Lando Calrissian/Legends

"He's a card player, gambler, scoundrel. You'd like him."

- Han Solo, to Leia Organa

Lando Calrissian was a professional gambler, entrepreneur, smuggler and long-time associate of Han Solo. Calrissian, born on Socorro, became a gambler and con-man and acquired his own ship, the Millennium Falcon. After losing it to a Corellian named Han Solo, Calrissian went on to become the Baron Administrator of Cloud City for a time before it was taken over by the Galactic Empire during the Galactic Civil War. Subsequently, he joined the Rebel Alliance and took part in numerous missions on its behalf. During the Battle of Endor in 4 ABY, Calrissian piloted his old ship, the Millennium Falcon, into the second Death Star's core to destroy its reactor.

Afterwards, he continued to serve the newly formed New Republic in times of need, but spent most of his time pursuing various business ventures, specializing in mining. A venture on the sun-baked world of Nkllon was soured by multiple attacks from the Empire under Grand Admiral Thrawn, but Lando continued in a number of other entrepreneurial plans. In 18 ABY, Lando met Tendra Risant, marrying her soon after the Bastion Accords were signed. During the Yuuzhan Vong War, Lando continued to aid the New Republic through his leadership and the YVH 1 droids that his company, Tendrando Arms, produced to combat the extragalactic invaders. Lando, along with his wife Tendra, continued to manage Tendrando Arms following the war. His YVH droids would play significant roles in the subsequent Dark Nest Crisis, Swarm War, and Second Galactic Civil War. During the latter conflict, Lando aided his friends Han and Leia Solo in their efforts against their son Jacen Solo until he was informed that his wife Tendra was pregnant. After the war, Calrissian settled down with his wife Tendra in a life of quiet luxury, managing Tendrando Arms and raising his son, Lando Calrissian Junior.

Biography
"I'll pour the wine, and you tell me what you like best about me."

- Ben Skywalker impersonating Lando

Early years
Calrissian's early years were obscured by history and Calrissian's own fabrications. He was originally a Socorran, leaving him with a hint of a Corellian accent thanks to the Corellian origin of that planet's settlers. His own memories pointed to his having a stable family life until at least the age of seventeen, and he had a vivid enough memory of his mother to recall her ability to memorize hundreds of songs and poems. A reference to having servants indicates he may have come from a wealthy background, which he gave up in order to live an adventurous life.

Early in his career, Lando, with the aid of a droid named Flek, impersonated a Jedi Knight in a scam attempt on the Meek people, who wanted him to slay a rancor. Lando knew that the rancor in the area had already been slain by poachers, so he used a rancor's tooth and a recorded rancor's cry as proof of his combat with the beast. However, he was surprised to find that there was another rancor. Having heard that rancors were incapable of swimming, he jumped into a nearby lake. Before the rancor could wander off, though, he attracted its attention with the decoy rancor cry and then tossed the decoy into the water, hoping to lure the rancor to its doom. To his surprise and dismay, the rancor swam off. Nevertheless, Lando returned to the Meek village and collected his reward of valuable artifacts from the Meeks, but later found out that he had been given fakes.

The earliest reliable accounts possessed by Galactic Alliance historian Voren Na'al of his life dated to 4 BBY, when Calrissian was around the age of twenty-seven. Already a professional gambler, Calrissian won a battered YT-1300 freighter called the Millennium Falcon in a high stakes game of sabacc from a man named Cix Trouvee, who was also a gambler. Calrissian won with an Idiot's Array, the best possible hand in sabacc, but Trouvee went on to do well for himself, eventually becoming a partner in a successful resort company. As he had no piloting experience, Lando sought out a tutor by the name of Han Solo. Calrissian found Solo being held at gunpoint by the bounty hunter Boba Fett, who had drugged Solo. Lando caught Fett by surprise, however, and drugged the bounty hunter with the obedience drug that had been used on Solo, after administering the antidote to the smuggler. Solo and Calrissian then ordered the entirely complacent Fett to disarm himself and fly his ship off to unknown space. Afterwards, Solo eagerly taught Calrissian the basics of starship piloting, and Calrissian used this knowledge to fly the Falcon to the Centrality.

The Mindharp of Sharu
"Please, call me Lando. 'Captain Calrissian' sounds like the one-eyed commander of a renegade Imperial dreadnought."

- Lando Calrissian

Taking the advice of spaceport attendants, Calrissian flew to the asteroid Oseon 2795, a decision he almost immediately regretted. To gain the funds he needed to leave, he played sabacc with an assortment of locals as well as a man named Osuno Whett. From Whett, he won the title to a Class Two droid named Vuffi Raa, but was told he had travel to Rafa IV to actually take possession. Calrissian was incensed, but was unable to press the issue as one of his tablemates, T. Lund Phuna, falsely accused him of cheating. While the rest of the table defended him, Calrissian was forced to make an immediate departure with his winnings.

From Oseon, Calrissian traveled to the Rafa system, which was littered with mysterious brightly colored buildings that were the remnants of the ancient Sharu race. Landing in the city of Teguta Lusat, he found a sabacc game that night in a bar named the Spaceman's Rest, and won an illegal cargo of life-crystals. Calrissian picked up Vuffi Raa on his way back to his inn, the Hotel Sharu. However, during the night he was arrested for acquiring an unlicensed cargo and other trumped up charges, beaten, and taken to see local governor Duttes Mer. Mer was working with Rokur Gepta, a Sorcerer of Tund. Both sought the Ultimate Instrument of Music, also known as the Mindharp of Sharu, and thought Calrissian was the one who could find it for them.

Calrissian agreed to assist them in exchange for his freedom and a cargo of life-crystals. Gepta gave Calrissian a peculiar artifact thought to be a key to the secret of the Mindharp, but no other clues. The gambler then decided to search for information in local drinking establishments. During his investigations, he discovered an ancient being named Mohs, who was High Singer of the native Toka species. Mohs hailed him as the Key Bearer that had been foretold, before trying to steal Calrissian's artifact for himself. Calrissian ran down and subdued Mohs, who agreed to behave and directed the gambler to largest Sharu pyramid in the Rafa system, on the planet Rafa V.

After arriving on Rafa V Calrissian was ambushed by numerous bow-wielding Toka who captured him and shot Vuffi Raa. Mohs took command of the newcomers, and ordered them to march him to a life-orchard and tie him to one of the crystalline lifetrees in the hope that he would freeze during the night. Despite the lifetree was robbing him of intelligent thought, Lando was able to free himself. He was then accosted by a group of men led by Captain Myle Jandler, a law enforcement officer in the service of Duttes Mer. Calrissian was freezing and barely clothed and in no position resist them, but they were intimidated into surrendering by a recovered Vuffi Raa piloting the Millennium Falcon. Jandler's ship was then dispatched by Vuffi Raa on autopilot for Rafa XI with Jandler and his men aboard, so that they would not bother the adventurers further.

Calrissian's feet were severely frostbitten and required treatment in a portable gel-bath kept on the Millennium Falcon. After the gambler had recovered, he and Vuffi Raa investigated the largest pyramid. There they found Mohs, who begged their forgiveness and directed them to the Great Lock located underground on the side of the pyramid. Calrissian inserted the Key he had been given into the Lock. Nothing happened at first, but then the three of them were transported inside the pyramid. However, inside the pyramid Calrissian and Mohs were sixty times their usual height, though Vuffi Raa remained the same size. In addition, Mohs mysteriously lost his eyes in his journey into the pyramid.

Calrissian and Vuffi Raa followed a moving walkway down deep beneath the pyramid. As they travelled, Calrissian and Mohs began to shrink down to their normal sizes, though Mohs mysteriously disappeared before the end of their journey. At the end of the hallway, Calrissian and Vuffi Raa found the Mindharp inside a Hall. The Hall spoke to them and told them not to cross the floor to the Mindharp, but the two did anyway. Calrissian then retrieved the Mindharp with the assistance of Hall. He and Vuffi Raa were then promptly teleported back to Rafa IV. While not much time had passed from Calrissian's perspective, months had passed in the rest of the Galaxy. The abandoned Millennium Falcon had been returned to Teguta Lusat by Duttes Mer. Rokur Gepta was with his forces around Rafa V, still waiting for Calrissian to emerge from the pyramid.

Vuffi Raa, who had been programmed to betray Calrissian before he had even been "won," promptly turned Calrissian in to Governor Mer. Mer greedily took the Mindharp and sentenced Calrissian to a lifetime of hard labor. However, Vuffi Raa, having fulfilled his imperative to betray Calrissian, rescued the gambler just as Mer activated the Mindharp. The two encountered Mohs once more, now snappily dressed, on the ramp of the Millennium Falcon. Mohs assured Calrissian that everything was under control, and that the all the Toka were becoming Sharu once again. Calrissian fled Rafa IV as the great pyramids of the Rafa system crumbled, leaving alien cities in their wake. Rokur Gepta, who had not reached Rafa IV fast enough to prevent Mer from activating the Mindharp, tried to stop the Falcon with his scoutship. However, Gepta's craft was disabled by an exploding Sharu obelisk.

Leaving the restored planet, Lando and Vuffi Raa entered hyperspace with a cargo hold full of the last Rafa life-crystals. This valuable cargo netted Calrissian nearly 250,000 credits. After returning to Nar Shaddaa, he bought a used-starship lot from a Duros. To his dismay, he discovered the business was expensive and difficult to run. He debated whether he should either sell it or keep running it when the Galactic Empire arrived in the criminal-ridden system. To fight the intruders, Calrissian donated his inventory of ships to his fellow outlaws. He and Vuffi Raa piloted the Millennium Falcon deftly in the resulting Battle of Nar Shaddaa. During the battle, Lando flew alongside noted smugglers such as Salla Zend, Han Solo, and Mako Spince. The attack was diverted, but less than ten percent of his stock was still spaceworthy. As a result, Calrissian sold 90 percent ownership in what was left of his lot to Roa at a loss.

Setup on Oseon
As Calrissian sought a way to recover his losses, he saw an opportunity in the regional sabacc championships that were soon to be held at Cloud City's Yarith Bespin casino. In order to raise the ten thousand credit buy-in, Calrissian and Vuffi Raa returned to the Centrality and attempted to haul legitimate cargo. However, tariffs, fees, and licensing cost him more than he made, leaving him with nothing. Thus, when an opportunity to play sabacc in the Oseon system during the arising of the Flamewind, Calrissian accepted.

Soon after arriving at Oseon 6845, Calrissian was assaulted and forced to shoot his assailant in self-defense with his stingbeam. The Administrator Senior of the Oseon system, Lob Doluff, was required to inform Calrissian that the penalty for possessing a deadly weapon was death by exposure. Since the administrator admired Calrissian, he offered a solution to avoid execution. Doluff arranged for Calrissian to participate in a drug bust against the lesai-addicted, wealthy industrialist Bohhuah Mutdah. Posing as Mutdah's dealer, Calrissian transported two agents, Bassi Vobah and Waywa Fybot, through the maddening radiation of the Flamewind to Oseon 5792.

Unfortunately for Calrissian, Mutdah, who turned out to be Rokur Gepta in disguise, promptly killed the two agents and planned to kill Calrissian. Rokur forced the gambler to endure torture by chagrin, which made him relive all the painful moments of his life. Luckily, Calrissian was saved by the timely intervention of Renatasian starfighters whose goal was to kill Vuffi Raa. During the impending chaos surrounding his escape, Calrissian grabbed Mutdah's drug payment: a whole twenty million credits. He deposited small sums in banks on several worlds, including fifty thousand credits into the Bank of Aargau, which he planned to use for covering the entry fee for the Bespin sabacc tournament. Unfortunately, his attempt to deposit the bulk of the money on the Centrality's primary financial planet, Dela, interrupted a pirate attack being committed by the "pirate queen" Drea Renthal. Despite Lando's charm, Renthal kept that large fraction of Mutdah's money.

Saving the Starcave of ThonBoka
Soon after, Calrissian encountered Lehesu, a young member of the space-dwelling, hyperjump-capable Oswaft species. Lehesu's curiosity had carried him from its home in the ThonBoka Nebula to a desolate part of the Centrality. He came in contact with Calrissian's ship, which he had brought out of hyperspace in deep space to recalibrate its engine. After several halting attempts at communication, Lehesu finally conveyed his need for sustenance. Calrissian emptied the contents of the ship's recyclers into space, which Lehesu eagerly gobbled up. The gambler and the droid then cobbled together a tank full of nutrients that Lehesu could carry with him, so that he could get home. Lehesu then rewarded them with synthesized gemstones.

However, Lehesu did not return home immediately. While exploring other star systems, he came to the attention of the Empire when he accidentally destroyed several fighters. The Empire tracked him to his nebula home, and some months later, blockaded the entrance to the sack-shaped ThonBoka with five hundred capital ships. The fleet's orders were to cut off nutrients and starve the entire Oswaft race into extinction. Some of the ships were Carrack-class light cruisers that were modified to contaminate the "interstellar plankton" drifting into the nebula. Lehesu used a transceiver provided to him by Vuffi Raa to contact the Millennium Falcon and plead for help.

Calrissian, meanwhile, had been getting into problems of his own. Rokur Gepta was still trying to kill him, and on top of that Klyn Shanga was trying to kill Vuffi Raa. Since Gepta's agents occasionally also targeted Vuffi Raa, and Shanga's Renatasians sometimes went after Calrissian, the months after Calrissian encountered Lehesu were eventful. Several bombs were planted inside the Millennium Falcon, she was rammed by a fighter, Calrissian broke his arm after being pushed into a vat of vitamin paste, and an assassin serving Rokur Gepta tried to kill Vuffi Raa with a fragmentation grenade. In addition, the ship had been harassed by pirates.

Calrissian, seeing in the plight of the Oswaft a lucrative solution to his own problems, raced to the rescue. When stopped by the blockade, Calrissian used the ruse that he was a trader plying his wares. Because no one below the rank of Admiral had been informed of the reason behind the blockade, the Falcon was inspected and then allowed to continue traveling from ship to ship. The Imperials failed to realize that the ship's real cargo was nothing more than the ordinary waste carried in its trash and toilet recyclers.

After working his way through the ships in the blockade, selling cigars and playing sabacc as he went, Lando made a break for the mouth of the ThonBoka. Once inside, his damaged craft was discovered by Lehesu. Calrissian dispensed some of his recycler cargo to the hungry Oswaft and then went to meet with the Oswaft leaders in the Cave of Elders. While he spoke to the elders, an Oswaft delegation under the command Bhoggihalysahonues went to negotiate with the fleet. An accidental altercation took place, and the Oswaft destroyed the unshielded cruiser Courteous, with their maser voice-streams. The fleet, seeking retribution, raised their shields and began to enter the nebula, but were called back by Rokur Gepta, who wished them to wait until his flagship, the Wennis, arrived.

When Gepta arrived, accompanied by Klyn Shanga and his Renatasian fighter squadron, the fleet re-mobilized and entered the nebula. Fortunately, the suspension of hostilities had given Calrissian time to suggest a battle plan. The Oswaft excreted heavy metals from their pores and then jumped to hyperspace, leaving decoy Oswaft outlines placed between the enemy cruisers. The Imperials fired at the Oswaft and decoys, taking some casualties from friendly fire. Meanwhile, the Oswaft "shouted" at the starfighters, destroying them with their powerful masers. The spacefaring beings swarmed around the blockade ships, vastly outnumbering them. After the fleet's forces had been reduced by about eleven percent, the battle ceased, and Rokur Gepta transmitted an ultimatum to Calrissian: engage Gepta in personal combat, or he would fire an electromagnetic torpedo into the nebula, killing all life therein.

Calrissian and Vuffi Raa (who was allowed to participate because Gepta believed he could not overcome his pacifist programming) faced off against the Sorcerer of Tund in the vacuum of space. After much maneuvering and exchanging of fire, Calrissian landed a stray shot on Gepta's ankle after chest shots were of no effect. The Sorcerer's form withered, but he hit Vuffi Raa, who had attempted to strangle him with his tentacles, with a final shot. Calrissian searched the space suit and found an injured Croke&mdash;Gepta in his true form&mdash;and then proceeded to kill him.

Osuno Whett attempted to interfere in the duel, but Klyn Shanga finally recognized him as the true Butcher of Renatasia and destroyed his ship, and in the process, the Wennis as well. At that, the battle renewed, but for only a moment. Out of nowhere, a multitude of fifty-kilometer diameter sentient droids suddenly appeared, demanding on all channels "Cease fire immediately or be destroyed!" They were the Silentium, the creators of Vuffi Raa, and they had come for their offspring. The Imperial fleet, faced with thousands of these immense ships, retreated. Vuffi Raa's progenitors repaired the little droid and departed with him into the Unknown Regions after playing a game of sabacc with Calrissian. Calrissian himself departed the ThonBoka with a hold filled with valuable Oswaft-synthesized gemstones. Calrissian would later be visited by Vuffi Raa several times.

Failure and success
"No Human in the galaxy has a right to be that lucky."

- Barpotomous Drebble

Unfortunately for Calrissian, his turn of good fortune was once again countered with bad luck, as his investment in a berubium mine in the Borgo asteroid belt turned out to be worthless. He was left with nothing except fifty thousand credits in his Aargau account and partial ownership of the Nar Shaddaa starship lot. During this time, he struck up a brief relationship with Drea Renthal, the very pirate who had stolen millions from him before.

To ease his need for cash, Calrissian stole a treasure cache from the Glottalphib criminal Nandreeson, which earned him Nandreeson's undying hate and promise of sure death if the gambler ever returned to Smuggler's Run. Soon after, Calrissian entered the Cloud City Sabacc Tournament along with Solo. However, he wound up in second place to his friend Solo. During the final round Calrissian had placed a marker for any ship on his used starship lot as part of his bet. Unexpectedly and much to the gambler's dismay, Han chose the Millennium Falcon, the ugliest but most efficient ship in the lot, and Calrissian's favorite.

Lando, somewhat annoyed over the loss of his ship, nevertheless accompanied Solo to a nearby cantina, where he devised a scheme to recoup some of his losses from the rather inebriated Corellian and his partner. Lando and his friend Marshak informed Solo of the dangerous Kessel Run, a milestone accomplishment for a spacer, that involved circling thirteen planets to retrieve valuable Kessel birds while dodging unfriendly fauna and local patrols. Solo, his ego and piloting prowess challenged by Lando's insistence that the run was too dangerous, insisted on going. Calrissian and his comrades were able to convince Solo to buy a map that allegedly led to prearranged drop sites and avoided the space patrols so that Solo could finish the Kessel Run in a record number of parsecs. They also set up the drop sites with traders and trappers, each of whom traded the Kessel birds to Solo for a tidy sum. Solo took off and doggedly pursued his quest, not knowing that the entire thing was a scam. The supposedly rare Kessel birds were actually vermin and the money Solo paid out at each stop was divided between Calrissian and his friends.

Lando, who was nearly broke after the tournament, managed some successful 'ventures' as he recouped his losses. He successfully scammed the governor of Pesmenben IV and later replaced the Falcon with the sleek Cobra. Free from any ventures to tie him down, he also spent a lot of time on cruise ships, slowly acquiring money through card games and sabacc. While traveling on the Queen of Empire, Lando encountered Bria Tharen&mdash;a Rebel agent and Han Solo's former girlfriend. He tried to strike up an acquaintance with her, but was captured by Boba Fett along with Bria, the real bounty. As Fett was taking his two prisoners off the Queen, the ship was boarded by Drea Renthal, who paid Fett more than his current employer in exchange for letting his prisoners go.

Some time during this period, Lando made several highly profitable runs to Chandrila. His smuggling was made possible through some skillful bribery of local customs officials. On these runs, Lando would first encounter Hiram Drayson, an officer in the defense force who later became part of the New Republic.

Fallout with Solo
Some time later, Lando assisted Han Solo in an attack on the Hutt spice and slavery operations on Ylesia, which Han was involved in due to being in love with Rebel agent Bria Tharen, the mastermind of the attack. Consequently, Solo recruited several smugglers for the strike, including Lando. The role of the smugglers was to pilot the Rebels through Ylesia's turbulent atmosphere and then help defeat the guards. After meeting unexpectedly stiff resistance, they eventually were successful in destroying the Hutt operation and freeing the slaves. Bria changed plans, however, and kept the spoils for the Rebellion. This left Han with nothing to pay Lando and the smugglers, and created a large rift between Solo and Calrissian.

