Invid's Guide to the Star Wars Universe: Alien Species (#95)

941. Sarkhai. The Sarkhai are basically pale-skinned, pale-haired humans (to the point where I can see implications that they interbreed with humans, meaning they aren't actually what I'd call a species, more like an ethnic group). They apparently have traditional facepaint they wear that they originally used to scare off predators. ...Right, a few vaguely jagged black lines will certainly boost my scariness ratio 150%.

Anyway, apparently Force sensitive Sarkhai are really rare, like "one or two at a time in the whole population" rare.

Also, during an era about 3500 years before the movies, the Sarkhai homeworld was a hotly contested planet in conflicts between the three powers of the day, the Galactic (AKA Old) Republic, the Sith Empire (no relation to most of the other empires of Star Wars, despite those also usually being ruled by Sith), and a group called the Rift Alliance (imagine if the Confederacy of the US Civil War formed during one of the world wars or something because they didn't approve of how the war was being handled and you have an idea of what these guys are), all wanted its defense technologies.

Rating: 2/5. The whole being fought over for technology bit is interesting, but it's the only actually interesting thing.

942. Sarrish. The Sarrish are ugly rubber-forehead aliens from a planet named Sarrish. Their homeworld had its own defense force before and during the Clone Wars, but despite this was occupied by the Separatists and became the site of one of their greatest victories during the war.

More notably, the Sarrish article is the site of this horrendous sentence:

At the end of the Clone Wars, in 19 BBY, Senator Padmé Amidala was died from childbirth and was sent to her homeworld of Naboo to be buried.

That's right, she was died from childbirth. (If you're wondering what a sentence like this was doing here, the Sarrish senator was at the funeral.)

Rating: 3/5. I like the details of them having their own military and being loyal to the Republic (things from this era that don't often go together), and yet they get stomped on by the Separatists even with help from the Republic. (In fact, multiple important named characters fought on their side in the conflict, and they still lost.)

943. Saurians. Okay, before I get into these guys, let's start a little running count. How many aliens with the combination of letters "s-a-u-r" at the beginning of their names are reptilian?

Saurians are lisping snake-headed reptilians (1 out of 1). Apparently they are widely known to wear drab colors, but at least one wore bright colors.

...That's about exactly it.

Rating: 2/5. Eh, they might have gotten better if they weren't universal lispers because I (slightly disproportionately) like snake people.

944. Saurin. The Saurin are a somewhat distant offshoot of the Trandoshans, reptilian people (2 out of 2-DING!) who are known as hunters. The Saurin apparently follow the same religion as the Trandoshans despite having somehow managed to evolve completely different hand structures from their cousins. (Saurin women also somehow have breasts-thanks, creepy ol' Wookieepedia-despite there being no evidence that Trandoshan women do.) They are apparently humorless, but despite being known for being in toughs-type occupations (i.e. thugs, bodyguards, etc.), their homeworld also was a major participant in the Old Republic's refugee program during the Clone Wars.

Now, that has slightly disturbing potential implications when the Saurin follow a religion that involves hunting, but as far as I can tell there's no evidence of untoward motives at all. The Saurin government of the time was just a bunch of nice guys, apparently (and there's no evidence that the population was upset about it, either).

Rating: 3/5. I've mentioned before that I like good guy reptiles. These guys have made it into my good books, even if there are some weird bits about them that I don't like so much.

945. Saurtons. Saurtons are reptilian beings (3 out of 3! DING DING DING!) with crocodilian features. These crocodilian features include straight up crocodile heads (classic) and the less well known but quite accurate feature of powerful immune systems combined with being hideously filthy (well, I tend to think they borrowed that second bit from monitor lizards, but the immune system thing is definitely true of actual crocodiles) to the point where they can get other beings sick by mere contact, and their cities apparently were not especially sanitary-they don't feel the need to clean it, so why bother? (On the one hand, this is essentially a "what dirty beasts" vaguely racist sentiment; on the other hand, why would they feel the need to clean up germy filth?)

