Star Wars: Calm The Eff Down Nerds, Disney Hasn’t Renamed Slave I

A new controversy has rocked the Star Wars fandom, let’s take a look at the outrage over Boba Fett’s ship.

Star Wars is no stranger to retcons and controversies. If there is one thing love more than the movies, it’s to argue and fight about Star Wars. Over the last week, a new controversy has grabbed the attention of fans and media alike. This is the case of the name of Boba Fett’s ship, Slave I. 

It All Started With LEGOs

The trouble all kicked off when pictures of a new LEGO set started to circulate. This set was clearly of Boba Fett’s iconic ship, Slave I. In particular, it focused on the ship as seen in the Mandeloran. No issues here right? Well, fans started to notice something when they looked at the set closer.

That’s right fans, instead of calling the ship Slave I the LEGO set merely calls it “Boba Fett’s Starship”.

GASP!!!

This name instantly lead fans to jump to the conclusion that Disney is renaming the ship to something else. Fans went so far as to ask LEGO designers at a fan FAQ about it. Their response was:

Michael: Yes, I built another. We’re not calling it Slave I any more. This is Boba Fett’s Starship.

James: OK, why are we dropping the Slave I name?

Jens: Everybody is. It’s probably not something which has been announced publicly but it is just something that Disney doesn’t want to use any more.

(via jedinews.com)

This to many confirmed it, Slave I was gone.

The Internet Gets Mad

The reaction to this supposed name change has been pretty harsh. Lots of people have attacked the change and Disney. To many, it seem like some sort of PC/WOKE agenda being shoved down their gullet. Just another part of Disney ruining Star Wars people say. Twitter lit up with the news and news sites started writing increasingly alarmist articles, such as this, this and this. People are mad and blaming all kinds of things. But they are mad about… nothing.

The Name Hasn’t Changed

Here is the thing, as of the writing of this article Disney has not changed the name of Slave I. Though Disney has been asked by media outlets, they have made no official stance on it. Indeed Slave I is still listed as Boba Fett’s ship on the official Star Wars website. Nor, we should point out, did anyone ever say the name was changing. Disney asking LEGO not to use it in a set, or LEGO deciding not to use is not the same as the ship being renamed. In fact, LEGO frequently names its sets with “incorrect” names. For example:

For instance, naming this set Jedi Interceptor did not mean that the ship was no longer called an Eta-2 Actis-class interceptor.

Similarly, the set Anakin’s Jedi Starfighter did not mean that the name was changed from Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor to anything else.

Nor is this naming scheme new or unique, for a few examples consider these sets:

All of these ships follow the “X’s type of ship” naming format. All of them fail to give the ship its proper name. Yet in 0 of these cases was the ship renamed.

Who Cares If They Rename It Anyway

So far Disney hasn’t said anything about renaming the ship. At best we’ve got some LEGO design people saying they don’t want to use the name. And you know what? That seems pretty reasonable. Slave I is a dumb name. Boba Fett is a bounty hunter, not a slaver, naming his ship Slave I (what’s with the I anyway? Is it a pronoun and not a number after all? Is the ship controlled by a Yoda species? Is the real name, I, Slave?) doesn’t really make sense for him or his dad. There is no reason behind it. And you know what, LEGOs are to a large part aimed at kids, I don’t blame Disney/LEGO for saying “maybe let’s not put Slave on this kids toy.” If Disney wants to just no longer say the name, that seems fine to me.

After all the name is so important and intrinsic to the ship, Boba Fett and indeed Star Wars that it’s been said… well never? At least the ship’s name has never been said in any of the movies. To the best of my knowledge its also never been said in any show. Indeed I’m not sure if there is any canon story that uses the name, though EU books did. I’m not even totally sure where the name was first said… a toy maybe? I guess if it came from a toy, then it’s OK for a toy to remove it. In short Slave I is a bad, stupid name, that is meaningless, has never been said, and isn’t connected with anything. Changing it wouldn’t be the first time Star Wars has changed the name of something,  and doing it would be fine, however as of now, it simply isn’t an issue. For now Slave I is Slave I and everyone should just calm down.

Let us know what you think about this controversy, down in the comments! 

Author: Abe Apfel

Abe is that rare thing, an Austin local born and raised here. Though he keeps on moving around, DC, Japan, ETC., he always seems to find his way back eventually. Abe has decades of experience with a wide range of tabletop and RPG games, from historicals, to Star Wars to D&D and 40K. He has been contributing to BOLS since almost the start, back when he worked at and then owned a local gaming store. He used to be big into the competitive Warhammer tournament scene but age has mellowed him and he now appreciates a good casual match. He currently covers 40K tactics and lore, as well as all things Star Wars, with occasional dabbling in other topics. Abe remains in mourning over the loss of WFB to this day.