A species’ history masked in dark legend and commonly told to
younglings as a scary folklore before bedtime, the Anzati were among the most feared aliens
in the Star Wars galaxy, and they had a reputation of being among the most dangerous beings to
ever wander across the stars, even being genuine threats to trained Jedi Knights.
A bare Anzati had the appearance of a humanoid that possessed two long tentacles from their
cheeks and usually a wide nose; however, rarely did they ever appear this way to the public.
As most of the time the Anzati disguised themselves by retracting their tentacles and altering
their face to look more like a common Human.
They did this to better remain hidden among the towns and colonies they frequently placed
themselves into to, or from their perspective, the basket of livestock they were to feast
on to satiate their hunger.
For when an Anzati was hungry, they preyed on other sentient beings so that they can
drink their so called “soup”.
They did this by isolating their prey and then using their basic mind control abilities
to sedate their victim, afterwards they expose their facial tentacles and use them to feast
upon the brain of their meal.
Usually this was done by entering the nose of the victim, though they could also directly
penetrate the skull of the head if needed.
The brains and life energies were completely sucked out over a short period, leaving only
a withered corpse afterwards as evidence of the meal.
The so called soup, which is what most of the Anzati called it, was actually the force
energies that they consumed as noted by the Jedi Order after they had studied the species.
This revelation had some to later refer to these creatures as either space or force vampires.
While many of the Anzati embedded themselves into small communities that they could secretly
feast on from the inside, others roamed the galaxy as assassins, bounty hunters, or straight
up serial killers that preyed on the strongest beings they could find.
As the stronger connection a being had to the force, the more the Anzati could feed
on.
These so called space vampires were quite dangerous to encounter as they typically had
at least three times the strength of most Humans, capable of easily overpowering most
during their meals if their natural telepathic abilities failed to sedate their prey.
The average lifespan of the Anzati was in the upper hundreds, with a few documented
having lived past a thousand years.
It was believed that the stronger beings they fed on, the longer they could live for.
This belief led many to hunt Jedi and other powerful force sensitives as they desired
to live for eternity.
Speaking of Anzati and Jedi, there were a few that became members of the ancient order.
Perhaps the most prominent one was Jedi Master Volfe Karkko.
While being trained at the Temple, Karkko refrained from ever using his tentacles to
feed upon the energies of another being, as it was known within his species that such
an act was highly addictive.
However, when he became a Master, Karkko desired to try feasting with his tentacles once to
see what it was like, believing he was strong willed enough to resist its highly addictive
nature.
Unfortunately for him, he was not strong willed enough, as after his first taste of the soup,
he became addicted and started to prey on his fellow Jedi, stealing their force energies
and as a result becoming more powerful after every meal.
After it was discovered what Karkko was doing, he was forced to flee from the Temple.
Understanding how dangerous a highly trained Anzati Jedi was to the galaxy at large, members
of the High Council personally went out to hunt him down.
A great battle took place between the council members and the empowered Anzati, but ultimately
Karkko was defeated.
Not wishing to execute a once great Jedi that simply fell to his species’ natural instincts,
the Jedi Order decided to place Karkko in stasis on the prison world of Kiffex rather
than kill him.
The once Anzati Jedi Master remained in his stasis prison for hundreds of years, until
one day he was able to break out after using his mind controlling abilities to influence
the other prisoners that were imprisoned with him.
A new Jedi task force was assembled to defeat Karkko, with Quinlan Vos ultimately putting
the Anzati down once and for all.
Also fun fact, the guy we see smoking in the cantina during A New Hope was actually a disguised
Anzati.
He was a notorious bounty hunter named Dannik Jerriko who was given the nickname Eater of
Luck, while others just called him Death, due to his gurosmes methods of killing his
targets, where he was known of just straight up eating them alive as was costume to his
species.
Interestingly enough, when Obi-Wan and Luke entered the cantina, Dannik felt both of their
powerful connections to the force and actually contemplated feasting on them once they left.
But he decided against it after seeing Obi-Wan cut down a thug with his lightsaber, realizing
that he was a Jedi Master and that it would be too risky to prey on someone so powerful.