I’ve already posted about the other Return of the Jedi-themed beach towel that Bibb put out. That one was a bit more Jabba-centric, while this one seems more like a representation of the movie as a whole, with Jabba’s palace making up roughly a third of it. I didn’t break out the measuring tape for this one, but I assume it’s the same as the other towel — around 30″ wide by 58″ long.
The Jabba illustration they used is basically the same as the one on the other towel, but it has been drawn and colored in a rather different style. Many of the other illustrations are more or less identical to the ones Bibb used on their sheet set, but the Jabba on the sheets is completely different for some reason. Given their size, these towels are pretty difficult to display, but I’ve been folding them over a piece of cardboard and displaying just part of the art as a background to some of my display shelves.
Vintage Return of the Jedi Bonded Leather Belt by Lee
For all the talk about how rare various vintage Star Wars action figures are, I’m convinced that some of the hardest-to-find items are clothing related. After all, they tended to get worn out or were discarded when the kids outgrew them. People tended to hang on to action figures, and some even had the foresight to keep them mint in the package for collecting purposes, but I don’t think very many people thought items like a child’s belt or pajamas would be sought-after 30 years later. And of course it’s true that they don’t command the high prices that toys can, so maybe there isn’t as much incentive for people to go digging through their attics in search of vintage Star Wars clothing to put on ebay.
In any case, I’ve been searching for Jabba items on eBay for several years now, and this is the first time I can recall seeing this particular belt, but admittedly a lot depends on the keywords you search for, so I might have missed something. In the past, I’ve posted about the vintage Jabba the Hutt belt buckle and the Jabba the Hutt elastic belt, both also made by Lee. But I was very glad to be able to get this excellent example of Lee’s bonded leather belt. It’s in nearly perfect condition, never having been removed from the original hanger. It even has the original price tag ($2.97). The “Cargo Bay” Collector’s Database says that there is also a version of this with a brown background, but has no pictures.
The belt features Jabba and Darth Vader on the rear, with some woklings (baby ewoks) and Jabba’s skiff on one side, and the Shuttle Tydirium, R2-D2, Wicket, C-3PO and Jabba’s skiff (again) on the other side. There are a couple of interesting things about these illustrations. The first is how off R2’s illustration is, with all of the red. Maybe they were trying to distinguish him from the blue background, but it’s a little hard to believe this got past Lucasfilm. The other is that they apparently copyrighted the phrase “The Skiff.” Maybe they just went a little overboard with the “TM” symbols.
As I understand it, bonded leather is basically bits of leather scraps that are chopped up and mixed with glue to form a new material that is cut into strips and used sort of like real leather. In this case, it doesn’t feel much like real leather, though. It’s almost like cork or something. This one has been displayed in a circle for a long time, so it wants to stay that way, but I did manage to straighten it out for a shot of the whole thing (click for a larger view):
Jabba the Hutt Stained Glass Panel by RussG
RussG over at the Rebelscum forums makes stained glass as a hobby. He’s done a number of pop culture-themed pieces, including Star Wars, so I asked him if he could make one of Jabba for me. We went through a few different design possibilities, but I decided that I wanted a full-body Jabba with a nice border around it. He really knocked it out of the park, if you ask me. It’s roughly 11″ by 17″ in size. Taking pictures of stained glass can be a little tricky, since the lighting changes its appearance quite a bit, but I think these are pretty good shots. The picture above is of the panel on a stand with sunlight shining through it. The picture below is the panel in front of a white background in natural light, which is closer to how it would look inside without any light source behind it.
I hope to remodel our basement into a collection room at some point, and now I’m wondering if it’s possible to actually incorporate this panel into the design of the room somehow. I’m really tempted to get some more of these done. The Max Rebo Band comes to mind as one that would probably translate well into stained glass…
Attakus Boba Fett Statue
Recently I’ve been trying to fill out my collection of Attakus statues. While they are often not great when it comes to human likenesses, they are very good quality overall, with excellent detail and paint work. And there’s just something I like about them. In fact, I’ve started collecting even some that aren’t related to Jabba. The Attakus Boba Fett has been a little harder than most to find at a good price, but my patience finally paid off.
I’m sure the Boba Fett experts out there can point out a number of inaccuracies with the armor and so forth, but nothing stands out as being egregiously wrong to me, and that’s what I care most about. It’s true that it’s the Empire Strikes Back version, so technically this isn’t appropriate for use in a Jabba’s palace display. But Attakus never made another one, so if you want a Fett in your display, this is it. In any case, the differences between the two versions of armor basically boil down to a couple of different colors (red gauntlets being the most obvious).
Everything on the statue is sculpted, with the exception of the wookie braids, which are actual hair of some kind (possibly synthetic). The only real problem I have with the statue is the pose. He’s kind of leaning back and pointing his gun up in the air, as if to shoot something coming in from above him. It’s a little too bad, since it takes away from the coolness of the character a bit. It reminds me a lot of the Attakus C-3PO’s pose, which is also leaning back.
Here it is with the rest of my Jabba-related Attakus statues (Gamorrean Guard, Han in Carbonite, C-3po, Bib Fortuna, and Oola. (Jabba, Slave Leia, and Salacious Crumb with Hooka Pipe won’t fit here, so I have them displayed elsewhere.)
