The Star Wars Expanded Universe was my whole life growing up: my childhood enemy called me “Star Wars Girl” from second grade to high school because I was almost never spotted without a Star Wars EU book in my hand. I even unsuccessfully tried to convince people to call me “Leia” in sixth grade when I moved to a different neighborhood and didn’t know anyone at school. I’m also bisexual, and this colors my perspective on every bit of pop culture within my grasp. I’m ranking each of my favorite EU characters in order of the “bi-fi” signal strength I get from them: in other words, how strongly I suspect that they may be bisexual. Can you handle my beautiful dark twisted headcanon?
Qwi Xux
Xux was kidnapped with nine other children from her homeworld of Omawat to be experimented on and brainwashed into serving the Empire, due to one asshole Moff’s notion that people of her species had the “potential” for extreme genius. Throwing that in there in case you needed a reminder that a cornerstone of the Empire was systemic xenophobia! She was the only one of those victims to survive.
I had wanted to make a joke about how brainwashing is a leading cause of bisexuality, but phew, that’s too heavy even for me. Poor Xux spends her whole life building superweapons for the Empire, isolated and deluded into thinking that their primary functions are benign. At one point, her mind is raided like a rolodex by darksided!Kyp Durron, who uses the Sun Crusher, one of her creations, to destroy an entire solar system. Durron’s mind invasion leaves Xux permanently brain-damaged. Shortly thereafter, her boyfriend, dear old Wedge Antilles (who fell in love with her while assigned to protect the vulnerable, newly-unbrainwashed mega-scientist from those who would manipulate her) leaves her because he’s too busy pew-pew-ing in his X-wing or whatever. It’s depicted as a mutual decision, but come on.
Qwi Xux is the quintessential manic pixie dream exoticized babe scientist, but despite her semi-fridging, she’s also a consummate survivor whom I kind of admire? Endurance paired with feminine fragility (her bones are literally hollow, like a bird’s, look it up) is a sure sign of bisexuality. 100% bi-fi, because wishful thinking with a dash of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ counts in fiction.
Mara Jade
Okay, so there may be a strong correlation between my bi-fi and the level of my secret adolescent attraction to a given person. Of all the Star Wars EU characters, Mara Jade practically needs no introduction. Most of us know her as the evil-hottie-assassin-Beatrix-Kiddo-to-Emperor-Palpatine’s-Bill-turned-neutral-good-hottie-Jedi-Knight. She’s a tempestuous redhead, which is like, Nature’s scarlet letter for bi chicks, amirite? She circles in and out of Luke Skywalker’s orbit as it suits her, frequently running off from her training to go “find herself,” aka, join underground galactic boxing rings and bang her rivals. (Just kidding, but please someone write me that fanfiction.) She eventually marries him after a near-death experience in a mountain full of psychotic clones, which is exactly how me and my husband ended up together. They spend a lot of time apart during their marriage because of war and stuff but also because Mara Jade is one bird who WON’T BE CAGED, MAN. 100% bi-fi or GTFO.
Harrar
An extra-galactic alien invader who worshipped a trickster deity and eventually defected from his invading army in favor of joining the New Republic. Devotees of tricksters are automatically bi; sneaky side-switching ones doubly so. 100% bi-fi.
Tionne Solusar
A Jedi Master archivist who spent most of her life compiling and teaching the lost histories of the Jedi; married a former student of the dark side who wasn’t super powerful after joining the light side, but was very devoted and eventually became a master, too. They were the heads of the Jedi Academy together. 90% bi-fi because have you ever even heard of a librarian who wasn’t queer? No, you haven’t. No, shhhh, don’t question this great truth.
IG-88
This lethal bounty hunter droid’s lust for murder is almost as powerful as his thirst for nothing but the highest-quality sex with whomever is up to the task. Mmm, murder. 85% bi-fi because we bisexuals sure are helpless to resist the sweet allure of lifting the veil of death, but he could also be pansexual, who knows?
Teneniel Djo
A Force witch — you read correctly, Force WITCH *snaps* — who dresses like Xena the Warrior Princess, keeps rancors as pets and for transportation, and tries and fails to seduce Luke. Not much later, she marries Prince Isolder, aka the Mr. Darcy of the EU Prince Isolder, aka the rich, stuck-up trophy husband with a heart of gold who was originally angling for Princess Leia mostly because his mom told him he should. She’s that straight girl you pine over for years, even though you’re old enough to know better, because you just pick up that vibe, you know? And you can’t. Let. It. Go. 50% bi-fi because LOVE IS AN EVER-FIXED MARK THAT LOOKS ON TEMPESTS AND IS NEVER SHAKEN, OKAY!?
