Forest moon of Endor
The forest moon of Endor| |
| Distance from Core | 43,300 light years |
|---|
| Sector | Moddell |
|---|
| Number of Suns | 2 |
|---|
| Population | 30 million |
|---|
| Points of Interest | Imperial Shield Generator (destroyed during Galactic Civil War) |
|---|
| Surface water | 8% |
|---|
| Affiliation | Galactic Empire, Rebel Alliance, Ewok |
|---|
In the
fictional universe of
Star Wars, the
forest moon of Endor, also known as
Sanctuary Moon, is a
moon which is home to the
Ewoks and above which the second
Death Star was constructed in
Return of the Jedi.
Endor's moon is also the location of the two Ewok
TV movies
Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure and
Ewoks: The Battle for Endor, as well as the adventures of the animated series
Star Wars: Ewoks. The moon is also home to deadly giant
Goraxes, tall and timid
Yuzzums, evil yet dim-witted Duloks,
rodent-like
Teeks, vicious condor
dragons and a settlement of offplanet reptilian
marauders.
Endor itself is not the moon, but instead the
planet which the moon orbits (or orbited).The planet Endor is never explicitly shown in the film, which the
novelization explains by asserting that it was destroyed some time earlier and that the moon now orbits its
star in a planetary
orbit of its own. It should be noted that in three scenes in the film, a pinkish planet can be seen briefly in the background, in the vicinity of the forest moon, though the two bodies are never seen at the same time. This, coupled with the fact that a moon separated from its planet is defined in
astronomy as a planet in its own right, has caused some fans to speculate that this pinkish planet is in fact Endor.
The moon resembles Earth in many ways; however, it seems to have more landmasses than oceans. The landmasses are primarily covered with thick
forests of massive ancient pine trees, and it has at least one desert region. Endor does not appear to have polar ice caps and may have a temperate climate around the globe.
The Star Wars planet is named after
J.R.R. Tolkien's Endor, the
Elvish name of
Middle-earth, probably an allusion to the similarity between Ewoks and
Hobbits, or the moon's tall foliage and the
mellyrn of
Lothlórien.
The Endorian moon played a pivotal role in the
Galactic Civil War in
Episode VI: Return of the Jedi. It was here that the
Rebel Alliance's greatest victory over the Galactic Empire occurred with the destruction of the second Death Star.
|
The Imperial Starport on the forest moon of Endor. |
On this moon was the Second Death Star's shield generator. It was guarded by its own shield, requiring the Rebels to use stolen codes and an Imperial shuttle to bypass it. On the ground was a contingent of the Empire's
scout troopers with armoured support in the form of a unit of
AT-ST walkers and at least one
AT-AT. However, the Rebels inadvertantly formed an alliance with the small, furry inhabitants of the forests, who believed
C3P0 to be their deity. These aggressive creatures called
Ewoks - although primitive in technology - knew the land better than either the Empire or Rebels and helped ambush Imperial troopers, getting the Rebels to the shield generator.
Once the Rebel Alliance took down the Death Star II's shield, the colossal space station was open to attack; Rebel starfighters, assisted by
Lando Calrissian in the
Millennium Falcon, were able to annihilate it completely. Moments before this final part of the Battle of Endor, the tyrannical
Emperor himself was killed by
Darth Vader. It was a spectacular victory for the Rebels and would bring about the downfall of the Galactic Empire and the start of the New Republic.
The Endor Holocaust is a devastation of the forest moon of Endor which happened after the second
Death Star was destroyed (in
Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi) by the
impact of falling debris. It has not been established to have occurred in any canon sources, but has been proposed as
fanon by some
fans as a scientifically inevitable consequence of the events portrayed.
This debate continues sporadically among some
Star Wars fans on the
Internet.
Evidence throughout the body of Star Wars work have been interpreted both for and against the holocaust theory. The complexity of the discussion is compounded by the
different levels of Star Wars canon, and the ways different groups resolve contradictions. For example, in one of the
Star Wars Tales comics,
an Imperial veteran of Endor makes an apparent reference to the holocaust theory, after telling the story of his unit's trouble with the Ewoks in a bar. Another character dismisses it as a myth, saying that most of the Death Star's mass was obliterated in the explosion, and that the Rebels "took care of the rest."
Inside the Worlds of Star Wars Trilogy describes how the Rebels managed to use
shields and
tractor beams to protect their strike team on the moon of Endor, though the defense of the rest of the moon is not mentioned.
*
Endorian Holocaust cartoon by Justine Shaw of
Nowhere Girl*
The Truth about the "Endor Holocaust", a PDF essay by Gary M. Sarli which argues against the possibility of a so-called "Endor Holocaust"
