If it wasn't for one rarely seen little red astromech droid, the Star Wars galaxy might have never achieved peace from the oppression of the Empire. R5-D4 was the droid who was almost purchased by Luke Skywalker and his Uncle Owen in A New Hope from a traveling band of Jawas. While he was almost bought, R5 had a bad motivator, which prompted Luke to buy R2-D2 instead, the much more famous astromech who carried the Death Star plans and a message requesting Obi-Wan Kenobi's help from Princess Leia. However, fans might not know that R5's malfunction was intentional, as it was his sacrifice to save the galaxy.

While R5-D4's first appearance was in A New Hope, he was briefly seen in Attack of the Clones, as well as in the first season of The Mandalorian, being featured in the Mos Eisley Cantina when Din Djarin was looking for work. Also, in the first episode of the second season, R5 was seen working for Peli Motto, the mechanic who took care of The Child during Mando's first visit to Tatooine in the first season (confirmed by the carbon scoring on his head from the bad motivator).

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Aside from R2-D2, R5 may be the most important little droid in the galaxy. In the official Star Wars canon, it's been revealed that R2 made an appeal to R5 during A New Hope while they were both aboard the Jawa's Sandcrawler in the short story from Lucasfilm Publishing's A Certain Point of View. In "The Red One" from writer Rae Carson, R2 told R5 that he was on an important mission for the Rebellion, and had to get sold so he could deliver his message, and even tried to sabotage R5 in his desperation. While R5 initially ignored R2's pleas as he very much wanted to be sold himself, he ultimately decided to do the right thing and intentionally popped his head plate, making it look as though he had a bad motivator.

Mandalorian Season 2 R5-D4 SR

While this story is great and provides the official heroics of R5-D4, Dark Horse Comics also provided a story featuring R5 before Disney's purchase and subsequent continuity purge of Star Wars which was much more grandiose, dramatic, and comically far-fetched. In Dark Horse's Star Wars Tales, R5 was nicknamed Skippy, and somehow had midi-chlorians in his mechanical systems, making him a droid with Force abilities. While he was working in Jabba's Palace, R5 was able to remove his restraining bolt with his newfound abilities in the Force and escape. However, the desert was vast and his power cells almost died before he was found by the Jawas. There he met R2 and C-3PO and learned of R2's mission, and that's when the Force started showing him visions of his potential destiny as a hero of the galaxy. However, as he was rolling towards his new life, thinking that he'd be fighting side by side with Luke as heroes, the Force helped him realize that his destiny was instead right then and there, allowing R2 to take his place.

Of course, "Skippy the Jedi Droid" is much more of a parody comic than anything else, but the end result is still the same as the official, Disney-approved story: R5-D4 caused his malfunction with his motivator intentionally so that R2 could succeed in his mission and helped save the galaxy as a result. Whichever story fans subscribe to, R5 is a hero, so it's nice to see that he survived his bad motivator and continued time with the Jawas, now living and working for Peli Motto in Mos Eisley. Without R5, the Star Wars galaxy would have become a much different and probably much darker place.

More: Why The Mandalorian Likes Droids In Season 2