Najra-Va

"This one's been cored perfectly."

―Kazuda Xiono — 20?cb=20250116042720

Najra-Va was a rocky planet in the Dassal system of the Unknown Regions, orbited by a once-inhabited moon. Along with the other celestial bodies in the system, Najra-Va was cored out by the First Order as a test for the Starkiller Base superweapon in the year 34 ABY. However, unlike the other worlds, Najra-Va remained mostly intact after the tests, albeit with a core shaft straight through the planet's center. The Resistance pilots Kazuda Xiono and Poe Dameron flew through the planet's core shaft while investigating the First Order's presence in the system.

Description[]

"What is that? Poe?"
"Yeah, I see it. It's a gravity well."

―Kazuda Xiono and Poe Dameron — 20?cb=20250116042720

▶️ (file info)^[1]

Dassal-Timelines — The Dassal system, home of Najra-Va, was located in the Unknown Regions.

A rocky terrestrial planet^[5] orbited by a formerly-inhabited moon,^[1] Najra-Va was located in the Unknown Regions's Dassal system, within Sector Epsilon 51-3^[5] in grid square H-7 on the Standard Galactic Grid.^[3] After the militant First Order cored out the planets in the system,^[6] Najra-Va was left with a circular tunnel that covered its entire diameter,^[1] and all of the planet's inhabitants and ecosystems perished.^[5] Despite no longer having matter in its core, a gravity well still existed in the center of the planet.^[1] Najra-Va orbited a single sun, which disappeared due to the First Order's experiments. Its lone moon's orbit was likely disrupted by the testing, as well.^[5]

History[]

"Why would someone do this?"
"Patience, kid. That's what we're gonna find out."

―Kazuda Xiono and Poe Dameron — 20?cb=20250116042720

▶️ (file info)^[1]

During the Cold War between the First Order and the New Republic-funded Resistance,^[1] the planets and celestial bodies of the Dassal system were located in the First Order's Sector Epsilon 51-3.^[7] They were cored out by the First Order^[1] as tests for the construction of the Starkiller Base superweapon,^[6] which also caused the disappearance of the system's sun.^[1] Unlike the other celestial bodies in the system, which cracked and broke apart, the First Order's third attempt, using Najra-Va,^[6] left the planet largely intact save for the massive hole that had been mined through its core,^[1] likely due to a reduced power level during testing to calculate Starkiller Base's limits.^[5]

IntoNajraVa-TheCoreProblem — The planet after having its core drilled through by the First Order

After retrieving intelligence from the First Order^[1] in 34 ABY,^[8] the Resistance spy Kazuda Xiono learned of its activity in the Dassal system. Informing fellow Resistance member Poe Dameron, the two pilots then investigated the system. Discovering the cored and broken celestial bodies, they came across Najra-Va and flew through its core. The pilots almost crashed their starships due to the planet's intact gravity well but managed to escape through the other side of Najra-Va, landing on its moon. Once the First Order was alerted to their presence by a probe droid, Dameron and Xiono were chased back into Najra-Va's core by several TIE fighters led by First Order Major Elrik Vonreg. The Resistance pilots used the gravity well to their advantage, causing the enemy fighters to crash, which forced Vonreg to retreat and allowed the pair to escape.^[1]

Inhabitants[]

The Dassal system, which included Najra-Va, was once thriving with life.^[4] However, all of Najra-Va's inhabitants were killed when the First Order experimented on the system.^[5]

Behind the scenes[]

"…the fun stuff around The Core Problem […] flying through the gravity wells inside the cored out planet. It gave us an opportunity to kind of be doing something that was super relevant and super tied in to what was happening in the movies, but also kind of do our own unique stuff you don't get to see anywhere else."

―Chris "Doc" Wyatt about Najra-Va, when asked about his favorite scene written from Star Wars Resistance^[9]

Najra-Va first appeared in "The Core Problem,"^[1] the seventeenth episode of the first season of the animated television series Star Wars Resistance,^[10] which aired on February 17, 2019.^[11] However, one of the shots with Najra-Va was included in the mid-season trailer for the show, which was uploaded to YouTube on January 9 of that year.^[12]

Najra-Va concept art — Concept art of the planet's core shaft

One of the writers of "The Core Problem," Chris "Doc" Wyatt, felt that the scene in which Xiono and Dameron flew through Najra-Va was among the favorite moments they had written for Star Wars Resistance. Wyatt and the episode's other writer, Kevin Burke, felt that viewers of the show who had seen^[9] the 2015 sequel trilogy film^[13] Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens,^[9] in which Starkiller Base—a superweapon made from the cored-out planet Ilum^[13]—would find Najra-Va interesting, as it was an early by the First Order to drill through a planet using the base. The pair considered the episode visually stunning, praising the installment in that it felt like a seamless cutscene from The Force Awakens due to its connection of Ilum and Najra-Va, conceptually.^[9]

Concept artwork for the planet's core shaft was created by Lucasfilm Animation artist Jim Moore on August 28, 2017.^[14] The planet's name was identified in the StarWars.com Databank entry for the Dassal system.^[4] While several sources refer to Najra-Va as a planetoid,^[15]^[16] several other sources refer to it as a planet.^[4]^[5]^[17] This article conforms to the majority of newer sources in regards to the contradiction and considers Najra-Va a planet.