Shortly thereafter, Lando found himself on another treasure hunt sponsored by a trio of Hutts eagerly hunting the fabled Yavin Vassilika, a priceless, gemlike statuette, having been saved by Bib Fortuna after losing a game of Sabacc. The chase pitted him against some of the Underworld's most notorious bounty hunters, including Bossk, Dengar, and IG-88. Unfortunately, it also threw him in unwilling partnership with Han Solo again, which made for an uneasy alliance following the recent Ylesian spice fiasco. Since the rewards were considerable, they managed through it, bickering most of the way. In time, however, all parties realized they were being used again. This time, it was one of the Hutts' assistants, a woman named Jozzel Moffet. Unknowingly, this assistant was being directed by none other than Bria Tharen herself on behalf of the Rebellion. The Vassilika was the key to opening a Massassi temple, a place that would become a strategic Rebel outpost once opened. After the Vassilika had been found, and the dust settled on this adventure, Solo and Calrissian parted ways, their anger tempered to a mere distrust and agreement to stay on their own ends of the galaxy.

Lando was on the luxury liner Star of Empire in 1 BBY searching for gambling opportunities. While onboard, he met Kyle Katarn and Governor Dol Donar II of Derra IV. Lando engaged Donar and other passengers in games of sabacc. Lando was able to win considerable amounts of credits from the governor, including a ring that the governor's wife had given to Donar for an anniversary.

Celebrity and Administrator
Five months after the Battle of Yavin, after shipping a cargo of denta beans to Taanab, he was caught up in a Norulac Freebooters raid. While in a Pandath cantina, Calrissian boasted that he could defeat the pirates. A drunken cantina patron named Gathal Danager, an employee of a Clendorian brewery, accepted the wager that Calrissian could pull it off. Thus, the gambler hid in the ice rings of Taanab's moon, and when the pirates approached their marks, he dumped his cargo of Conner nets into the midst of their fleet, temporarily disabling their ships. While they attempted to extricate themselves from the nets, he tractored ice chunks from the rings into their cockpits. He then led Taanab's orbital defense fleet in a mopping up operation. As a result, Calrissian single-handedly destroyed nineteen of the remaining vessels and crippled the pirate's two supporting corvettes. The ships were captured with all hands, thanks to Calrissian using yet more Conner nets to secure the escape pods. After TriNebulon News carried the story, Calrissian became a minor celebrity.

Two months later, Calrissian made a visit to an amusement park known as Hologram Fun World, examining it as a possible investment for his funds. While there, he met two Human children, Tash and Zak Arranda. Saying that he wanted to see how popular the park was from the children's point of view, as they were the park's primary clientele, Calrissian offered to tour the park with them, but their droid guardian, DV-9, nixed that idea. However, the two Arrandas were able to change the droid's mind and they agreed to tour the park with him. Calrissian first took them back to where they were staying, at the visitor's lodge near the park, and returned to his own room to play sabacc. During the game, Zak came to Calrissian's room in search of something to do and the gambler allowed the boy to watch as he raked in a sizable sum of credits. The last player in the game, Dengar, vehemently demanded to see Calrissian's cards after folding, to the point of drawing his blaster, but Calrissian thwarted any attempts at violence by pointing a "hold-out blaster"&mdash;actually a ship's slave circuit control rig&mdash;at him. Calrissian then showed Zak how to play sabacc before sending the boy back to his room for the night.

The next day, Calrissian, the two Arrandas, and DV-9 toured the park, and Calrissian liked what he saw. However, later in the day, Zak wandered off to investigate an attraction dubbed the Nightmare Machine. Entering, he discovered Borborygmus Gog, a scientist in charge of Project Starscream, an Imperial project devoted to creating super-soldiers and who had previously encountered the Arrandas. Zak raced back out to warn the others, and Calrissian took them to Danna Fajji, the baron administrator of Hologram Fun World, who bemusedly took them to the room. There, he showed them how what Zak had seen was nothing more than a persuasively realistic holographic and sensory simulation&mdash;in essence, the Nightmare Machine scanned people's minds and let them experience their greatest fears. After the children tried the ride, which was not to their liking, Calrissian had a meeting with Fajji to discuss the possibility of his investing in the park. However, during the meeting, Zak noticed that most of the visitors to the park were computer-generated, and Calrissian stormed out of the meeting, allegedly outraged about Fajji's deception&mdash;in truth, he was not angry at all.

The next day, Calrissian continued his tour of the park with the children, but they returned to the Nightmare Machine and were trapped inside, locking out Calrissian and DV-9. When Calrissian brought this matter to Fajji, the administrator claimed it was a glitch that would soon be rectified, but Calrissian didn't wait. Drawing a hold-out blaster, he charged into the exhibit, followed by DV-9, only to find that Imperial stormtroopers were present in the park. Although he was able to free the two Arrandas from a creature that had been controlling the Nightmare Machine, he was forced to surrender in the face of numerous stormtroopers. They were captured and brought out to face the real Gog, who had been using the amusement park as a front for some of his experiments.

The three prisoners were loaded into a shuttle, guarded by a stormtrooper, to be returned to Gog's cruiser for experimentation, but during the flight, the stormtrooper revealed himself to be the Arrandas' uncle, the Shi'ido shapeshifter Mammon Hoole. Hoole incapacitated the pilot and the four escaped in the shuttle. Once they were safely away, Calrissian summoned his yacht remotely and parted ways with the others for Bespin, suggesting that the two Arrandas also go there, as it was remote enough to serve them well as a hiding place.

Calrissian continued his gambling ventures, though, showing up on Naboo to ply his trade. While there, he encountered Dusque Mistflier, a female Imperial bioengineer, but although she allowed him to show her the basics of sabacc, she was not interested in his advances.

Later, while on Cloud City, Lando played a game of sabacc against the Baron Administrator of the facility, a man named Dominic Raynor after his success at gambling had caught the eye of the administrator. Lando quickly found himself in a very high stakes game, with millions of credits and his Cobra on the line, which he lost. Because an anonymous benefactor had advanced Calrissian five million credits, the gambler bet four million and his lot on Nar Shaddaa against Raynor's administrators post, and won not only his ship back, but the whole game and became the new Baron Administrator of Cloud City. The unknown benefactor turned out to be Cloud City's cyborg liaison, Lobot, who had obtained the credits from the pooled funds of thousands of Ugnaught workers to ensure Raynor's departure.

Calrissian took his job as Baron Administrator seriously, working closely with Lobot for over two years. He deflected both the Mining Guild and the eyes of the Empire from the city, scouted new Tibanna plumes, hired pilots to protect the city from raids, repealed restrictive anti-alien immigration laws put in place by Raynor, and increased Tibanna gas profits by over 35%. In one incident, Cloud City's security chief, the droid EV-9D9, was found to have been torturing other droids, going so far as to dismantle a quarter of the city's droid population. She escaped on a stolen ship after being exposed, planting explosive charges that nearly destroyed Cloud City and Lando. The disaster was avoided, though EV-9D9 escaped; Calrissian and his new chief of security, Sarl Random, enacted new security procedures in the wake of this incident. Another reform Calrissian instituted dealt with the Wing Guard, Cloud City's security force, who had garnered a reputation for corruption. Calrissian changed the system to allow more oversight of the Wing Guard by the Baron-Administrator and made their pay dependent on how well they were doing at maintaining order. Calrissian's reforms were successful in bringing a reputation for honesty back into the Wing Guard, and contributed to Cloud City's growing reputation as a luxury resort.

Calrissian also focused his efforts on other areas besides running the Cloud City and attending high-profile social events; among these were zoning. By placing the higher-class hotels on the surface of the city and the seedier elements of the city on lower levels, he helped eliminate the threat of criminals preying on tourists. However, he did not fully remove some of the rowdier areas, feeling that as long as the individuals there kept to that location, they could be easily contained.

However, Calrissian himself still craved adventure, and so while he was a responsible administrator by day, he would disguise himself and enjoy the gambling and female companionship to be found among Bespin's casinos by evening. One of his aliases led him to be known only as "the old man," who gained attention by winning and losing a fortune every single evening he was present. Though Calrissian never gained financially out of that particular alias, it was the thrill of risk that motivated him, so he did not mind.

Entering the Galactic Civil War (3 ABY–4 ABY)
"Yeah, a Tibanna gas mine. Lando conned somebody out of it. We go back a long way, Lando and me." "Can you trust him?" "No. But he has no love for the Empire, I can tell you that."

- Han Solo and Leia Organa

Trap at Cloud City
As it was a key source of Tibanna gas, Cloud City was a lucrative target for the Galactic Empire, though Lando had so far managed to keep his operation beneath the attention of both the Empire and the Mining Guild. While preparing for the Security Guild conferences set to be held on Cloud City, Calrissian noticed an woman named Platt Okeefe, who was an old acquaintance of his, and took interest in her. Determined to meet her, he set up a meeting with her, but despite his attempts, she was involved in a smuggling racket and did not accept his invitation. This was changed when Boba Fett and Darth Vader, in pursuit of the Millennium Falcon and its Rebel crew, reached Cloud City before the Falcon did.

Calrissian, quietly escorted by a group of concealed Wing Guard, met Vader on the landing pad, and the Dark Lord of the Sith indicated that he wished to speak to Calrissian in private. Vader wished to discuss arrangements for capturing the inbound Han Solo and his compatriots, and though he acquiesced to a few of Calrissian's wishes, such as leaving Fett, whom Calrissian distrusted, out of the conference, Vader maneuvered the Baron Administrator into agreeing to betray Solo. Although he was reluctant to do so, Calrissian knew the lives of everyone on Cloud City were at stake, and so made the deal. In exchange for Cloud City's continued independence and survival, Lando agreed to help detain the Falcon's crew until Luke Skywalker arrived and was captured by Vader.

Playing the part of a congenial host, Lando greeted his old buddy Han and his companions Chewbacca, Leia Organa, and C-3PO. He gladly agreed to help fix the Falcon's damaged hyperdrive while they enjoyed Cloud City's hospitality. The travelers, however, did not trust Lando entirely, especially after the disappearance of C-3PO. Not long after their arrival, Lando invited the Rebels to refreshments and led them to Darth Vader and his stormtroopers, where Han, Leia, and Chewbacca were captured. Much to Lando's chagrin, Vader considerably altered the original deal. The Dark Lord insisted that Leia and Chewbacca remain on Bespin and decided to test the carbonite-freezing chamber (normally used to prepare Tibanna gas for shipment) on Han Solo, hoping that the same apparatus could be used on Luke to transport him to the Emperor. Lando, increasingly unhappy with the arrangement, which now included the torturing of Han Solo, informed Han and Leia of their fate, telling them "I had no choice." Han did not take this well, and punched the Baron Administrator.

Lando personally supervised Solo's freezing, and announced that the freezing had been successful: Han was in perfect hibernation, encased inside a slab of carbonite. The experience deeply affected Lando, who years later would still suffer the occasional nightmare based on the events in the chamber. Fett removed Solo and left the chamber, and shortly after Vader altered the deal further by taking Leia and Chewbacca as Imperial prisoners. Lando realized that the Dark Lord had no intention of making good on his promises and, via Lobot, summoned a group of the Wing Guard to help free Leia and Chewbacca from the Imperial stormtroopers.

Though they had been freed, Leia and Chewbacca did not trust Lando, but went with him to try and rescue Han. As they evaded stormtroopers and pursued Fett, Lando announced the takeover of Cloud City by the Empire and ordered its evacuation. Unfortunately, Lando, Leia, and Chewbacca barely missed catching Fett, and the bounty hunter escaped with his frozen prize.

Meeting up with R2-D2 and retreating to the Falcon, they took off under fire from stormtroopers and were almost immediately pursued by Imperial TIE fighters. As they escaped Bespin, Leia received Luke's call for help through the Force and had Lando return to rescue him. Under threat from Chewbacca, Lando flew the ship back and pulled the wounded Luke into the ship via the top hatch. While trying to escape Bespin, it was realized that while the hyperdrive had been repaired, it had been deactivated by the Imperials. R2-D2 reactivated the hyperdrive and Lando piloted the Falcon to the Rebel rendezvous point.

Cody Sunn-Childe's dream
"I wonder how long your "truth" would hold up if the war you ran away from came knocking on your front&hellip; door&hellip;?!"

- Lando Calrissian to Cody Sunn-Childe, suddenly interrupted by an Imperial attack

Feeling guilty for what had happened to his old friend and coming to view the Empire as evil, Lando joined the Rebel Alliance, allying with Chewbacca and using the Millennium Falcon to search for Han Solo. One day, while utterly lost, the pair stumbled across a dimensional rift inhabited by Cody Sunn-Childe, a former Rebel Alliance operative and a hero of Lando's who had used strange powers he'd gained during his travels to construct a City of Dreams in a dimensional rift. Angered by Sunn-Childe's abandonment of the Rebel cause, Lando threw a punch at him, only to be attacked by several creatures&mdash;manifestations of the darker side of Sunn-Childe's power&mdash;which were immediately absorbed by Sunn-Childe, lest they cause injury to Lando.

The former Rebel's city had a hypnotizing effect on its inhabitants as they were enthralled by the phantasmagoric surroundings, even Chewbacca. The Wookiee, spellbound, even seemed to forget the search for Han in favor of the city's distractions and had roughly punched Lando for speaking ill of the city. As Lando walked back to the Falcon, the city was attacked by an Imperial fleet led by Captain Plikk, who had also become trapped in the rift. The attack caused many, Chewbacca included, to snap out of their charmed state. Lando and Chewie piloted the Millennium Falcon against the Imperials, but the battle was cut short when Sunn-Childe, who had at first allowed his mysterious manifestations to attack the Star Destroyers, made no further attempt to stop the Imperial bombardment of the city, letting the fleet utterly destroy it and all its citizens, himself included. The Falcon then escaped through the rapidly closing dimensional gate, but the Imperials, lacking the hyperdrive power to escape because of their excessive bombardment, were forever trapped in Sunn-Childe's dimension.

Skywalker's affliction
"Something terrible has happened. Terrible enough to send me combing the Galaxy for you two&hellip; and have you abandon the search for Han."

- Leia, to Chewbacca and Lando

Lando and Chewbacca's frantic search for Han was again cut short as Leia Organa summoned them to a Rebel base on Golrath. Once there, they were informed that Luke Skywalker had caught a deadly disease known as the "Crimson Forever" after boarding an Imperial vessel and finding its crew crimson-colored and dead. Suspecting a red-glowing stone aboard the ship to be the source of whatever killed the Imperials, Luke rushed back to the Rebel headquarters, but he was already infected. In a short time, Luke was lying comatose, his eyes turned scarlet red. Leia remembered a story Han Solo had told her about the Red Nebula that featured a pair of stones similar to the one that infected Luke. Chewbacca regaled the tale, and the group came to the conclusion that the "Crimson Forever" stone was indeed one of those Chewie and Han had encountered&mdash;when the two stones were separated, they were extremely lethal. Following up on the lead, Chewbacca, Lando and Leia piloted the Millennium Falcon to the Red Nebula, only to find a seemingly abandoned House of Tagge spaceship. Lando and Leia boarded the vessel while Chewbacca waited in the Falcon and immediately saw victims of the "Crimson Forever". Convinced that it was nearby, they started looking for the second stone. Their search was cut short, however, when they were captured by a gang of bounty hunters employed by Domina Tagge.

Tagge explained that the stones were part of her plan to kill Luke Skywalker as revenge for the death of her brother, Orman Tagge, which Darth Vader had falsely accused Luke of being responsible for. She had hired the bounty hunters to retrieve the stones once word of the deadliness of the red-glowing rocks reached her. Bombing the planet where the stones had been held, she soon had them in her grasp. Tagge and company were surprised by an Imperial warship, however, and the Tagge ship was boarded by stormtroopers. Not wanting to risk her plan, Tagge at first allowed the Imperials to seize one of the stones&mdash;encased in a protective canister&mdash;and even told them the location of the Rebel Alliance's base on Golrath. Provoking a firefight, Tagge's bounty hunters forced the stormtroopers to retreat back to their own ship and jump to hyperspace, heading for Golrath. Unbeknownst to the Imperials, Tagge had tinkered with the canister of their stone, making it burst open when it was placed under the pressure of hyperspace travel. By the time they arrived near Golrath, they were all dead, and the ghost ship trap was set for Skywalker. However, a priest the bounty hunters had captured to get information about the stones from released the stone in Tagge's ship from its canister as well, killing many. Domina and a few bounty hunters were able to seal themselves away on the ship, avoiding certain death, but lacking space suits to shield themselves from the disease, they were trapped.

Escaping Tagge and her crew by jumping through an airlock, Leia and Lando were picked up by the Falcon. Realizing that they needed the stone to cure Luke, Leia struck a deal with Domina&mdash;the Rebels would save her and her bounty hunters from the "Crimson Forever"-infested ship, and in return, she would hand over her stone so they could stop the plague. As the crystals were reunited on Golrath, Luke was cured. Domina and her accomplices flew off in an escape ship per the agreement, and the stones were loaded aboard the Imperial ghost ship, which was sent straight into Golrath's sun.

Destruction of the Tarkin
"They left me out of this mission because they thought I couldn't be trusted. But stowing away so I could be their ace-in-the-hole should prove that&mdash;"

- Lando Calrissian's thoughts interrupted by an approaching stormtrooper patrol

Calrissian, accompanied by Chewbacca in the Millennium Falcon, was on the trail of a gunrunner named Shem-Lern, who Calrissian believed knew Boba Fett's location. However, when Shem-Lern flew into an asteroid field, Calrissian was reluctant to follow, and a priority signal from General Carlist Rieekan ordering them to return to the fleet interrupted their chase. Informed by an operative that the Empire was constructing a new superweapon&mdash;the Tarkin&mdash;the Rebellion ordered Chewbacca and Lando to stop their hunt for Shem-Lern and return to the temporary base, where they were briefed on their new mission&mdash;to destroy the Tarkin.

A small commando team, consisting of Luke, Leia, Chewbacca, C-3PO and R2-D2, were to sneak aboard the superweapon dressed as workers and strike at its reactor with a proton grenade. Lando, whom both Leia and General Rieekan thought of as untrustworthy, was "left out" of the mission but the gambler stowed away on the Falcon that the commando team piloted to Hockaleg, the planet over which the Tarkin orbited. Lando hoped to make himself useful by staying with the Falcon, ready to rush to the superweapon to save his friends.

Unbeknownst to the commando team, Darth Vader was also present at the space station, having sensed that Skywalker had infiltrated it. Believing the Rebels' plan was to destroy the Tarkin ' s reactor, Vader personally saw to the protection of that area, delegating the rest of the security personnel to potential escape routes. However, just as he was en route to catch Luke, a group of high-ranking Imperial officers attempted to kill the Sith by opening an airlock, sending Vader into space. The plan was foiled by Vader himself&mdash;using the dark side of the Force he was able to pull himself back into the Tarkin from the vacuum of space. This distraction helped Luke barely escape the Dark Lord. In the meantime, Leia had wired the superweapon's ion cannon to fire upon itself&mdash;something that would utterly destroy the station.

Meanwhile, on Hockaleg, Lando was approached by a stormtrooper patrol, but he was able to "bribe" them with two kilos of what he said was Gannarian narco-spice&mdash;in reality, it was simply slime yeast from the Falcon's provisions. At the same time, on the Tarkin, the Rebel commando team prepared to flee the space station, aborting their original mission. Just as they rocketed off the station, they were followed by two TIE fighters. They had little chance of survival until Lando appeared with the Millennium Falcon, blasting the enemy craft and bringing the group aboard the YT-1300. Darth Vader boarded his personal modified TIE and gave chase, but he was ultimately outmaneuvered by Luke when the young Jedi jettisoned the Falcon ' s water supply into space, creating an instant ice barrier that Vader crashed into. Seeing that the Rebels were about to escape, the officers aboard the Tarkin decided to fire the superweapon on the lone freighter. However, thanks to Leia's wiring of the ion cannon, the space station exploded violently. The Rebels escaped to safety while discussing Princess Leia's ion cannon-tinkering.

