesome video dude, keep up the great work!
Amazing vid, this really deserves more views, hoping to see more soon.
The best video on the internet!!! This deep dive is awesome!!
Incredibly well done. At first I thought this would be a rather boring topic to cover, but hell was I wrong. Great job, and keep it going!
This video is fantastic. I can’t imagine how long it took you to research all this. But I thank you for doing it because it’s an incredibly interesting topic
Man your videos are amazing! Happened to see why aotc looks like a video game and now I'm just going through em
Wonderful content, very astute and informative. Not an animator myself but was always an artist and I love this content
Another incredible video mate
New to your channel. Very professionally made, love it
It's rare i finish long videos of any kind (unless it's a podcast/livestream), but this kept me. Great video.🤙
Wonderful content! Keep up the great work!
"Everyone's favourite grave-robbing union-buster" made me almost fall out of my chair laughing
great video! as always 😆
A whole ass hour without any filler, nice video.
Well researched video, thanks for the good content 😊
This has become one of my favourite channels.
16:47 EPHANT MON MENTIONED LETS GOOOOOOO
seriously man, out of new channles jumping out of the ether, yours is one of the best ones. I've rewatched your last two Star Wars videos super often. Your videos are super well produced and structured, with in depth research and always coming at it from the perspective of how it was made, instead of the boring-ass "lore" nonsense SW-RUclips is infested with.
I love this channel. It takes such a good look on whay makes something work and what doesn't. And when it doesn't it isn't this end of the world portrayal of it.
The guy in Nien Numb's suit taught me how to fence
This one is a really good essey about an interesting topic.
And as far as i know the first video i see about this topic.
i always felt something was weird about the sequel aliens i just never knew what it was exactly, anyways really good video you definitiv gained a follow, keep that quality up and many more will sure follow!
By far, one of the best Star Wars videos I've watched in a long time
I love this kind of nitty gritty look at all of the inner workongs of a series. 10/10
I'm sure you've gotten this before but the videos you've been making have been some of the best Star Wars videos on youtube. Nerdonymous still may be my favorite but you're doing awesome work.