The latest Star Wars tie-in has introduced a new potential Jedi - who deserves to be canon. The Star Wars sequel trilogy is generally considered to have ended not with a bang, but a whimper, with Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker heavily criticized. Although it set up Rey founding a new Jedi Order, that's unlikely to happen for some time yet - not least because Daisy Ridley is in no hurry to return as Rey. "I'm always open to a revisit," she observed in one interview earlier this year, "But also the beautiful thing is it's this wonderful, huge universe with all of these stories that have yet to be told. I think there's a lot of cool things to be made before any potential revisit." Instead of focusing on the post-sequels status quo, Star Wars is bouncing around the timeline with impunity right now.
There is, however, one curious exception; the LEGO Star Wars series, which is enjoying telling stories featuring the stars of the sequel trilogy. The recent LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales special, released before Halloween, tells an entertaining story in which Resistance pilot Poe Dameron crash-lands upon Darth Vader's planet Mustafar. There, he encounters the Sith Lord's servant Vaneé - who plans to become a force to be reckoned with in his own right. The concept is an entertaining one, inspired by IDW's Star Wars Adventures: Tales From Vader's Castle comics, and it also introduces a potential recruit to Rey's Jedi Order - a character who really deserves to become canon.
In LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales, a Hutt businessman is attempting to turn Vader's Tower on Mustafar into a haunted house-style tourist attraction. Dean is one of his employees, a naïve young mechanic who hero-worships Poe Dameron and is thrilled when he meets the Republic pilot. He proves to be brave and courageous, overcoming his fear to help Poe against Vaneé, and it doesn't take long for Poe to figure out he's Force-sensitive. When Vaneé is defeated, Poe decides to take Dean to meet his friend Rey.
It's reasonable to assume that Star Wars will visit the post-sequels era sooner or later, whether in live-action or in other mediums. Lucasfilm would be wise to incorporate Dean into those stories as a member of Rey's Jedi Order because the character speaks to the heart of Star Wars - the idea that a galactic nobody, somebody overlooked by everyone around them, can actually become a hero and even a Jedi Knight. This "Everyman Hero" element of Star Wars was core to the first film - a farmboy on a remote desert world changed the fate of the galaxy - but became obscured as the Skywalker dynasty became more important. It would be great to see it restored among Rey's recruits, given Rey is the nobody who became a Skywalker by choice.
Meanwhile, it's not unusual to see powerful Force-sensitives who are skilled with machines; Anakin Skywalker built C-3PO when he was just a child. The Star Wars: The High Republic transmedia initiative has built on this idea, introducing a Padawan named Ram Jomaran who lived 200 years before the events of Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace. He perceived the Force in a different way to the other Jedi, relating to it through machines and technology, intuitively seeing circuit boards and repairing systems through the Force. It is possible Dean would become a Jedi with the same kind of relationship with the Force, adding welcome diversity to Rey's new Jedi Order. Hopefully Lucasfilm won't forget Dean, but instead will incorporate him into the future of Star Wars.