A short while later, while investigating an incredible power source on Ventooine, Lando, Luke and C-3PO discovered a giant golden statue of Han Solo as they were being chased by Imperial stormtroopers. The statue had been erected by Vetter Piin, a man Solo had helped in the past. After listening to the tale of Solo's escapades on the planet through a memory stone, the three defeated the pursuing stormtroopers by tricking them into a room with a specific mineral composition that put them into suspended animation.

The search for Leia
"I hate to disappoint you, ugly&mdash;but this is as far as you go!"

- Lando to Sk'ar

Some time later, Princess Leia went missing while on a mission to investigate Imperial activity in the Shiva system. Luke, Chewbacca and Lando embarked on a desperate search for her before finally finding her on Shiva IV&mdash;a technologically primitive planet. Unable to leave the planet due to its lack of space technology, she had gotten tangled up in a conflict between the Calian Confederacy and the Galactic Empire. The Empire, lead by General Sk'ar, sought to invade Shiva IV by destabilizing the Confederacy&mdash;wiping out cities using anti-matter bombs, and kidnapping Aron Peacebringer, the Warlord of the Confederacy, as well as Leia.

Lando, Chewie and Luke found Leia just as she was being assailed by Ygal Delois, a Calian Imperial sympathizer, while attempting to defuse an anti-matter bomb meant to destroy the Confederacy's capital, Illÿriaqum. As Chewbacca and Luke fought Delois, Lando landed the Millennium Falcon only to discover a fleeing General Sk'ar. Lando fired at the General, but the enormous man carried a personal anti-blaster shield, so the blaster bolts had no effect. Unable to defeat Sk'ar in close combat, Lando pretended to be knocked unconscious after being slapped to the ground. Luckily for the Rebels, Lando later spotted Sk'ar's escape ship, prompting Chewbacca to throw a large piece of metal shrapnel at it, causing it to explode. With Sk'ar's forces defeated, the Rebels were hailed as heroes in a large celebration, where Lando was the center of attention for several Calian women.

Return to Cloud City
Afterwards, as the Rebel Alliance was establishing its new base on Arbra, Lando made a return visit to the Imperialized Cloud City. Upon arrival, he was flabbergasted by the apparent abandonment of the city. Unable to locate a single person, he queried the city's central computer, which informed him that all of Cloud City's residents had been evacuated to the artificial surface located below the city itself. Upon learning this, he was attacked by Lobot, who sprang from the shadows behind him. Lobot had somehow identified Calrissian as an "intruder" and "threat to the city," and was set on destroying the returned Socorran. Lando took several punches, and was hurled around a few times by the cyborg, but eventually escaped. Wandering around Cloud City, he soon happened upon an Imperial patrol, led by Captain Hugo Treece. As Treece informed his men of the task that lay before them, Lando learned that the city had been evacuated due to a bomb threat from disloyal Ugnaught workers. The Imperial patrol was to make sure any bombs were defused. Spotting a chance to divert Lobot's attention from himself to the Imperials, Lando opened fire, killing a stormtrooper. Treece immediately ordered his men to attack their assailant. Lando lured the pursuing stormtroopers into Cloud City's carbon-freezing room, then knocked them all into the freezing pit. He dedicated the following carbon-freezing of the stormtroopers to Han Solo. Meanwhile, the remainder of Treece's men were attempting to defuse a bomb. This failed horribly, and caused a sizable explosion which rocked the city itself. Concerned about the explosion, and hoping to escape the wrath of the impending Lobot, Calrissian fled the carbon-freezing room. Shortly after, he stumbled upon the site of the explosion, and found all the Imperials dead&mdash;save one. Hugo Treece had survived without a scratch, and pulled a blaster on Lando&mdash;an action mirrored by Calrissian. Realizing their predicament, the two agreed to temporarily work together for the benefit of their mutual survival. Treece elaborated on the Ugnaught bomb threat, while Calrissian conjured up a plan to save the city. Calrissian acted as bait, and tricked Lobot into the grasp of a loading claw operated by Treece. Realizing that not even such a tight grip could hold the cyborg, Lando removed Lobot's motivational programming capsule, rendering the crazed automaton unconscious. Before long, Calrissian had fixed Lobot's broken programming, and the three went about disarming the rest of the Ugnaught-planted bombs. When that task was completed, Lando appealed to Treece, asking that he treat the Ugnaught workers with respect. Treece promptly refused, and kicked Calrissian off the ledge of Cloud City. As Treece watched Lando plummet towards the artificial surface, Lobot deduced that the Imperial officer had become a threat to the city, and seeing as Calrissian was the one most likely to defeat him, it was imperative that he be rescued. He swiftly grabbed a jetpack, hurled himself off the city's edge, and soon caught up with and grabbed Calrissian.

The two landed in a swamp on the artificial surface, right next to a boat laden with a Ugnaught team of journalists that were hoping to catch the destruction of Cloud City on film. They were initially helped aboard the boat, but as the Ugnaughts recognized Calrissian, suggestions were made to lynch the former Baron Administrator. Such thoughts were cut short as two Imperial skimmers attacked the Ugnaught vessel. Calrissian reacted quickly and, despite the reluctance of the journalists, made an improvised slingshot that sent a camera flying straight into one of the skimmers, causing it to explode. The Ugnaughts retreated, and led Lobot and Lando to their city. There, the Ugnaught leader, King Ozz, told Lando of the poor working conditions that had been established on Cloud City during the Imperial reign. This greatly upset Lando, who immediately hatched a plan to reclaim the city.

Meanwhile, Luke Skywalker and Shira Brie had arrived on Cloud City, only to find themselves pinned down by Imperial fire. Luckily for them, Lando arrived with the Ugnaught journalists, and informed the Imperials that if they didn't flee the station, he would order Lobot to re-arm the Ugnaught explosives. Treece promptly shot Lobot in the head. However, Skywalker was able to create a set of mock explosions that frightened the Imperials into leaving. Following this, the Ugnaught population moved back into Cloud City, and held a large celebration in which Calrissian, Skywalker, Brie, and the repaired Lobot participated. As the celebrations continued, Lando and his fellow Rebels returned to their base on Arbra.

Revolution on Drogheda
Not long after, Lando was unknowingly used as both commander and decoy in a civil war on Drogheda. Initially summoned to the planet by Queen Sarna, who was an old flame of his, he led royalist forces to defeat a small band of revolutionaries. After that, and learning that the revolutionaries were fighting for democracy, Lando attempted to leave the planet, but was halted by the Queen's guards who saw him as a traitor. While the guards were preoccupied with chasing Lando, a large group of revolutionaries conquered the royal palace and dethroned Sarna. Revolutionary leader and sister of the Queen, Danu, promptly kicked Lando off the planet, and forced him to take Sarna with him.

Business on Bazarre
"&hellip;that monster's gonna learn&hellip; there's no such thing as a free lunch! 'Specially not when it's Lando Calrissian!"

- Lando Calrissian

On a mission to acquire black-market TIE fighters for the Alliance, Lando, Chewbacca and Luke journeyed to the space station and trading post Bazarre to meet with Orion Ferret, the administrator of the station. Lando, due to prior dealings with Ferret, was suspicious of him. Upon arrival, Luke and Lando were accosted by a gang of merchants who mistook them for merchandise, but that matter was settled once Ferret approached them. He informed them that he had been able to scrape together enough parts from damaged Imperial ships to reconstruct four TIE fighters. For security reasons, he had stored the spacecraft on the garbage planet Patch 4. Ferret offered Lando and Luke his own private shuttle, which was programmed with the coordinates for Patch-4. Distrustful of Ferret, Chewbacca stayed behind to keep the administrator from betraying their agreement.

Shortly after landing on Patch-4, Skywalker spotted the TIE fighters. As he and Lando approached them, they were attacked by a large creature that seemed nearly impervious to their weapons. Forced into retreating to the nearby caves, Luke and Lando discovered a community of vagabonds that had settled there. One of the inhabitants, Serja Kesselrook, informed the two Rebels that the creature was controlled by a sonic pacifier on the ship they had been given, which meant that Ferret had been controlling it and had betrayed them. Returning to confront the beast, Lando distracted it by shooting while Luke went to the ship and used the sonic pacifier to put the beast to sleep. Then, they retrieved the fighters, returned to get the Falcon and Chewbacca, and returned to Arbra. Later, Calrissian was present at an awards ceremony honoring starfighter pilot Shira Brie, and commented that she was an exceptional member of the Alliance.

Some time later, Luke came under suspicion for killing Shira Brie in a covert mission. Lando offered his assistance, helping Luke to "steal" the Millennium Falcon so he could investigate the case. After Skywalker was cleared of suspicion following his discovery that Shira Brie had been an Imperial agent, the Rebellion learned of a new threat emanating from their former base on Golrath. The stone there released images whatever occurred around it when heated, meaning that if the Empire found that secret, they would be able to see into Rebel discussions and databases by heating the stone, leading them to Arbra. As a result, two fighter squadrons were scrambled to destroy the base, which the Empire had taken over. For his part, Calrissian flew a Y-wing starfighter along with Leia Organa, who he dropped off near the base. Organa went on a solo mission to overload the base's reactor and was ultimately successful, while Calrissian helped the other Rebels against Imperial starfighters. After picking up Organa, the Rebels left the planet and returned to Arbra as the base exploded, save for Luke Skywalker, whose hyperdrive had been damaged.

Encounter with Black Sun
Lando continued the search for Han Solo, hiring a guide who knew where Boba Fett had been hiding. Flying the Falcon, Lando, Leia, and Luke attempted to intercept Boba Fett and rescue Han at Gall, but their guide, Dash Rendar, abandoned them, and the opposing Imperial forces were too numerous for the Rebels to pursue Fett's fleeing Slave I.

Lando was with Leia and Chewbacca when they met with the Black Sun representative Guri. With the Wookiee's help, he discovered that Guri was actually a droid. When Leia and Chewbacca went to Coruscant with Guri, Lando eventually met up with Luke and sneaked into the capital world to find the Princess and the Wookiee. When Chewbacca told them of Leia's capture by the lustful Xizor, Lando and the others journeyed through the sewers into the sub-sub-basement levels of Xizor's Palace. Once inside, they worked their way up and were reunited with Leia, who had escaped as well. Finding themselves surrounded by Xizor's guards, and the Prince himself, Lando pulled out a thermal detonator, set it to explode after five minutes and dropped it into the garbage chute. In the ensuing chaos of fleeing guards and employees, the Rebels made good their escape, boarding the Millennium Falcon (which had been brought to the castle by R2-D2 and C-3PO). With Lando safely back at the controls, they flew off Coruscant, pursued by Xizor's considerable forces. However, the timely interference of both Rogue Squadron and the Imperial Navy allowed the Falcon to escape.

Mission to Blimph 3
"Who'd have guessed Quaffug would hold a twelve-year grudge over a little gambling setback! What a cry-baby! We did plenty of business together&hellip;I thought we were solid. Never should have volunteered for this mission&hellip;I thought I was the right man for the job&mdash;big diplomatic hero&hellip;I thought I was the man for the job&hellip;I thought I knew Quaffug&hellip;but it was all a setup! Quaffug wanted me, not a deal with the Alliance."

- Calrissian laments

Some time later, Calrissian volunteered to go on a diplomatic mission for the Alliance to the Mid Rim moon of Blimph 3. The moon was a trade hub and of strategic importance to the Alliance, which hoped to establish a presence there post hast, and its ruler, Hutt crime lord Quaffug, offered to cut a deal with the Alliance and allow their presence in his domain. Calrissian had worked for the Hutt previously, though their last meeting ended on less-than-cordial terms, after Calrissian won Quaffug's Ceramo-Werx manufacturing facility in a game of sabacc. Despite this, Calrissian volunteered to negotiate on behalf of the Rebels. He believed that Quaffug would have moved on and no longer care, and was confident that his diplomatic skills would be able to sway to Hutt into allying with the Rebellion. The former gambler also hoped that his dealings with Quaffug might lead him towards a means of rescuing Solo from Jabba, and might increase his standing in the Rebellion. He departed for Blimph 3, alone.

He soon learned that it had all been a set up; an embittered Quaffug, upon learning of Calrissian's position in the Alliance, had offered to open negotiations on the knowledge that Calrissian was most likely to be sent. Lying in wait for the would-be diplomat were a number of bounty hunters hired by Quaffug, including Bossk, 4-LOM, and Dengar. The bounty hunters took Calrissian prisoner, but Quaffug opted not to kill him immediately, preferring to make a sport of it.

Trouble on Stenos
After Xizor's death, Lando returned to the Rebel base on Arbra. However, with Han Solo still in captivity, Calrissian, Skywalker, Chewbacca, and Leia Organa decided to embark on a mission to track down Boba Fett and free their companion. Wishing their companions luck, Calrissian and Chewbacca took the Millennium Falcon and began their search, after Chewbacca dealt with an alien entity named the Darker that infested a cave on Arbra and was threatening the Alliance. To start them off, Leia had received information regarding Han Solo: The bounty hunters Dengar, IG-88 and Bossk, was aware of where Boba Fett was storing the Corellian. In light of this, Lando traveled to The Wheel, accompanied by Chewbacca. While there, he met up with Skywalker again and was informed that IG-88 and Bossk had been spotted on Stenos and the three Rebels departed for Stenos in the Millennium Falcon.

Leaving Chewbacca aboard the Millennium Falcon, Luke and Lando searched Stenos for any clue of Solo's whereabouts. They eventually spotted a metal storage block similar to the one Solo was frozen in being carried into a building. As they broke into the building, they discovered that the metal casket contained Chihdo, a Rodian, and was merely bait for a trap set by Bossk and IG-88. As the two bounty hunters cornered Lando and Luke, Rik Duel and Dani, friends of Chihdo, rushed to their aid. They initially escaped, but IG-88 summoned reinforcements and was able to capture Lando and Dani. They were brought before Drebble, who had contracted to have Calrissian captured since he was still outraged about being outwitted years earlier by Lando. However, Skywalker and Duel arrived just as Drebble was about to have Calrissian and Dani frozen in carbonite. Unfortunately for the Rebels, there were too many guards present, and they were all captured and set to be frozen. However, at that point, Chewbacca and a band of native Stenaxes the Wookiee had enlisted charged, causing Bossk and IG-88 to flee.

Finding Argo and Vanis
"My plans involve secrecy&hellip; subtlety&hellip; subterfuge&hellip;"

- Lando Calrissian

Soon after, Lando, Luke, Chewbacca, R2-D2 and Dani&mdash;who had sneaked aboard the Falcon as it left Stenos&mdash;teamed up with Leia Organa and C-3PO on a new mission. The group was charged with tracking down the undercover Rebel operatives Yom Argo and Tay Vanis, who were tasked with finding the plans of the second Death Star. Pursuing Argo first, they found records of him crashing on the planet Lahsbane. Closer investigation revealed that Argo had died in the crash, along with a native Lahsbee. The natives kept the tapes from Argo's starship&mdash;the Death Star plans included&mdash;to themselves, to honor their fallen kinsman. Leia and Dani were fortunately able to retrieve the tapes from The Forbidden City.

Tracking Tay Vanis to the planet Iskalon, the group soon got involved in the delicate conflict between the Galactic Empire and the other planets in the sector. They were informed by the leader of the Iskalonians, Primor, that Vanis's old K3PX droid was present on Gamandar, a heavily fortified Imperial planet not far from Iskalon. Hoping to find clues to Vanis's whereabouts through his droid, Lando, together with Chewbacca, Mone, C-3PO and R2-D2 flew the Millennium Falcon to Gamandar. They purchased the K3PX droid from the Imperials, but unbeknownst to the Rebels was that K3PX had been turned into an espionage droid employed by Darth Vader himself. Even though they were captured, R2-D2 saved them when he returned from pursuing another lead of his own. ). Fleeing Gamandar, they picked up Leia and Luke on Iskalon. The mission ended as a failure, with no information about Vanis recovered.

Returning to the Arbra base to report their failure, they were informed that a third Rebel operative apparently had gotten hold of the Death Star plans: Han Solo. Although it seemed impossible that the Corellian had escaped Boba Fett, Lando and Chewbacca were nevertheless sent to investigate, but were apparently unable to find anything.

Mission to Yinchorr
"Luke, it could be nothing. Maybe&hellip;" "No, Lando, there's trouble -- and it feels like the Empire."

- Lando and Luke, after receiving Leia's distress call

In an effort to gain more support for the Rebellion and its fight against the Empire, Princess Leia organized a diplomatic mission to the planet of Yinchorr. Wanting to foster a sense of trust between the Rebellion and the Yinchorri, Leia decided to go on the mission by herself, and unarmed, so as not to threaten the Yinchor leaders. Though he did not agree with Leia's stance on the subject, Luke gave her an emergency beacon which she could trigger if any problems arose. Luke, meanwhile, boarded the Millennium Falcon, along with Lando and Chewbacca, to rejoin the main Rebel fleet.

Once on Yinchorr, Leia soon discovered that she had been betrayed by the Yinchorri, who planned to hand her over to the Empire. Having been shot down by Imperial TIE fighters, Leia activated her emergency beacon, hoping that Luke and Lando would reach her in time&mdash;or at all. Eventually, Leia was confronted by Moff Marcellin Wessel and his stormtroopers, but at that moment, Lando, Luke, and the Falcon arrived to rescue the Princess. With the help of Lando and Luke, Leia boarded the Falcon and was able to rendezvous with Alliance forces.

Hutt guardsman
Lando learned that Solo had been delivered to Jabba Desilijic Tiure while undercover on Arcan IV, and put into motion plans to infiltrate the crimelord's base. On Blimph 3, he visited Quaffug the Hutt in hopes of winning him over to the Rebel cause. Quaffug was uninterested in this and decided to execute Calrissian by having several high-profile bounty hunters chase the Socorran down. Calrissian not only escaped the bounty hunters, but he ended up saving Quaffug's life. In return, Quaffug gave his support to the Rebel Alliance and arranged for Lando to be accepted into the Hutt Guardsman's Guild. Adopting the pseudonym Tamtel Skreej, Lando infiltrated Jabba the Hutt's organization as a guard in Jabba's throne room.

However, this was not enough to gain the Hutt's trust and so, hoping to prove himself and impress the Hutt, Lando volunteered to enter Jabba's demolition games. He offered to take the controls to one of Jabba's modified desert skiffs in order to participate. It was during this time that Lobot also came to Jabba's palace, hoping to dismantle the rogue droid EV-9D9. Though Jabba was planning on feeding the cyborg to his rancor, Lando suggested that Lobot instead be placed in the games with him. As Lobot did not know that the disguised Tamtel Skreej was in fact Lando, the two became opponents.

Lando was present as each member of the rescue team&mdash;R2-D2, C-3PO, Leia (disguised as Boushh), Chewbacca, and finally Luke Skywalker&mdash;arrived. Deciding to wait until all the team was in place, Lando remained in his role even as Han Solo&mdash;released from carbonite by Leia&mdash;and Chewbacca were imprisoned and Leia's identity was revealed, resulting in her enslavement. Even after Luke arrived, Lando remained the "ace-in-the-hole" as the Jedi defeated Jabba's monstrous rancor.

When Luke, Han, and Chewbacca were sentenced to execution in the Great Pit of Carkoon, Lando was a guard on the same skiff as the prisoners, ready to spring them on Luke's cue. At the Pit of Carkoon, as Luke received his lightsaber from Artoo and fought off the other guards, Lando helped free the other prisoners. In the process, he was nearly knocked into the maw of the sarlacc. Only the timely intervention of a partially blinded Han Solo and Chewbacca saved him from the Sarlacc. After Luke defeated the guards and rescued Leia from the Khetanna, Lando piloted the skiff away as Jabba's barge exploded.

The Battle of Endor
"Well, look at you! A general, huh?"

- Han Solo

In preparation for the attack on the second Death Star, Calrissian was promoted by the Alliance to Restore the Republic to general, based largely on the laurels of his victory at Taanab. At the Battle of Endor, General Calrissian commanded the Rebel starfighter contingent as Gold Leader. At the urging of Han Solo, he once again piloted from the cockpit of his old ship, the Millennium Falcon, this time alongside copilot Nien Nunb.

