Vote For Your Favorite Thrawn Novel Characters

The Top 20 will be illustrated

Growing up, I hoarded my Star Wars Insider magazines like they were copies of National Geographic. The issue I remember most vividly was No. 38 (June/July 1998) with Bart and Homer Simpson reenacting the Bespin duel on the cover. (At the time, I had no idea who these characters were.)

Inside, this edition had an update from Rick McCollum on the preproduction of the yet-untitled Episode I (George Lucas and Ben Burtt are hard at working editing) and an interview with Samuel L. Jackson about his involvement (he was on set for four days and has no idea what the plot is).

Seven years old and oblivious to the Phantom Menace hype, I focused instead on the results of the “Top 20 Star Wars Characters” fan poll. Jon Bradley Snyder had asked fans to write in with their favorite characters, and the tabulated results were illustrated delightfully by Michael Rex.

Check out Mara Jade’s memorable line.

In hindsight, it’s a fun time capsule from the moment right before the prequels came out. Mara Jade was the lone Expanded Universe character to make the cut (no Thrawn!), as Han Solo narrowly edged Boba Fett (lol) out for the top spot.

I don’t know why this feature got stuck in my brain for 25 years. I guess it was my first connection to the opinions of other Star Wars fans. (Now I wish I was a little less connected to their opinions—no offense.) The art was also fun.

In the spirit of this article, I want to create a similar list, but not of the best characters in general. (I’d have Kylo No.1 with Watto nipping at his heels.) I’m interested in the Top 20 characters in the Thrawn novels. Timothy Zahn has populated an entire little cozy corner of the Star Wars universe. Since reading the latest six books, I’ve enjoyed finding other fans with whom to complain about Ahsoka and fawn over Eli Vanto. And I’m genuinely curious what the order will be.

Part of the fun of doing this poll for book characters is the opportunity to imagine what they look like. I’ve really enjoyed the Thrawn art of Miri (@mirandaemia on Instagram), and they’re on board to illustrate the Top 20. If you want to see Miri draw your favorite characters—no matter how obscure—vote!

mirandemia

A post shared by @mirandemia

How to Vote

Send me a list of your Top 5 characters from the Thrawn books, ranked. They can be any combination from the six canonical novels (Thrawn, Allegiances, Treason, Chaos Rising, Greater Good, and Lesser Evil) and/or “Legends” books (Heir to the Empire, Outbound Flight, etc.). They can also be characters who didn’t originate in said books (Darth Vader, for instance).

You can send the list in however you want—a comment on this post, an email reply to the newsletter, or a separate email to write.questis@gmail.com. You can send it on Instagram, you can dispatch a carrier pigeon to my house, whatever. And feel free to include as little or as much explanation as you want, with the assumption that you could be quoted in the resulting final list. (Let me know if you want to be quoted anonymously, though.)

And while I’d like to assume you’re always forwarding these newsletters to everyone you know, please share this one with anyone who might have five favorite Thrawn characters. Not everyone has that level of knowledge of Star Wars canon, but the people that do probably could use something to take their mind off of Ahsoka’s finale.