Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Invid's Guide to the Star Wars Universe: Alien Species (#63)

621. Latarzian. Latarzians aren't canonical because the only known individual was from a cancelled story, but there's nothing about them to distinguish them from humans (in fact, there's just plain nothing about them besides the fact that the only known individual went by two different funny names, M'kyas Love and Grandyl Grieve).

Rating: 1/5. It would have been N/A, but those names are funny.

622. Leffingites. Leffingites are ugly and their home planet, Almak, has apples on it.

This led to a dish from their planet being called all-Almakian apple pie.

Supposedly, Almak was just a random assemblage of syllables, but "all-Almakian" sounds suspiciously like "all-American," so I have to wonder a bit if it's a reference to things being "American as apple pie."

Rating: 2/5. Pie.

623. Lekuans. Apparently, they're tall, gray-skinned humanoids with high-pitched voices. One of them, Osuno Whett, was a nasty spy who orchestrated the conquest by the Empire of a primitive solar system (and set it up so that a harmless droid would be blamed for it) and then went on to harass Lando Calrissian and work for a Sorcerer of Tund during the Lando Calrissian Adventures.

Rating: 2/5. I mean, we know too little about them, but I liked those stories, so... As long as they don't stereotypically become spies, I'll probably be cool with whatever people come up with for them, assuming anybody ever does come up with anything.

624. Lellish. The Lellish made a lot of money for themselves by advertising the possibility of hunting big, dangerous game on their homeworld, and then charging rather sizable fees for the opportunity to do so.

I would assume that they also charged fees for the various services they rendered, fees for permits to use appropriate weapons, rented out or sold appropriate weapons, charged a fine for use of inappropriate weapons (which would be any weapons that they hadn't sold you), didn't let weapons through customs (meaning you'd have to sell them back to the dealers at half price at best), charged offworlders different rates for food and lodging, and don't get me started on the wait lists...

Rating: 3/5. It's noted that their advertising for hunting targeted wealthy people (specifically "public servants," which under the Galactic Empire meant high-ranking government officials), which makes all that less stupid than it might sound. Presumably, the game that they allowed to be hunted, the ketrann, wasn't endangered.

625. Lemmers. Small, sapient humanoids.

Rating: 1/5. Insignificant, irrelevant humanoids.

626. Lepi, or Lepus Carnivorus. They're huge green rabbit guys. They're omnivorous, and some even claim to be entirely carnivorous.

Basically everything about them is based on rabbits, except they're large, eat meat, and are green. That's awfully gutsy.

Rating: 3/5, because it's funny.

627. Leresai. The Leresai have a very strict code of vengeance comparable to the Code of Hammurabi, in that equal measures are demanded in response to any crime or loss, even accidental ones. If they don't get equal reparations, they feel entitled to make their retribution themselves, but tenfold.

This obviously can cause problems during a crisis, and totally did during the ol' Caamas document crisis, a thing that's been mentioned way too often in this series for me to try to link it (well, okay, here). When two Leresai died on Bothawui during a riot in the middle of the crisis, Leresen justice required that the Bothans hand over two of their own who could be considered culpable for execution; when they didn't, the Leresai destroyed a small Bothan space station, and sabotaged New Republic ships that would have interfered, seeing the sabotage as an honorable practice because it kept innocent neutral lives out of harm's way.

Apparently, they have melodious voices, and presumably claws and horns, as the guiding principle of their legal code is "claw for claw, horn for horn, life for life."

Rating: 3/5. That rather primitive (by our standards) legal code is obviously great for drama during a crisis.

628. Letaki. Letaki are supposedly four-eyed even though the only illustration of one shows two eyes. They're apparently fully amphibious, have tentacles which are supposed to be useful manipulators even though the ones in the picture are useless stubs, and have sharp beaks. They apparently have a reputation for gutting their prey/meals.

Some Letaki display great skill for music because they're really good at using all of their tentacles at the same time with great coordination to play multiple instruments. Bith look down upon them snootily, however, because Bith have more sensitive ears and thus a better sense for music and stuff. On the other hand, apparently at least one Letaki had a voice that ranged across eleven "sectaves," whatever the heck that means.

Rating: 3/5. I mean, they're obviously rather defined by music at this point, but that's still interesting.

629. Lethagoes. Lethagoes are human/Kalai hybrids. (Apparently, somebody did get something from them.) This makes the Kalai rather creepy, because apparently, these hybrids are often born with their human parents never having met Kalai. Wat.

Rating: Creepy 3/5.

630. Leviathans. Leviathans (of Arrakan) are ambiguously canonical inhabitants of an ambiguously canonical ocean world which is also inhabited by the (ambiguously canonical) dolphin-like Duors. They are essentially one-eyed giant squid, which has nothing to do with the term "leviathan." (Incidentally, in the Star Wars galaxy, two of the several things called "leviathan" are Sithspawn monsters that devour lifeforce from anything that gets too close; that makes it rather ironic that there's a luxury liner from some story or another called Leviathan.)

Duors believe one of the Leviathans created them. This individual was at least a thousand years old, so apparently these Leviathans are pretty long-lived.

Rating: 3/5. I like the sound of one-eyed giant squid who are apparently mysterious enough and impressive enough that some group sees a single individual of their race as their mythological creator.

-Signing off.

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