When the Alliance discovered that the battle was orchestrated by the Empire as a trap (largely thanks to Calrissian's announcement that saved dozens of starfighters from smashing into the Death Star's shield), the gambler's unorthodox strategies were vital in keeping the flailing Alliance forces from collapsing. He suggested taking the fleet's Mon Calamari Star Cruisers into point blank range of the Empire's Star Destroyers, exposing them to the Empire's warships but protecting them from the far more dangerous superlaser of the unexpectedly operational Death Star. At one point in the battle, while pursuing two TIE Interceptors, Calrissian approached a Super Star Destroyer too closely; rather than flee, Calrissian flew the Falcon into the hangar bay of the massive ship, flew through an interior access corridor, and, after blasting away at the unarmored innards, flew back out the way he came ahead of a sensor-obscuring fireball, saving the ship and crew from what otherwise would have been certain death.

Eventually, the strike team on the surface of Endor was able to bring the shield protecting the Death Star down. Calrissian, along with Wedge Antilles, led the starfighter assault into the battle station to destroy it. After evading TIEs and having close run-ins with the station's superstructure resulting in the loss of the Falcon's long-range sensor dish, Calrissian fired concussion missiles into the Death Star's reactor core, destroying the station; for the second time that day, Calrissian rode a fireball from inside an Imperial structure to safety. The destruction of the second Death Star, along with Luke and Anakin Skywalker's victory over the Emperor, effectively sealed the fate of the Empire, and Calrissian was hailed a hero. Following the victory at Endor, Lando stayed behind on the moon to "keep an eye on how the Alliance was handling the Empire's defeat."

Under the New Republic (4 ABY–25 ABY)
After the Battle of Endor, Calrissian continued to serve the Rebel Alliance and its successor governments&mdash;the Alliance of Free Planets, the New Republic, and the Galactic Federation of Free Alliances&mdash;usually as a civilian, but intermittently taking up his general's commission.

Mission to the Hunter's World
"Let's get out of here!"

- Lando, to Han and Chewbacca

With the defeat of the Empire at the Battle of Endor, the Alliance leadership began preparations for the establishment of an internment government. Part of this was to invite various representatives from a planets throughout the galaxy to come and have their voice be heard at the first meeting of the Alliance of Free Planets. One such planet was that of Keyorin, also known at the Hunter's World due to its popularity amongst bounty hunters. Volunteering for the mission to Keyorin were Han Solo, Chewbacca, and Lando. The reason for the Lando and Han to volunteer for this mission was that Keyorin was the first planet in a long string of diplomatic missions which would eventually pass the Wookiee homeworld of Kashyyyk. Chewbacca had not been able to visit his homeworld for a long time, and Han wanted to be able to provide the opportunity to his old friend. Lando, likewise, enlisted his services, and those of his ship the Cobra, to the mission so that if Chewbacca wished to stay on Kashyyyk for longer than planned, then he would not be without a ship. However, before Chewbacca would be able to visit his home, the three smugglers would have to first complete a diplomatic mission to the Hunter's World.

Leaving the forest moon of Endor behind, Lando, Han, and Chewbacca traveled to Keyorin and were granted an audience with Pinurquian Tinketh Fo, who was the planetary leader of the Hunter's World. After the short meeting, in which Fo agreed to think about attending the Alliance meeting, Han led Lando and Chewbacca to a small bar where the trio decided to unwind before continuing their mission. However, shortly after their arrival, the Trandoshan Bossk made an appearance, an appearance which startled both Lando and Chewbacca. Not understanding why one more bounty hunter would cause his friends such discomfort, Han gradually grew irritated at their hushed tones. Lando, not wanting to draw the attention of Bossk, told Han that while Han had been encased in carbonite, the trail that they had been following to rescue him had grown cold. As a result, Lando devised the idea of tricking several bounty hunters into tracking down Han's trail, hoping to follow them to his friend's location. One of the said bounty hunters who Lando tricked was Bossk. However, when the trio decided to leave the bar, Lando ended up running into another acquaintance, an acquaintance whose identity Lando had stolen&mdash;Barpotomous Drebble. Drebble, himself, was quite powerful within the community of Keyorin, and was the owner of the bar which Lando and company had been in. Upon seeing Drebble, Lando, Han, and Chewbacca fled the establishment, but were eventually captured by Drebble while they were trying to board the Falcon. Taking Lando into custody, Drebble handed Han and Chewbacca over to the criminals Lemo and Sanda who had also been chasing the trio.

With Lando his prisoner, Drebble attempted to operate the Cobra, but instead activated a holo-recording from Mon Mothma, leader of the Alliance. The recording stated that because of his efforts in aiding the Rebellion, Drebble was to be awarded for his bravery, and granted the rank of Captain within the Alliance. Lando, however, could still not believe that Drebble was getting rewarded for all of the work that Lando had done, disguised as Drebble, during his search for Han. During this time, the Cobra was attacked by Lemo and Sanda who had been tricked by Han into believing that Drebble was in possession of a rare statue known as the Dancing Goddess. The ensuing fight saw Drebble release Lando to help against the criminals, and also witnessed the arrival of both Han and Chewbacca who had managed to escape captivity. With Lemo and Sanda having surrendered, Drebble decided to let go of the past, and forgive Lando of his past transgressions&mdash;Drebble was too excited about his new title within the Alliance, along with the enormous opportunities it would afford him. Before the trio departed Keyorin, Lando, who had been in possession of the Dancing Goddess all along, decided that the best way to keep Lemo and Sanda from tracking the statue further was to award it to Drebble for his past "services" to the Rebellion. Drebble accepted the statue with full enthusiasm, much to the disappointment of the two criminals.

Trouble on Kashyyyk
"&hellip;I can't help feeling that something's wrong here&hellip;like there may be trouble."

- Lando, speaking to Han Solo shortly after arriving on Kashyyyk

Following their escape from the Hunter's World, Lando, Han, and Chewbacca continued on to the Wookiee homeworld of Kashyyyk. Upon arriving at the jungle world, the trio set both the Falcon and Cobra down on a landing pad, and set out to find Chewbacca's wife, Mallatobuck, and his son, Lumpawaroo. While following Chewbacca to his home, Lando and the others were confronted by a male identified only as Knife, as well as Chewbacca's brother-in-law Vargi. Though Lando and Han sensed that something was wrong, they allowed Knife and Vargi to accompany them to Mala's home.

Shortly after arriving at Chewbacca's home, Knife and Vargi sprang a trap which was aimed at capturing Chewbacca. Lando and Han soon realized that Knife had hired Wookiees, like Vargi, to help with re-initiating the slave trade on Kashyyyk. In an effort make his job easier, Knife wanted to capture Chewbacca, who was a hero throughout Kashyyyk, along with his family and parade them through the streets in an effort to demoralize the other Wookiees. With Chewbacca firmly under his control, Knife left both Lando and Han under the watchful eyes of several guards. Nonetheless, Lando was able to pick the lock on his and Han's cuffs, and the two managed to escape from their captivity.

While Han attempted to free Chewbacca from custody, Lando decided to make his way back to the Cobra and attempt to send out a distress signal to the Alliance. Along the way, he encountered Chewbacca's father, wife, and son, who were being held captive in a hangar, and managed to free them from the slavers. With Chewbacca's family safe, Lando was able to send out the distress call like he and Han had decided upon. Believing that Han was in trouble, Lando hurried away from the hangar, and made his way to where Han had managed to free Chewbacca. However, during the freeing of Chewbacca, both he and Han had been assaulted by Wookiee slavers who were being directed by Knife. When it became clear that Chewbacca, in a fit of rage, was a danger to himself, Knife attempted to throw on of his several blades at the angry Wookiee. Nevertheless, Lando managed to arrive in time and used his blaster to shot the blade out of Knife's hand. Seeing that his plans had become unraveled, Knife ran away while the freed Wookiees celebrated. Due to the sheer number of Wookiees who had been freed, and who were now celebrating with each other, Lando and Han were unable to pursue Knife. As a result, Knife was able to steal Lando's ship, the Cobra, and use it to escape Kashyyyk.

The destruction of Naldar
"It's like walking through a ghost town."

- Lando, after landing on Naldar

With the slavers routed on Kashyyyk, Lando, Han, and Chewbacca returned to the Alliance command on Endor, where they were reunited with both Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa. Following a short briefing with Admiral Ackbar, where Lando helped explain what had transpired on the Wookiee homeworld, a ship of unknown origins arrived on Endor whose pilot sought an audience with the Alliance leadership. The pilot, who identified himself as Denin, told Lando and those gathered about the Imperial invasion and occupation of the planet Naldar, where Denin confessed to be the last surviving member of the royal bloodline. After hearing about the Imperial takeover of Naldar, Luke Skywalker organized a relief force consisting of Lando, Han, Leia, Chewbacca, Barney and the droids C-3PO and R2-D2, to aid Denin in the fight to free Naldar from the Empire.

Upon arriving at Naldar, Lando and the rest of the party were surprised to find the capital city, which Denin had told them was the most fortified city on the planet, completely destroyed. At that moment, the Falcon was attacked by a group of Imperial TIE fighters, and was damaged when a surface cannon from the planet managed to hit them. Forced to land on Naldar, the group split up: Leia and C-3PO left to go look for replacement parts to use on the Falcon; Han and Chewbacca opted to stay behind and attempt what repairs they could; and Lando, Luke, and Denin departed for the capital city in search of survivors. During their search of the capital, Lando and his team were ambushed by Imperial stormtroopers led by a mysterious figure in black armor, an apprentice of Darth Vader named Flint. Knowing that Lando and Denin were no match for a dark side warrior like Flint, Luke ordered them to retreat back to the Falcon and warn the others. Lando, however, could not stand the thought of leaving one his good friends in danger, and upon returning to the Falcon, organized a rescue team to assist Luke.

With the help of Leia, Han, Chewbacca, and Barney, Lando was able to rescue Luke who had been wounded by a stormtrooper's blaster shot. However, Flint did not expect to see his childhood friend, Barney, among the rescuers. With the intervention of Barney, Flint was able to see the error of his ways and how he had allowed his anger over the deaths of his parents to control his actions. With his newfound perspective on life, Flint ordered the Imperial forces to desist in their plan to further destroy the capital city using an enormous energy cannon. Even though Flint had turned away from the dark path, Denin, who had confessed to actually be the princess Vila, was gunned down by a stormtrooper attempting to kill Flint. Lando was among those present who watched as Vila died a hero for her planet.

Work for the Alliance
Following the surrender of Flint on Naldar, it became known to the Alliance leadership that a new conflict had spilled over into Alliance space&mdash;that of the Nagai-Tof War. During this time, the man known as Knife had been apprehended, along with members of his species, who had been identified as the Nagai. Proceeding this event, Lando was present during a meeting of the leaders of the Alliance who were discussing the various ways that this war could, or would, affect the fragile state of the galaxy. Due to Knife having been taken into custody, Lando once again regained control of the Cobra.

With Chewbacca away on a vacation with family on Kashyyyk, and Leia preoccupied with meetings, Han found himself without a co-pilot for an upcoming mission to a former Imperial prison planet. At the insistence of Lando, Han accepted the Sullustan Nien Nunb to be a temporary companion. With Nien as his co-pilot, Han was briefed by Lando on what he had to do. Han eventually learned that his mission was to learn if the Imperials had been influencing the Metalsmith's Guild a guild who was supplying the Alliance with ores and alloys.

However, near the end of his mission, Han encountered trouble with the Imperials, who had programmed the barge fleet Han was a part of to pilot itself into a nearby sun. Not in possession of the codes needed to override the Imperial commands, Han began to believe that that the Falcon, his passengers, and the barge fleet was doomed. Nevertheless, at that moment, Lando arrived out of hyperspace the captain of a EF76 Nebulon-B escort frigate, and latched onto the Falcon using the frigate's tractor beam. Lando proceeded to tell Han that several of Han's passengers had been in possession of the override code, and that they had had Nien Nunb transmit to the Alliance frigate when it appeared out hyperspace. Knowing that Han was safely away from the Imperials, Lando advised him that Han's true mission all along had been to draw out the Imperials, and not just to gain intelligence. Lando believed that Han had been the perfect candidate to cause enough trouble to draw the Imperials out in the open.

Near-death experience on Godo
"Seriously&hellip;would you have started a war, just to save me&hellip;or were you bluffing?" "Lucky for everyone&hellip;we'll never know."

- Lando and Han, shortly after Lando's recovery

With Fenn Shysa and Bey as allies, the leaders of the Alliance once again turned their focus back to helping member worlds who had experienced hardship and strife over the previous years. One such world was the planet of Godo, whose inhabitants resembled small children, both in stature and attitude. Over the course of several years, the natives of Godo, known as Godoans, had become afflicted by an unknown disease that had wreaked havoc across the populace. As a result, the Alliance sent several of their personnel to Godo in an effort to ascertain the root of the disease&mdash;the Alliance party, so not to be infected by the sickness, had to be inoculated before setting foot on the planet. Among this initial party was Han Solo and Chewbacca, and the Alliance soon discovered that the Godoan disease stemmed from an enormous machine that the Godoan worshipped. The machine itself had actually been manufactured by an unknown person, or persons, to aid in keeping the Godoans alive when Godo had become unfit to support them anymore. Over the centuries, knowledge of the machine turned into a local religion in which the Godoans believed a "Goddess" lived in the machine, seen as a holy temple, and looked after the welfare of their people. Unbeknownst to the Godoans, for the machine to operate properly it required a large number of integral cogs which resembled golden statues&mdash;two of which had been stolen, and ended up in the possession of Lando Calrissian through a card game.

Having acquired the knowledge that it was the missing statues that was causing the disease to continue on Godo, Han and the others returned to the Alliance base on Endor to speak with Lando. Surprised by what Han told him, Lando devised a plan to retrieve the two statues from those who possessed them and return them to the machine on Godo. Han and Luke opted to travel to the prison world which housed Lemo and Sando and speak with them about the location of the Minstrel; while Lando and Chewbacca were to seek out Drebble on Stenos in hopes of acquiring the Dancing Goddess.

While Han and Luke were busy tracking down the Minstrel, Lando and Chewbacca found themselves in dire straights in the streets of Stenos. Believing that Drebble had ordered them to be killed, the pair participated in a running firefight with a large group of Drebble's gang. Nevertheless, Lando expressed surprise when Drebble appeared and ordered his gang members to cease fire, explaining that Lando and Chewbacca were actually old friends of his from the Rebellion. Believing that Drebble had changed for the best, due to his new found stature brought upon by none other than Lando, Lando explained to Drebble why he and Chewbacca had sought him out. Though Drebble was visibly sad to give his "award" back to Lando, he was cheered when Lando told him that they were friends, and that he truly had earned the friendship of the Alliance. With the Dancing Goddess in their possession, Lando and Chewbacca hastily made their way back to Godo.

Arriving ahead of Lando, Han and Luke replaced the Minstrel within the machine&mdash;however, without Lando and the Dancing Goddess, the Godoans' sickness would continue to worsen. Just as the Fumiyo, a Godoan was acting as an interpreter, was close to death, Lando arrived with the Dancing Goddess and placed it within the machine. With both of the missing pieces now back in their original lodgings, Fumiyo immediately began to heal&mdash;as did the rest of the Godoan population. Believing that their mission had come to an end, Lando, Luke, Han, and Chewbacca boarded the Millennium Falcon, and took their position at the head of the Alliance fleet orbiting Godo. However, Lando soon began exhibiting the exact same symptoms that the Godoans' had shown when sick&mdash;Lando's sickness, though, had accelerated quicker than Han and the others had expected. According to Chewbacca, Lando, in his rush to get the statue back to the machine, had forgotten to get inoculated against the deadly disease. Believing that his friend was close to death, Han radioed back to Fumiyo and requested permission to transport Lando to the temple. Fumiyo, however, advised Han that the Godoans' had just sealed the temple against all "alien" persons in an attempt to dissuade the theft of anymore statues. Outraged that they would condemn to death the man who just saved their entire populace, Han warned Fumiyo that he had at his disposal enough Alliance firepower to level the entire planet if they did not help Lando. With the support of various other Alliance military persons present, such as Wedge Antilles, Han gave Fumiyo ten seconds to accept his deal. To the relief of Admiral Ackbar, Fumiyo conceded and allowed Han to bring Lando back to the temple, where he was instantly healed.

Black Sun coup
"Do you really think we can convince Black Sun to stop shooting it out, Princess?" "I hope so Lando. The Alliance doesn't need any more citizens getting killed in any kind of war."

- Lando Calrissian and Leia Organa

Lando joined his fellow Heroes of Yavin on a mission to Coruscant to negotiate a cease fire between the remnants of Black Sun, whose internecine warfare had resulted in numerous civilian casualties. However, Savan, Prince Xizor's niece, was making her own bid to take over the syndicate. Lando and the droids remained behind while Organa, Skywalker, Solo, and Chewbacca went to the negotiating table with several black sun vigos, including Savan, who was disguised as a human. While at the table, Black Sun forces alleged by Savan to belong to the vigo Vekker attacked, these forces, actually Savan's, served to intensify the bloodbath and further her goal of picking up the pieces of Black Sun.

Organa saw through Savan's disguise, however, and the negotiating team decided to track her down. Though she had left Coruscant for Hurd's Moon to track down the Human Replica Droid and former Black Sun majordomo Guri, Calrissian was able to learn of her destination, as the port chief owed him a favor as a result of the gambler having taken the chief's I.O.U. on several occasions. Upon arriving at Hurd's Moon, it was again through favors owed to Calrissian that the group was able to learn of Savan's goal to capture Guri and the Black Sun secrets she possessed.

They entered the fortress-laboratory of Massad Thrumble, who was reprogramming Guri at her bequest to forget her previous life as a Black Sun operative and assassin, just as a multi-way firefight was beginning; not only had Savan and her hired mercenaries entered the facility, but so had criminal scientist Spinda Caveel and his hired hands, the "Pikkel Sisters." Calrissian and his fellows first encountered this latter group, and after a brief firefight, Calrissian recognized the two women as the Pike Sisters, and the sisters recognized Chewbacca; upon realizing who they were dealing with, the sisters refused to fight further, killing Caveel when he attempted to insist violently.

The group continued on their quest to find Savan, dispatching one of her mercenary teams, before finally finding her just as she was giving Guri a secret code that she believed would take control of the erstwhile Black Sun droid, then instructing her to attack Thrumble. Skywalker sensed she was different, and held the group back from making a move; true to his suspicions, Guri feinted a move toward Thrumble before striking Savan. The group took Savan into custody, and allowed Guri, who no longer remembered her past criminal actions, to go free.

Second Battle of Endor
"Calrissian&hellip; I've never seen flying like that in my life! Are you a pilot--or a magician?"

- Fenn Shysa

Following the events on Godo, Lando and his colleagues returned to the Alliance base on Endor. Concerned by the fact that he no longer was part of the Alliance's decision making process, he now hoped to be employed as a piloting teacher. For this purpose, he suggested to the Alliance leaders that all pilots should take holographic piloting exams, using a program devised by Calrissian himself. To Han Solo and Luke Skywalker's dismay, the exam results concluded that they both flew in insane patterns, and thus should be kept out of space combat. When confronted about this, Calrissian admitted that the poor results were due to a programming error in the exams themselves. However, until he could fix it, both Solo and Skywalker would have to stay on the ground.

When a group of Nagai spacecraft approached Endor, Lando was given command of both the Alliance defense and the Millennium Falcon. Anticipating a few Imperials to be among the attackers, he gave the order to use new flight formations that had been indoctrinated in the weeks leading up to the attack, thus making them unknown to the Imperials. However, when they finally engaged their enemy in combat, it seemed that the Nagai were familiar even with the new tactics. This was due to the betrayal of Bey, who had secretly been supplying the Nagai with confidential information in preparation of the battle. Faced with heavy losses, Admiral Ackbar suddenly realized how to beat the enemy: he ordered all Rebel ships to lock their computers with that of the Millennium Falcon, whose pilots would formulate a new attack plan. Lando then employed one of Solo's piloting tricks to make the Rebel ships fly in seemingly irrational patterns that masked each other's movement. The Nagai, led by Lumiya, were caught off guard by this tactic, and retreated before long.