These cards were printed on the backs of certain Kellogg’s cereal boxes in Canada in 1997. You had to cut them out yourself, but they were printed on both sides like actual cards. They were part of a promotion for the “Shadows of the Empire” novel, which seems a little surprising to me. Star Wars fiction seems a bit outside the mainstream compared to the films, but I suppose the release of the “Special Editions” of the films contributed to it.
There were four different sets of four cards, for a total of 16. On the back are some facts about each character in both French and English. I was interested to know that Jabba is precisely 3.9 meters long — something I hadn’t really been aware of.
I posted about the Jabba the Hutt and Gamorrean Guard bobble-heads from the Funko POP! line earlier, and it seemed like a natural choice to get the Slave Leia one as well. In fact, I decided to go ahead and get the rest of the ones that might conceivably fit in a Jabba’s Palace display.
I’m really not a fan of the Slave Leia one, though. These figures already have ridiculously big heads, and they decided to shrink Leia’s body way down to the point that she has a little trouble standing without her base. I’d like it better if she had a body similar in proportion to the other figures. They also forgot to paint one of her earrings gold, as you can see in the shot above.
I’m not going to do separate entries for the rest of these guys, but here they are as a group, along with Jabba and the Gamorrean. You can take them off their bases, and I think I like the baseless look better — especially when displayed with Jabba, who doesn’t have a base to begin with. I like the look of these overall, but I really would prefer them as static figures rather than bobble-heads. I find that their heads have a tendency to look off to one direction or the other when the spring gets a little twisted, and I don’t really see the appeal of the shaking heads, personally.
Return of the Jedi Stein by Dram Tree
Who would’ve thought there would be so many steins with Jabba on them? I’ve already posted about one with the original Return of the Jedi Jabba on it, and one with the CGI Jabba and Han Solo from the “Special Edition” of A New Hope. This one is a more general collage of characters from Return of the Jedi, although it does several Jabba-related scenes represented on it. On the front you can see Luke and Boba Fett from Jabba’s sail barge.
Jabba himself can be found on one side, along with Slave Leia and Bib Fortuna. It’s an altered version of the photo they used for their ROTJ Jabba stein, with the background (and C-3PO) removed.
The other side is mostly Endor-related, with ewoks and a biker scout taking center stage. I’ll have to say that I’m not very impressed by this piece compared to the other two steins I have (and I wasn’t crazy about those). In fact, I was surprised that they were all made by the same company, since this one seems rather different in style and quality. The photos don’t look very good on this one, in my opinion. The colors seem oddly washed out and they added some odd highlighting effects, like the orange line around the bike scout above. Plus, the photos seem kind of grainy and unclear, like a poor quality printout. Unlike the other steins, this one comes with a lid, but it seems to me to be of an inferior kind of metal and seems roughly made, so it actually cheapens the look rather than improving it.
Unlocking Jabba the Hutt’s Bounty Hunter Missions in LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
This is definitely not “news” but it’s kind of new to me, so I thought I would post about it. My son and I have been playing the video game “LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga” and have enjoyed it quite a bit. We liked the Jabba’s palace level in particular (you fight the rancor at the end) but were disappointed that you never really see Jabba there. But as it turns out, there is a way to unlock Jabba in the game. At first when I heard this, I thought he might be a playable character, since part of the fun of the LEGO video games is saving up “LEGO studs” (their version of money) and spending them to unlock new characters and features. Sadly, you can’t play as Jabba (although there are a number of people from the palace that you can play as, including Bib Fortuna, a Gamorrean Guard and Slave Leia to name a few.
When you unlock Jabba’s office area (which, from what I can tell, requires that you finish all of the levels in the game and unlock all of the bounty hunter characters from the original trilogy), you can then visit him and select from 20 “bounty hunter missions.” In these missions, you play through some of the same levels that you played through in the normal game, but this time you play as the bounty hunters (and can switch freely between them). The goal is to find your bounty in the level before your time runs out. I’m not sure if anything happens when you complete all 20 levels, but I was happy to finally see Jabba in the game at least.
Unlicensed Jabba the Hutt “I Am Your Father” Button
I got this small (around 1″ in diameter) button from the UK. As far as I can tell, it’s unlicensed. I thought it was funny, since it spawned a whole thought experiment for me about how the Star Wars films might have been different if it had been Jabba that was Luke’s father. 😀
Jabba the Hutt Plush by ChildhoodRelics
I’ve said before that I don’t understand why there aren’t more Jabba plushes available. In terms of commercial products, all we have are the Kenner Star Wars Buddies Jabba and the Comic Images “Scruffies” Jabba, both of which are quite small. Luckily, having a custom plush made is not all that hard or expensive (especially compared to having a custom sculpture or painting done), so I’ve been trying to make up for the sad lack of Jabba plushes on my own. The first one I had made was a large piece by Figureinesbyingrid. The one above was made by Etsy seller ChildhoodRelics.
He’s about 11″ wide by 9″ tall, and his body is very firm and round like a soccer ball — perfect for hugging (not that I’ve done that…)
Mighty Jabba's Collection 