When word reached the Templin Institute from the deserts of Tatooine that Boba Fett was
abandoning his career as a bounty hunter to become a crime lord, I was intrigued.
Here, I thought, was an opportunity to analyze his decisions, speculate on their consequences
and gain some insight into the development of a criminal empire from the ground up. But now,
with the rise of Boba Fett seemingly over, I can’t help but feel this opportunity was wasted.
But let’s quickly review Fett’s rise to power. 5 years after the death of Jabba the Hutt, Boba
Fett attacked his former palace and killed Bib Fortuna, who had taken over the criminal empire
in Jabba’s absence. In an attempt to consolidate his authority over Jabba’s holdings and vassals,
Fett demanded tribute and was granted this by some, but notably rejected by
the Mayor of neighboring Mos Espa. In addition to these meetings,
Fett collected tributes in person and after meeting the owner of a Cantina named Sanctuary,
was nearly assassinated. An interrogation revealed the assassin to have been hired by the mayor,
who denied this and instead implicated the Hutts, whose emissaries, a brother and sister, had just
arrived on Tatooine. They attempted to lay claim to Jabba’s territories, were rebuffed by Fett,
and later departed Tatooine upon learning that the mayor had begun working for the Pyke Syndicate,
another rival criminal organization. As Pyke reinforcements flooded into Mos Espa,
Fett attempted to create a defensive alliance with Mos Espa’s existing crime families,
but they only promised to remain neutral. To make up for his manpower shortages,
Fett enlisted fellow Mandalorian Din Djarin, who in turn appealed to the citizens of Freetown, a
settlement in the outlying Mos Pelgo territories. Eventually, the standoff between Boba Fett and
the Pykes broke out into open warfare in the streets of Mos Espa. Fett’s forces were ambushed,
betrayed by the supposedly neutral crime families. The Pykes however were ultimately destroyed,
caught between reinforcements from Freetown, and Boba Fett’s pet rancor.
Boba Fett ultimately achieved his initial goal, and now runs Jabba’s former operations
on Tatooine. But rather than having accomplished this through any planning or actions on his part,
it instead seems like Boba just blundered into this outcome. If the Templin Institute were
to summarize his career as a crime lord, Boba Fett, seemed directionless, lacked initiative,
and just generally seemed naive. A lot of this is due to Boba Fett’s
overall objective, sure he says he wants to become a crime lord, but why exactly?
And more importantly to this discussion, what does being a crime lord actually mean to Boba
Fett? What does his ideal criminal empire look like? Jabba was involved in smuggling, extortion,
murder, protection racketeering, money laundering, and quite a few other illicit activities. Is Boba
Fett still interested in these enterprises? Does he intend to reform these businesses into
something less harmful? Is this all purely for the money? Is it for prestige? Is he trying to improve
the lives of the people of Tatooine? What does Boba Fett think he can accomplish as a crime lord?
If his overall objective is rather vague, then methods he uses to achieve are even more
imprecise. Boba mentions needing to move quickly to consolidate Jabba’s holdings, but acts pretty
casually at what is supposedly a critical time. The only one of Jabba’s businesses that Fett ever
appears to visit is the Sanctuary Cantina, which rather than a critical part of the overall empire,
seems more like a money laundering operation, of which there are probably quite a few.
This is strange, because personal initiative is an area in which I would have thought Boba Fett would
excel. As a Bounty Hunter he was usually operating on his own, identifying opportunities for action,
manipulating circumstances until they were in his favor, gathering local assets and resources.
As a crime lord, I would have expected this same approach; gathering intelligence on the
situation on Tatooine, identifying potential challengers to his regime, either eliminating
them or buying their loyalty. Seeking out allies, testing their loyalty, aggressively pushing the
boundaries of his territory, winning over the locals and people of high status. Instead, Boba
Fett seems to be much more passive. He waits for Jabba’s former vassals to come to him, and seems
almost entirely unprepared if they should refuse. Every development seems to take him by surprise.
