10 Background Star Wars Characters More Important Than You Think

9. Aurra Sing

aurra sing
Lucasfilm

Tatooine is one of the most vibrant worlds in Star Wars, teeming with life (read: scum and villainy) from across the galaxy. George Lucas and the other fine minds behind 1977's Star Wars made that abundantly clear when Luke Skywalker entered Mos Eisley for the first time, and everything that made the locale charming in that initial encounter was present and accounted for in the first Star Wars prequel: The Phantom Menace.

Many of Star Wars' most creative aliens can be spotted during one of the film's best set-pieces - the Boonta Eve podrace. There are the brilliant co-commentators, Fode and Beed (the former voiced by Whose Line is it Anyway? alum Greg Proops), Orr'UrRuuR'R (the lead Tusken who takes potshots at the racers), and then Aurra Sing, a mysterious pale-skinned alien who viewers can spot in the foreground as the racers make their way through a canyon.

Sing's design instantly caught the attention of fans, and it wasn't until long she found herself the focus of several expanded universe stories. The old Legends continuity established that she was a former Jedi Padawan who became a bounty hunter, but that was changed once again when the character made her animated debut in the 2008 Clone Wars animated series.

This time she was just a feared bounty hunter, but she was also instrumental in training Boba Fett after the death of his father Jango, and even assisted Boba in trying to assassinate Mace Windu in revenge. She dies by the time of the events of Solo: A Star Wars Story, but it's still unclear just how exactly she met her end.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.