Bossk

Bossk is a Trandoshan bounty hunter and a villain from the Star Wars franchise.

Birth and Early Career
Bossk was born the son of the leader of the Bounty Hunters' Guild, Cradossk, and upon hatching, he devoured all of his siblings before they hatched, much to his father’s pride. Bossk started his work as a Bounty Hunter by hunting Wookies as was customary for Trandoshans. He quickly became well known and eventually started taking on other bounties, becoming one of the most infamous bounty hunters in the galaxy. At one point, during the Clone Wars, Bossk, before he joined the Bounty Hunters’ Guild, engaged in a spaceship dogfight with a Jedi master, Bant Eerin, and her apprentice as the Republic was hunting for Bitt Panith, a scientist for the Confederates. Bossk was defeated and later became wanted by the Republic with a 35,000 credit bounty on his head.

After this, Bossk joined forces with other bounty hunters:Aurra Sing, Boba Fett, and Castas to hunt down Mace Windu. They managed to crash the Star Destroyer the Jedi Master was on, before going onboard and taking hostages. However, Bossk and his allies withdrew after they saw Windu escape in his starfighter. The bounty hunters went to Florrum to get help from Hondo Ohnaka, a space pirate, and Bossk was left to keep an eye on Slave I, which held two of their hostages. The Trandoshan prepared to kill the two, but Ashoka Tano showed up and took down Bossk, saving the hostages. Bossk and Boba were then arrested by the Republic and while he was in prison, the Trandoshan watched Obi-Wan Kenobi, in the guise of Rako Hardeen, fighting Boba Fett. Bossk aided the young bounty hunter and knocked Kenobi away, causing a distraction that sent the prison into chaos and allowing Bossk and Boba to escape. The two continued to work together and headed for Tatooine, where Bossk met up with other bounty hunters including Dengar, Boba Fett, Oked, C-21 Highsinger, and Latts Razi. After Oked was killed by Asajj Ventress, Bossk and Latts invited her for a drink and got her to replace their dead partner for a job. When she agreed, Bossk and Latts brought her to meet Boba and the rest of their team of bounty hunters.

Major Rigosso had hired the group to protect a chest while it was delivered to his master, Otua Blank, but on the way, they were attacked by Kage Warriors. During the fight, Bossk helped fight them off, but got blinding dust in his face and was knocked off the tram they were on. Despite this, the mission was completed, Bossk received his share of the payment. Later, the Trandoshan joined forces with Skorr and some other bounty hunters to hunt for Kestrel, a Rebel agent but failed to capture her. On another occasion, Bossk met up with Boba Fett again while the young bounty hunter was looking for Connor Freeman. The Trandoshan didn’t think Freeman had a high enough bounty on him and didn’t want to get caught in Boba’s fight with the League of Bounty Hunters. Bossk left him to his search, telling him to have fun playing with dead bounty hunters. At another point, Bossk had an encounter with Chewbacca and Han Solo, as he and his cohorts found a Wookie refuge planet, tracking down the Wookies, who were being led by Chewbacca. Before Bossk could capture the Wookies, Han Solo showed up and landed the Millennium Falcon on the Trandoshan’s ship, trapping him on the planet. Bossk would eventually replace his ship with a YV-666 light freighter, but would still have a score to settle with Chewbacca and Han Solo.

Future Jobs
Bossk was hired by the Hutt Cartel, namely Jabba the Hutt, to hunt down Tyber Zann, when he deactivated Droideka Mark IIs, starting the battle of Hypori. However, Zann turned Bossk to his side when he offered the Trandoshan three times what Jabba was paying him. The bounty hunter proceeded to defend the crime lord from the Hutt Cartel’s forces. Bossk went on to perform a number of missions for Zann’s organization until Zann met with Grand Admiral Mitth’raw’nuruodo of the Empire. Bossk stole a Sith artifact from the crime lord’s organization, which he sold to the Empire, though this was apparently Zann’s plan, and left the organization. Bossk was later hired to capture the Emperor’s Most Wanted, a group of major leaders in the Rebel Alliance that had considerable bounties on their heads. The Trandoshan managed to capture one and brought him to an Imperial prison on Naboo. Bossk then brought all the captives held there to another prison on Tatooine, before heading to a spaceport nearby. As he was bringing cargo on his ship, a rebel agent, pretending to be a minion of Borvo the Hutt, who tried to find out where the captives were being held. However, Bossk didn’t want to give that information to a Hutt’s minion and ordered the men working under him to teach the agent “a lesson”. But the agent had some backup of his own, who took down the thugs and captured Bossk, asking him about the facility again. While the bounty hunter taunted the Rebels, he told them what they wanted to know, having already been paid and thus with nothing to lose. Bossk also didn’t think the Rebels would even be able to approach the prison. So he wouldn’t warn the Imperial forces of the attack, the Trandoshan was imprisoned for the time being in Mos Eisley to be questioned. Bossk, because he was next in line as leader of the Bounty Hunters’ Guild, spent some time planning to take out his father, Cradossk. His dedication to the guild also leads to this, since Bossk didn’t want to let his senile old father run it into the ground.

