Jabba Desilijic Tiure

A loathsome slug of a gangster, Jabba the Hutt was the preeminent kingpin of crime in the Outer Rim Territories. Basing his operations out of Tatooine, the Hutt had his pudgy fingers in a number of lucrative and unsavory rackets -- slavery, gunrunning, spice-smuggling, extortion and more. Jabba's physical appearance was as repulsive as his decadence. A hefty Hutt, Jabba resembled a worm-like slug, with a legless, tapered body coated in slime. A wide, drooling toothless grin split his flat face, and two yellow-red reptilian eyes stared covetously from his immense head. Jabba surrounded himself with the shiftless dregs of society, ensuring his protection with a screen of henchmen and hired guns. He lived in an opulent if sand-scarred palace out in the Tatooine deserts.

Jabba's depravity was legendary. He kept himself entertained by torturing and humiliating his subjects. He kept scantily-clad slave girls chained to his throne for his amusement. When fickle, Jabba would send his prize possessions to a ghastly end. For example, the beautiful Twi'lek slave Oola was fed to the terrible rancor monster living beneath Jabba's throne room when she failed to amuse him.

To spread his influence and business across the Outer Rim, Jabba employed a number of smugglers to traffic his illicit goods. One of the best starpilots on his payroll was a young Corellian named Han Solo. Solo's luck ran out while running a shipment of Kessel spice, and his freighter, the Millennium Falcon was boarded by an Imperial patrol. With no options, Han jettisoned Jabba's cargo into space.

The Hutt was livid. He demanded compensation for his lost cargo. When Solo failed to provide the credits, Jabba sicced his bounty hunters after him. One of the first, a bumbling Rodian named Greedo, failed miserably and ended up fried in a seedy Mos Eisley cantina. Jabba then tried to smooth things with Solo by trying to play the fatherly patron. It was all a ruse, and Solo knew it. That Jabba showed up with the deadly bounty hunter Boba Fett in his party indicated to Solo that time was running out.

Weeks passed, then months. Still, Solo had not paid off the crime lord, as he was drawn deeper into the Galactic Civil War and assisting the Rebel Alliance. Jabba, never one to be interested in political ideals or civil wars, saw this as no excuse. More bounty hunters came. One nearly bagged the price on Han's head in a run-in on Ord Mantell.

Ultimately, it was Boba Fett who tracked down the Corellian. Fett delivered Solo, frozen in carbonite, to Jabba's palace in return for a large bounty. Solo, once an extraordinary pilot, smuggler, and soldier in the Rebel Alliance, was now little more than wall decoration for a grotesque crime lord.

It wasn't long before Solo's friends attempted a rescue. Spearheaded by Luke Skywalker, the last of the Jedi, this mission brought C-3PO, Princess Leia Organa, Chewbacca, Lando Calrissian and R2-D2 into Jabba's dark palace. After a seeming failure in which the Rebels were held as Jabba's prisoners, Skywalker turned his would-be execution in the Dune Sea into a surprise attack.

Jabba's enforcers were no match for a group of determined Rebels led by a Jedi Knight. Princess Leia Organa, who had been subjected to the humiliation of being one of Jabba's slave girls, instead used the chain that bound her to strangle the Hutt. Using all her strength, Leia drove the chain deeper into Jabba's gullet, cutting off his air. Aboard his luxurious sail barge out in the desert sands, Jabba breathed his last fetid breath. His body was consumed by the flames that exploded from the sail barge as the Rebels raced for freedom.