Return to Iskalon
Teaming up with Luke, Lando piloted the Cobra on a mission to Iskalon, to inform its leaders of the death of Kiro, an Iskalonian that had contributed in the Alliance war effort. As they descended on the planet, Lando expressed dismay at the isolationism adopted by the Iskalonians since the Imperial attack that had destroyed much of Iskalon's infrastructure. Landing on the ruins of the city of Iskalon, the two were greeted by a plethora of corpses&mdash;both Iskalonian and Nagai. Before long, Mone and a group of his people ascended from the Iskalonian oceans, and thanked Lando and Luke for dealing with the Nagai invaders. When Luke acknowledged his and Lando's lack of involvement in the battle that had taken place, the Iskalonians assumed Kiro had slain the Nagai. Luke attempted to regale the tale of Kiro's death to Mone, but the Iskalonian leader was convinced Kiro was alive and well, harassing the Nagai that had invaded Iskalon. This was news to Luke, who had witnessed Kiro being shot by the Nagai Den Siva.

Lando and Luke agreed to help the Iskalonians repel the remaining Nagai forces, who had garrisoned themselves in a large tower. Just as they gave their consent, the party was attacked by a group of Nagai divers and stormtroopers. Hoping to cover the escape of the fleeing, unarmed Iskalonians, Lando and Luke stood their ground. Despite killing several of their assailants, they were eventually overpowered by the Nagai sonic weapons. Just as the stormtroopers trapped the defeated pair with net guns, Kiro sprang from the ocean and dispatched of the remainder of the Nagai-aligned party. Kiro swam off without stopping for conversation, leaving Lando and Luke to shake off the effects of the sonic weapons. Calrissian was convinced that the Nagai had escaped with Mone and several Iskalonians captive. He feared that, given the school-centric nature of the Iskalonians, and their hatred of the slavery the Nagai were imposing on them, the entire species would rather commit suicide than succumb to the invaders. The two quickly formulated a plan: they would destroy the Nagai tower as quickly as possible.

They swam to the ocean floor near the tower, and began hacking away at it&mdash;Luke with his lightsaber, and Lando with a minuscule lightsaber that Luke had "whipped up" some time prior. As they swung at the base of the tower, Lando began fearing that the native Chakai predators would attack them. As he expressed this concern, two Nagai divers approached the pair, but were suddenly intercepted by Kiro. With the Nagai dead, Kiro and Luke swam off to rescue the Iskalonians inside the tower, while Lando continued destroying the tower. Kiro and Luke were successful in their task, and before long, Lando had toppled the Nagai construction. Shortly after, having returned to the Cobra, Lando and Luke said their goodbyes to Kiro and the Iskalonians.

Nagai-Tof War
"Everything's under control up here. We destroyed about half of their small ships and then the Merriweather surrendered to us."

- Lando Calrissian

Calrissian later journeyed to Zeltros, along with Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa, as part of a diplomatic mission to enlist the native Zeltrons' support in the war against the Nagai invaders. They were later joined by Han Solo, Chewbacca, and the Zeltron Dani, and Calrissian enjoyed the festive, carefree mood that pervaded the entire planet, as the Zeltrons were a fun-loving people. However, while they were partying, a group of Nagai landed and captured the Rebels, along with the royalty of Zeltros, while insectoid Hiromi made their own attempt to seize the world. However, while Calrissian and most of the Rebel delegation was in Nagai custody, a group of Tofs, the enemies of the Nagai, arrived. However, their initial attempt to seize the Zeltron palace was thwarted by Skywalker, Dani and Organa, who were aided by the Hiromi and a group of Hoojibs. While Skywalker, the Hoojibs, and the Hiromi went to attack the Tof command ship, Calrissian, Solo, and Chewbacca were captured by the Tofs, who intended to imprison all the Zeltrons and Nagai and kill the others. However, before they could do so, Organa and Dani arrived, rallying the Zeltrons to defeat the Tofs and free the other Rebels. Soon thereafter, a truce was reached with the Nagai, who agreed to aid the Alliance of Free Planets.

Calrissian was later sent to Saijo, along with Solo, Organa, Chewbacca, and Skywalker. Also present on Saijo were some Mandalorians, led by Fenn Shysa, Zeltrons, Hoojibs, Hiromi, and Nagai, all fighting against the Tofs, who had set up their headquarters on the world, and their crown prince was present there as well. However, Calrissian, Chewbacca and Nien Nunb were not assigned to the planet's surface with the others&mdash;instead, they remained in orbit with an Alliance Star Destroyer. When Tof fighters launched from their main ship, the Merriweather, Calrissian led a formation of Alliance ships to engage and defeat them. After that, he pressed the attack on the Merriweather and compelled its surrender. As the Tof crown prince had been captured on the ground by the Alliance forces there, the Nagai-Tof War was brought to an end.

New missions and failed businesses
"This is good-bye, old buddy. My political career in Cloud City has just come to an end!"

- Lando, to Han Solo, after losing control of Cloud City in a sabacc game

Calrissian was eventually persuaded to join a short-lived New Republic organization named SPIN&mdash;the Senate Planetary Intelligence Network&mdash;alongside Han, Leia, and Luke. SPIN's main task was to extinguish the threat of Trioculus and the Central Committee of Grand Moffs, who had laid claim to Palpatine's vacant throne; Calrissian used his history with the galactic criminal class to advise the New Republic on a number of matters, particularly during the rise of Trioculus. His main priority, however, lay with his business on Cloud City, and Calrissian only performed occasional errands for SPIN, spending most of his time on Bespin. During this time, Calrissian put great effort into reducing the amount of pollution in Cloud City, though the toxins produced by a local Imperial munitions factory allied with Trioculus meant that his efforts did not come to fruition. Calrissian sent Trioculus several messages requesting that he move his factory elsewhere, though the self-proclaimed Emperor refused, threatening to attack Cloud City if Calrissian persisted in his complaints.

During the pollution crisis, Calrissian allowed Luke Skywalker and Ken, the "Jedi Prince", to stay in one of his residences on Cloud City, though he was too busy to spend much time with his friends. While Luke and the others were staying on Bespin, Zorba Desilijic Tiure, Jabba's father, demanded that Calrissian hand over the Holiday Towers Hotel and Casino to him. Zorba had owned the Casino previously, and felt that it was still lawfully his. Eventually, the two reached a compromise, whereby they would play a game of sabacc for control of the entire Cloud City. Calrissian was confident of his chances, erroneously believing Zorba to be a poor player. Ultimately, the Hutt won the game; he had cheated, using his Hutt ability to see ultraviolet light while using a deck of secretly marked cards. Calrissian was forced to hand control of Cloud City to Zorba, and fled the planet.

Calrissian was not particularly perturbed; he decided to try his hand at several new businesses, including administrating Hologram Fun World. During his tenure as administrator, Lando ran into trouble when Han and Leia Organa Solo decided to elope there at the same time as Zorba the Hutt decided to attack his competitor; ultimately, however, Calrissian was able to repel the attack. After the dissolution of SPIN, Calrissian left Hologram Fun World to make investment elsewhere.

Upon receiving a call for help from Han Solo and Chewbacca who were on Kashyyyk battling the Empire, Lando and Luke Skywalker journeyed to help their friends and the Wookiees. Upon reaching the Wookiee homeworld, Lando found the Falcon on the forest floor abandoned. Reclaiming the vintage freighter, he, Luke and a group of X-wing pilots helped Solo, Chewie, and the Wookiees take Avatar Orbital Platform and rescue Attichitcuk.

In c. 5 ABY, Lando was put in charge of a rescue mission for the New Republic. Several Republic ships had been captured by pirates, and the Republic hoped to "send a thief to catch a thief," as Lando himself put it. He assembled a large team, Lando's Commandos, consisting of spacers, bounty hunters, smugglers, and the former Imperial officer Von Asch. Guided by another former Imperial named Kine, Lando and his team assaulted the pirate base, and were eventually able to defeat them. However, Von Asch was killed while saving Isolde Siro, a spacer, from Kine, who was a spy still working for the Empire. Upon returning to base, Lando was commended for his successful operation.

Nomad City
He had some success with mining through his mobile Nomad City&mdash;a walking mining platform&mdash;on the super hot world of Nkllon. However, Nkllon was raided in an Imperial raid led by Grand Admiral Thrawn in 9 ABY to steal his mole miners, despite the best efforts of Luke, Han, Leia, and his own defense forces. While his three friends were on Nkllon, Lando helped identify an old beckon-call for Luke and had Threepio reprogrammed to sound like Leia as part of a decoy operation. Lando and Han then went to Abregado-rae to meet a representative of Talon Karrde's, Fynn Torve. Torve sent them to Myrkr to meet with Karrde. While on Myrkr, Lando and Han became the first members of the New Republic to see Thrawn in person when they spied on him with a pair of electrobinoculars. Lando also deduced that Karrde had been holding Luke Skywalker hostage and participated in the subsequent ambush of the Imperial forces on Myrkr that rescued Luke. He had a tense moment with one of Karrde's associates, Aves, who was helping with the ambush, over the timing of the ambush and was wounded in the attack.

Thrawn would use the mole-miners he stole from Lando in an attempt to steal a large number of Rebel capital ships at Sluis Van. Returning to Sluis Van from Myrkr, Lando, Han, and Luke were caught up in the middle of the battle. After realizing what the Imperial admiral was planning, Lando used his command codes to drive the mole-miners into the ships to cripple them in order to prevent the ships' theft. At Sluis Van, Lando also confronted starship thief Niles Ferrier, preventing him from making his own grab at New Republic ships.

After this, Lando and Han Solo, operating from a lead garnered at New Cov while looking for evidence of Borsk Fey'lya's private operations, made contact with and recruited Garm Bel Iblis for the New Republic after Bel Iblis's private Dreadnaughts helped save them from an Imperial attack. While at Bel Iblis's base, Lando deduced that the ships that Bel Iblis was using had been part of the Katana fleet. In the race to reach the lost Dreadnaught fleet, Lando and Han searched out a contact named Hoffner on the Coral Vanda, but were ultimately unsuccessful in reaching him before the Empire did. Lando journeyed with a small team to the remaining ships, participating in the Battle for the Katana fleet from the Katana itself, fending off Imperial boarding teams.

Lando returned to Nkllon, but before he achieved much more progress he was attacked again by Thrawn's forces, who stole his entire stockpile of metals and severely damaged his complex. He and his miners were evacuated by Garm Bel Iblis, but the Nkllon complex was doomed. Returning to Coruscant, Lando was at the Imperial Palace when an Imperial Intelligence team penetrated the palace, intending to capture Leia Organa Solo's twins. With the help of Mara Jade and Garm Bel Iblis, Lando and the Palace Security defeated the intelligence team.

At the end of Thrawn's campaign, Lando played an important role in the destruction of the Imperial stronghold at Mount Tantiss on Wayland. In this mission, Calrissian would accompany Talon Karrde, Princess Leia, and a pair of vornskrs on the Wild Karrde to rescue Han, Luke, Mara Jade, R2-D2 and C-3PO. With the help of Chewbacca, Lando rigged an arrhythmic resonance scheme that destroyed the complex, ending the threat of the clones grown there.

Palpatine reborn
"I guess I just wasn't cut out to command Star Destroyers!"

- Lando

During the resurrection of Emperor Palpatine in 10 ABY, Lando accompanied Luke Skywalker on a hit-and-run mission to weaken the Imperial forces battling each other in the Battle of Coruscant. They were shot down, however, and were stranded in the midst of battle. Luckily, Han Solo and Leia Organa rushed to save them, only to find Luke unwilling to leave the planet. As a Force Storm attacked the party, Lando and the others escaped in the Millennium Falcon, leaving Luke behind to battle the storm. Soon thereafter, Lando and Wedge Antilles commanded the Rebel fleet from the Star Destroyer Emancipator during the Battle of Mon Calamari against the Imperial World Devastators. Unbeknownst to Lando, Luke had fallen to the dark side of the Force, and was in fact commanding the Imperial fleet. The Rebels were near defeat when the Falcon arrived, carrying amongst others R2-D2, who had acquired a code to shut the World Devastators down. As the gargantuan superweapons collapsed, the Rebel Alliance defeated the remaining Imperial troops.

Lando informed the New Republic leaders about a cargo of large X-1 Viper war droids being shipped from Balmorra to the Imperial headquarters on Byss. Lando led a group that included Wedge Antilles and New Republic commandos that hijacked a shipment of the new Vipers and hid in their cramped innards. After the Vipers were unloaded on Byss, the commandos activated them and advanced on the Emperor's Citadel. They were able to defeat the Imperial forces until huge mutant chrysalides were released. The New Republic force fled the droids to seek cover before the Vipers were defeated. Lando, Wedge and other surviving New Republic personnel were evacuated by Salla Zend and her friends as a chrysalide closed in.

Later Lando, Wedge Antilles, Kam Solusar, and R2-D2 would infiltrate Palpatine's flagship, Eclipse II over Onderon, in an attempt to destroy the massive vessel after boarding it using the Millennium Falcon. While dozens of Rebel starfighters launched a diversionary assault, the Rebel team successfully took control of the helm and R2-D2 jumped the ship back to the exact coordinates of Palpatine's Galaxy Gun orbiting Byss. As the two massive weapons collided, Lando and the other Rebels extracted under fire from the Imperial crew as the Galaxy Gun fired a final projectile into Byss, setting off an unstoppable nucleonic reaction. As Lando and rest of the Falcon's crew flew away, Byss was destroyed, as were the two most dangerous superweapons to date.

Kessel investment
"A shoot-out at the blob corral. Just the way I wanted to spend my vacation."

- Lando Calrissian on Umgul

Later in 11 ABY, Lando would help Luke Skywalker search for Force-sensitives to study at Luke's Jedi Academy. At the time, he had no investments&mdash;while the Nkllon facility had been reclaimed, it was not as profitable following the Sluis Van attack and Lando had lost it in a sabacc game. During the search, Lando, along with C-3PO and R2-D2, was led to the Umgullian Blob races in search of a possible Force-sensitive who had won considerable fortunes betting on the blob races. The candidate, Dack (also known as Tymmo), turned out to be a cheater on the blob races instead of a Force-sensitive, and Lando helped expose him. When Calrissian went to confront Tymmo at the blob stables, he found that the man had planted something on one of the blobs. Tymmo did not take kindly to being discovered and a short firefight at the corral ensued before security forces arrived to subdue him. Rather than suffer the usual death penalty for cheating, Dack was returned to his wife Mistal, the Duchess of Dargul. As a reward for Lando's help in returning her husband, Mistal gave him one million credits.

Lando was later called in, along with Luke Skywalker, to help find Han and Chewbacca after the two had disappeared following a diplomatic mission to Kessel. Taking the Lady Luck, Calrissian and Skywalker posed as businessmen seeking to invest in the mines. With this cover, they investigated the moon and its administrator, Moruth Doole. Finding the Millennium Falcon in Doole's private fleet, the two ersatz "businessmen" confronted Doole, who fired at them and ran off the ship. In response, Luke and Lando took the ship and fled, though Lando was forced to leave the Lady Luck on Kessel. They were pursued by the rest of Doole's ships and fled towards the Maw, when the Sun Crusher&mdash;piloted by Han, Chewbacca, and Kyp Durron, who had recently escaped from a secret Imperial research base inside the Maw&mdash;burst out, followed by Admiral Daala's fleet. The New Republic heroes escaped in the confused brawl that ensued between Doole's and Daala's ships. After the Sun Crusher and the Falcon returned to Coruscant, Lando decided that the spice mines of Kessel were his next investment; with a million credits at his disposal, he only needed to wrest control of the facility from Moruth Doole. As Admiral Daala's fleet had largely destroyed Doole's meager fleet, Lando anticipated little trouble in doing so.

Shortly thereafter, Lando and Han also traded control of the Falcon three more times over games of sabacc. Calrissian had lost his own craft on Kessel and felt that he was entitled to some compensation from Solo, who disagreed. When Lando accused Han Solo of cheating in the original game in which Solo had won the Millennium Falcon, Solo angrily offered to replay their game. Calrissian won their first match, leaving Han to take diplomatic transport.

However, when Lando next encountered Solo again on Coruscant, Mara Jade was also present, and Lando found himself attracted to the former Imperial assassin. However, Jade coldly rebuffed Lando's charms, leaving him to contemplate how to best attract her attentions. While Lando was making repairs to the Falcon, Han Solo arrived in the hangar bay, demanding passage to Mon Calamari to rescue Leia. Lando agreed, but insisted on flying. En route, Lando suggested playing sabacc for the Millennium Falcon again. Solo agreed, and this time the Corellian won the vessel back from Lando. The pair arrived at Calamari, and Solo was able to rescue his wife, returning her to Coruscant.

Not long afterward, Lando asked Solo to borrow the Falcon. Kyp Durron, who had fallen to the dark side, had seized Mara Jade's Z-95 Headhunter on Yavin 4, leaving her stranded. Calrissian sought to elevate himself in her eyes by offering her a ride, and Solo relented, coming along to visit Luke. Although Mara agreed to journey in the Falcon, she adamantly ignored Lando's advances. With little else to do, Calrissian and Solo played one final game of sabacc for the Falcon. In their third game, Lando won the prized ship from Han, but gave it to Solo forever in order to impress Mara Jade.

Lando continued to try and attract Mara Jade once the Millennium Falcon had returned to Coruscant, but he also started a venture with the Smuggler's Alliance to take over the Kessel mines. Still short a vessel, Lando once again tagged along with Han Solo while Solo went to search for the renegade Kyp Durron, hoping to make it to Kessel within a week. Solo and Calrissian were able to track Durron, who had stolen the Sun Crusher and gone on a rampage of destruction and found the Dark Jedi near the galactic Core. While Solo attempted to reason with Durron, Lando sought to override the Sun Crusher with a set of control codes. Though he was able to do so, Durron quickly bypassed the override and threatened to destroy the Falcon. However, across the galaxy, Luke's Jedi apprentices were able to defeat the spirit of Exar Kun, who had been influencing Durron. With that influence removed, Durron surrendered and agreed to be transferred by Han and Lando back to Coruscant, along with the Sun Crusher. After that, Solo agreed to take Calrissian to Kessel.

By the time Lando arrived at Kessel, the Smuggler's Alliance, led by Mara Jade, had already secured the Garrison Moon. After Calrissian arrived, Lando and the Smuggler's Alliance journeyed down to the planet to seize the mines from Doole. Jade also returned Lando's Lady Luck to him, greatly pleasing Calrissian. Finding the planet largely deserted and somewhat damaged from an Imperial attack, Lando was only opposed by Doole in the prison fortress. With the aid of Zakarisz Ghent, Lando was able to bypass the defenses and breach the interior to confront Doole, who perished in the crossfire between the smugglers and his own larvae. Lando and Jade had just finished taking over the mines when the Death Star prototype emerged from the Maw and blew up Kessel's moon. Leading the smugglers and pirates, Lando and Mara attacked the Death Star prototype, but were unable to keep it from re-entering the Maw Cluster. Lando and Mara pursued the prototype, with Lando, Solo, and Jade flying into its superstructure. Deep inside, near the reactor, Calrissian and Jade, clad in vacuum suits, planted timed detonators. However, they were attacked by spacetroopers and were forced to flee, which resulted in most of the charges being disarmed. As the Millennium Falcon roared out of the prototype, they realized that they were deep inside the Maw, where New Republic forces under Wedge Antilles were engaging Admiral Daala's vessel. With the Falcon flying cover for a redeemed Kyp Durron in the Sun Crusher, Calrissian, Solo, and Jade were able to help lure the prototype into a black hole, where it was destroyed, along with the Sun Crusher, though Kyp Durron ejected and was retrieved by the Falcon. Despite the setback of the garrison moon's loss, Calrissian and Jade continued mining operations and Calrissian installed Nien Nunb as the mines' new administrator.

Lando was with Mara when he received a call from Han Solo, who was on Belsavis. Leia had gone missing while they were on a search for the children of the Jedi, and Han had called Mara for more information about her activities on Belsavis as Emperor's Hand. It was then that Mara realized that she had been tricked by the Emperor into thinking she was the only Emperor's Hand; she hadn't been on Belsavis at the time Solo had specified. Lando was shocked at the sight of her fury, and she left him to journey to Belsavis for a time to deal with the other Hand. Some time during this period, Lando would also invest in a pleasure craft on Coruscant's artificial seas.

