Star Wars Kyber Crystals Aren’t the Only Crystals That Can Power Lightsabers

Star Wars: Kyber Crystals Aren’t the Only Crystals That Can Power Lightsabers

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While the current Star Wars canon focuses on kyber crystals as the main source for lightsabers’ power, Legends offers alternatives.

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Star Wars Kyber Crystals Aren’t the Only Crystals That Can Power Lightsabers

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Star Wars: Doctor Aphra #17, Star Wars: The High Republic: A Test of Courage and Star Wars: The High Republic: Mission to Disaster, on sale now.

Throughout the modern canon of Star Wars, lightsabers are powered by kyber crystals that have a strong connection to the Force itself. This connection to the Force allows the crystals to bond to the Jedi and Padawans that find them, forging a strong relationship between Jedi and weapon. However, the Sith and other dark side users can corrupt that connection with the Force, both in their lightsabers and in other weapons, most notably in the Death Stars.

While kyber crystals have become the fundamental building block of canonical lightsabers, they were not always necessary for the weapons in Star Wars Legends canon. Instead, Jedi and Sith alike used a variety of crystals both natural and synthetic, and there are indications in more recent canonical Star Wars works that a larger variety of crystals might be used in lightsabers in the future.

Lightsaber Power in Star Wars Legends Canon

Star Wars Kyber Crystals Aren’t the Only Crystals That Can Power Lightsabers

In Star Wars Legends canon, kyber crystals, spelled kaiburr at the time, were still sought after. However, as Luke Skywalker explains in Star Wars: Young Jedi Knights: Lightsabers by Kevin J. Anderson and Rebecca Moesta, kaiburr crystals were rare and simply not available to most Force users. Luke explained, “‘though lightsabers are powerful weapons, their design is so flexible that practically any kind of crystal can be used.'” Therefore, Jacen Solo, Jaina Solo, Lowbacca and Tenel Ka had to find other sources for their lightsabers’ focusing crystals.

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As a result, the process of finding or constructing their lightsabers actually revealed their personalities and reflected how they are as Jedi. Jacen Solo went the most traditional route and used a Corusca gem that he mined himself from Lando Calrissian’s GemDiver station. Jaina Solo, an engineering genius, created her own synthetic crystals because she wanted every part of her lightsaber to be something she constructed by hand. Lowbacca, Chewbacca’s Jedi nephew, even used a crystal and lens from an old projector to represent his own technological skills and background in computer programming.

However, Star Wars: Lightsabers also serves as a cautionary tale. Tenel Ka, the secret heir to the Hapan throne, did not spend the same time and care constructing her lightsaber. While her quest to harvest crystals from a lava tube was brave, she also only found imperfect crystals and used them anyway. Because of the flaws in her crystals, Tenel Ka’s lightsaber failed at a critical moment during a training exercise, and Jacen Solo accidentally cut off her arm. Later, when constructing her second lightsaber, Tenel Ka took much more care in selecting her components. She used the crystals from her crown alongside the tooth of a rancor for the hilt, allowing her weapon to represent both her Hapan and Dathomiri ancestry. In that way, Star Wars: Lightsabers reflects the Star Wars Legends canon’s focus on the process of constructing a lightsaber and choosing the crystal to reveal crucial characterization of each young Jedi as they forge their path in the Force.

Kyber Crystals in the New Star Wars Canon

Lightsaber design in the current Star Wars canon is far less flexible, but the process of a young Jedi finding their kyber crystal still holds meaning. In Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ “The Gathering,” six Padawans traveled to Ilum’s Crystal Caves to find their kyber crystals for their lightsabers in a graduation ritual. The journey for each of them to find their kyber crystal was unique because they each had to overcome their own fears and shortcomings in order to successfully find their crystal. After the rise of the Empire, kyber crystals were harder to find, but as Ezra Bridger showed in Star Wars Rebels’ “Path of the Jedi,” young Jedi could still earn their crystals, albeit in less ceremonial ways.

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While the current canon focuses on kyber crystals, there are possibilities that other crystals could be introduced to power lightsabers and other similar weapons. For example, there are theories that the Darksaber is powered by beskar. Also, most recently, Kho Phon Farrus revealed their Whip of Sorrows, a weapon they made to mimic a lightsaber whip that did not actually use a kyber crystal in Star Wars: Doctor Aphra #17 by Alyssa Wong, Minkyu Jung, Rachelle Rosenberg, Sara Pichelli, Nolan Woodard, Carlos Lao, Danny Khazem, Mark Paniccia and C. B. Cebulski.

Still, the possibility remains that alternate crystals could be used to power lightsabers in the future. In Justina Ireland’s Star Wars: The High Republic: Mission to Disaster, child genius Avon Starros attempted to create her own lab-grown version of kyber crystals, similar to Jaina Solo’s approach to lightsaber construction in Star Wars Legends canon. However, Avon was not a Jedi, and she was more interested in other uses for the crystals than lightsabers. After her crystals were used in a weapon by the Nihil, Avon seemed to abandon her quest to recreate kyber crystals synthetically, but Padawan Imri Cantaros’ support may sway her back towards her research and experiments.

So, while kyber crystals are the only canon option for Jedi and Sith currently, Avon’s research indicates that fans may see other sources for lightsaber crystals. While kyber crystals are important because of their connection to the Force, that connection might be replicated or found in other gems and crystals throughout the Star Wars galaxy. In a post-Empire world, kyber crystals were even rarer, and having alternate crystal power sources could enable more young Jedi to gain access to lightsabers, even if their construction is less traditional.

Link Source : https://www.cbr.com/star-wars-kyber-crystals-power-lightsabers/

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