Editorial: Lunar New Year 2023 — Deep Dive Into Jaxxon the ‘Star Wars’ Rabbit
The Lunar New Year, which covers the famous Chinese New Year and other celebrations, is one of the biggest festivities held throughout Asia and its diaspora. This holiday is a prelude to new beginnings and a fresh start. Every year, one of the Chinese zodiac signs stands in as the symbol of each new year on the lunar calendar. This year, it happens to be the Year of the Rabbit. What better way to kick off the Year of the Rabbit than learning about Jaxxon, the famous green rabbit from Star Wars?
Jaxxon first appeared in the Star Wars Legends comics. He is a witty smuggler from the Lepi species, and was created by Roy Thomas and Howard Chaykin. Jaxxon initially premiered in Marvel’s Star Wars (1977) #8. Essentially, he was created as an homage to the famous Bugs Bunny.
Jaxxon was born on Coachelle Prime, and after stealing a freighter at a young age, he departed his home planet. He initially started out as a mercenary, but then eventually dipped into smuggling and purchased a WUD-500 Star Yacht which was appropriately named the Rabbit’s Foot. It was a hunk of junk and constantly needed repairs, which eventually led to him accepting a job working with Han Solo as one of the crew members on a quest to free a group of Adubans from the vile Serji-X Arrogantus, the tyrannical leader of the Cloud Riders.
The comic run that Jaxxon initially appeared in is one of the earliest stories in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, making him one of the first characters to be created outside of the films. He appeared in a majority of the issues in the original Marvel Star Wars run, but was eventually phased out after issue #16. Jaxxon would then go unreferenced for over 20 years.
That was until the 2001 Star Wars Gamer #4 article The Starhoppers of Aduba-3 — written by Pablo Hidalgo, Cory J. Herndon, and Michael Mikaelian. This article gave background information on Jaxxon as well as made references to famous Looney Tunes cartoons, further cementing Jaxxon as a homage to Bugs Bunny.
Although Jaxxon is a cult favorite amongst some fans and Star Wars creators, he is mostly despised in the community and viewed as the embodiment of the silliness that sometimes plagued the original Star Wars comics. Jaxxon was even referred to as the original Jar Jar Binks, and his introduction was ranked as one of the five goofiest moments in all of the Expanded Universe.
As far as cannon appearances, Jaxxon has had very little. He has appeared in multiple comics, but premiered in the Star Wars Adventures Annual of 2018. Jaxxon also appeared in the Star Wars: Tales from the Clone Wars reprint — he is seen on a wanted poster. In The Clone Wars episode “A Sunny Day in the Void”, you can see a skeleton in a crashed shuttle that appears to be wearing the same suit that Jaxxon wears. He has appeared on the variant covers of various Star Wars comics, too.
In 2018, a character model resembling Jaxxon was seen on Ord Mantell in the sixth episode of Star Wars: Forces of Destiny’s second season, titled “Bounty Hunted”. The 2020 novel From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back, which was written by Cavan Scott, officially revealed Jaxxon’s name in the short story “Fake it Till you Make It”.
As of now, that was the last time we have seen Jaxxon in any sort of media. However, Jaxxon was made into a Star Wars: The Black Series action figure in 2021 (see below). Even then, Jaxxon has had little representation in Star Wars. However, seeing that Jaxxon is a cult character and that many Star Wars creators like him, there is no doubt that he will make a more prominent return at some point.
Mario is a YouTuber, podcaster, writer, actor, and overall content creator from Torrance California. His initial love for Star Wars and Disney made him interested in pursuing creative work in that field. Mario hosts his own Disneyland-centric podcast "Disney Diggin. He has a youtube channel that serves as a companion piece to the podcast. While also writing his own young adult fantasy novel series "Land of the Unknown".
