Yoda

"Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? No. And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is."

- Yoda, to Luke Skywalker

Yoda was one of the most renowned and powerful Jedi Masters in galactic history. Standing at about 66 cm tall, he was a male member of a mysterious species.

He was known for his legendary wisdom, mastery of the Force and skills in lightsaber combat. In service to the galaxy and the Force, Grand Master Yoda spent eight centuries training Jedi. He served as a member of the Jedi Council in the last centuries of the Galactic Republic and as Grand Master oversaw the Jedi Order before, during and after the devastating Clone Wars.

Though Yoda was, arguably, the most highly Force-attuned member of the Order, he was not flawless. It was partially due to his failure to recognize that Chancellor Sheev Palpatine was actually responsible for the outbreak of the Clone Wars, and was in fact the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, which led to the Republic being overthrown and the Jedi Order being decimated. The Grand Master was among the few Jedi to survive Emperor Palpatine's Jedi purge, after the beginning of which, he went into exile on the swamp planet of Dagobah.

Later, before dying and becoming one with the Force, the exiled Jedi Master was responsible for the instruction of Luke Skywalker who would use Yoda's training to overthrow the Sith. Following his death, Master Yoda retained his identity within the Force.

Invasion of Naboo
"There's no doubt. The mysterious warrior was a Sith." "Always two there are. No more, no less. A Master and an apprentice." "But which one was destroyed, the Master, or the Apprentice?"

- Mace Windu and Yoda, about Darth Maul

During the invasion of the planet Naboo by the Trade Federation, Yoda served on the Jedi Council as the Grand Master of the Jedi Order, having trained Jedi students for about 800 years. He was present when Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn presented Anakin Skywalker, a young slave boy from the planet Tatooine, to the Council in the hopes of training him. Although Jinn believed Skywalker to be the Chosen One, prophesized to bring balance to the Force, Yoda and the other Council members did not share his opinion, sensing an uncertain future and a high amount of fear in the boy, and refused to grant permission.

After Jinn and his Padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, returned to Naboo, they forged an alliance between the Human inhabitants of the world and the native species in order to combat the Federation occupation forces. The Federation's droid army was eventually deactivated after the accidental destruction of its command ship by Anakin Skywalker. During the battle, however, Jinn and Kenobi dueled a dark side Force user &mdash;Darth Maul, the Dathomirian Zabrak apprentice of the Sith Lord Darth Sidious&mdash;which cost Jinn his life. Yoda, along with other members of the Council, was present at the Naboo victory parade and Jinn's subsequent funeral, sharing his thoughts on the apparent reemergence of the Sith with fellow Master of the Order Mace Windu and pointing out that the Rule of Two, the Sith succession system in effect at the time, meant that another Sith was still present. Unbeknowst to the two Jedi, the remaining Sith was Sheev Palpatine, the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic, having been sworn in after a Vote of No Confidence forced his predecessor Valorum to resign.

With Jinn dead, following the events on Naboo, the Council named Jinn's former Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi a Jedi Knight, who informed Yoda of his master's final will&mdash;that Skywalker be trained. Reluctantly, Yoda permitted him to take the boy as his Padawan.

Onset of the war
"Master Yoda, do you think it will really come to war?" "Hmmm. The dark side clouds everything. Impossible to see, the future is."

- Palpatine and Yoda

Ten years after the Naboo crisis, several thousand systems, disillusioned by heavy taxation, seceded from the Galactic Republic and formed the Confederacy of Independent Systems under the leadership of Count Dooku, a former student of Yoda who left the Order due to widespread corruption in the Republic. As the Galactic Senate, the chief governing body of the Republic, debated the creation of a standing army, an unsuccessful attempt was made on the life of Senator Amidala of Naboo. After Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi and his Padawan Anakin Skywalker cornered the assassin, the killer was in turn killed by a mysterious person who escaped using his jetpack. The events prompted the Council, which included Yoda, to appoint Kenobi to track him down.

Kenobi's investigation led him to attempt to find the planet Kamino, whose location had been missing from the Jedi Archives, alarming Yoda, since only a Jedi could have erased the files. Interrupting a training session, Yoda helped Kenobi pinpoint the world's exact location through meditation, allowing the latter to travel there.

Following Kenobi's departure, Yoda experienced a vision while meditating, in which he heard the voice of the spirit of Qui-Gon Jinn, and sensed that Anakin Skywalker was in terrible pain. He discussed the vision with fellow Master Mace Windu afterwards.

