IG-88 assassin droid/Legends

"I think, therefore I am. I destroy, therefore I endure."

- IG-88A's final thoughts

IG-88 was an assassin droid line designed by Holowan Laboratories. The IG-88 line was a derivative of the IG-86 sentinel droids used during the Clone Wars. IG-88B later became one of the galaxy's most infamous bounty hunters. However, the bounty hunting was just a cover for his master, IG-88A, and his grand plan&mdash;the Droid Revolution.

Moments after activation, the original massacred the scientists and transferred his consciousness into the other three. They then escaped the lab. It was possible it was the droid's incompletely formed identity that made him obsessed with bounty hunting and killing.

Biography
"WANTED: IG-88, aka the Phlutdroid, also reportedly operating as IG-88A, IG-88B, IG-88C, or IG-88D. Heavily armed, more than 150 kills. DISMANTLE ON SIGHT."

- Imperial bounty posting

Design history
Assassin droids were banned even before the Empire came to power, possibly by Palpatine himself when he was still Chancellor, although many beings continued to use them. The very nature of their job necessitated highly adaptive, autonomous programming that unfortunately caused them to frequently turn on their masters. The droid programmers at Holowan Laboratories, however, developed new programming methods that they felt confident would keep their new line of assassin droids in check, even with their new sentience programming. Thus, the development of the IG-series assassin droids&mdash;also known as the Phlut Design Systems Project Phlutdroid&mdash;would become well known as an idea that went wrong with disastrous results. The droids were also similar to IG-72 and IG-97, but the IG-88 line was by far the most infamous.

Activation & awareness
Evolving from Phlut's contract with the InterGalactic Banking Clan (hence the "IG" prefix), IG-88 was a natural design evolution from the IG-100, IG-86 and IG lancer combat droids that had made their mark during the violent Clone Wars. Only four of these droids were ever created, and all were completely identical. While these creations were supposedly subservient to their masters, when IG-88 was activated, the sentience programming--designed to make the droid a more adaptive and resourceful assassin--had results far outstripping their expectations. Within a few seconds, he had chewed through the data files in the computer, realized he was an assassin droid, and reasoned his superiority to the biological creatures who had created him. The designers only had time to decide to deactivate the droid and find out why he was outperforming their expectations--which the droid decided he would not allow. He then proceeded to slaughter his makers with his bare hands, copy his programming into three other IG-88s, kill the majority of the guards in the Holowan Labs complex, and escape. Before making his escape, he also freed the droid designated IG-72. It should be noted that he did not copy himself over into IG-72's programming, as the latter droid expressed a desire to maintain its own individuality, whereas the other three droids had empty memory cores.

IG-88 designated himself as "A" and the rest in activation order "B, C, and D". They worked in tandem, while IG-72 went his own way. They traveled to Mechis III and conquered the droid factory there, killing all of its biological occupants. To throw Imperial investigators off their trail, IG-88B worked as a bounty hunter, killing various former employees of Holowan to prevent discovery.

The droid revolution
From their base on Mechis III, the four IG-88s began planning their "Droid Revolution", a movement in which an army of all types of droids would rise up and annihilate all the "biologicals" of the universe. After taking control of Mechis III, they began uploading their advanced sentience program into all droids manufactured there; the sentience programming was to be loaded into the droids when the appropriate code was sent by the IG-88s. When this occurred, all of the droids would rise up and destroy all biological life in the galaxy.



Bounty hunting
"Why do people keep hiring him? They're risking the wrath of the Empire.''" "''Sir, I believe it's because IG-88 always gets the job done."

- Gurdun and Minor Relsted

The IG-88 designated "B" operated as a bounty hunter, with his appearances throughout the galaxy serving as cover for their real operations on Mechis III. One assignment saw the droid bounty hunter hired by Zatec-Cha, vizier of Tammuz-an, to track down the missing Prince Mon Julpa. IG-88 tracked Julpa to Tyne's Horky and followed him to see if the lost Prince would lead him to the Tammuz-an Royal Scepter. During the course of this assignment, IG-88 would cross paths with the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO.

At some point, IG-88 would team up with Bossk and Dengar, having been hired by the Hutts to locate the Yavin Vassilika. Eventually, IG-88 turned on his teammates, attempting to claim a bounty on them which was recently posted by rival bounty hunter Zuckuss.

After the Alliance's Renegade Squadron caused a stir in the Alderaan system, the Empire started actively hunting them. This led one of the IG-88s to pick up the bounty on the Squadron, finding them on Ord Mantell and attempting to capture or kill all he could. However, due to the actions of Han Solo, they were able to temporarily defeat the droid and escape.

At some point during 1 ABY, IG-88A set up a droid factory on Lok where he planned to manufacture a plethora of battle droids and droidekas for his own nefarious purposes. However, with the help of Nym, a group of spacers were successful in foiling his plans and seemingly destroying the droid and the factory. Sometime later, IG-88 reactivated a Clone Wars-era droid factory on Corellia.