Run-in with the Imperial Remnant
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm sitting in a cell. How about you?"

- Lando Calrissian to Kyle Katarn

In 12 ABY, Cloud City was overrun with mercenaries, criminals and thugs. Lando took it upon himself to track down their leader. After a few card games and bar fights, he was led to Reelo Baruk on Nar Shaddaa. The moment he heard of a Remnant agent called Desann, Lando was captured and placed into one of Reelo's holding cells. Fortunately for Lando, Kyle Katarn was also looking for Reelo Baruk. He freed Lando Calrissian from Baruk's hold and eventually Katarn and Calrissian managed to find the Lady Luck and refuel her using pipelines. When they were about to make their escape from Nar Shaddaa, Reelo attacked them with a handful of mercenaries. The criminal used a gun platform to hit the ship while his thugs boarded the ship, but Katarn leaped into the laser turret of the Lady Luck and shot down the gangster. Lando, finally able to call for help, signaled the New Republic with the news that the Imperial Remnant was on Cloud City. Lando dropped Kyle off in the lower levels while he organized the security forces to drive Reelo's remaining thugs and the Remnant off.

In the same year, an outbreak of the Death Seed plague and the disappearance of Chief of State Organa Solo caused Han Solo to recruit Lando to accompany him on a desperate search to find Leia. Lando and Han, onboard the Falcon were searching on Damonite Yors B when they discovered the remains of a New Republic warship, with a few badly injured survivors. Taking the survivors back to nearby Nim Drovis, they unloaded them to the nearest medical facility. While outside the ship, Han got caught up in inter-tribal warfare, but made it back to the Falcon, where Lando and Chewbacca were waiting. Leaving Nim Drovis, they finally managed to wrangle a small New Republic fleet to go to Nam Chorios to rescue Leia, with the aid of a forged holo of her. Arriving over the planet, Lando and Han participated in a frantic battle against Loronar Corporation's CCIR Needles and Moff Getelles's fleet, though victory was only achieved after Admiral Daala, thought to be dead, attacked Getelles and Luke Skywalker shut down the Needles.

Black Fleet Crisis
In 16 ABY, Lando found himself with nothing to occupy his time; Mara Jade had resisted all of his advances thus far and he was still fairly flush with money from his reward from Duchess Mistal. With no better diversion, Lando infiltrated the Alpha Blue headquarters to meet with his friend Admiral Hiram Drayson to ask him for a challenging task. Drayson agreed to his request and freshly reactivated Calrissian's rank as a general. Drayson showed him images of the mysterious Teljkon Vagabond, a large, powerful, and entirely mysterious vessel. New Republic Intelligence assets had been trailing the vessel for some time, and Drayson wanted Lando to accompany a team commanded by Colonel Pakkpekatt to board the vessel in an attempt to determine what it was and its intention. Lando readily agreed and began preparing for his trip.

Journeying to Yavin 4, Lando convinced R2-D2 and C-3PO to come with them, claiming that Luke Skywalker had let him borrow their services. In fact, Luke had done nothing of the sort, but Lando did not reveal that detail to either the droids or Streen, the Jedi who was responsible for them. Departing Yavin 4, Lando next took the Lady Luck to Bespin, where he was able to persuade the new administrator of Cloud City, Lobot, to accompany his expedition, and with surprising ease. All Lobot required in exchange for his assistance was the various objects and furnishings that Lando had left in the administrator's office and never retrieved. Lando agreed and Lobot joined Lando's team.

At the rendezvous point, Lando flew the Lady Luck to meet up with the other six vessels of the task force, led by the Belarus-class cruiser Glorious. After docking the Lady Luck with the Glorious, Lando met Colonel Pakkpekatt and quickly established that he and his party would have an active role in mission, preventing Pakkpekatt from relegating him to the role of observer.

When the Glorious and its escort first approached the unknown vessel in the Gmar Askilon system, Lando was initially annoyed at Pakkpekatt's cautious approach, as twenty-two days passed without their team attempting to make contact with the vessel. Eventually, an unmanned ferret was sent in closer to the vagabond to investigate. As it did so, the vagabond sent out a melodic communication pulse and then jumped to hyperspace after it received no response. Lando asked Threepio to analyze the transmission, but while the sound was similar to one that had been recorded as coming from the vagabond earlier, it did not exist within the protocol droid's databases, nor any other. Thanks to an interdiction field established by Pakkpekatt, the vagabond did not jump a great distance, and while the fleet closed to their usual following distances, Lando and Pakkpekatt disagreed over the best way to approach the vessel. Pakkpekatt sought to launch boarding teams to investigate the alien craft, while Lando felt that more time and caution was needed before approaching the vagabond.

Lando and his team were able to conjecture that the ship was of Qella origin, and that its communications pulse was part of the Qellan genetic code. Retrieving the rest of the code from a data archive, Lando felt that his plan was far superior to that of Pakkpekatt. With time until the boarding parties were launched, Lando detached the Lady Luck from the Glorious without permission, bringing it in close to the alien vessel. With Pakkpekatt unwilling to fire weapons or use a tractor beam in the vicinity of the vagabond, Lando was able to transmit the rest of the Qellan genetic sequence to the vessel, which responded by placing a secondary shield around the Lady Luck, protecting it from the Glorious 's tractor beam.

Lando, Lobot, R2-D2, and C-3PO, now isolated from the rest of the New Republic task force, were able to dock with the Qellan ship. After suiting up against the atmosphere, Lando entered, followed by the droids. In order to gain access to the rest of the ship, Lobot provided Artoo with a set of perceptual parameters that would display the interior from the viewpoint of a genetic relative of the Qella. The result was a handle that Lando degloved and touched. Immediately following this, the Qellan ship sliced free of the Lady Luck, destroyed an interdiction picket, and jumped to hyperspace.

Trapped inside the ship, Lando and his party used a cutting blaster to gain entry in another part of the mysterious vagabond. The ship, detecting the breach, dropped out of hyperspace and attempted to vent them, but Lando was narrowly able to scramble through the hole that they had cut before the ship's self-sealing bulkheads repaired the breach, protecting them from decompression. They attempted to explore the vessel, but the featureless corridors and lack of gravity, the constantly changing interior walls, random arrangement of the ship, and dynamic external length of the vagabond made for slow going. When the ship finally reverted to realspace, Lando and his party found a sort of control panel. However, Threepio touched it inadvertently and received a significant electric jolt that rendered the protocol droid inoperable. Lando quickly realized that they had returned to realspace and attached a limpet to the vessel's outer hull while Artoo attempted to repair C-3PO. Rejoining the others, the party moved out of the conduits, which they realized were linked to the weapons systems and thus not a safe place to be.

Recalling that it had been a touch of Lando's hand that had first activated the ship, Lando and Lobot proceeded to remove their suit gloves and touch the wall surfaces, which immediately reformed into various constructions and even a doorway. Exploring the resulting chambers that opened up when certain surfaces were touched, Lando discovered that the interior of the ship had been set up to display Qellan history lessons. Lando also discovered that the ship was alive; a living museum of the Qellan people and it had adjusted its atmosphere to suit the needs of its human visitors. However, they were still in deep space and completely isolated from Pakkpekatt's fleet.

Their period of discovery and exploration was interrupted by an Imperial frigate, which attacked the vagabond with an ion cannon battery. The vagabond returned fire, easily destroying the Imperial vessel, before fleeing into hyperspace, but Lando's limpet had been fried by the ion cannon barrage. During their journey, Lando was confronted by the rest of his group, who were concerned that their chances of rescue were diminishing. Lando informed them that his mission priorities differed from Pakkpekatt's and that he also still had a beckon call for the Lady Luck, which would bring the yacht. However, he was unwilling to use the call before he was able to ensure that the vagabond would not attack it.

Still, peace was not to be had for Lando and his team of explorers. After the Qellan vessel dropped out of hyperspace, it was soon attacked by the Gorath, an Imperial vessel seeking to avenge the lost frigate that had been destroyed earlier. The damage was significant and, anxious, Threepio activated the beckon call. Lando was irate at the idea of bringing an unmanned vessel into a combat zone, and left with Lobot and Artoo to inspect the damage. While the vagabond had managed to destroy the chamber, it had sustained heavy damage. Lando's problems were compounded when Lobot and Artoo left him to inspect some previously undiscovered interior passages that Lobot surmised led to a control nexus.

After observing the vessel repair itself, Lando was summoned back by Lobot, who wanted him to enter into the internal passages that the cyborg had found. Lando somewhat irritably complied, making his way through a series of narrow passageways to Lobot's location. There, he found that Lobot had removed half of his neural interface band and plugged it into the Qellan ship in a location that Lobot referred to as the place of awareness. Lobot then informed Calrissian that the damaged ship was returning to its home, bearing the seeds of Qellan civilization, and also that the vessel was returning to Maltha Obex, the ancestral system of the Qella. There was little for Lando to do but explore the biological ship further.

As the vessel orbited the barren ice world of Maltha Obex, Lando realized from a viewport that the Lady Luck, which had been commandeered by Pakkpekatt, and an archaeological expedition were present. However, the relay satellites used by the expedition were interpreted as false by the vagabond, which destroyed them and forced Pakkpekatt and his small crew of volunteers to keep the planet between the Lady Luck and the mysterious vessel. Finally, help arrived in the form of Luke Skywalker, who used a Fallanassi illusion technique to approach the vessel with a cargo of supplies and one passenger, a scientist named Doctor Joto Eckels from the expedition. Skywalker was able to reach the vessel and rescue Lando and his party. The Jedi, together with the scientist, also realized that the Qellan vessel was awaiting a thaw of the now-frozen planet. Using Lobot's communication interface, Skywalker was able to convince the vagabond to use its weapons to melt the thick ice and begin the thawing process while he cloaked the planet in an illusion. For his part, Lando was grateful to have access to food, water, and shelter again, and played little part in the final stages of the expedition.

Almanian crisis
"Great rescue. Excellent rescue. In fact, the best rescue I've ever experienced."

- Lando Calrissian, speaking sarcastically to Han Solo after Han's rescue attempt of him from Nandreeson went awry

During the Almanian Crisis in 17 ABY, Lando had just dropped off Mara Jade, whom he was still somewhat affiliated with, so she could run an errand with Talon Karrde in the Minos Cluster. On his way back, he encountered a derelict freighter, the Spicy Lady, normally piloted by Jarril. Linking his own craft to the Spicy Lady's holocams, he found that Jarril had been killed by a blaster shot at close range, apparently by stormtroopers, as a stormtrooper helmet was floating in the ship also. However, he also found evidence that Han had possibly known about the bombing on the Senate Hall that had not long before rocked Coruscant.

Lando immediately went to Chief of State Leia Organa Solo's residence on Coruscant where he finally managed to get through to Leia, who was still recovering from the bombing. Lando hoped to find Han on Coruscant, but the Corellian had gone to Smuggler's Run in search of information. Lando's sense of urgency was temporarily deflated by that news, as Nandreeson&mdash;whom Lando had once stolen weapons from twenty years earlier&mdash;was still alive and nursing both a bitter hatred and a bounty on Calrissian's head, and his lair was in Smuggler's Run. However, Lando put aside his fear of Nandreeson to go try and save Han, as he believed the message in Jarril's ship meant that Han might be targeted.

As Lando approached the run, he faked damage to the Lady Luck after sending a message to Mara in case of his disappearance in order to gain access to the Run. Lando arrived on Skip 1, where he was met by Sinewy Ana Blue, who warned him that Nandreeson was probably aware of his presence. His former associates on Smuggler's Run were also less than welcoming, treating him with open suspicion, even as he tried to discreetly find out what Han had been up to without revealing his purpose to the smugglers. Unfortunately, a group of Rek bounty hunters&mdash;at least thirty&mdash;arrived with weapons and captured him for transport to Nandreeson on Skip 6. Lando had no chance to put up a fight and the smugglers, including Ana Blue, Zeen Afit, and Kid DXo'ln made no move to protect him.

The Reks conducted him to Skip 6 and unceremoniously threw him into a slime pool to await Nandreeson's twenty years of stored up retribution. Nandreeson and his Glottalphib henchmen kept him in the pool, where he desperately treaded water in an attempt to stay alive, though Nandreeson intended for him to drown after becoming too exhausted to stay awake. The Glottalphib also refused any offers from Lando to bargain for his life and Lando forced himself to stay afloat as he was taunted and tormented by his captor.

Fortunately, Han&mdash;who was free and unharmed&mdash;found out about Lando's presence when he spotted a group of smugglers stripping the Lady Luck. Han recruited a gang of reluctant smugglers, including Blue, Wynni, Kid, and Zeen to help him rescue Calrissian, but Kid, Zeen, and Wynni betrayed him when they arrived at Nandreeson's slime pool, turning their weapons on Solo, as Nandreeson had hired them to help capture Han in an extension of his revenge against Lando. Lando, for his part, was unsurprised by Nandreeson's plan and threw several sarcastic comments at Han for his lack of foresight. A brawl broke out between Nandreeson's goons and hirelings and Han's diminished rescue party, and Lando began wrestling with Kid. With Han's help, he defeated Kid, then took his blaster and fired a shot into the ceiling of the cave, which was lined with watumba bats. The aggravated bats, natural predators of Glottalphibs, swooped down as Lando, Han, and Chewie made their escape. Before they could climb out of the slime pool, Nandreeson dove into the pool and attempted to kill Lando, but Han fought off the crime lord while Chewie dispatched him with a bowcaster quarrel. Lando, Chewie, Han, and Ana Blue then made their escape on Nandreeson's ship back to Skip One.

There, Han and Lando reclaimed their ships, though Lando was outraged by the damage done to his ship. As they were repairing the Lady Luck, a number of droids that had been stolen from various New Republic sources exploded, as they had been built as part of a plan to sabotage droids and computers across the New Republic. The droids had been stolen by various smugglers and now their confiscation came back to haunt them when their illicitly acquired property killed and maimed many of them. Han and Lando, despite the fact that many of the denizens of Smuggler's Run had betrayed them to the point that Blue had lured them here so the mastermind behind the plot could use Han to get at Leia and Luke, opened up their vessels to ferry the injured to Wrea, the nearest inhabited world with the medical capacity to treat the numerous casualties.

Lando soon after received a distress call from C-3PO on Telti and he brought the Lady Luck to pick up Threepio, R2-D2, and Cole Fardreamer, a mechanic with whom the droids had helped stop the factory that had been producing the explosive-packed droids by deactivating all the detonators across the galaxy before they could be activated. After this incident, Lando sold the Kessel mines to Nien Numb, taking up other ventures instead.

First Corellian Insurrection
As of 18 ABY, Lando used his business sense for more altruistic purposes when he created Dometown&mdash;safe, affordable subterranean housing on Coruscant. That same year, with the reluctant help of Luke Skywalker, Lando set up a series of visits with wealthy women in order to find one to marry. One of them was Karia Ver Seryan of Leria Kerlsil, a "life-bearer" (or "life-witch"), who had the power to give men very good health for a time—usually 3-5 years—with the tradeoff that they would die as soon as the period ended. Lando almost unknowingly bound himself to the life-witch when R2-D2 and C-3PO arrived and explained the truth to Lando. Rather shaken, Lando continued his search for a prospective bride, but his next prospect turned out to already be married. To forestall any further "surprises", Lando made a holocomm call to his next prospect: Tendra Risant of Sacorria. Upon meeting her, Lando was very impressed and definitely wanted to deepen the relationship, although he was surprised to find he liked her for more than just money. However, the governing Sacorrian Triad had made it illegal for a Sacorrian to marry an offworlder. The Triad chased Luke and Lando off the planet, but not before Lando was able to provide Tendra with a radionics communication device.

Luke and Lando returned to Coruscant with the disturbing news of a Corellian interdiction field, which shut down hyperspace travel in the entire system. Calrissian and Skywalker themselves only narrowly managed to escape being caught by it before they left the system. After being escorted through a hazardous path into a secret underground government headquarters, Calrissian and Skywalker were advised by Mon Mothma to request the aid of Bakura's fleet to assist in efforts to stabilize a rapidly deteriorating Corellian system, which had fallen under a system-wide interdiction field. Additionally, the Solo family had been there when the entire Corellian system had become embroiled in chaos, rioting, and terrorism. Lando accompanied Luke to Bakura, ferrying him on the Lady Luck to meet with Captison, who agreed not only to dispatch a Bakuran fleet, but also accompanied it. The two would return to the Corellian system on board the Bakuran war fleet dispatched to find out what was happening in the system. Shortly after they arrived, the Bakuran fleet engaged a number of light Pocket Patrol Boats, with Lando participating in the skirmish from the Lady Luck. He also was surprised to find that Tendra was in the system, attempting to reach him via the radionics set he had left her. Lando survived the battle, though one of the Bakuran ships, the Watchkeeper was destroyed by a planetary repulsor over Selonia.

Approaching Centerpoint Station, Lando, Luke, R2-D2, C-3PO, Gaeriel Captison, and New Republic Intelligence agent Belindi Kalenda boarded the massive structure in an attempt to figure out why it was destroying stars, a critical part of the Starbuster Plot. However, they found the entire station unoccupied except for one staff member, Jenica Sonsen, who was ignorant of the entire plan. Upon reaching the center of the station, once known as Hollowtown, they realized that the whole area was heating up and would soon be lethal to Humans. Lando's toxic air training came in handy as he was the first one to reach the elevator car they would use to escape the increasingly hot and toxic atmosphere.

Lando would later rescue Tendra, who was single-handedly providing the New Republic and the Bakuran fleet with intelligence on the Triad fleet from her ship Gentleman Caller. She was code named "Source T" by intelligence operatives. They escaped the ensuing battle unscathed and spent more time together on Selonia, and Lando, who had fallen deeply in love with Tendra, asked her to marry him, and she agreed.

Caamas Document Crisis
Following his subsequent marriage to Tendra, Lando opened an underwater mining/tourist attraction on Varn, but had difficulty finding ways to protect his shipments from pirates. Lando, while on Bothawui, gave Diamala Senator Porolo Miatamia a ride back to his homeworld after he was cut off from his ship, hoping to discuss the possibility of Diamalan protection for his mining shipments. En route, they were interdicted by the Empire and the Lady Luck was brought onboard an Imperial Star Destroyer, where Grand Admiral Thrawn reappeared to them. Thrawn, after a short discussion, released them with an offer to the New Republic to let Thrawn investigate the brewing Caamas Document crisis. Lando took this report back to the New Republic, which alarmed the government greatly.

Lando served the New Republic during the Caamas Document crisis in several ways, going with Han Solo, Lobot, and the Verpine slicer Moegid on a mission to the Imperial Remnant's capital Bastion in an effort to retrieve the document. Lando was reluctant to go, but he was aware of the potential ramifications of a galactic civil war and a resurgent Empire. They were able to reach the Imperial capital of Bastion, but were unable to find the file. When they were discovered, Calrissian, Solo, and Lobot evaded local security officers in an attempt to reach Moegid and their ship. Lando caused a distraction by firing a slug thrower into the ceiling of a crowded building, and, evading pursuit, Han, Lobot, and Lando arrived back at the spaceport only to find Thrawn and a large cordon of stormtroopers waiting for them. Thrawn gave them a copy of the Caamas Document and allowed them to leave, astonishing both Han and Lando. However, they would later find the Caamas Document given to them by Thrawn was a fake. They arrived back at Bothawui, only to find that warships on both sides of the issue had drawn battle lines and a full scale battle was imminent. Lando was onboard a Diamala warship when the Second Battle of Bothawui started and was instrumental in convincing Senator Miatamia to investigate an anomaly near a comet, which was actually a cloaked Imperial Star Destroyer. Following the discovery of three cloaked Star Destroyers, Lando led the suddenly united fleet against the Imperials at the request of Ponc Gavrisom and defeated them.

Lando would also later be invited to the Wedding of Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade on Coruscant. Prior to the wedding, Calrissian attended a raucous bachelor party for Luke Skywalker at a Coruscant cantina. When a bar fight broke out, Calrissian, along with Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, several Jedi, Talon Karrde and three Rogue Squadron veterans quickly dealt with the combatants and escaped before local media was attracted to the altercation.