Having arrived on Kamino, Kenobi reported that the Kaminoan cloners had created a clone army, the order for which had been placed by Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas, who had perished around the time of the Invasion of Naboo. Kenobi believed that the template used to create the army, bounty hunter Jango Fett, was the person involved in the attack on Amidala. After a brief encounter with Fett, Kenobi followed him the planet Geonosis, where he found that Dooku's Separatists ordered the assassination attempt on Amidala and had constructed a droid army. After relaying the information to the Jedi Council, Kenobi was captured and scheduled for execution, later joined by Amidala and Anakin Skywalker.

Battle of Geonosis
"The shroud of the dark side has fallen. Begun, the Clone War has."

- Master Yoda

News of Skywalker's and Kenobi's capture prompted the Council to dispatch a Jedi strike team to Geonosis, while Yoda headed to Kamino to take command of the clone forces. As the strike team interrupted the execution of Kenobi and his associates, suffering casualties at the hands of the numerically superior Confederate battle droid forces, Yoda led the clones into battle, thus beginning a galaxywide conflict that would become known as the Clone Wars.

As the clones engaged the Confederacy's forces in a massive battle, Yoda headed to rescue Kenobi and Skywalker from Dooku, who had incapacitated the duo in a duel. The diminutive Jedi Master repelled Dooku's telekinetic assault and Force lightning, but could not prevent the Sith from fleeing, as the latter brought the hangar ceiling down to force Yoda to protect his unconscious comrades, buying him time to escape. Although the battle on Geonosis ended in the Republic's favor, Yoda was concerned about the growing influence of the dark side of the Force and the outcome of the Clone Wars.

Catering to Anakin Skywalker
As the Clone Wars progressed, Yoda decided to alleviate Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker's fear and inability to lose loved ones by assigning him a Padawan learner, Ahsoka Tano, as he believed that by becoming a teacher, Anakin would develop emotionally and understand that his excessive bonding to those he loved was unnecessary once Tano would be ready to go. Tano traveled to the planet of Christophsis, where she presented herself to Skywalker in the midst of a battle against Confederate forces.

After the battle had concluded, Yoda himself arrived on the planet and assigned the duo to the task of finding Rotta, the son of influential Hutt crime lord Jabba, who had been kidnapped as part of a plan arranged by his uncle Ziro to alienate the Hutts and the Jedi and drag the former into war. After the two Jedi successfully completed the mission, Yoda, along with a group of clones, extracted them from the planet Tatooine.

Mission to Rugosa
Some time later, Yoda, along with an escort of clone troopers, was sent to the neutral coral moon Rugosa to negotiate the construction of a Republic base on Toydarian territory with the incumbent monarch, King Katuunko. Simultaneously, the Confederacy dispatched Asajj Ventress, an assassin trained by Confederate leader Dooku, to the moon with droid escort to pressure Katuunko into siding with the Separatists.

Yoda's starship was ambushed by two Confederate vessels upon arriving into the system, forcing him to use an escape pod to land on the surface of the moon, accompanied by three clone troopers. The Jedi then successfully made contact with the Toydarian delegation, prompting Ventress, who was at the king's location, to challenge Yoda: if he could defeat her droid units, Toydaria would join the Republic, but a defeat would result in the planet pledging its allegiance to the Confederacy. The Jedi accepted, and Katuunko requested that he be given a fair fight, which Ventress did not intend to honor.

Encountering the droids, Yoda single-handedly destroyed a squad of them without using his lightsaber, and returned to assist his clone companions, until the arrival of droidekas forced them to flee. The Jedi covered their escape by deflecting the droids' blaster fire at a nearby rock formation that collapsed and crushed them, after which he and the clones retreated to a nearby cave to rest. Although the troopers were low on ammunition, Yoda raised their morale by lecturing them on their individuality.

Upon hearing the sound of more approaching Confederate units, Yoda and his escort left the cave. The Grand Master engaged and destroyed three tanks and their associated infantry alone, much to the amusement of the king and the anger of Ventress. Breaking the terms of the competition, the assassin sent in droidekas to take out Yoda, which the clones prevented by launching their final rocket that caused the enemy to be buried under a rockslide.

Discovering immortality
While meditating during the end of the war, Yoda heard the voice of Qui-Gon Jinn, who demonstrated his presence by levitating Yoda. The encounter left Yoda distracted during the subsequent Council gathering, leaving them worried about whether the stresses of the war were finally taking its toll on him. While strolling through the Temple gardens, Yoda was greeted by Anakin. Yoda asked him about his encounter with Qui-Gon's spirit on Mortis, which Anakin had dismissed as a trick, noting the Jedi belief that one could not retain their identity after becoming one with the Force. Yoda responded that he now questioned this dogma.