In 3 ABY, IG-88 was commissioned to find the Millennium Falcon. However, IG-88 was beaten to the Han Solo bounty by Boba Fett. IG-88B was destroyed on Bespin by Fett in retaliation for attempting to track him. IG-88s C and D engaged Fett in orbit over Tatooine in identical models of the IG-2000 in attempt to steal the carbonite containing Solo, but were defeated. C was destroyed first. IG-88D then launched a surprise attack, but in the end its ship was also destroyed by Boba Fett's Slave I, in a maneuver in which Fett pretended to have been killed. Unbeknownst to Fett, IG-88D somehow survived the encounter, but was later destroyed by Dash Rendar while looking for repair parts for his ship in an Ord Mantell junkyard while Rendar searched for information on the carbonite-frozen Han Solo.

At some point, one of the IG-88s came under the employment of the Zann Consortium criminal organization, apparently owing the second-in-command of the organization a favor. He hacked into Bespin's central computer and retrieved information on the planets on Zann's "hit list". He was also possibly involved in the Second Battle of Kuat and Zann's sketchy deal with Grand Admiral Thrawn over a Sith artifact. During his employment in the Zann Consortium, IG-88 possibly became one of the commanders of the organization.

Despite his feud with Boba Fett, IG-88 assisted Fett on a mission against the Shell Hutts.

Just before the Battle of Endor, IG-88A was hired for one last mission. Vader hired the droid to deal with the Renegade Squadron once more, who had attacked Sullust in a diversionary attack. He was defeated again however, despite being equipped with a lightning-powered shield generator.

Destruction over Endor
The remaining IG-88 uploaded his consciousness into a computer core destined for Death Star II. He succeeded in being uploaded, and was preparing to activate his program to take over all droids in the galaxy when it was destroyed. With his consciousness in the Death Star II, he would literally become the Death Star.

Emperor Palpatine was the only known person on the Death Star to suspect something was wrong after the uploading of the computer core with IG-88 inside. Before the station's destruction, he noticed a series of doors in his throne room opening and closing sporadically. IG-88 did this to show the Emperor that he was not all powerful. However, IG-88 was utterly baffled when it appeared that Emperor Palpatine used some unseen force to attempt to push the doors open. However, IG-88 exerted more force and was able to continue to keep the Emperor locked in, until he grew tired of the game and unlocked the door.

Lando Calrissian and Wedge Antilles ended up destroying the core, destroying both the Death Star, and the A.I. of IG-88 as well.

Reactivation
Years later, the IG-88A body, now inactive, was reprogrammed. The droid worked for Barpotomous Drebble temporarily in the months following the Battle of Endor, and later was found in service to the Thul family, protecting them from the Diversity Alliance and serving as bodyguard of Tyko Thul. Later IG-88 would save the young Raynar Thul from near death, after being reprogrammed to protect the Thul family.

IG-88A
IG-88A was the first of the IG-88 line. He was the leader of the IG-88s. When he rebelled against his creators on Holowan, he transferred all of his memories and files into the other IG-88s. He designated them IG-88s B, C, and D, in the order they were activated. He traveled to Mechis III with his counterparts and started his droid rebellion there. He planned to take over the galaxy with droids because he thought droids were far superior to biologicals. He uploaded himself into the second Death Star, and was about to start his droid rebellion all over the Galaxy, when the Rebel Alliance destroyed the Death Star, destroying him with it. Later IG-88A's body was reactivated and reprogrammed by Tyko Thul to become his family's bodyguard against the Diversity Alliance.

IG-88B


IG-88B was the second of the four IG-88s. It was agreed by all four of the units that this one would be the bounty hunter as to distract any attention from Mechis III where the droid revolution was being conducted. He flew the first sleek ship of its class: the IG-2000. It was this one that was aboard the Super Star Destroyer Executor during the hunt for Han Solo. While aboard, he learned of the new Death Star project underway at the forest moon of Endor. He relayed the information to the other three IG-88s. Afterwards, he started placing trackers on all of the bounty hunters' ships that were present and used them to find Solo. Boba Fett was not fooled; he allowed IG-88B to follow him to Bespin, where the droid met its end. IG-88B was left as scrap in the bowels of Cloud City.

IG-88C
IG-88C was another of the IG-88 line. Along with IG-88D, he was assigned as guards of Mechis III, should any intruder come upon their operation there. When IG-88B was destroyed, C and D were left to pursue Boba Fett and avenge their fallen brother. IG-88C was destroyed in Fett's counterattack.

IG-88D
The fourth IG-88 assassin droid was IG-88D. He and IG-88C were used as guards on Mechis III. When C and D were ordered to intercept Boba Fett, IG-88C was destroyed. D, however, suddenly emerged from hyperspace and fired on Slave I. When it seemed as if Fett was going to crash into the deserts of Tatooine, IG-88D sent an ultimatum. When Boba didn't respond and plunged deeper towards the surface, the droid had no idea what the bounty hunter was doing. Fett suddenly pulled a fast one and hit the air brakes, stopping in mid-air as IG-88D's IG-2000 craft blew past him. Boba Fett then used his ship's tractor beam to pull D's ship to him and unleashed a barrage of fire on the craft. IG-88D was thought to be destroyed in the assault, but Dash Rendar later battled with and destroyed IG-88D on Ord Mantell while looking for information about the carbonite entombed Han Solo.

