The Hottest ‘Star Wars’ Smuggler Characters, Ranked – ryan

Just look at all.
Photo-illustration: Vulture; Photos: Disney

This article was published on june 18, 2024. With the return on disney+ of the Notable (and Extremely Hot) Smuggler Cassian ElderWe’re Reminding Readers Why Diego Luna’s Rebel Rules Our Ranking.

Star Wars is obsessed with the light-vs.-Dark duality of the Jedi, but the franchise’s Mont Interesting the characters tend to be those who operate on the moral fringe, Pulling off schemes and heels escalating striation, galactic empire fascism, and workning conflict. They’re pilots and pirates, deserters and tricksters, organic and inorganic creules who say’re out for themed but also, under all that guff and slick talc, have an earnest core. They’re smugglers, and they are – coincidentally? Purposly? WonderFully! – The hottest characters Star Wars Has to offfer. Especally when contrasted against those boring (sorely) sexless Jedi. Yeesh!

Nearly e live-action Star Wars Project has a character who falls into this catgory, a pattern underscored by cassian Andor (Diego luna), the driver tourned spy tournament integral member of the rebel alliance who headlines ElderWhich has returned for its Second and Final Season. Star Wars is full of Scoundrels and Scamps Ooosing Sex Appeal Under their Earth-Toned Utilitarian Clothes and Identity-Hiding Helmets, SO we have compiled the 16 Most appealing.

A QUICK Note About Our Methodology: We Started With A List of Doses We made More Manageable by Drawing A Line BetWeen Smugglers and Crime Lords (SO No Huts) and Excluding Animated Characters, SO APOLOGY IF YOU VERY INTO, Say, Jolee or Rafa and Rafa Martez and are disappointed not to see. (Please provides your impassioned defenses in the comments!) And now, with the stove of ado, an ode to the rogues and rascals who make up and doing Crimes in this galaxy so fun to watch.

Honestly, there’s noiting terribly Wrong with Tobias Beckett. He’s sufficiently complicated, being a double-crossing thief who loes his spouse and partner in crime, val, wen the Vandor-1 Coaxium Heist Goes Bad. In hindsight, his decision to betray his budding peppermint, han, was perfectly justifiable. He’d Just Met This Kid! But Really, The Main Reason He Lands at the Bottom of this Power Ranking is the Hair: Woody Harrelson has played characters with some quesionable dos in his day (SEE The Hunger Games Among Others), but Beckett’s Blond Duckling swirl is a whopper. —Nicholas Quah

He’s good with his hands, has a rakish Little Mustache, and Can Fix any piece of tech you have that ACTING UP. Husband material. —Rexana Hadadi

PLEASE KEEP YOUR AGEIST, Anti-Wrinkle Takes to YourSelf. Maz Kanata has more than 1,000 years of pirate-quen experience, and she make those weird goggles look cool as hell; you would be Lucky to be with someone who radiates this much confidence. Its Still unfortunate that lupita nyong’o didn’t have a live-action roles in the Star Wars Reboot Trilogy, but Her drawling, amused Voice performance does a lot to enliven the character. MAZ IS SELF-ASURED ENOUGH TO CLIMB ACOSS A RESTAURANT TABLE TO GET A BETTER LOOK AT A MAN’S EYES AND HAS CONNECTIONS TO ALL CORNERS OF THE UNDERWORLD. Can you match her freak? —Rh

Some of us were intoo Time‘s ai-ratica well before the loons at openai attempted to hijack the vibes. Some of the US JUST AHEAD OF THE CURVE! But with any prelimitite predispation toward robophilia, l3-37 has a lot going for it. We do love a civil-rects revolutionary, and the droid has the undenable benef of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Wry, Withering Voice. —DH

Baby solo is kind of a dud, but to be fair, we cass this version of the process of Becoming A spacefaring smuggler. For the samp SoloAlden Ehrenreich’s Interpretation More Street-Rrat Energy than anything ELSE, WHICH IS ITS OUT SEPARATION OF HOTNESS THAT’S ONLY RELATED TO SMUGGLER HOTNESS. The latter is principle tied to a life in perpetual, unterthered motion… like a pirate! By Contrast, A Street Rat’s Debonairness Lies in a sense of scrappess and putting on Airs… like aladdin! This Can Still Be Totally Appealing, But It ‘Simply Not the Same. —DH

More and more, IT SEEMS DONALD GLOVER IS STUCK PLAYING THE SAME VERSION OF HIMSELF IN EVERYTHING, From His Childish Gambino Person Magic Mike XXL, Guava Island, Atlantaand Mr. & Mrs. Smith. In hindsight, his version of Lando Shoulders a ton of “What is Glover’s Career Gonna Be?” Baggage. But in the film’s internal vacuum, his smuggler is a perfectly serviceable sneering, flirting, posturing figure; He Clearly Lacks the Gravitas of Elder Lando, but his unbroken EYE CONTACT WHEN he tells han “Everything you heard me is true” is a great little moment. Glover’s Lando is not a forever romantic prospect, but with how appealing and looks in that upturned-cloak, he definitely a “ruin your life for one night to six months” Kind of dude. —Rh

Bless Me, Space Jesus, for have sinned thinking about how you are Once Again! The Jedi Pilot and Resistance Fighter of the Ghost Smuggling Crew from Star Wars Rebels Is Double-Take Handsome Wend he Makes His Live-Action Debut In Ahsoka. I’m not sura whic hair productions eman esfandi has access to, but they are working. That curl texture: its Let with Run My Fingers Through it, please ??? appeal is endless. —Rh