Yoda confessed what happened to the Council, much to their disbelief. They agreed though to meditate with him, to verify his experience. Despite meditating together for an entire day, they were unable to hear anything. Ki-Adi-Mundi expressed worry that Yoda had become suspectible to Sith manipulation, so Yoda underwent medical tests that revealed that he was still in good health. Jedi Doctor Rig Nema suggested Yoda undergo a deprivation ritual that would allow him to meditate more strongly and find the source of the voice.

Agreeing, Yoda was suspended in a liquid tank with an oxygen mask to bring him as close as possible to death without actually becoming one with the Force. While unconscious, Qui-Gon's voice requested Yoda go to Dagobah, and to tell no one about it. After Obi-Wan broke open the tank due to his concern over Yoda's failing life signs.

Put on bedrest and under guard, Yoda convinced Anakin to help him escape by posing as simply accompanying each other for a walk. Guided to the Jedi Temple Hangar, Anakin lended Yoda his astromech droid R2-D2 to accompany him in his personal interceptor. Yoda and R2-D2 flew to Dagobah, where Yoda asked to droid to stay with their ship while he found a clearing to meditate.

Qui-Gon's voice greeted him in the form of fireflies, explaining he had not completed his training while still alive to manifest after death as anything more. Guiding Yoda to a cave strong with the dark side, it showed the Jedi Master a vision of the future, where a hooded Sith Lord slaughtered the Jedi. Qui-Gon explained to a distraught Yoda that he would help him bring hope for the future, and directed him to the planet that spawned the midi-chlorians.

Arriving there, Yoda gave his lightsaber to R2-D2 for safekeeping, and descended into the world to meet the Force Priestesses, who agreed to teach him how to achieve life after death. First, Yoda confronted a manifestation of his own dark side, conquering his hubris. Next, he witnessed a vision of the Jedi massacred in the Temple, where an apparition of Katooni invited him to enter a peaceful courtyard to escape these painful events. Seeing Qui-Gon, Kenobi and Dooku together, Yoda recognized the vision's falsehood, overcoming its temptation and his attachment to those that have fallen.

Instructed to complete his tests on the Sith homeworld of Moraband, Yoda and R2-D2 flew to the valley where the ancient Sith Lords were buried. Recognizing the danger, Yoda instructed R2-D2 to return to the Jedi Temple and inform the Council of what happened, if he did not come back after three nights. Spectres of a serpent, undead Sith warriors and even Darth Bane himself confronted him, but Yoda brushed them off. As he entered a temple execution chamber, the Force Priestesses warned Yoda that whatever he encountered there would be beyond their control.

Unknown to Yoda, Darth Sidious and Dooku sensed his presence on Moraband, and met in an abandoned tower in the industrial sector of Coruscant. Using Dooku and Yoda's Force bond, Sidious planned to reach out to Yoda and crush his spirit. Appearing to Yoda in the form of Sifo-Dyas, Sidious had Yoda wake up in a Republic attack gunship with Anakin and members of the 501st Legion, en route to terminate the Sith on Coruscant. As they arrived, Yoda pursued the fleeing Sidious, and witnessed Anakin decapitate Dooku, much to his dismay.

Emerging out on a catwalk, Yoda and Sidious dueled. Anakin tried to help, but Sidious knocked him out. Sensing an opportunity, Sidious damaged the catwalk, forcing Yoda to divide his attention on preventing Anakin from falling to his death. After Sidious taunted him by suggesting he sacrifice Anakin to concentrate on defeating him, Yoda put down his lightsaber to ensure Anakin's safety. The catwalk collapsed, proving Yoda's selflessness and demonstrating his resolve to Sidious, who concluded the illusion as he realized it would take more to defeat the Jedi Master.

Yoda awoke, and was greeted by a Priestess who explained he would continue his training with Qui-Gon's spirit. As she disappeared in a glow of light, Yoda had a vision of the future, including his own death. Yoda returned to the Jedi Temple, where Windu and Kenobi greeted him in the garden. Yoda claimed his journey had been uneventful, but felt it had demonstrated the Jedi had been wrong to wage the war on the Republic's behalf.

End of the war
"I fear the dark cloud of the Sith shrouds us all."

- Yoda

Three years after the initial battle on Geonosis, the Republic was crumbling under the atacks of the Confederacy. After a Separatist attack on the Republic capital world of Coruscant by General Grievous, Chancellor Palptine grew increasingly concerned over possible attempts by the Jedi to curtail the power of his office. He nominated Anakin Skywalker, whom he had befriended, as his personal representative in the Council, which the Council begrudgingly accepted but refused to grant him the rank of Jedi Master, fueling Skywalker's anger.