An especially prominent moment in Boba’s career is when he invites the criminal families of Mos Espa
to his palace to discuss an alliance against the Pykes. Boba makes his offer, but the families are
unconvinced. So Boba immediately concedes and then just asks that they remain neutral. There’s no
attempt at negotiation, no threats, no proactive attempt on Boba’s part to secure them as allies.
He seemed so disinterested in actually convincing them to fight against the Pykes,
that I was convinced this had to be part of a bigger plan. Boba had lured the families to his
palace, only to kill them or imprison them, and put loyal people in charge of their organizations.
Or maybe he wanted to track their movements, and while they were at dinner, tracking devices had
been planted on all their ships. But I was wrong. Boba accepted their word, was eventually betrayed,
and had no contingencies for their actions. And this seems to be a common theme in his
career as a crime lord. Boba takes everything at face value, and never attempts to dig deeper
into a person’s motives or intentions. Garsa Fwip, the owner of Sanctuary seemed
to accept Boba Fett as the new crime lord of Tatooine a bit too easily.
Is she truly loyal to Boba? Did she fill his helmet with coins hoping he wouldn’t have it on
when Boba was ambushed a few minutes later? The Hutts tried to kill Boba Fett,
only to give up on Tatooine without a fight and gift him a rancor as restitution. Could
this just be another Hutt plot to kill him? Can the Rancor trainer be trusted?
Boba has known the Speeder Bike gang for just a few days. Can he count on them when things
get tough? How are a bunch of bored kids going to hold up when the blaster bolts start firing?
Boba seems all too willing to hire people he doesn’t really know
on the spot. Except for Black Krrsantan, why did Boba wait before offering him a job?
In all these situations I tried to anticipate what Boba Fett must be thinking, how he would
play the situation for his benefit, but in every case Boba just went along with whatever
was happening, often with very little consequence. Even major decisions affecting the state of Boba’s
empire are made almost flippantly. This not only makes him appear rather disinterested in the whole
criminal empire thing, but almost comically uninformed. Most of Jabba’s business is in the
spice trade, but when asked to shut it down, Boba agrees with barely any hesitation, almost as if
this was the first time he was aware that’s where the money was coming from. Was he unaware people
on Tatooine weren’t a fan of drug smuggling? Does he have any plans to replace it with another
business? Why does such a decision with such major ramifications seem like an afterthought?
Just a few minutes later this happens again. Boba wants to hold off the Pykes
in his palace, away from Mos Espa where there is greater protection.
One of the members of the speeder bike gang says that the people of Mos Espa need them,
so Boba Fett should stay. Again he agrees pretty much immediately.
It seem like he agrees with whoever spoke last. If someone else had said “we can best serve Mos Espa
by preventing it from becoming a battlefield” would Boba Fett have again changed his mind?
This of course ends up being the wrong decision and the Battle of Mos Espa is
very nearly a disaster. If only Boba Fett had some sort of mobile heavy weapons
capable of destroying large groups of enemy personnel and heavy weaponry.
Something that would be especially effective on desert plains where there is almost no cover.
Oh well. Let’s shoot small arms at these things in the middle of a neighborhood.
I think it says a lot that Boba Fett eventually triumphs over the Pykes
not because of his own actions and ingenuity, but in spite of them.
After spending an inordinate amount of time trying to win the respect of the citizens of Mos Epsa,
not a single one takes up arms in his defense. Freetown, a settlement with which Boba has had
no contact, shows up instead. The Scorpenek droids are destroyed not because Fett had planned
for such an eventuality, but because the Hutts just happened to give him a rancor.
This is not to say that Boba Fett needed to have perfectly prepared for every situation.
It just strikes me as almost unbelievable that an experienced bounty-hunter
would try to become a crime-lord and then do very
little aside from the odd meeting and visit to a Cantina to make it happen.
But I think the biggest problem with the rise of Boba Fett is that I don’t quite
understand what it achieved. There were problems on Tatooine, but we never really saw any of them.
We’re told the streets are in chaos, but we never really see it. And we’re told Boba
Fett has taken control over Tatooine, but again, we don’t really see what this means.
Here is Mos Espa in the grips of the spice trade and the corrupt rule of the Hutts.
Here it is in the middle of a deadly gang war. And here it is under the benevolent rule of Boba Fett.