Massassi Temple

• Appeared in:
  
  I
  II
  III
  IV
  V
  VI
  CW

• Homeworld:
  Yavin 4

• Affiliation:
  Rebel Alliance, Sith

• 

From the Movies

Nothing remains of the vanished race of Massassi that once lived on Yavin 4, save for their moliminous edifices. Though the species left no traces of advanced technology, they somehow built huge ziggurats of stone amid the endless jungle. It was here that the Rebel Alliance established one of their early bases, under the stewardship of General Jan Dodonna and Commander Willard.

The Massassi Outpost housed several squadrons' worth of X and Y-wing starfighters in a cavernous hangar bay built into the temple's first level. The dank interiors were converted into control stations and barracks. The uppermost level of the temple held a huge throne room that served as a ceremonial chamber for Alliance dignitaries.

From the Expanded Universe

The ancient Sith left behind few traces of their existence prior to their extinction. The monuments of Yavin 4 are among the most impressive. Having fled the Great Hyperspace War, the Sith Lord Naga Sadow hid in the jungles of Yavin 4 alongside mutated Sith warriors called the Massassi. Sith alchemical experimentations further mutated the Massassi, turning them into dark side-wielding savages. Centuries later, a young Sith initiate named Exar Kun enslaved the Massassi, and forced them to construct temples as focal points of Sith power.

The largest of these became known as the Great Temple. Exar Kun used the power of the dark side of the Force to seal his consciousness into one of the temples. To do so, he drew upon the power of all the Massassi, bringing about the extinction of the race. The jungle moon was left undisturbed for millennia.

Thousands of years later, the Rebel Alliance scouted Yavin 4, and Sullustan naturalist Dr'uun Unnh named many of the temples in the so-called Massassi site. These included the Temple of the Blueleaf Cluster, the Palace of the Woolamander, and the Great Temple that would house the Rebel base. It is a colossal structure, roughly pyramidal in shape, ringed by smaller buildings.

The Massassi base was the site of repeated Imperial harassment after the Battle of Yavin. The Imperials hid a secret launch base in the heart of the gas giant. From there, they staged surprise TIE fighter raids. Luke Skywalker managed to destroy the launch base, drawing the ire of the House of Tagge family of nobles.

Shortly thereafter, the Empire established a blockade in the Yavin system. A crippled TIE bomber crashed into one of the unoccupied buildings of the Massassi site, and released the Sith night beast from its millennia-old sleep. Again, it was Luke that saved the day, as he lured the dangerous creature into an abandoned transport, and sent the night beast into space.

With the help of the Aquaris Freeholders and the Mon Calamari, most of the Rebels were able to bypass the Imperial blockade of the system. During the final evacuation, General Dodonna stayed behind to detonate a series of concussion charges meant to destroy the base. He was believed killed in the blast, but was later recovered from an Imperial prison.

The blast did destroy some of the sensitive Alliance computers, but did little to affect the actual temples themselves. Again, Yavin 4 was plunged into obscurity as the Alliance moved on. Several scouting parties from the Fernandin Scouting Expedition were sent to the moon to see if colonization was possible, but nothing ever came of that.

After the defeat of the Empire at the Battle of Endor, the New Republic re-established a temporary base in the Great Temple for their Senate Planetary Intelligence Network, or SPIN. A few years later, Luke Skywalker, now a Jedi Master, returned to Yavin Four to set up a training facility for a new generation of Jedi. The Jedi praxeum was set up in the Great Temple. Drawn to the Jedi was the ancient spirit of Exar Kun, who possessed several of Luke's students. Nearly killing Skywalker, the spirit of Kun challenged all the Jedi, who combined their Force abilities to banish Kun's presence.

Though the Jedi Academy withstood many a crisis, including attacks from Imperial warlords and the Shadow Academy, the massive structures of the Massassi site were recently destroyed by invading Yuuzhan Vong.

Behind the Scenes

For their brief appearance in Star Wars: A New Hope, the Massassi temples were actually the ancient pyramids found in Tikal, Guatemala. A skeleton crew of ILM cameramen traveled to Guatemala to film the handful of scenes required. When they arrived, they discovered that the path to the 300-foot summit was completely overrun by the jungle. They hired locals to hack through the brush with machetes.

Arriving at the summit, ILMers Lorne Peterson, Richard Edlund and Dick Alexander discussed who should be the one to play the Rebel sentry standing atop the slender tower. Peterson "won" that honor by virtue of him having no children. The crew lacked appropriate props, so the scanner that the Rebel trooper carries is actually several light meters held together with gaffer's tape.

For the shot of the Rebel heroes entering the temple's massive hangar, a matte painting was used. This painting was enhanced digitally for the Special Edition release of the film.