Following Skywalker's appointment, the Council dispatched Yoda with a clone trooper force to the planet of Kashyyyk to aid the native Wookiee species in averting an imminent Separatist invasion, due to his good relations with the Wookiees. After the battle, Yoda participated in a holographic session of the Council, where he learned from Skywalker that Republic intelligence located the fugitive General Grievous in the Utapau system. Seeking quick and decisive action, Yoda disagreed with Skywalker's self-nomination to go to the world, and instead stated his belief that a more experienced Jedi was needed to combat the feared cyborg. Agreeing with Yoda, fellow councilor Ki-Adi-Mundi nominated Obi-Wan Kenobi for the mission.

Order 66
While Yoda was on Kashyyyk, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine revealed his true identity as the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, turned Anakin Skywalker to the dark side of the Force, and defeated a group of Jedi who had come to arrest him. Christening his newfound apprentice Darth Vader, he sent him and an elite unit to assault the Jedi Temple, while he gave Order 66, a contingency order that required the clone troopers to eliminate their Jedi Generals, from his office.

As the clone army turned on their leaders galaxywide, Yoda sensed the consequent deaths of Jedi while overlooking the battle raging on Kashyyyk, and prevented his own death at the hands of his subordinate, Commander Gree, and another trooper by decapitating the duo with his lightsaber. He then proceeded to escape with the help of the Wookiees Chewbacca and Tarfful, rendezvousing with Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Yoda and Kenobi then proceeded to the Jedi Temple to reconfigure a beacon that broadcast a message calling any surviving Jedi back to the Temple as part of a trap set by the Sith to eliminate the survivors of Order 66. The two Jedi fought their way in and witnessed the effects of the rampage by Vader and his clone unit, including the visible lightsaber cuts on several dead bodies.

Having recalibrated the signal, Kenobi wished to learn the identity of the one responsible for the massacre. Yoda, aware that Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side would cause Kenobi pain, cautioned him before the young Jedi activated the security recordings. The duo thus learned of Palpatine's Sith identity and the formation of the Galactic Empire from the Republic. Agreeing that the two Sith had to be destroyed, Yoda headed to the Galactic Senate to confront Palpatine, while a deeply reluctant Kenobi departed to the volcanic planet of Mustafar to face his former apprentice.

Duel in the Senate
"I have waited a long time for this moment, my little green friend&hellip; at last, the Jedi are no more.''" "''Not if anything to say about it, I have! [&hellip;] At an end your rule is, and not short enough it was."

- Palpatine and Yoda

Upon arriving into the Senate, Yoda confronted Palpatine, who surprised the Jedi and rendered him unconscious with a burst of Force lightning. As the Sith boasted about the eradication of the Order at his hand, Yoda managed to wake up and slammed his opponent into a wall. The duo then drew their lightsabers and engaged in a fierce duel that soon continued into the central auditorium of the Senate Building. After deflecting Sidious' own lightning back at him and repulsing his multiple telekinetic assaults that made use of the numerous Senate hoverpods, Yoda was flung to the bottom of the Senate Building. He then fled through the maintenance tunnels of the building to the airspeeder of Senator Bail Organa, considering the duel his personal failure and voicing his intent to go into self-imposed exile.

Escape
"Into exile I must go. Failed, I have."

- Yoda to Bail Organa

After being rescued by Organa, the two proceeded to the asteroid Polis Massa, where Yoda conferred with Qui-Gon Jinn's spirit, who offered him to train him in techniques that could help him retain his identity after his death. Obi-Wan Kenobi, having defeated but not killed Vader on Mustafar, arrived soon thereafter, bringing with him a severely injured Senator Amidala, who gave birth to her twins from Anakin Skywalker before her death.

Sensing the children's power in the Force, Yoda, Kenobi and Organa decided to keep them hidden in unsuspecting locations to avoid detection by the Empire; Luke Skywalker was delivered to the Lars family on Tatooine, while Organa personally adopted his sister, Leia.

Taking a new apprentice
"Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try."

- Yoda to Luke Skywalker

Later, Luke Skywalker, under guidance from the Force spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi who had served as his mentor, sought out Yoda in his Dagobah exile to receive Jedi training. To test Skywalker, Yoda did not reveal his true identity and instead promised to lead him to Yoda; Skywalker's subsequent frustration and his age made the Jedi doubtful as to whether it was a good idea to train the boy, but Kenobi's spirit managed to convince him to do so.

Yoda proceeded to tutor Skywalker with a variety of exercises, including the telekinetic manipulation of objects in the area. As part of his training, he also sent Skywalker into a nearby cave, which was powerful with the dark side in order to demonstrate the dangers of falling to the dark side of the Force.

