{"id":45879,"date":"2025-11-01T00:00:26","date_gmt":"2025-11-01T04:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/?p=45879"},"modified":"2025-11-01T01:38:00","modified_gmt":"2025-11-01T05:38:00","slug":"what-does-dash-rendar-look-like","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/2025\/11\/what-does-dash-rendar-look-like\/","title":{"rendered":"What does Dash Rendar look like?"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the official promo art for Dash Rendar, drawn by concept artist Michael Butkus (l.) and modified by LucasArts' Jon Knoles (r.):<\/p>\n

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And that leads us down two divergent design paths. The Kenner action figure, for instance, clearly favors Butkus' original (because sculpting and producing toys takes so long):<\/p>\n

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Logically, Knoles' was used directly on the box for the Nintendo 64 game, and later inspired the art on the PC version:<\/p>\n

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The Brothers Hildebrandt were working from the Butkus design when they painted the trading cards, so they hired a man named Tom Kyte to model for the character:<\/p>\n

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A model is the reason Knoles' design looks the way it does, too: since the game was being developed for the N64, and the N64 still used cartridges instead of CDs, there wasn't enough room on the cart to make 3D cutscenes; LucasArts hired an unidentified actor to stand in for Dash, then based the 2D art on him; however, the model was slightly younger than they wanted, so Knoles and the other artists had to age him up every time, leading to him looking slightly different in every scene.<\/p>\n

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That's still better than when the game was ported to PC and could<\/b> have 3D cutscenes, because WHOOF!<\/p>\n

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That doesn't look much at all like either of the two designs we've seen so far. But oddly, it does<\/b> look like the original storyboards used to plan the blocking of the cutscenes:<\/p>\n

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And wherever that super baby-faced design came from, it seems to have influenced Mike Sutfin's art in 2002's New Essential Guide to Characters<\/i>, because certainly nothing else looks like that.<\/p>\n

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At least it got the hair color right. The comic clearly favors the Knoles design (making Dash look like a cross between Dennis Quaid and Bill Paxton), but made his hair blonde in the first book and black in the sequel:<\/p>\n

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The confusion over his looks didn't abate in subsequent years, either:<\/p>\n

Top row (l-r): Rogues and Scoundrels<\/i> TCG set (2004), Shadow Syndicate<\/i> expansion to the Star Wars Galaxies<\/i> TCG (2009), Topps Galactic Files<\/i> cards (2012)
\nBottom (l-r): Fly Casual<\/i> RPG supplement (2015), Star Wars Armada: Rogues and Villains<\/i> expansion (2015)<\/p><\/div>\n

And now we've got the Black Series<\/i> action figure<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Basically, Hasbro had tons of options when it came to designing their toy, and they somehow managed to get it absolutely, entirely, wrong.<\/p>\n

<i>And now, some more OAFEry:<\/i><\/H5>