GemDiver Station
"You need to broaden your horizons-learn about the way commerce works in the New Republic. That'll give you some useful knowledge, in case your lightsabers ever fail."

- Lando Calrissian to the Solo twins and Lowbacca

In 23 ABY, Lando opened a Corusca gem mining station over Yavin, known as GemDiver Station with the aid of Lobot. When the Solo twins and Lowbacca planned to visit, Lando agreed to let the young people assist in the mining process and was happy to show them around the station, having assured Luke Skywalker that they would be safe. Lando had taken numerous security precautions with the station, including security satellites, automated cargo pods, and guard droids. Then, taking the Jedi hopefuls down into the swirling storms of Yavin in a mining pod known as the Fast Hand, Lando embarked on a mining trip and Jacen Solo was able to catch one of the rare corusca gems. Upon their return, though, GemDiver Station was attacked by the Second Imperium using a boarding shuttle equipped with corusca gem teeth to breach the station, who kidnapped the Solo twins and Lowbacca while they were taking a tour of the station. Despite Lando's best attempts, the Second Imperium kidnappers, with their captives in tow, got away, with Lando stunned by the invading troops. Feeling bad about what happened, Lando lent the blockade runner Off Chance to Luke Skywalker, so that the Jedi Master could find the culprits. However, the young Jedi eventually managed to escape from their captors and returned, warning of a group known as the Shadow Academy that sought to train a new wave of Dark Jedi. For his part, Lando was distraught that his own gems had been used by the Shadow Academy to penetrate his station's defenses and planned to upgrade the station to avoid repeating another such incident.

During the Battle of the Jedi Praxeum, Lando led his private fleet to aid in the defense of the Jedi Praxeum against the Second Imperium. While the Jedi engaged the Dark Jedi trainees on the surface of Yavin 4, Lando's fleet, along with a small group of New Republic vessels, engaged the Imperium ships. After the Imperium ships were defeated thanks to programming changes made to their friend-or-foe transponders by Jaina Solo, Lando brought Jaina down in his ship to lend aid to Luke Skywalker on the surface. By that time, the battle was largely over, so Lando helped evacuate the casualties among the Jedi.

Using income from his profitable GemDiver venture, Lando opened the SkyCenter Galleria on Bespin, partnering with a former smuggler associate of his named Cojahn. Lando also contacted the Solos and received permission for their children to accompany him to Bespin to help test out the new entertainment center. He ended up bringing not only the Solo twins, but also Zekk, Lowbacca, Tenel Ka, and Anja Gallandro, after promising Luke Skywalker not to allow any kidnappings. However, upon arrival at Cloud City, Lando was informed that Cojahn had died, apparently by committing suicide. Lando was deeply disturbed by this news, losing much of his enthusiasm for the SkyCenter after the death of Cojahn. The young Jedi Knights agreed to investigate his death, though, suspecting foul play. While eating a meal with the young people, Lando noted that Anja Gallandro failed to show up and also that she displayed symptoms of addiction to andris. While touring a swamp attraction, Lando also learned of a possible connection between Cojahn's death and a band that had been booked for the SkyCenter, Figrin D'an and the Modal Nodes. Upon this discovery, Lando decided to go to the Bith homeworld of Clak'dor VII, suspecting that the band had disappeared somewhere on the planet. He decided to take Jaina Solo and Zekk with him, promising the others that he would return quickly.

Contacting some of Figris D'an's gambling partners on Clak'dor VII, Lando quickly obtained information on the whereabouts of the band. Once confronted, D'an revealed that he and his band were on the run from a revitalized Black Sun organization, who was also implicated in Cojahn's death. Returning to Cloud City, Lando learned from Jacen Solo that the new leader of Black Sun, Czethros, had personally slain Cojahn. While investigating, Lando was summoned to help a labor dispute with some Ugnaught workers. However, the summons was actually cover for a Black Sun. Only quick action by Zekk, Jaina, and Anja Gallandro saved their lives. Eventually, Lando and his Jedi companions managed to kill or frighten off some of their pursuers and trap some of the others in the attractions in the SkyCenter. Once they returned to Lando's quarters, Lando was able to expose the Black Sun conspiracy to take control of Cloud City, though Czethros had disappeared. Thanking the Jedi apprentices for their aid, he returned them to Yavin 4. The Jedi would later completely defeat Czethros and his organization, freeing Lando's investments from the specter of Black Sun control. He would also later hire Anja Gallandro as a pilot for his companies, as she showed little Force potential in becoming a Jedi Knight. Lando later sold the Galleria in exchange for a controlling interest of two Outer Rim planets: Dubrillion and Destrillion.

Early efforts
With Tendra, Lando ran a mining operation on Dubrillion and Destrillion, where many smugglers came to train in the asteroids surrounding the planets. At the beginning of the Yuuzhan Vong War, Lando asked Han and Chewbacca to make a supply run to Sernpidal, which resulted in the Wookiee's death. Lando felt extreme guilt because of this, and made sure he did all he could to stop the invading Yuuzhan Vong. Unfortunately, as the Yuuzhan Vong invasion swelled in scope and magnitude, he was forced to evacuate Dubrillion, sending the refugees to Dantooine, though that planet soon also fell under Yuuzhan Vong attack.

He oversaw the construction of Shelter base, a space station hidden deep inside the Maw, which housed Jedi children and apprentices. Lando met Han Solo, Leia Organa Solo, and Jacen Solo at the rudimentary Shelter base shortly after Jacen rescued his mother from Warmaster Tsavong Lah. The three had journeyed to Shelter to meet a Hutt representative, as well as other trade guilds who helped Lando fund Shelter, to discuss plans for the Great River network. Lando additionally provided intelligence on Peace Brigade activities. The collaborationist body had asked Lando for help in hunting down Jedi and covering their convoys, which Calrissian flatly rejected.

Calrissian was also responsible for establishing Tendrando Arms, which manufactured YVH 1 droids that were considered instrumental in fighting the Yuuzhan Vong. The heavily armed droids were specifically designed to resemble Yuuzhan Vong warriors and spoke in a booming facsimile of Calrissian's own voice. During a demonstration of his new droids to various New Republic officials, including Chief of State Borsk Fey'lya, General Garm Bel Iblis, and General Wedge Antilles, several Yuuzhan Vong infiltrators launched an attack. While Lando's YVH droid tried to stop them, its weapons were not fully equipped and was unable to do so. This "failure" gave Lando some initial difficulty in marketing his droids to Defense Force members.

When the Jedi decided to launch the Mission to Myrkr, Lando and Tendra posed as Yuuzhan Vong sympathizers and journeyed to Talfaglio to deliver the seventeen Jedi, including all three of the Solo children, to the Yuuzhan Vong. The strike team was delivered without a hitch, and went on to continue their mission with the aid of two YVH droids. Lando would later feel considerable guilt for helping deliver many of the Jedi, including Leia's son Anakin, to their deaths on this mission.

Fall of Coruscant
Returning to Coruscant, Lando continued to purvey his droids to the New Republic, giving one to the Solos. When Leia felt the disturbance in the Force caused by her son Anakin's death on Myrkr, and then Han realized what had happened, Lando helped them both through their grief. As Coruscant came under attack by the Yuuzhan Vong, Lando was on board the Orbital Defense Headquarters and advised the commander, General Ba'tra, to deactivate the orbital minefields and allow the Yuuzhan Vong, preceded by captured refugee ships, through the minefield into the planetary shields. Ba'tra, recognizing Lando's tactic, reactivated his General's commission and Lando implemented the order. As more Yuuzhan Vong ships followed the refugee ships and advance units, Lando reactivated the mines, sowing chaos and destruction into the assault wave. However, his efforts were ultimately in vain and Lando and General Ba'tra evacuated in the Lady Luck. From there, they received word that treacherous Senator Viqi Shesh's star yacht Byrt was fleeing the besieged planet with a kidnapped Ben Skywalker and C-3PO. Lando, through use of a clever Bothan runaway gambit, was able to approach the Byrt and attach onto it. Sending YVH droids in first, Lando and Ba'tra effectively neutralized Shesh and the other escorts and rescued Ben and C-3PO, though Shesh did escape. Retrieving the young Skywalker, Lando sent a triumphant message informing Ben's parents, aunt, and uncle of his rescue, much to their relief. However, as Coruscant was rapidly being overrun by the Vong, Lando, too, withdrew from the battle.

Following the fall of Coruscant, Lando served with distinction in the Second Battle of Borleias when he, along with some New Republic engineers and YVH droids, successfully destroyed a Yuuzhan Vong rakamat. Once the New Republic was established on Borleias, Calrissian, along with Jedi Knight Alema Rar and Rogue Squadron, participated in a trap against a Yuuzhan Vong warship that had been hunting refugee ships. Using sensor equipment developed by scientist Danni Quee, Lando and Alema determined that the Yuuzhan Vong were hunting the ships through inside information after Danni's sensor revealed no tracking creatures. They also lured a Yuuzhan Vong boarding party in an ambush of YVH droids while Rogue Squadron dealt with the Vong frigate.

Lando would later help insert Luke Skywalker, Mara Jade, Tahiri Veila, and Wraith Squadron into occupied Coruscant, now known as Yuuzhan'tar. Calrissian felt that he needed to be more active in aiding the war effort, so he and a YVH droid piloted the patched-together transport Record Time over to Coruscant. Once in orbit, Calrissian jettisoned orbital insertion pods containing the infiltration team of Jedi and Wraiths and then escaped in a waiting B-wing starfighter, narrowly escaping death from the orbiting Vong ships. He then returned to Borleias, where the defenders had just repulsed a significant Yuuzhan Vong thrust, and had a celebration with his friends over their joint successes. Later, he aided Talon Karrde in "persuading" important Senators to elect Cal Omas, the pro-Jedi candidate, as Chief of State. Lando and Karrde would approach a supporter of the main opposition candidate, Fyor Rodan, and offer him supplies for their refugee constituents. The senators would often think that they were being bribed and responded in such a way as to incriminate themselves. Calrissian and Karrde recorded these conversations and were thus able to influence a number of senators to change their votes in favor of Omas.

The War's End
"I only charge enough to keep me from looking foolish. Anyway, my businesses won't run without communications, either. And there's plenty of competition-the Smugglers' Alliance loves this sort of work. Appeals to the romantic in them."

- Lando Calrissian, on his courier service

After Omas's election and the subsequent formation of the Galactic Alliance, Lando continued to serve against the Yuuzhan Vong invasion. He found that with the fall of the Holonet, his services as a courier were highly valued by the new government. On a visit to Mon Calamari, Lando also informed Han Solo that a modified dovin basal was responsible for the collapse of the galactic communications network. In his work, Lando was sometimes partnered with the Smugglers' Alliance and almost always accompanied by his YVH 1 droids.

When Han, Leia, Kyp Durron, Wraw, and Meloque were investigating rumors that Caluula was being used as a staging area for an attack on Dac, they found themselves captured by the Yuuzhan Vong. It was Lando, Talon Karrde, Shada D'ukal and other smugglers who saved them from being sacrificed to a yammosk.

During the final phases of the Yuuzhan Vong War, from aboard the Lady Luck, he and Tendra used their advanced sensory equipment to relay information to the Galactic Alliance fleet during the Liberation of Coruscant, as well as to the Jedi helping to defend Zonama Sekot. After the battle, he and others, including Wedge Antilles, discussed the post-war balance of power over a friendly drink on Zonama Sekot's surface.

Second Galactic Civil War and beyond
By 40 ABY, Lando and Tendra were successful in their business endeavors, leading a life of luxury. Somewhere around this time he began to carry a cane, more as a symbol of aged taste than any actual need for it. His life also seemed to have become somewhat boring and uneventful, according to him. That would change after he was visited by Han and Leia Solo, who had requested his help after being exiled by both the Corellian rebels and the Galactic Alliance. He willingly paid the cost to repair the Millennium Falcon and while the Falcon was under repair he lent the Love Commander to Han and Leia, on the condition that they let him come with them, which they agreed. Lando, in disguise, served as the captain, which somewhat irritated Han, who posed as his navigator. After an eventful trip to Corellia, which consisted of a shoot out with the Corellian Defense Force in a cantina after meeting with Denjax Teppler and blasting their way away from Corellia with the aide of Wedge, Iella and Myri Antilles and Corran and Mirax Horn, they made their way to the Errant Venture and a meeting with Booster Terrik. Lando continued to work with his friends on the Star Destroyer to prevent a full-scale war between the Corellians and their allies and the Galactic Alliance. He had a run-in with Alema Rar while on the Errant Venture, tricking her and using his cane, secretly modified to emit electric bolts, to make good his escape; however, she was able to remove his memory of the encounter. After the encounter with Alema, Lando and Han went off on an errand until Han heard the news about Mara's death.

Later in the war, Tendra announced that she and Lando were expecting their first child, much to the shock of Lando who was intimidated at the idea of becoming a father at the age of 71. Lando left Kashyyyk to be with his expecting wife, but not before bequeathing the Love Commander to Han Solo for his own use. Calrissian remained with his expecting wife through the remainder of the war. Afterward, he and Tendra continued to manage Tendrando Arms, doing business with any number of legitimate sales as the Daala administration took the reins of power of the Galactic Alliance.

Three years after the Second Galactic Civil War, the Calrissians had acquired a total of eight homes on various worlds and Lando himself had become a skilled sailor of a boat. He lived the life of a successful businessman and abandoned his cane, as Tendra convinced him it was merely an affectation. He also made time to look after his young son, whom he loved greatly. During his peaceful routine, Han and Leia Organa Solo, along with their foster daughter Amelia, came to visit the Calrissians in search of information regarding the past of the Millennium Falcon. Though Calrissian was unsure of the true history of the ship, he did pass along the name of the man he had won it from&mdash;Cix Trouvee, allowing the Solos and Amelia to continue their search into the ship's past.

Personality and traits
"Well, he seems very friendly."

- C-3PO

Throughout his life, Lando was both a gambler and businessman, crook and hero. Han Solo referred to him as a card player, gambler, and scoundrel. This was in part reflected by his adventurous, risk-taking, and seemingly shallow nature. He was known for being a classy, dapper gentleman, with a sense of humor, fine fashion taste, and more culture than the typical smugglers and pirates seen in some of his haunts. Despite his proficiency with weapons, Lando much preferred to use a con or trick to deceive an adversary rather than fight them. Lando, for all his love of adventure, disliked complications and was fond of the "easy life." However, his adventurous, debonair exterior was augmented by his deep sense of loyalty. At times, such as his betrayal of Han Solo on Bespin, his business-like pragmatism would come into conflict with his sense of loyalty. As a result, he felt he "owed" Solo for the fate he had helped deal him and did many things to try and repay that, including accompanying Solo to search for Leia when she was kidnapped by Seti Ashgad and placing him at the mercy of the Glottalphib thug Nandreeson, who hated him, in an effort to warn Solo of impending danger. He would later experience a similar form of guilt after Solo's twins were kidnapped by the Second Imperium from his GemDiver Station and later aiding seventeen young Jedi on the Mission to Myrkr by turning them over to the Yuuzhan Vong&mdash;a mission which resulted in the death of Leia Organa Solo's youngest son, Anakin. That guilt added to the debt he felt he carried.

When he felt it was needed, Calrissian was known to take charge of a situation, often solving problems in unexpected ways. In such cases, he had little regard for rules, regulations, or established conventions if he felt his methods were more suited to the situation. If he felt that he had been betrayed or mistreated, his anger at times boiled to the surface in visible rage, which at various times throughout his life was directed against the Empire, Han Solo, and the Yuuzhan Vong. Calrissian was known to use his personal connections for his own benefit, such as during his search for a wife or by trying to get a favor owed to him by Diamalan Senator Miatamia. He could also be persuaded to act when convinced that the fate of numerous others was at risk; Han Solo used this reasoning to convince Calrissian to attempt a risky infiltration of the Imperial capital of Bastion during the Caamas Document crisis.

In his younger days, Calrissian found himself attracted to women who he found classy, intelligent, and beautiful, and he was fond of such female companionship. Lando, for all his love of prosperity and well-run businesses, surprised even himself when he fell in love with a woman he had planned to marry for money&mdash;Tendra Risant&mdash;despite his many previous flings with other women. Lando remained faithful to his wife throughout their marriage, even rejecting an attempt by Alema Rar at seduction, as his former carefree womanizing gave way to a stable relationship with Tendra.

Talents and abilities
Lando was a man of many talents, ranging from card-dealing to business to military tactics. He was fluent in 18 different languages, including 3 only used by droids and computers. As expected of a professional gambler, Lando was an excellent sabacc player, well versed in both tangible gambling knowledge such as rules and practices and the more intangible qualities of winning large amounts of money while losing enough to keep away suspicion and dealing cards. While not traditionally as much of a gunman as say, Han Solo, Lando was still proficient with personal weapons such as a stingbeam or blaster. Later, Lando learned how to fly from Solo, and became an excellent pilot in the Falcon in his own right. However, he also admitted that while he was a good pilot, he was not as skilled as Solo.

Calrissian was also considered a capable con-man, even to the point of being able to hoodwink Jedi Masters such as Luke Skywalker on multiple occasions, a fact which he enjoyed. He also displayed a flair for unconventional methods, which aided him numerous times during his life. Working with Lobot, R2-D2, and C-3PO, he was able to investigate and eventually discern the purpose of a sizable Qellan vessel using what his New Republic superiors considered unorthodox methods. Years earlier, Calrissian defeated an entire group of pirates in the Battle of Taanab with more unorthodox methods and it was his tactic for Ackbar's cruisers to engage Piett's Imperial fleet at point-blank range in the Battle of Endor, which ultimately proved successful.

As administrator on Bespin, Calrissian received toxic air-training, which later aided him on Centerpoint Station during the First Corellian Insurrection.

He was also known for his business sense, having run and managed any number of both legitimate and illegitimate business interests across the galaxy, ranging from  Hologram Fun World to mining operations on worlds such as Varn, Kessel, and Nkllon. Lando was also quite proud of his charm on females, and was known to exercise it, particularly in his younger days, before he eventually fell in love with and married Tendra Risant. He was also an author; by the time of the Yuuzhan Vong War he had written and published two memoirs, A Toss of the Dice: This Gambler's Life and How to Succeed in Everything (22 ABY); this second memoir was a bestseller.

"Drebble"
"What an appalling performance!"

- Griggor Tower, after talking to a disguised Lando

Lando would often use the name "Drebble" as an alias during his search for Han Solo. The name was "borrowed" from an old acquaintance of Lando's; Barpotomous Drebble, a man he had severely beaten in sabacc at one point, launching a long feud between the two. After Drebble almost got Lando killed at Stenos, the Socorran started using the alias in hopes that people he conned would decide to look Barpotomous up. Ironically, Lando's efforts for the Rebel Alliance under the guise of "Drebble" caused the real Drebble to be hailed as a hero&mdash;the Alliance had no idea Lando used "Drebble" as an alias.

Relationships
Throughout his lifetime, Lando was known as a charming individual with a taste for members of the opposite sex, to the point where these traits were noted in an official history compiled by the Galactic Alliance.

Sarna


Before the Galactic Civil War, Calrissian journeyed to Drogheda, where he began courting Sarna, the queen of the planet, in hopes of marrying into her family's mining business. Even after becoming the Baron Administrator of Cloud City, he maintained some relationship with Sarna, and eventually started falling for her himself. However, her father learned of Calrissian's ulterior motives and cut off contact between them by banishing Calrissian. Years later, Calrissian would be summoned to Drogheda again, where he was recruited by Sarna to fight against a group of revolutionaries, whom she claimed were funded by the Empire. However, he eventually learned that Sarna's opponents were proponents of democracy and sided against her. He ultimately took Sarna hostage, and while her right-hand man, Harlech, was distracted, the revolutionaries flooded into the palace. To replace Sarna, her sister Danu was chosen as the new leader, and she too ordered Calrissian to leave the planet, but promised him a reward if he took Sarna into exile with him. As such, Calrissian departed Drogheda with his old flame.

Mara Jade
"Frankly, I think she'd like to buy Lando for what she thinks he's worth and sell him for what he thinks he's worth."