He executed a brutal and efficient coup against Cradossk, taking command. Bossk then went after a bounty alongside Boba Fett, IG-88B, D’harhan, and Zuckuss. During this mission, he was able to avoid being assassinated by Zuckuss, who was working for Cradossk, using bribery to bring the bounty hunter to his side. When Bossk returned alive, much to his father’s shock, he proceeded to kill Cradossk with his own ornamental dagger, before consuming him as the Guild erupted into a fight. However this made the Guild fracture into two enemy groups, the Guild Reform Committee lead by Bossk, which consisted mainly of the younger bounty hunters and the True Guild, which consisted of what the Trandoshan considered the pathetic, older bounty hunters. Bossk joined forces with Boba, despite thinking the partnership wasn’t a good idea, to hunt for a rogue stormtrooper, Trhin Voss’on’t. They managed to capture the defector, but Bossk then turned on Boba, reasoning that the bounty on Voss’on’t could help his Guild Reform Committee take down the True Guild, so it’d be best if he received all of it. Bossk proceeded to disable Slave I’s internal defenses, before subduing Boba. However the bounty hunter had foreseen the Trandoshan’s betrayal and had Zuckuss backing him up. Bossk was captured, before Boba turned on Zuckuss as well, forcing the two into the ship’s escape pod and launching it. But in one last act of malice, Bossk tossed a small thermal detonator into the Slave I just before he launched. The Trandoshan was later hired to by Jabba to hunt for Luke Skywalker so as to get at Han Solo for not paying back a shipment he’d lost.

Bossk eagerly accepted for his grudge against Solo and tracked Luke to a funeral for a friend of his that had been killed by Darth Vader. When the Jedi had a swoop bike race with his friend, Jaxson, Bossk sabotaged their bikes so they exploded, then bound them together and dragged them to the Jundland wasteland. Luke demanded to know why the Trandoshan had captured them and Bossk explained he’d done it to get even with Han Solo, though he didn’t mention Jabba had asked him to. Luke managed to free himself and Jaxson with his lightsaber and cut off Bossk’s arm and leg, before escaping. However, the Trandoshan’s regrew his limbs, thanks to the fact that he was a reptile, and made another attempt to get Luke. Bossk tracked him to a Mos Eisley cantina, where the Jedi and his friends were having a reunion and tried to kill them, taking out some bar patrons in the process. Luke managed to defeat Bossk, who retreated, and tried to leave Tatooine, but was caught by Jabba’s thugs. Upon telling the Hutt of his failure, Bossk was dropped into the rancor pit but survived the encounter.

The Trandoshan continued to work for Jabba and when he took a break in the Mos Eisley cantina, he ran into a pilot, who he believed might be able to help with some jobs for Jabba. Bossk asked him to find the smuggler working for Jabba, who’d told Lady Valarian about a spice shipment he’d been making. The pilot succeeded and killed the traitor, with Bossk giving him a sizeable reward. In his next encounter with the pilot, the Trandoshan offered him a role in another job. Jabba had been having a disagreement with the mayor of Mos Eisley, so he’d planned to trick Tusken Raiders into attacking the spaceport. However, one of the Tuskens had found out the truth and was going to tell the others. Bossk told the pilot to talk to his Jawa contact in Mos Espa to find out where the Tusken was and silence him. The pilot again succeeded and received another generous reward from Bossk. In the Trandoshan’s third meeting with the pilot, he had yet another job. Jabba had made a wager with another Hutt over who could acquire the greatest trophy quickest. The only thing he could think of that would let him win was a Nightsister shroud.