Callista Ming
THIS LADY. Okay. Taking a deep breath. Get ready: THIS LADY falls in love with a man imprisoned on what is essentially a ghost ship while disembodied, her consciousness having been trapped in the ship’s computer for like, 1000 years. Said consciousness is then uploaded into the dead body of one of Luke’s nubile young Jedi apprentices, and they try to make it work, but Callista loses her Jedi powers and it’s just too weird and they go their separate ways. Look, this whole mess would be very at home on The L Word. Reading it is like watching someone repeatedly jumping into the same trashcan fire over and over and telling you they’re training for the hurdling segment of a decathlon. It just doesn’t make sense, because why. WHY. I can’t say I have experience in this arena, but if Callista Ming is not the dis/embodiment of a femme lesbian in complete denial trope, I don’t know who is. I understand this is a totally arbitrary and contentious call. I don’t care. 30% bi-fi for plausible deniability.
Danni Quee
Another science babe, but this time a Strong and Confident one who also happens to be an untouchable beauty. Can’t commit to Jedi training, which sends up bi flags, but is also more interested in science than in pursuing the only dude she’s seen to vibe with, so I’m leaning towards asexual with her? Let’s go with 25% bi-fi.
Winter Celchu
Live-in caretaker who raised Han and Leia’s kids for the first years of their lives, leading them to call her “mother” instead of Leia for a while. This was, of course, used as a device for Leia to wring her hands over whether she could really have it all, which was further complicated by the fact that Winter looks almost exactly like Leia, snow-white hair aside, and used to sometimes trade places with the Princess when they were kids back on Alderaan. Can you hear me rolling my eyes? Anyway, I always pictured her in my head as a gentle crone-goddess!Willow from Buffy, so this solidifies her position in my headcanon as a helpful, kindly lesbian. 10% bi-fi.
Prince Xizor
Drugging a woman with your sex pheromones to ostensibly rule sci-fi capitalism or WHATEVER when really you’re just a rapist perv is about the straightest straight male thing you can do. 5% bi-fi for the chance that he hates himself in addition to being a horrible yet problematically sexy monster.
Kyp Durron
Ohhhh, Kyp. If you tend toward the geekier side of the Star Wars fandom, you may be familiar with and/or a supporter of the notion that The Force Awakens’s Kylo Ren is an off-brand Kyp Durron and Jacen Solo-flavored soft-serve swirl. There are some striking similarities, even if they are fairly reliant on major tropes: Kyp Durron has two father-ish figures, Han Solo (who rescued him from a spice mine) and Luke Skywalker, who trained him as Jedi. He was something of a prodigy, until he went to the dark side and uh, blew up a solar system, as mentioned earlier. Mallory Ortberg has the best take (of course) on THAT situation and its RIDICULOUS outcome, but basically he is absolved of guilt and later becomes a Very Important member of the Jedi Council???
More importantly, however, the sexual tension between Luke and Kyp is INTENSE. How else could he be turned back to the light side; how else would Luke stan for him in intragalactic genocide adjudications, if not through the power of love bittersweet, passionate desire? I know the fanfiction supports me on this, but I can’t find it with my SafeSearch filter on at work. Go forth and follow that rainbow, younglings. 2% bi-fi.
Luke Skywalker
I’m sorry, but his man has had too many doomed romances with women and too many strapping young male apprentices that he remains utterly devoted to beyond the point of reason to be straight OR bi. Plus, he and Mara BARELY hang out alone. I say this as someone who shipped Mara/Luke as my OTP when I was a kid and who still kinda does. I could truly see this as a super cute and genuinely loving lavender marriage, like Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester or the characters in this charming short story by Ellen Klages. 1% bi-fi. Fight me.
Joruus C’baoth
Nothing says “gay tyrant overlord” like an evil clone who tries and miserably fails to overthrow an already-overthrown former dictatorship. Everyone openly speculates that he’s utterly psychotic, and it’s hard to take him seriously, even when an author wants you to treat him like a huge threat, because he constantly walks around in a bathrobe with his chest exposed. 0% bi-fi.
Corran Horn
I think I had to read like, 100 pages of Horn just sitting in a shitty apartment concentrating really hard while attempting to make a janky off-brand lightsaber, because he couldn’t just follow the instructions or ask for help. Grizzled member of Rogue Squadron. Loves to complain about his kind of sexist father-in-law. His last name is Horn for crying out loud! I strangely have a kind of affection for the dude, maybe because I’m suddenly realizing that he reminds me of my dad, but this guy is STRAAAAAAIGHT. 0% bi-fi.
BONUS ROUND:
Darth Millennial (no, this is not a joke, he is a real EU character)
All Millennials are bisexual, even three-eyed Sith lords who can see the future. 105% bi-fi.
