False Facts About Star Wars Droids You Always Thought Were True

Thirty years later, it's easy to lump Star Wars: Droids in with other mid-'80s animated series like Transformers, G.I. Joe, and He-Man. The series, which debuted in 1985, has all the hallmarks of its toy-hawking peers. It stars two kid-friendly characters, C-3PO and R2-D2, who go on adventures with a rotating cast of characters, many of whom would make great action figures. It had all kinds of tie-in merchandise, including comic books and video games. Its opening sequence, which was written and performed by The Police's Stewart Copeland, is pure '80s cheese.

And yet, Droids wasn't supposed to be a money grab. In fact, George Lucas considered it the future of the Star Wars franchise. After Return of the Jedi, Lucas didn't know if he was going to make any more Star Wars movies, and hoped that Droids (and its counterpart, Ewoks) could keep the series alive. Producer Miki Herman said Lucas also wanted to "raise the standards of Saturday morning children's programming" by telling better stories, hiring better actors, and investing in high-quality animation.

As a result, Droids cost between $500,000 and $600,000 an episode and used more than twice as many animation cells as other shows, making it one of the most expensive animated series ever at the time. Ultimately, the push for quality is what killed it: Droids was simply too expensive to keep producing and was canceled after a single season.

Sometimes, R2-D2 is done with animatronics, but sometimes there's a real person inside that robot suit. All those times that R2-D2 rocked back and forth excitedly? Those performances are the work of Kenny Baker, an actor who has appeared in Willow, Time Bandits, The Elephant Man, and Labyrinth. Baker returned to play R2-D2 for The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, as well as all three installments of the Star Wars prequel trilogy — at least, that's what the end credits say.

While Baker's name appears alongside R2-D2's at the end of Revenge of the Sith, C-3PO actor Anthony Daniels told a Brazilian magazine that Baker didn't spend a single day filming on the Sith set. Despite their on-screen camaraderie Baker and Daniels didn't get along at all, so it's easy to assume that Daniels was simply sniping at his co-star — but in this case, Baker actually offered some supporting evidence. "I think a lot of it is footage he's already got of me in the robot from when we shot Attack Of The Clones and The Phantom Menace," Baker admitted.

Baker isn't in The Force Awakens, either, although Daniels' dismissive comments about Baker's contributions to that film aren't as fair. For Episode VII, Baker was only credited as a consultant and never got into costume, likely due to his failing health. (Baker passed away just a few months after Episode VII premiered.)

By this point, R2-D2, C-3PO, and BB-8 are all iconic names, but they're not exactly normal. Most people assume — fairly — that they're also the droids' serial numbers, a theory supported by the way other characters will refer to droids using phrases like "that R2 unit" in Star Wars fiction.

But that doesn't hold up. At all. Over at Jalopnik, writer Jason Torchinsky did an in-depth investigation into Star Wars droids and discovered there's no real rhyme or reason behind their names. While droids do come in a variety of different and clearly defined categories — astromech droids help pilot starships, protocol droids translate languages and help explain local customs, and so on — their names don't always match. Droids that look identical have entirely different designations. Others have entirely different looks and functions but have names that are only one or two digits off from one another.

Pablo Hidalgo, a member of Lucasfilm's canon-policing Story Group, posits that droid names are actually excerpts of longer serial numbers. For example, in Star Wars Insider #58, Hidalgo says the prequel-era droid G8-R3 could've had a real name like "R5-X41238-G8-R3-3124-D2," but it's not clear if that explanation is canon. Obviously, this is the kind of thing that happens when you have a giant shared universe populated by multiple creators, but for now, it seems obvious that the real logic behind droids' names is what sounds coolest, nothing more.

If you're confused about BB-8's gender, don't blame yourself. It's not like you can tell if it's a boy or a girl just by looking, and in the lead-up to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Lucasfilm's various representatives sent some decidedly mixed messages.

Before Episode VII arrived in theaters — but after the first trailer hit, which gave ample time for BB-8 to steal our hearts — the Telegraph reported that Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy referred to BB-8 on set as "she," and that some of the film's promotional materials hinted that BB-8 was a female. The Telegraph also quoted an anonymous source "close to the filmmakers" as saying that Disney and Lucasfilm wanted to "appeal to girls as much boys" by making The Force Awakens' breakout star one of them.

In the final film, however, Poe refers to BB-8 as a dude, as do most promotional materials. As far as we can tell, the story goes something like this: BB-8 started as female but became male sometime during production. At least, that's what Neal Scanlan, the head of The Force Awakens' creature shop, says. "BB-8 was female in our eyes. And then she became male. And that's all part of the evolution," Scanlan told EW. Scanlan refused to commit to that for sure — "I'm still not sure, dare I say, whether BB-8 is male or female," — but nearly four years later, the answer seems pretty clear.

The Mandalorian, the live-action Star Wars show set to premiere on Disney's new streaming service, Disney+, won't have many familiar faces. It's a new adventure that takes place on the outer reaches of Star Wars' galaxy far, far away. Still, thanks to some behind-the-scenes photos shared by Mandalorian creator Jon Favreau, fans thought they'd identified at least one classic Star Wars character in The Mandalorian's cast: IG-88, a vicious droid who makes a brief appearance in The Empire Strikes Back.

Favreau did nothing to dispel this notion. In fact, if anything, he supported that theory with another picture that implied that filmmaker Taika Waititi, who voiced the rocky revolutionary Korg in Thor: Ragnarok (which Waititi also directed), would be voicing the mechanical bounty hunter. Unfortunately, that's not quite right. After the first bit of Mandalorian footage screened for the audience at Star Wars Celebration 2019, Favreau told EW that the character is actually a different IG-series droid, IG-11.

The Mandalorian trailer, which sadly isn't available online, showed IG-11 mowing down a platoon of stormtroopers, so he's probably just as bloodthirsty as his big-screen cousin. While it's a shame that IG-88 won't be getting the spotlight he deserves, the Star Wars universe is a big place. If Lucasfilm, Disney, and Favreau want to tell some new stories, who's going to turn that down?

To some people, BB-8 is a perfect angel who can do no wrong. To others, he's got a naughty streak. If you wonder which side you fall on, watch this scene, and then answer the big question: Did BB-8 give Finn a thumbs-up, or was the plucky little droid flipping the former stormtrooper off?

When watching the clip, you can see how it could go either way. BB-8 has just learned that Finn is lying about being part of the Resistance, and he's pretty rude to BB-8 when trying to get the droid to share the location of the Resistance base. They are not, at this point in time, particularly friendly. On the other hand, the gesture comes right after Finn flashes a thumbs-up of his own, and it'd be out of character for BB-8 to reply with so much sass.

Thankfully, this isn't a white-gold dress or blue-black dress situation. There is a real, definitive answer. As the Nerdy Bird reports, The Force Awakens novelization refers to BB-8's lighter-flick as a thumbs-up, while BB-8's puppet-masters refer to the beat as a "thumbs-up moment" in an interview with MTV. So, there you have it. Get your mind out of the gutter, folks. BB-8 is too good for you. You don't deserve him.