Bossk sent the pilot to Dathomir to obtain the shroud and he succeeded, but Jabba declared that it was not good enough, instead wanting a Nightsister Elder’s shroud. The pilot succeeded and Bossk not only gave him a sizeable monetary reward but also give him a modified carbine rifle. At the time of the Trandoshan’s fourth meeting with the pilot, Jabba had begun growing nervous about the criminal organization, the Black Sun. He’d gotten an informant in the group, but he was found and Jabba needed someone to test the Black Sun’s strength. Bossk had the pilot take on the Black Sun agents in the Death Watch Bunker on Endor, gaining information as he went. The pilot returned to Bossk successful and was rewarded with the largest monetary reward yet, as well as gloves that improved the wearer’s accuracy. Soon afterward, Bossk was hired to take out Lando Calrissian, owner of Cloud City and brought along a group of thugs to help him, knowing how well Calrissian would be protected. Bossk and his men managed to infiltrate Cloud City and prepared to ambush Lando in a maintenance deck. However, Lando and his guards managed to fight their way out.

Engaging the Rebellion
Bossk was later among the group of bounty hunters hired by Darth Vader to track down Han Solo and Chewbacca and was eager to hunt down his enemies. So as to get information on Solo’s location, Bossk had to work with a pair of amateur bounty hunters, Tinian I’att and Chenlambec, who he believed had that information. They also had information on a Wookie intelligence network that could give Bossk the information he needed to find and kill countless Wookies. However, the two turned on the Trandoshan, hacking into his ship’s computer and taking it over, before trapping him in a meat locker. They used Bossk’s ship to help launch a Wookie rebellion, before handing him over to the Empire to obtain a fake bounty. However, the Trandoshan escaped his imprisonment and got his ship back. Bossk later came into conflict with the Corellian Security Force and killed Hal Horn, an agent of the security force, and the two men he was meeting with.

Bossk was then arrested by Corran Horn but was released by CorSec’s Imperial liaison, Kirtan Loor, on the condition he performs a mission for the Empire. Bossk and Zuckuss met Boba Fett in a Gallian catina, where they tried to get him to help them hunt down Han Solo, but he refused. Afterward, the Trandoshan was called in by 4-LOM, who’d stolen Boba’s ship. As Bossk approached in his ship, he sent Zuckuss and some of his minions on Slave I to subdue Boba, then obtain the carbonite slab containing Han Solo. Zuckuss eventually contacted Bossk to tell him they were returning with Solo, but he found the shuttle only contained his dead thugs and a detonation device. The explosion damaged Bossk’s ship and he cursed Boba as he jumped into hyperspace.

Settling Matters
Sometime later, Bossk had another encounter with Boba Fett, when he found a bomb counting down on his ship. He fled into an escape pod, angrily noting that Boba had again left him stranded in an escape pod. However, another countdown started up in the pod and Bossk began frantically looking for the bomb. He finally found it just as the countdown reached zero, but when nothing happened, he realized that this had just been a trick by Boba to drive him off of his ship to take it for himself. Bossk landed on Tatooine, stranded without any credits, but he’d succeeded in stealing important evidence from Boba’s ship. Thus the two had another encounter in the Mos Eisley Cantina and Bossk refused to give up the evidence without being paid, even with Boba’s blaster trained on him point blank. But shockingly, he did as Bossk asked, giving a substantial amount of credits to him for the evidence. This money, as well as his new reputation for defeating Boba, allowed the trandoshan to rebuild his position as a bounty hunter.

Years later, Bossk finally retired from professional bounty hunting and later had an encounter with Han Solo on a space station above Ord Mantell. Upon learning Chewbacca was dead, Bossk taunted Solo, until he was punched in the snout and they started fighting. The two were arrested and detained with Solo eventually getting released while Bossk was still there when the station was destroyed. However, the Trandoshan may have survived since a single escape pod launched before the station was annihilated.

Abilities and Arsenal
Bossk is a brutal and deadly bounty hunter and because he is a Trandoshan, he can regenerate lost limbs. His main weapon is a Relby-v10 micro-grenade launcher, as well as a common blaster, and he also utilizes thermal detonators and a flamethrower. However, Bossk can fight even without weapons, improvising when he needs to and has even used other beings to fight. His ship is a modified YV-666 light freighter called Hound’s Tooth, which also serves as his base. It is equipped with shielding and hyperdrive systems and reinforced armor and for weaponry, it sports a retractable four-barreled laser turret, an ion cannon, and a concussion missile launcher.

Trivia

 * Bossk was portrayed by Alan Harris in Star Wars Episode V and Episode VI. In the Clone Wars TV show, he was voiced by Dee Bradley Baker.
 * Bossk had met Ezra Bridger sometime before the start of Star Wars Rebels and had a friendship with him.