XJ-2 airspeeder

The XJ-2 airspeeder was a customized Narglatch AirTech vehicle owned by Bail Organa during his tenure as senator of the Alderaan sector and as Viceroy of Alderaan itself. After seeing fellow Senator Simon Greyshade's XJ-6 airspeeder, Organa purchased his own custom kit, which sported a red and silver color scheme. The airspeeder became a hobby of Organa's, and he would tinker with it when he was not pressed to attend to senatorial duties. With the advent of the Clone Wars, Organa took the XJ-2 with him to Coruscant, where he found himself spending most of his time.

Organa registered the speeder under the alias of "Org Banelli," allowing him to operate without the attention of the authorities. Along with several other senators, Organa was considering ousting Supreme Chancellor Palpatine at the conclusion of the war, and he needed to be able to move covertly. When the war did conclude, Organa used the speeder to rescue Jedi Master Yoda from Palpatine's clutches. Returning to Alderaan, Organa found himself dedicated to forming the Alliance to Restore the Republic, and as a result, the speeder gathered dust. He gave it to his adopted daughter, Princess Leia, and taught her piloting skills when she came of age. The speeder was eventually destroyed when the Death Star obliterated Alderaan, but a line based on the model was later put into production by Narglatch AirTech during the Galactic Civil War.

Characteristics
A customized airspeeder, the XJ-2 was a small, two-seat vehicle that was 5.9 meters in length. The seats themselves were made of blue-hued leather. It sported a red and silver color scheme, selected by Senator Bail Organa, and in the hands of an able driver, the speeder could reach high and potentially hazardous speeds. As a precaution, the steering yoke was modified to allow for sharp turns. Though entirely new, the vehicle was based on an older airspeeder model. The original vehicle owned by Organa was unique at the time of its conception and creation. The later reproductions of the speeder were good at handling and boasted impressive speeds, and they excelled at both acceleration and climbing. A recolored variant of the speeder, used on worlds such as Onderon, sported a blue and yellow livery.

Purchase and modifications
Narglatch AirTech, a small independent company, developed custom kits for airspeeder development. Their products were aimed at the upper class and more prestigious inhabitants of the Republic, such as senators and Core World aristocracy. Senator Simon Greyshade of the Vorzyd sector often flaunted his constructed XJ-6 airspeeder before his peers. Greyshade's displays inspired Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan to purchase and construct his own Narglatch AirTech kit.

Modification of the speeder became Organa's hobby, and when he was not being called upon to address matters of State, he could be found in his garage on Alderaan, working on the XJ-2. Deciding that it would be wise to keep a means of covert movement, Organa registered his speeder under the false name of "Org Banelli."

Usage
With the Separatist Crisis demanding Organa's full attention as a senator, he found little time to work as an aspiring mechanic, and so the XJ-2 received less and less attention. When the Clone Wars broke out, Organa spent most of his time on the galactic capital of Coruscant, and he brought his speeder along with him. In 22 BBY, Organa learned from a contact that the Sith were planning to destroy the Jedi Order, so he flew his speeder to the apartment of Senator Padmé Amidala to try and organize through her a meeting with the Order. Around 21 BBY, while working to defeat a bill that would escalate the war effort, Organa came under fire from the bounty hunters Robonino and Chata Hyoki, who attacked him while he was preparing to leave from the Galactic Senate's speeder hangar. While police droids and Alderaanian troopers worked to apprehend the hired guns, Organa attempted to leave the hangar in his XJ-2 speeder, only to crash it into the hangar entrance when the vehicle was hit by laser fire from Hyoki. Although Robonino and Hyoki were apprehended, Organa sustained injuries from the crash and was unable to deliver a speech to the Senate.

XJ-2 airspeeders also proved to be popular on worlds such as Onderon, which was controlled by the Confederacy of Independent Systems. During the Battle of Onderon of circa 20 BBY, the Onderon rebels&mdash;operating against the Confederacy in the capital city, Iziz&mdash;loaded an XJ-2 speeder with munitions, then left it in the path of a Separatist battle droid patrol in one of Iziz's streets. Once the droid patrol arrived, the rebels detonated the bomb-laden speeder, manipulating the Separatists into dispatching reinforcements to the site in the form of an Armored Assault Tank, which the rebels then used to destroy Iziz's power generator.

During the war's progression, Organa grew weary of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine's constant amendments to the Constitution, and he therefore met with other senators, such as Mon Mothma and Giddean Danu, for frequent airing of grievances. The "Banelli" ruse allowed him to escape the notice of Palpatine's offices and enabled him to travel to the designated meeting points with a minimum of fuss. As the war came to a sudden halt in 19 BBY, the XJ-2 saw considerable use during the chaos of Operation: Knightfall, part of Order 66. When fires broke out at the Jedi Temple, Organa sped there in his speeder to investigate. He was stopped by Clone Commander CC-1119, who advised him to leave. After watching CC-1119 and the 501st Legion gun down Zett Jukassa, a Jedi Padawan, the horrified Organa fled the scene in his XJ-2.

In the following days, Organa witnessed Palpatine's Declaration of a New Order. Disgusted with what he saw, he aided and abetted Jedi Master Yoda's assassination attempt on now-Emperor Palpatine. The attempt failed, however, and Organa once more used the speeder to help Yoda escape the clutches of the Emperor's clone troopers. The "Org Banelli" registration helped Organa avoid arrest and allowed him to return to Alderaan, with the speeder, in peace. For a short while, he resumed his modification of the vehicle, but the forging of the new Alliance to Restore the Republic meant that the XJ-2 would eventually gather dust.

When Organa's adopted daughter, Leia, came of age, he gave her the XJ-2 as a birthday present. Using the airspeeder, he taught her basic piloting skills, which were essential when handling such a high-speed and dangerous craft. When Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin decided to use Alderaan as a test for the highly destructive capabilities for the Death Star, the XJ-2 was destroyed in the planet's explosion. The craft was later produced in larger numbers by Narglatch AirTech and saw use during the Galactic Civil War. The speeder was considered classy, and those utilizing it were held in high regard. The speeder was also covered in a consumer report from Corellia Times on the HoloNet. Corellia Times gave a good rating all round, with particular recommendation for the craft's acceleration and climbing ability.

Behind the scenes
The XJ-2 airspeeder was created for George Lucas's 2005 film Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, where it was used as a mode of transport for Bail Organa's character. Lucas based the speeder on the 1948 Tucker Sedan and intended it to be a reference to Tucker: The Man and His Dream. The vehicle's back story was later developed by "Master Devwi" through the StarWars.com Hyperspace feature "What's The Story?" Devwi's Databank entry explained that Organa's speeder was of the same model line as the XJ-6 airspeeder, which was featured in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. Through the XJ-6, Devwi made a connection to the greater Expanded Universe in his entry as well, including the character of Simon Greyshade from 1978's Star Wars 18: The Empire Strikes; Greyshade had been associated with the XJ-6 by the HoloNet News website.

The speeder was featured in the 2008 Star Wars Galaxies Trading Card Game set Champions of the Force as a "loot card," which players could redeem for an actual speeder in the computer game Star Wars Galaxies. After being briefly featured in the 2008 novel The Clone Wars: Wild Space, the airspeeder appeared in "Pursuit of Peace," an episode in the Star Wars: The Clone Wars television series' 2010 third season. A recolored version of the speeder also appeared in the 2012 fifth season episode "Front Runners."

Appearances

 * The Clone Wars: Wild Space
 * Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith novelization
 * Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith / comic adaptation
 * Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith junior novelization
 * Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith / comic adaptation
 * Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith junior novelization