They may have gold skin and apparently usually stand in the roughly-six-feet-tall range, and suffer from inconsistent description/artwork disparity-they're "slender and quick" yet are drawn like cartoon pro wrestlers. While I can see the appeal of slender reptile people in general, the huge crocodilian head suits a beefy guy better, I think (though there really ought to be variety in any species).

Anyway, they apparently had reasonably advanced tech before coming into contact with the galactic civilization, and several members of the species also were involved in the Kathol Rift stuff.

Rating: 4/5. Aside from being proof that alien species namers are often spectacularly uncreative (consider that, using Earth-language etymology, "Saurton" could be seen to mean "lizard town"), the Saurtons are pretty nice, if admittedly fairly basic. Also, I will go on record as saying there can never be too many crocodile people in a fictional universe.

946. Sauvax. The Sauvax are very cool looking crustacean people. By appearances, they only have huge pinchers, but apparently tucked inside these are small hands with opposable thumbs, which explains how they can make spears and such (which gives them a point in plausibility, anyway). They're supposedly strong swimmers, which seems unlikely, but they definitely look fairly amphibious.

Anyway, whilst primitive and isolated from galactic society (despite there apparently being fairly sparse human settlements on their homeworld), the Sauvax apparently are peaceful and have a complex society that is heavily dependent on diplomatic gestures and such. Central to this is the sharing of food. Rather than take offense at those who have trouble stomaching food that the Sauvax offer (which is very common), the Sauvax will instead mock the victims of their cuisine. ...Wow, what a bunch of trolls.

Their favorite letter is clearly "u," as their personal names have an average of three apiece. Most of these names are five to seven letters long.

Anyway, during the New Sith Empire's time of activity (it comes after the Sith Empire mentioned in the Sarkhai entry above, hence the "new"), some artifacts were stored on the Sauvax homeworld, and then, many years later, a Sith adept showed up (shortly before or around the prequel movies era) and searched for the artifacts in question, enslaving the amphibious Sauvax to do the searching (apparently with help from the human colonists). However, they were stopped, stuff was happy afterwards, blah blah yadda yadda.

Rating: 5/5. Mostly because they look cool, admittedly. Also because they're kind of amusing trolls.

947. Sawal. Sawal apparently are green, scaly humanoids. They are suspected of "cannibalism" (i.e. eating sapients) by settlers on their planet, but it's possible that the disappearances that cause this suspicion were caused by hostile wildlife.

Incidentally, Wookieepedia both infuriated and amused me with this article's use of the word "disparition." Just say "disappearances," guys, the whole five dollar word thing is unnecessary and confusing (even to a word nerd like me sometimes).

Rating: 2/5, mostly for the oddity of the article.

948. Sayormi. The Sayormi appear to essentially be a generic dark elf type fantasy race (albeit with rubber forehead alien features instead of the usually inevitable perfectly smooth skin) that happen to live in a creepy forest on Kashyyyk, the Wookiee homeworld, for some unfathomable reason.

And when I say "generic dark elf type fantasy race," I mean they supposedly use magic (including "voodoo"), all the women are called "witches," all the men are either warriors or "monks," and their most-feared warrior is the hilariously named "Cyrans the Unfeeling." (He's called "the Unfeeling" because he cannot feel. Amazing.)

While all that amuses me to some degree, no. Just no.

Rating: 1/5. Check, please.

949. Schenor. Schenor are apparently universally Force-sensitive felinoids. (Hey, I'd have never guessed "cat alien" from "Schenor!" Extra point!) Apparently, they also may lay eggs (!) and grow to be eight feet tall. They love martial arts and honor (typical cat aliens) and apparently were offhandedly described in RPG material as "eight-foot samurai cat men." (...Okay, another point.)

Rating: 4/5. They got one more point for the sheer weirdness of maybe possibly laying eggs.

950. Schiav. Big ugly cartoon alien humanoids (from the Droids cartoon).

Rating: 1/5. Meh, whatever.

-Signing off.