- Corran Horn, on Mara Jade's view of Lando.



In a reversal from his earlier views, Calrissian found himself attracted to the former Emperor's Hand Mara Jade in 11 ABY. While he made several advances toward her, she rebuffed his every move. Eventually, Calrissian was able to get on her good side by winning the Millennium Falcon back from Han Solo once and for all in a game of sabacc, and then giving it back to his friend. Mara was impressed by his action, and he was able to strike up something of a relationship with her. He struck up a business venture involving the spice mines of Kessel with her Smuggler's Alliance, and was able to spend a considerable amount of time with Mara on business trips and other missions, but she continued to distance herself from him. Ultimately, she later told her future husband, Luke Skywalker, that her relationship with Calrissian had been a ruse set up by Talon Karrde to allow them to conduct several missions for him.

Karia Ver Seryan
In 18 ABY, Calrissian set out on a quest to marry a wealthy woman, recruiting Jedi Master Luke Skywalker to come along with him to serve as a chaperone and endorsement. The first woman he met with was Karia Ver Seryan of Leria Kerlsil. Lando was taken with her, and since she was more than willing to assent to the marriage, was about to proceed in matrimony only a short period of time after meeting her. Unbeknownst to him, though, Ver Seryan was a life-witch, which meant that she could give him excellent health for three to five years before having to withdraw her support, which would kill him. Just before the ceremony started, Calrissian was interrupted and warned of the danger by R2-D2 and C-3PO. Somewhat shaken, he declined to marry Ver Seryan, who had thought he knew about her status as a life-witch all along, and continued on with his search.

Tendra Risant Calrissian


After his shakeup with Karia Ver Seryan and his next prospect, who turned out to be freshly married when he arrived, Calrissian decided to make a holocomm call ahead of time to the next woman on his list, Tendra Risant of Sacorria. She was still eligible and happy to meet with him, so Calrissian arrived on Sacorria accompanied by Luke Skywalker. He was immediately attracted to her, and not just for her money, which surprised him. Although he desired to deepen his relationship with Tendra, he and Skywalker were chased offworld by Sacorrian authorities, as the governing Sacorrian Triad had made it illegal for Sacorrians to marry offworld. However, he left a radionics communications system with her so she could call him.

Calrissian found himself back in the Corellian system, which was near Sacorria, not long afterwards as part of a combined Bakuran and New Republic effort to investigate and settle the First Corellian Insurrection. He was able to make contact with Tendra via the radionics set, who was in her ship, the Gentleman Caller. Calrissian enjoyed just hearing her voice again, and spoke with her often, though New Republic Intelligence was also trying to use Tendra as an intelligence source about the motives of the Sacorrian Triad, who had engineered the entire insurrection. When the Gentleman Caller was left stranded in space during the Battle of Centerpoint, it was Calrissian who came to Tendra's rescue. They were married shortly after the Galactic Civil War ended.

Their marriage endured through the Yuuzhan Vong War and beyond. Calrissian survived the war, despite the loss of his mining colony on Dubrillion, and incorporated Tendra's name into his next venture, a defense company named Tendrando Arms. He remained faithful to her, despite an attempt by Twi'lek Jedi Alema Rar to seduce him. Years afterward, during the height of the Second Galactic Civil War, Calrissian learned that he and Tendra were expecting their first child.

Behind the scenes
"The audience was so enamored with Lando, they could forgive Lando for anything. If you're able to play a character that can be sort of a bad guy but has redeeming qualities, those are the best characters to play. That was a great challenge to me, to make him palatable, and it worked."

- Billy Dee Williams, commenting on his work as Lando Calrissian

Lando Calrissian was developed for Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, where he appears as an old friend of Han Solo's. In this film, Calrissian betrays Solo to the Empire before expressing regret for his decision and joining the Rebel Alliance. Calrissian later appeared in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, where he aids the Rebellion, as he is one of the Rebels responsible for the rescue of Han Solo and also the destruction of the Second Death Star.

Sources such as the Lando Calrissian Adventures have since expanded on his backstory before Episode V, including how he lost the Millennium Falcon to Han Solo. The character was a prominent part of the Marvel Star Wars comics produced during the 1980s. Calrissian has also featured prominently in post-Return of the Jedi novels like the Thrawn Trilogy and the Corellian Trilogy. These series have helped build his character, with the latter first introducing his wife, Tendra Risant Calrissian. Though Calrissian was only featured in a minor role in the Legacy of the Force series, those books, set in 40 ABY, reveals that Calrissian was to be a father. A subsequent novel, Millennium Falcon, later revealed that Calrissian's progeny was named Lando Calrissian Junior.

Origin
Calrissian was several different beings as 'The Empire Strikes Back was developed. The first draft had him as a smuggler named Lando Kadar, a veteran of the Clone Wars who lived on Hoth. In the second draft, the surname Calrissian first appeared, along with information about a gas giant he won in a game of sabacc (then known as sabacca).

He was also known as a gambler on Kashyyyk, a role that would be fulfilled by Saun Dann in the Star Wars Holiday Special, released in 1978. Another role for Calrissian had him as the leader of a clan of clones who fought in the Clone Wars. His planet had over 700 different countries, each with a new clan. This idea was later dropped, although for a while Calrissian remained a clone, as he was a member of the Ashandi family, who reproduced through cloning. Though it is rumored that Lando was supposed to have died at the end of Return of the Jedi, this is not true, according to Lucasfilm.

Portrayal
Lando Calrissian was portrayed on-screen in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi by actor Billy Dee Williams, who reprised the role for the radio adaptation of The Empire Strikes Back, the video game Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast, and the audio dramatization of Dark Empire. Williams also reprised the role for an episode of Robot Chicken: Star Wars.

Arye Gross provided the voice of Lando in the radio adaptation of Return of the Jedi. Obba Babatundé provided the voice for Lando in Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader, and Star Wars: Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike. In his disguise as Tamtel Skreej for an appearance in Star Wars: Demolition, Calrissian was voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson. For the 1999 video game Star Wars: X-wing Alliance, Calrissian was voiced by Dave Fennoy.

Actor and author comments


According ABC news, Williams rose to screen prominence during the 1970s in no small part due to his popularity and success in portraying Calrissian. In July of 1980, shortly after the release of The Empire Strikes Back and the introduction of Lando Calrissian to the Star Wars saga, Billy Dee Williams was interviewed by Lois Armstrong for an article in People magazine. In the article, Armstrong commented on the fact that Calrissian was the first major black character to be introduced to the Star Wars universe, pointing out that earlier social critics had noted a lack of racial diversity in the saga. Armstrong also described Calrissian as "the swaggering, jive-talking, morally ambiguous leader of the Cloud City of Bespin." For his part, Williams refuted claims that the role was written with race in mind, stating that "The reason I was attracted to this role was because it wasn't written for a black person." This same sentiment, that the character of Calrissian was not intended to draw attention to race in the galaxy far, far away, was also echoed by Sid Ganis, the vice-president of Lucasfilm at the time.

On a trip to Australia to attend Star Wars-related conventions in 2007, Williams was interviewed by Courier Mail. During the interview, the subject of Calrissian's betrayal of Han Solo was brought up, and Williams replied that Calrissian wasn't "a double crosser." Williams went on to say that he had had to make a similar defense of the character over the decades since The Empire Strikes Back was filmed, to the point where children would ask him why he betrayed Solo when Williams was picking up his daughter from elementary school. Another example Williams gave was having to justify Calrissian's life to an airplane stewardess. Defending Calrissian, Williams gave the explanation that "He had to figure out a way to hold on to what he had created for himself and at the same time prevent the complete demise of a friend." Williams also admitted that he was aware that Calrissian, and to some extent himself, was typecast as a "cool character," but that he was fine with that, saying "Obviously I think I have this persona, and the persona is based on character attributes or flaws, so I have to live with it." Likewise, during an interview with Star Wars Insider, Williams recalled how casting wanted Calrissan's character to be a dashing, swashbuckling space entrepreneur, and how he knew could understand why they chose him for the part &mdash; because he had all those qualities, thus allowing for a more convincing Lando to be played.

When interviewed by fansite Lightsabre.co.uk in 2007 about his experiences portraying Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, Williams said that working on Star Wars was quite exciting. He also explained how he got the part: Williams was asked to do it, and Irvin Kershner, the director of The Empire Strikes Back, had come to his house to discuss the part, whereupon Williams agree to take the role. Williams also said that had he had agreed to work on the films after being impressed with one of Lucas's earlier films, THX-1138. Williams denied any claims that Calrissian was written with him in mind, saying that he wanted to move beyond the idea of racial or ethnic thinking. In Williams' mind, Calrissian was an epic hero and had no concept of racial barriers, repeating his comments about the character not being drawn up with race in mind. He also particularly enjoyed the cape part of the costume that he wore as Calrissian.

During the same interview, a mention was made of an alleged scene where Carrie Fisher, as Leia Organa, was supposed to have gotten annoyed at Lando and slapped him. Rumor had it that Fisher had forgotten to telegraph the slap and had actually hit Williams, but Williams had no recollection of the incident, saying that he couldn't remember being hit, but did recall constantly flirting with Fisher as part of his "very charming" character. Williams also said that he wished there had been more time to flesh out Calrissian's adventures in the movies, but recognized that the destiny of Luke Skywalker was the primary focus of the trilogy. However, he was also pleased with how the character of Calrissian had evolved to become a Rebel hero, and said, though he believed the possibility of playing Calrissian again to be highly unlikely, he would not rule out taking on the role again, were Calrissian being played as "an older gentleman who still ‘has it’, to some degree."

Also in 2007, Williams was interviewed by Will Harris of Bullz-Eye.com regarding his role in the soap opera Night Shift. During the course of the interview, the topic of Lando Calrissian came up. Williams again reiterated his view that Calrissian was a character who was devoid of racial barriers, describing him as a "heroic character of the future." He also said that ethnicity, in his view, would not matter in the future and played Calrissian to reflect that viewpoint.

In 2008, Williams reprised the role for an internet Star Wars political ad: "Vote for Lando Calrissian! w/ BILLY DEE WILLIAMS". In the video, Calrissian encourages citizens to vote for him instead of Palpatine. Though he has been an artist for years, Williams has also taken up commercial painting, and, with permission from Lucasfilm, pictures of Lando Calrissian in some form or fashion are part of his gallery of work.

Another individual with significant influence on Calrissian is L. Neil Smith, the author of the The Adventures of Lando Calrissian, one of the earliest Expanded Universe works written. In an interview with Lightsabre.co.uk, Smith stated that when writing the books, he found that seeing an image of Calrissian without his mustache helped him get the characterization of a young Lando Calrissian down better. Smith was drawn to the character because he was a "gambler and a wheeler-dealer", qualities which he had also admired in Han Solo, of whom he was also a fan. In his books, Smith sought to portray Calrissian as a younger gambler and con artist still learning his trade. Discussing the events on Bespin during The Empire Strikes Back, Smith also said that he thought Calrissian would not have viewed the situation as a predicament, but rather a "problem that could be solved by a sufficiently intelligent con-man." In another interview, Smith explained that he was asked to write the books by Del Rey Books on behalf of Lucasfilm. He was ordered by his editors at Lucasfilm to keep his libertarian politics out of the trilogy, but ultimately "decided that I'd make the books as political as I could until the editors squeaked. That's why Lando is an anarchist and free trader."

Losing the Falcon
On a backwater world, Lando was playing sabacc when he was defeated by another human. Calrissian lost a significant sum of credits, but he also lost his ship, the Millennium Falcon. While Lando had cheated in the game, his opponent, Han Solo had out-cheated him and when Calrissian attempted to challenge the integrity of his opponent, he was faced with a number of gun barrels from the other players. Unable to question the other player, he unhappily accepted the loss.

Tag and Bink
On one occasion in Calrissian's life before he became involved with the Rebellion, he was assisted by Tag Greenley, who provided him with an alibi that allowed him to escape a double booking. Calrissian also dated both of Greenly's sisters around the same time, and on one occasion, Greenley saved Calrissian by cooking up a story about the Battle of Taanab when one sister spotted Calrissian with another woman. Years later, Calrissian met up with Greenly and his companion, Bink Otauna, while serving as the Baron Administrator of Cloud City. Greenly and Otauna approached Cloud City with stolen Imperial property and appeared before Calrissian seeking refuge and repairs to their ship, as they had made an enemy of bounty hunter Boba Fett. However, Calrissian was quick to point out that Fett had already arrived on Cloud City and ordered the two to leave immediately. However, Greenley reminded Calrissian that the Baron Administrator owed him, from the fictitious Battle of Taanab, and Calrissian begrudgingly had their stolen Imperial shuttle moved to a maintenance hangar for repairs.

However, while finding a place to remove the stormtrooper outfits they had been wearing, they were walked in on by C-3PO, a protocol droid who had earlier gotten them captured by the Empire. They blasted the droid, but Calrissian found out about the incident and wasn't pleased. In return for getting back on his good side, Calrissian told Otauna and Greenley to disguise themselves as stormtroopers again and shadow a princess and a Wookiee whom he claimed he might need for leverage in an Imperial deal rapidly turning sour. They were standing right behind the Wookiee in a carbon freezing chamber when the furry alien went wild and knocked them both out.

After he joined the Rebel Alliance, Lando would later recruit Otauna and Greenley, who had escaped Cloud City and returned to the Rebel fleet, to help him get the jump on Boba Fett on Tatooine. While his two accomplices posed as stormtroopers, Lando attempted to search Slave I for the carbonite frozen Solo, but to no avail. Tag and Bink managed to get themselves caught by Fett before Calrissian could search the bounty hunter's craft. Instead, Calrissian decided to join Jabba's guard organization, leading to the skirmish at the pit of Carkoon.

In an alternate version of the events surrounding Han Solo's rescue, Greenly and Othauna aided Calrissian in his attempt to search Fett's ship after interrupting his meeting with a Rebel spy in a cantina. They arrived in Fett's hangar to distract the bounty hunter while Calrissian planned on entering Fett's ship quietly. Though Fett tricked them into revealing themselves, Calrissian knocked Fett out, but Solo was not in Fett's ship. Instead, Calrissian infiltrated Jabba's guard organization, as did Greenley and Othauna. Calrissian nearly fell into the Sarlacc, but was saved and went on to win the Battle of Endor.

The Empire Strikes Back
During the Galactic Civil War, Calrissian was the head of a mining colony known as Cloud City on Bespin when he was sought out by Han Solo, an old acquaintance of his, and Leia Organa, who were hoping to get his aid with repairs on Solo's ship, the Millennium Falcon. Both Solo and Organa were members of the Rebel Alliance, and Calrissian declared that he was happy to help, though he scoffed when he heard the idea that Han Solo was going to become a Jedi. However, while the Rebels were taken to their quarters, Calrissian met with another guest who had arrived just after Solo and Organa did, a bounty hunter named Boba Fett.

Calrissian demanded to know the reason for Fett's arrival, and the bounty hunter replied that he was there to collect a bounty on Han Solo. Compelling the cooperation of Calrissian and his cyborg assistant, Lobot, at gunpoint, Fett demanded that he be taken to Solo. However, Calrissian and Lobot alerted the Wing Guard, Solo, and Chewbacca, who were able to defeat Fett in a brief melee. After Calrissian had the Millennium Falcon repaired, the Rebels left, leaving Fett in Calrissian's hand. Unwilling to kill the bounty hunter, Calrissian had him frozen in carbonite and used Fett as his desk. Unfortunately for Calrissian, the Empire, Fett's employer, soon arrived and began attacking Cloud City, on the basis that they were colluding with the Rebel Alliance. Calrissian ordered an evacuation of the city, but the Empire struck the mining station's repulsors, causing it to plummet into Bespin's atmosphere.

Return of the Jedi
During the Galactic Civil War, Calrissian became part of the Rebel Alliance and joined up with Leia Organa and Chewbacca in an attempt to rescue Han Solo, who'd been frozen in carbonite and turned over to Jabba the Hutt, whom Solo owed money. Calrissian was posing as one of Jabba's guards in the Hutt crime lord's Tatooine palace when Organa and Chewbacca arrived, with the princess disguised as a bounty hunter bringing in Chewbacca for a bounty. However, when she revealed her true identity and armed a thermal detonator in order to extort Solo from Jabba, Boba Fett prepared to gun her down. Before Fett could do so, though, Calrissian intervened, shoving a Gamorrean guard into Fett's line of fire. In the ensuing chaos, Fett was able to escape with a carbonite-frozen Han Solo, but Organa, Calrissian, and Chewbacca were able to flee the palace before the thermal detonator, which Organa had dropped, exploded, consuming the palace, Jabba, and C-3PO, a protocol droid belonging to the Rebels. They seized Jabba's sail barge and departed to rendezvous with their Jedi friend, Luke Skywalker.

After apprising Skywalker of what had transpired, Skywalker encouraged them to keep searching for Fett. Calrissian, Organa, and Chewbacca had little fortune until they met with one of Fett's contacts, Gre'ento, who, under duress, divulged the location of a meeting Fett would soon be making with the Empire on a remote arboreal world. Arriving at the meeting site, Calrissian and Chewbacca used the light freighter Millennium Falcon to blast the Imperial shuttle, while Organa dealt with Boba Fett with a sniper rifle. Their opponents dead or neutralized, they were able to retrieve Fett's ship, the Slave I, and the frozen Han Solo. The Rebels then returned to main Rebel Alliance fleet massing over Sullust in preparation for attacking a new Imperial superweapon, the second Death Star. However, a transmission from Skywalker revealed to Leia that she was his sister, and also that he had been captured by the Empire. Organa did not take the news well and stole the Slave I for a brash rescue attempt to break Skywalker out of the the second Death Star, where she believed he was being held. Calrissian had the Rebel fleet follow her, bringing Han Solo, still blinded from hibernation sickness, and Chewbacca with him in the Millennium Falcon. Arriving from hyperspace at the Death Star's location over Endor, Calrissian and his Rebel compatriots were dismayed to learn that they had flown directly into an Imperial trap; dozens of Imperial warships had been awaiting them.

Calrissian attempted to keep holding off Imperial TIE fighters until a Rebel commando team was able to weaken a large planetary shield generator defending the superweapon. Once the shields were damaged, Calrissian flew the Millennium Falcon down to finish off the shield generator complex. A strafing run destroyed the generator, and Calrissian then flew the light freighter up to the Death Star, landing inside its hangar bay in time to rescue Organa, Skywalker, and a freshly redeemed Darth Vader. Meanwhile, Rebel fighters had initiated a chain reaction in the Death Star's reactor with proton torpedoes, and Calrissian brought the Millennium Falcon out of the Death Star just as the station exploded. Although the Emperor was able to escape, Calrissian and the Rebels, aided by Anakin Skywalker, vowed to continue fighting against him.

LEGO Star Wars
Calrissian's role in The Empire Strikes Back and the Return of the Jedi was shown in both LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy and LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga, although both completely omitted his near-death during the skirmish at the Pit of Carkoon. Also, Calrissian was omitted from the short LEGO video LEGO Star Wars: The Han Solo Affair, which takes place at the same time as The Empire Strikes Back and is set on Bespin starting immediately after Han Solo is frozen in carbonite, though other characters from the original film such as Lobot, Chewbacca, Leia Organa, Boba Fett, and Darth Vader are featured.

The Force Unleashed
In the Star Wars: The Force Unleashed video game, if SCOUNDREL is entered as a cheat code, players can play as Lando.

Galactic Battlegrounds
Calrissian appears as a non-playable character as part of a Rebel Alliance force defending Bespin's Cloud City during an Imperial assault. A bonus mission for the Imperial campaign, it involves the player taking control of Bespin with Imperial forces and Calrissian is one of the opponents the player's forces may encounter.

Non-canon appearances

 * Young Lando Calrissian
 * In the Beginning
 * LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy
 * LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
 * Tag & Bink Are Dead
 * Star Wars Infinities: The Empire Strikes Back
 * Skreej
 * A Wookiee Scorned
 * Star Wars Infinities: Return of the Jedi
 * The Revenge of Tag & Bink
 * The Return of Tag & Bink: Special Edition
 * The Secret Tales of Luke's Hand
 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed video game