The Riverside Press-Enterprise
Those marks in Oga's are blasts from past
Here's their story, per a new book: Darth Vader stopped by the `Star Wars' dive, got into a shootout
A “Star Wars” book from Lucasfilm and Walt Disney Imagineering explains how those blaster marks ended up on the walls of Oga’s Cantina, the notorious intergalactic watering hole at the heart of the Galaxy’s Edge themed land in Disneyland.
The “Traveler’s Guide to Batuu” serves as an in-world travel guide to the Black Spire Outpost village on the “Star Wars” planet of Batuu, the setting for the 14-acre lands at Disneyland in Anaheim and Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.
Oga’s Cantina gives visitors the opportunity to order an alien cocktail in a wretched hive of scum and villainy just like the one where Han Solo dispatched a bounty hunter — minus the blaster aimed at you under the table.
An inauspicious visit to Oga’s Cantina 40 years ago by Darth Vader led to the eruption of blaster fire that still scars the walls of the interstellar bar, according to the “Traveler’s Guide to Batuu.” A remodel of the lively cocktail bar 20 years ago left behind a few hints of its sordid past, according to the book.
“Take the blaster marks on the wall, for example,” according to the book. “Locals say those ended up there before Oga took over, scorched into the permacrete when a blue-skinned Imperial officer named Grand Admiral Thrawn got into a blaster fight with a group of off-worlders known as the Darshi.”
The Darshi, known as Thinfaces on Batuu, are a nonviolent “Star Wars” species with longclawed limbs and narrow heads and bodies.
“These little reminders are proof that the cantina was a rough place long before Oga got here,” according to the book. “The staff under Oga’s employ are no strangers to dealing with sketchy clientele and the trouble they bring with them.”
The recent “Star Wars” book “Thrawn Alliances” offers even more details about the origins of the blaster marks in Oga’s Cantina — the result of a skirmish between Grand Admiral Thrawn, Darth Vader and the group of Darshi.
Vader and Thrawn were on Batuu searching for Force-sensitive children hiding in a Black Spire Outpost house. The search brought them to the cantina, and the blaster marks serve as a fateful reminder of the deadly encounter with the Darshi.
The “Traveler’s Guide to Batuu” offers recommendations on where to eat, shop and sightsee during a visit to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge while providing backstories for the characters and locations in the land.
The book is ostensibly penned by Eloc Throno, a galactic historian and travel writer who has also written guides to Tatooine, Mustafar and other “Star Wars” destinations.
Eloc Throno is an anagram and “Star Wars” pen name for author Cole Horton. Horton based “Traveler’s Guide to Batuu” on the creative guide made by Imagineering and Lucasfilm for Galaxy’s Edge.
The book also credits Lucasfilm creative executives Pablo Hidalgo and Matt Martin as well as Walt Disney Imagineering managing story editor Margaret Kerrison — who all had a hand in developing the backstory for Galaxy’s Edge.