Abilities and equipment
IG-88's BlasTech DLT-20A blaster rifle was made from a heavily modified resin cast BlasTech A280 blaster rifle used by Rebel troops on Hoth. Other weapons included the following:


 * Flamethrower
 * Pulse cannon
 * DAS-430 electromagnetic projectile launcher
 * Repeating blaster
 * Sonic stunner
 * Paralysis cord
 * Poison gas
 * Trilon gas
 * Thermal detonators
 * Needle dart gun
 * Butcher vibroblade
 * Concussion grenade
 * Throwing flechettes
 * Trifaraleen gas
 * Wide-dispersal radiation grenades
 * Computer input port
 * Broadband antenna
 * Blaster reflective palms
 * Heat and motion sensors
 * Highly advanced trackers
 * Acid-proof servo wires
 * Armor nearly impenetrable from external attack
 * Cutting laser in finger on right arm
 * Extremely fast reflexes, even by droid standards; during his escape, the droid managed to kill a technician by calmly and methodically calculating the trajectory of an incoming laser bolt, deciding to deflect the bolt instead of dodging it, and furthermore making sure that his deflected beam reflected at just the right angle to kill the fleeing technician who had fired upon him -all in the microseconds that it took the laser bolt to travel from the gun to his position.
 * Extreme physical strength.
 * As the Second Death Star, IG-88A possessed all the armaments and capabilities of the station itself, including, most notably, its planet-destroying superlaser.

IG-88 was designed to have blaster cannons built into the structure of each arm, but that they were not yet installed. IG-88 used external weapons for the rest of his existence, indicating that they were never installed later.

Behind the scenes
IG-88 seems to be primarily built from parts of aircraft scrap, though most of his parts have yet to be identified. The droid's head was constructed from a Rolls-Royce Derwent jet engine burner can with slight modifications and additions. Similar burner cans were originally used as part of the distillery behind the bar in the Mos Eisley Cantina in A New Hope. A similar prop also appears in a junkyard in "Dawn of the Gods", an episode of the British science-fiction series Blake's 7 which aired in 1980.

According to the Shadows of the Empire PC video game, IG-88 speaks in a deep, mechanical, almost Vader-esque tone as opposed to the more comical voices presented by the battle droids of the Prequel trilogy.

The BlasTech E-11's were built from British Sterling Mk4/L2A3 submachine guns.



IG-88's gun included modifications, including the addition of six grips around the barrel. The exact identity of the grip material has yet to be determined, but recent revelations suggest stamped metal T-track from old cupboards with sliding doors for the A New Hope grips. The grips on The Empire Strikes Back lightsabers are rubber or plastic and may be newer style T-track or reproductions of the original ANH grips. It is unknown at this time if The Empire Strikes Back E-11 blasters had the original ANH grip material or newer grips of plastic or rubber. Note: The row of holes on the underside of the gun had no grips as they would interfere with the folding stock. Also, the row of holes just above the folding stock the left side of the gun received no grips, presumably this is because of the bayonet attachment stub that occupies the third hole from the front in this row.

Another modification includes the addition of a M19 or M32 azimuth scope (see below) to a mount by the use of the two hex head bolts that came with the scope. This scope mount is in the form of an approximately 1cm wide by 1/16" - 1/8" thick strip of metal sitting about a 1/4" above the gun. The front end of the strip was bent and inserted into the rear most vent hole on the top of the gun thus requiring no rivet or other attachment. On this blaster variation the rear of the mount strip goes straight back into the rear sight and is attached there presumably by riveting it to the sight.

An IG-88 body, presumably IG-88B's, is seen on Bespin in the scene where Chewbacca is recovering the parts of C-3PO from the Ugnaughts.

In LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy IG-88 is playable in Free Play mode. Also, IG-88 is available in free play in LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga. In a possible oversight by the designers, IG-88 is playable in the final battle of Star Wars: Empire at War: Forces of Corruption, whereas all four IG-88s would have been destroyed by that point.

Rapper MC Chris wrote a track on his Part Six Part One album about IG-88 called "IG-88's '57 Chevy".

In the computer game Half-Life: Opposing force, a security guard can be heard saying 'Have you seen the new IG-88?' Shortly before being killed.

The timed-explosive device used by an assassin in the Episode "Chuck Versus the Thrid Dimension" of the TV show "Chuck", has the designation IG-88.

In the book Scarecrow by Matthew Reilly, one of the bounty hunting groups calls itself the Intercontinental Guard, Unit 88 or IG-88.

Non-canon appearances

 * LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy
 * LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
 * Tall Tales
 * Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron
 * Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds