Star Wars: 10 Most Ridiculous Stories From The Expanded Universe
2. Chewbacca Goes Smoosh
The 1999 novel Vector Prime kicked off the New Jedi Order series and introduced us to the aforementioned Yuuzhan Vong. Because the Vong originated from outside of the known galaxy and thought technology was blasphemous, no one really took them seriously.
The Vong are such jokes that even after they take over some backwater planet, Han, his son Anakin and Chewbacca go on vacation. In order to prove they mean business, the Vong decide to destroy an entire planet by pulling its moon out of orbit, forcing it to collide with the planet. Han and Chewbacca try and save as many people as possible, but during the course of their heroics Chewbacca is left behind, and subsequently dies when the moon crashes into the planet.
This was the first time that a major Star Wars character had been killed n the Expanded Universe, and was incredibly controversial among fans. Legend has it that the publishers of the book sent a letter to George Lucas with a list of the characters they wanted to kill. Lucas responded with a list of his own, comprised of characters that could not be killed. Since Chewbacca was not on the list, it was decided that the Wookie would bite the big one.