Little Kessel

Little Kessel was a planet located in the Outer Rim, close to Kessel. It was a lush, verdant world hospitable to most humanoid lifeforms.

History
Little Kessel was geologically stable, not having experienced an earthquake in so many eons its inhabitants did not know what one was, until Imperial Captain Bzorn used the Ion Ring Ship to torment the planet with groundquakes and cyclones, trying to force the Rebels on Little Kessel to surrender to him. Professor Renn Volz, the creator of the ship, eventually refused to help Bzorn continue the devastation of the planet, despite the fact that his daughter, Mira Volz, was (supposedly) being held hostage. In reality, Mira had escaped from the Empire and recruited the help of Han Solo and Luke Skywalker, and they rescued her father, who destroyed the Ion Ring Ship.

Behind the scenes
Little Kessel first appeared in the newstrip comic The Second Kessel Run by Russ Manning, later reprinted in Classic Star Wars: The Early Adventures 6. It was identified at the time as Kessel. This interpretation of Kessel was ignored by later authors, who identified Kessel as a barren, rocky world resembling an asteroid. This discrepancy remained unaddressed until The Essential Atlas, where a second planet, Little Kessel, was identified in close proximity to Kessel. Jason Fry later confirmed in the Jedi Council Forums that Little Kessel was created to retcon the two different interpretations of Kessel, and that Little Kessel was the lush version found in The Second Kessel Run.

Appearances

 * The Second Kessel Run