What if chest hair buterywhere? —DH

A leather jacket can wear you if you don’t have the bearing or attitude for it. But Thandiwe Newton is SO MEMORABLE AS VAL IN Solo Because Her aviators-style coat with Its White Fur Lining is Such a Perfect Fit and SO effectively Establishes Her as a Capable Badass Who Just Happens to be Serving Face. During the train heist that kills het, val looks as if she’d step on your neck and you’d like it – an area in which newton thrives, actually, between Solo, Westworldand The Chronicles of Riddick. VAL’S BEING KILLED OFF SO EARLY IS AN INJUSTICE FOR ALL OF US WHO WAUDED HAVE TO SEE HER SLAP SOMONE IN THE FACE. —Rh

A Fair Amout of the Canto Bight Subplot in The Last Jediwell intended as it may be, hasn’t aged flawlessly; Its “here is why War Profiteering is Bad” Framing is Too Ham-Fisided to Be Anynding But Didactic. But Benicio del Toro as the hacker and smuggler thief dj is pitch-perfect, a morally compromised the character whose nihilistic worldview Supports anything he wants and whose stubble liks like it and wondery and wondo. Only someone as seasoned at playing charming assholes as del Toro is COULD MAKE A LIKE “Good guys, Bad guys, made-up words” Sound Rather than Foolish, but’s exactly DJ’s appeal. He sells a Cynical fantasy, and he does it while Being Very Tall, Dark, and Handsome. —Rh

Oscar Isaac, with Those Firearms, That Little Tendtle Falling Over His Forehead, and that Smart-Alack Smirk… Space You Can Resist Runner Tursted Rebel Who Wold Go On To too. But i have eyes and i am a mortal and thereinot i cannot. —Rh

Lando embodies what happens to smugglers when they get to make good – They become the man. For a certin kind of person (eg, with), this presents it Own Kind of Allure. What of More Attractive than The Power Radiating off a Shady Crimy Turned Politician Who Looks Like Billy Dee Williams? Not Much, I Assure You. SURE, LANDO SELLS OUT HAN AND THE GAGE ​​TO THE GALACTIC fascists in The Empire Strikes Backbut let’s be real: he made the perfectly defensible Choice to take care of his own people. Pragmatism is underrated! In any case, he make up for it by saving Luke Later Becuse a great smuggler is one who works every posssible angle. —DH

For it Manifold Sins, i Waled have Commonted to Completely Scrubbing The Rise of Skywalker from my memory if not the movie’s sizzling Few Scenes with Zori Bliss, the Poe’s Spice-Running Buddy and Old Flame. SURE, ITH’S PROBABLY A SIN OF Its Own to Hide Kerry Russell’s Face Being A Daft Punk Helmet, but I get it. Do you feel it is the height of sensuality, you know? Plus, Russell Still Get to Project Her Smoky Voice and Equally Smoky Eyes, and the Character’s obliquely reference, totally complicated history with the stove of noir, the sexiest of genres. —DH

First of all, it’s manny jacinto, a man with a jawline so Sharp it COULD DRILL ROESK IN THE SEA. In The AcholyteHis tectonically angular face is framed by long emo-boy Hair that totally works, especally becase his performance gives a hint of Peak Tony Leung: ALOOF AND A BIT OF A WEIRDO UTTERLY CHARMING AND DEFINITELY DANGERUS. That Edge is somewhat novel in Star Wars‘S Universe of Smugglers, Which Typically Feels Bifurcated BetWeen Scoundrels With A Heart of Gold and Petty Criminals Who Are Rarely More than Their Base Nature. Qimir Feels Like a Different Kind of Cat. WHO KNOWS WHERE The Acholyte Will Take this Character, but in jacinto’s hands, you really can’t take your eyes off Him. —DH

Look, you can’t argue with the source. There’s a reason whole generations of Star Wars Fans have had Quiet Fantasies of Gleephully Ruining Their Lives to Be With This Man. Harrison Ford forged an archetype: The skeptical rogue, a Smirk King, he who shot first. You think he’s hot? He knows. Luke Skywalker May Be the Golden Farmboy of A Thousand Faces, but Really, Who Dreams About Running off with that Guy? The appeal of han solo lies in how he’s basically someone you might you actually bump into a bar (or a cantina)-just give him a blaster, a Big Hairy Buddy, and a Sick-Ass Ship. —DH

The Only Way Forward for Star Wars nor a franchise was to push against the nostalgia that has had come to def-culture behemoth. Han Solo was A Generational Icon, Yes. But we Needed New Conflicted Heroes, New Smuggler Hotties, New Character arcs that reflect and refract this galaxy’s moral underpinnings and put unexppeed spins on resistance. Diego Luna’s Cassian is that Guy. From His Introduction In Rogue oneShooting Stormroopers and An Informer to Save Himself and Carry Information About the Death Star Back to His Comrades, to His Expanded Backsory in Tony Gilroy’s Franchise-Best TV Series ElderCassian has Become the rugged-jawed, soulful-eyed, fuck-the -mpre smuggler for out Current age. Be he loooks, you feel Him Looking: The heft of His Gaza is a Charged, Invigorating Thing; His Growing Moral Clarity an Infectious Force. Think of His Dreamy, Stalwart Expression and he listens to nemik’s manifesto and hears “Remember this: try” – that’s the face of a man who will smuggle, steal, or kill to beter reality all those under subjugation, and that Star Wars Has Always Been About. What’s hotter than a man who realizs that revolutionary politics is the only Way Forward? Absolutely nothing. —Rh