The Name Game

As all good Star Wars aficionados know, fan-favorite character Boba Fett's ship is called the Slave 1— and has been, ever since it first appeared in 1980's The Empire Strikes Back. 

For over forty years that name's never caused so much as a ripple of controversy. Until now, of course.

This week Lego announced they were releasing a brand new, pricey (of course) Slave 1 playset. Except it's no longer called "Slave 1."

As you can see from the box art, it's now been re-christened with the incredibly imaginative non-name, "Boba Fett's Starship.™"

In an interview with Jedi News, Lego designers Jens Kronvold Frederiksen and Michael Lee Stockwell claimed that Disney (who owns the Star Wars brand) demanded the name change.

Said Stockwell, "We’re not calling it Slave I anymore. This is Boba Fett’s Starship.”

Frederiksen added, “Everybody is dropping the Slave 1 name. It’s probably not something which has been announced publicly but it is just something that Disney doesn’t want to use any more.”

Although Disney declined to comment on the matter, it's pretty clear they're distancing themselves from the name due to the negative and uncomfortable connotations surrounding the word "slave." 

Predictably, once news of the change broke, Star Wars fans pitched a huge sh*t fit. They pulled out all their old favorite arguments, crying that Disney was ruining their childhoods, destroying the brand and bending the knee to the SJW Twitter posse, so as not to offend their delicate sensibilities.

Personally I don't have a dog in this fight. 

Which is odd, because I've been a HUGE fan of all things Boba Fett since his debut. At one point I probably would have been incensed by this news along with the other fans, but that time has long passed— for multiple reasons.

First of all, the sub-par Prequels and unwatchable Sequels have pretty much killed my once all-consuming passion for Star Wars. While I've admittedly enjoyed The Mandalorian for the most part, it hasn't been enough to reignite my love for the franchise. So I honestly don't care about this whole name change business.

Secondly, the name Slave 1 has been used in the novels, comics, toys, games and publicity materials since the 1980s— but amazingly it's NEVER actually been uttered onscreen in ANY of the movies!

That means there's likely a huge swath of the population that's completely unaware that Fett's ship even HAS a name! Seriously, if it's never been said aloud, does the name even count?

Lastly, "controversial" name changes like this are nothing new.

In The Empire Strikes Back, Darth Vader's massive Star Destroyer was called the Executor. Again, this name was never said aloud onscreen, but that's what it was dubbed in the script.

When it came time for Kenner to make an action figure playset of the ship, they were uncomfortable releasing a kids' toy with "executor" in its name. To that end, they simply called it "Darth Vader's Star Destroyer."

Oddly enough, no one flipped a table over this back in 1980. Either people were more reasonable and had better things to worry about in the 80s, or there was no Twitter then where they could post their mock outrage.