During his tenure with Yoda, Skywalker sensed that his friends were in danger in Cloud City on the gas giant Bespin, and headed there to confront Darth Vader in spite of Yoda's and Kenobi's persuasion to the contrary. Although Kenobi was distraught by Skywalker's rushed departure, Yoda reminded him that there was still another offspring of Anakin Skywalker &mdash;Leia Organa.

Death
"Twilight is upon me, and soon night must fall. That is the way of things&hellip;the way of the Force."

- Yoda, to Luke Skywalker, shortly before his death

Skywalker, having engaged in a duel with Vader on Cloud City, returned to Dagobah after a year. Yoda, ill and close to death, confirmed what Vader had revealed to the young Jedi on Bespin: that the Sith Lord indeed was Anakin Skywalker, his father. He also warned him that with his training fully complete, his final task would be confronting Vader again and defeating him, and cautioned Skywalker not to underestimate the Force prowess of Galactic Emperor Palpatine. Before passing away, he also managed to inform him of the existence of another member of the Skywalker family.

Legacy
"Yoda will always be with you."

- The spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi to Luke Skywalker, after Yoda's death.

With his death, Yoda's body disappeared and he managed to retain his consciousness by becoming a Force spirit thanks to the techniques passed on to him by Qui-Gon Jinn's spirit. Luke Skywalker used the training he received to confront Palpatine and Darth Vader aboard the Imperial battlestation Death Star II over the forest moon Endor as part of an all-out attack on the station by the anti-Imperial Rebel Alliance, defeating Vader and turning him back to the light side of the Force, resulting in Palpatine's death at the hands of the redeemed Anakin Skywalker. As the Rebels and Luke Skywalker celebrated on the surface of the moon, the ghosts of Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda briefly appeared to Luke Skywalker.

Personality and traits
Yoda had spent eight centuries training and tutoring generations of Jedi, he was reluctant to accept Anakin Skywalker or Luke Skywalker for Jedi training, considering them unfit. In both cases, however, he allowed Obi-Wan Kenobi to persuade him into accepting them as trainees.

When Dooku triggered a partial room collapse during his duel with Yoda on Geonosis, the Jedi, confronted with the choice of pursuing the fleeing Sith or protecting the unconscious Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker from the falling debris, opted to save his comrades instead of going after Dooku.

As he neared his death before the Battle of Endor commenced, Yoda accepted his own mortality and imminent demise, and died becoming one with the Force.

Powers and abilities
Wielding a green-bladed lightsaber, Yoda was capable of holding his own in combat against opponents such as the Sith Lords Darth Tyranus and Darth Sidious. He was also able to deflect the Force lightning of the aforementioned Sith with his bare hands, a feat he demonstrated in both duels. Yoda could also telekinetically toss aside metal pieces hurled at him by Tyranus, levitate stone slabs in mid-air, or move Senate hoverpods around.

During a confrontation with Confederate forces on the coral moon of Rugosa, Yoda annihilated an entire squad of droids without using his lightsaber, and destroyed three assault tanks and their accompanying infantry single-handed.

In spite of his abilities, the diminutive Jedi Master was overpowered by Darth Sidious during their final duel in the Galactic Senate chamber, forcing him to flee.

Behind the scenes
Yoda made his first appearance in the 1980 Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back, and subsequently appeared in Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi, the closing installment of the original trilogy. He was also featured in all three episodes of the prequel trilogy, and multiple episodes of the Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated television series. Yoda also played a role in various Expanded Universe material now under the Star Wars Legends brand and thus non-canonical.

Early concepts of Yoda imagined him as a large alien before he was reimplemented as a tiny one, with various gnome– and elfin-like portrayals being created by the design team of Episode V. During story development, Yoda was referred to with the full name Minch Yoda.

Once Yoda's appearance was finalized, make-up and creatures supervisor Stuart Freeborn created a detailed puppet, brought to life on screen by Frank Oz. A new model, younger in appearance, was built by Nick Dudman's animatronics crew for the filming of Episode I, in which Yoda also appeared as a CGI model for two shots' duration. In Episode II, Yoda's character was realized entirely through computer-generated imagery, partly due to the practical necessity imposed by the action scenes of Yoda's duel with Dooku, and partly due to the determination of Animation Director Rob Coleman. Designed specifically to not exceed Oz's puppetwork in realism, the animated version of Yoda was accepted after several shots from Empire Strikes Back were recreated using the new technology as animation tests and evaluated.

Yoda's Star Wars: The Clone Wars incarnation was voiced by veteran Star Wars voice actor Tom Kane.