Revenge Of The Sith Concept Art Revealed The Coolest Lightsaber Design

Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith almost featured Jedi Master Plo Koon with a Wolverine-looking lightsaber. Being Star Wars‘ third episode, the film closes off the events of the prequel trilogy and the Clone Wars itself. To do this, 2005’s Revenge of the Sith needed to feel huge in its scale. The Clone Wars, as seen in the animated series of the same name, were a galaxy-spanning conflict. So many different types of planets, aliens, cultures, vehicles and weapons are featured in Revenge of the Sith, and there were even more left out of the film. One piece of concept art for the film even shows this variety when it comes to the Jedi Order’s weapons.

Revenge of the Sith is set at a landmark point in the history of the Star Wars galaxy. The Jedi Order is falling, the galaxy is reeling from war, and the Empire is rising. In the film, there is a specific emphasis on the fact that the Jedi have become militaristic in leading their own specific clone trooper units. The Jedi were meant to be keepers of the peace, as stated by Mace Windu, but in Revenge of the Sith they are very clearly soldiers, fighting a war on behalf of a government. One of the Jedi in charge of a clone unit in the film is the Kel-Dor named Plo Koon. Master Plo has appeared significantly in Star Wars: The Clone Wars in the years since 2005, but never holding the strange weapon concept art showed him wielding.

Plo Koon’s Lightsaber Claws Explained

There is a piece of concept art depicting Plo Koon with something like a lightsaber gauntlet. The weapon is held by a bar across the hand, like a normal lightsaber, but attached at the wrist as well, with twin short blades protruding forward, rather than up. It’s almost as if this is a lightsaber designed specifically for offense, rather than the defensive weapon it’s supposed to be. These are Wolverine-like claws, not something that could easily be used to deflect blaster fire or subdue an enemy. These claws seem to be made for war, which fits perfectly within the Jedi Order’s decline into the prequel era. Jedi of the past would look shamefully upon this kind of violent weapon, let alone the Jedi being generals.

Will Star Wars Ever Introduce The Lightsaber Claws?

Unfortunately, the lightsaber claws were never seen onscreen, as Plo Koon died in Order 66 in his starfighter over the planet Cato Neimoidia. But will Star Wars ever actually bring the weapon into canon? In 2022, The High Republic book Quest for the Hidden City by George Mann introduced Silandra Sho, a Jedi with a lightsaber-shield she can throw like Captain America. If the Jedi have their own Captain America with a lightsaber shield, it could absolutely be possible to see a Jedi that fights like Wolverine. However, Jedi Sho’s shield exemplifies the defensive aspect of the Jedi, while the concept art claws do the opposite.

Perhaps the claws could show up in a future story set during the Old Republic. This was a time when the Jedi were also at war, but with the Sith in ancient times. The lightsaber claws seem very unconventional for the time of the very unified Jedi of the prequels, and could definitely fit during a warlike period such as the Old Republic, or maybe even in the Ahsoka era, where they’re bokken Jedi, not unified, and often unconventional. Revenge of the Sith‘s concept art is very strange, but it has a place in Star Wars when the right story comes along.