What's a jerba, you ask?

I've been fascinated by Tatooine for a long time. Probably because it was (that was pre-Phantom Menace) the most detailed and overused planet of the Star Wars galaxy. It had that old feeling of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons worlds that I used to love, such as World of Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms (I've long since come out of my AD&D phase). The planet had its own maps, ever-changing over the years, in books such as WEG's Galaxy Guide 7: Mos Eisley, Starlog's Star Wars Technical Journal Vol.1: The Planet Tatooine and DK's Inside the Worlds of Episode I: The Phantom Menace. Mostly, I was attracted by the myriad lifeforms, intelligent or otherwise, that populated the desert planet. It seemed that every video game, comic book, novel or reference book kept on adding more and more new creatures.

At one point, I started a catalog of the creatures on a webpage that I hosted for a while on TheForce.Net, of which I have been a contributor since 1999. (but with the transition to the new format, the page is lost sadly. I still have it on my hard drive though.)

Among all the creatures, from sources ranging from the Marvel comics to the SNES games Super Star Wars and Super Return of the Jedi, the most reknown were of course the ones mentioned in the movies such as banthas, dewbacks, krayt dragons, worrts, sarlaccs, womp rats and later, rontos and scurriers. But there is one animal from A New Hope that was pushed back to the depths of obscurity, even though two of them are in plain sight in the movie! The jerba has been ignored for years, until being used in some references by author David West Reynolds in the Star Wars Visual Dictionary and in The Wildlife of Star Wars: A Field Guide by Terryl Whitlatch and Bob Carrau.

After the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition was released, the major source of new Expanded Universe lore at the time was Decipher's amazing Star Wars Customizable Card Game. When they did the Special Edition series, you would have thought they would have made a jerba card... So in frustration, I wrote the following article probably around 1999 or 2000. And because it talked about the CCG, I posted it in the CCG section of TheForce.Net which is run by my friend and fellow SWFA member Josh Radke. The article was also a casualty of the redesign of the site, so here it is again, in case you care to read it.

(You can view it here with pictures.)

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THE HARD TIMES OF A JERBA FAN
by Jeff Boivin

Years ago, while reading the biographical book Skywalking, I was intrigued by that picture of George Lucas and his wife standing by this huge animal named a Jerba during the shooting of the first Star Wars movie. I spent a long time trying to figure out where that animal could be seen in the movie.

And then I saw it. Actually two of them.

Just like the number "94" near the door to the Docking Bay 94, it was there, in plain sight, for everyone to see. But did anyone else notice it? Sure, they noticed the banthas, and the dewbacks, and even heard the cry of an unseen Krayt dragon. But sadly, just like Luke's friend Tank, the poor jerba would go into obscurity for the rest of eternity.

One person, an avid Star Wars archaeologist and custom action figure maker named David West Reynolds, noticed it too. But unaware of its name, he would call it a "minyak" in his fan-made Mos Eisley Cantina Exterior playset. Mr. Reynolds would go on and write the Star Wars Visual Dictionary and mention that Leia's slave boots are made of jerba leather. And in the Episode I Visual Dictionary he would give the jerba another nod with Anakin's japor snippet cord made of the same material. But would the world ever be aware of the jerba?

The big chance came with Decipher's Star Wars Customizable Card Game. The premiere pack included had a lot of little-known or -seen characters and objects from the first movie. There was a freakin' Blaster Rack but no jerba. Maybe in their A New Hope expansion, which added a lot of the stuff they missed the first time. There was a Dantooine card, which is only mentioned in the movie and not even seen in it. But still no jerba. Their next expansions would cover the next two movies, and the hopes of seeing a jerba card were pretty much depleted.

A miracle came in the form of the re-release of the movies, and Decipher's Special Edition expansion. Yes, the jerbas were still there in the same scene! They weren't blocked off by a CGI animal or droid. Lucasarts even released a Behind the Magic CD-ROM which included for the first time ever the Tosche Station scenes which were cut in the first movie, and include another jerba in the background! Go Decipher! Show us the jerba in all its glory.

No such chance. The much ignored jerbas would be overthrown by new creatures, which don't even bring anything useful to the movie, like the ronto and the scurrier. Decipher would even make cards for the Krayt dragon and the womp rat, which unlike the jerba, they are not even IN the movie. Making cards for the characters in the Tosche Station cut scene was just a slap in the face...

Now Decipher have released a Tatooine expansion. And of course you have your regular Ugnaughts on Cloud City, and an event card from Return of the Jedi. What do they have to do with Tatooine, you ask? Nothing at all. But the jerba has everything to do with Tatooine, gently waiting outside the cantina for its righful owner to reclaim it...

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PS: As I write this tonight, I just found out that Decipher, who lost the Star Wars license around 2001 but still had all the card lists and scans on their website, have now removed their Star Wars CCG content. So this is in honor of a great game, with which I have spent many hours of fun and still play from time to time.


Updated August 13: The first round winners for the What's the Story feature are in, and the entry for Cantina patron Swilla Corey not only mentions jerbas, but reveals that Ms. Corey was a jerba rancher! Congrats to Sompeetalay who submitted the entry. I wonder if he was inspired by my blog....

I contributed an entry last week for the dark-complexioned X-wing pilot. Of course I made him Lt. Barlon Hightower from issue #78 of the Marvel comic series. Can't wait to see if my story gets chosen.