Cad Bane

Cad Bane
Star Wars character
Cad Bane in his initial outfit from Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
First appearance	The Clone Wars – "Hostage Crisis" (2009)
Created by	George Lucas Dave Filoni Henry Gilroy
Voiced by	Corey Burton
In-universe information
Species	Duros
Occupation	Bounty hunter
Affiliation	Confederacy of Independent Systems Hutt Clan
Homeworld	Duro

Cad Bane is a fictional character and antagonist in the Star Wars franchise, voiced by Corey Burton. Created by George Lucas, Dave Filoni and Henry Gilroy, he is introduced in the 2008 animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars and returns in the 2021 sequel spin-off, Star Wars: The Bad Batch. The character is a ruthless bounty hunter from the planet Duro who is usually employed by other villains, such as the Separatist Alliance and the Hutt crime families. Known for utilizing weapons and gadgets specifically designed to counter the abilities of Jedi, Cad Bane was the preeminent blaster-for-hire during the Clone Wars.^[1]

Aside from the television series, the character appears in several canon and non-canon Star Wars media, such as comic books and video games. Since his first appearance in The Clone Wars, Cad Bane quickly became a fan favorite, and has been highlighted as one of the best bounty hunter characters in the franchise, usually alongside the likes of Boba Fett and Jango Fett.

Appearances[]

Television[]

The Clone Wars[]

Cad Bane recurs in the 2008 animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars. He first appears in the first season's finale "Hostage Crisis", in which he and Aurra Sing assemble a team of fellow bounty hunters to rescue Ziro the Hutt from the Republic's prison facility. They infiltrate the Senate building on Coruscant, murdering all of the guards and taking a group of senators hostage as leverage to demand Ziro's release. Their plan is successful, and the bounty hunters manage to escape with Ziro, despite Anakin Skywalker's attempt to stop them.

Bane makes his first chronological appearance in the second-season premiere "Holocron Heist", in which he is hired by Darth Sidious to steal a Holocron from the vault of the Jedi Temple. He escapes with the Holocron and manages to evade Anakin Skywalker and Ahsoka Tano in "Cargo of Doom". Bane subsequently helps Sidious use the Holocron to kidnap several Force-sensitive children in "Children of the Force" before he is captured by the Jedi. Obi-Wan Kenobi and Mace Windu force him to take them to the Holocron, and Bane leads them into a trap in his headquarters, giving himself time to flee.

The third season explores the events leading up to Bane's takeover of the Senate building in season one. "Evil Plans" features Bane capturing the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO, who involuntarily give him the schematics of the Senate building. The following episode "Hunt for Ziro", which takes place after "Hostage Crisis", reveals that Bane was hired to extract Ziro from Republic custody by Jabba the Hutt as Ziro possessed a datapad with incriminating evidence against the Hutt crime families. Shortly after Bane is congratulated by Jabba for his success, Ziro escapes and the bounty hunter is hired to track down and capture the rogue Hutt. He eventually finds Ziro's corpse on Teth but realizes the datapad is missing. After a short altercation with Obi-Wan Kenobi and Quinlan Vos, who were also searching for the Hutt, Bane escapes once again.

Before the fourth season's episode "Deception", Bane is revealed to have intentionally been captured to infiltrate a Republic prison; he is hired by Count Dooku to break Moralo Eval out of the facility. Unbeknownst to them, Obi-Wan Kenobi poses as bounty hunter Rako Hardeen and seeks to gain the duo's trust to uncover Dooku's plans. Following a successful prison break and pursuit throughout the Outer Rim, the trio finally reach The Box: a competition to decide which of a small group of chosen bounty hunters will participate in the Separatist plot to kidnap Chancellor Palpatine on Naboo. Bane and "Hardeen" survive the events of the box and go on to kidnap the Chancellor in "Crisis on Naboo", but Kenobi's deception is soon revealed and he manages to foil the plot, leading to Bane's arrest once more.

Following the series' cancellation in 2014, creator Dave Filoni confirmed that Bane was slated to return in an unfinished story arc which saw him and a group of bounty hunters mentoring the young Boba Fett and helping him follow in the footsteps of his late father, whom Bane had known personally. The end of the arc would see Bane and Fett having a standoff, which presumably resulted in the former's death.

The Bad Batch[]

In the 2021 spin-off/sequel series, Star Wars: The Bad Batch, Cad Bane is still active as a bounty hunter after the Clone Wars and the rise of the Galactic Empire. In the episode "Reunion", he is hired to kidnap Omega from the Bad Batch on Bracca before the Empire finds them. He intercepts the Bad Batch's ship and kills the clones who have seized it before hiding inside. When Bad Batch leader Hunter returns with Omega to the ship, Bane confronts them and engages in a standoff with the former. Bane shoots Hunter in the chest, injuring him, and escapes from Bracca with Omega.

In the next episode, "Bounty Lost", Bane arrives at a cloning facility on Bora Vio for the delivery, but Omega escapes. Bane then gets into a fight with Fennec Shand, who has been hired to stop Omega from falling into the hands of the Kaminoan Prime Minister Lama Su. Omega manages to escape and is then rescued by the Bad Batch who managed to find Omega’s location during Bane’s duel with Shand. Bane tries to pursue the Bad Batch, but discovers that Shand sabotaged his ship, leaving him stranded and unable to pursue her or the Bad Batch.

Rebels[]

One of Sabine Wren's graffiti images inspired by Cad Bane is depicted in "Fighter Flight", the second episode in the first season of the 2014 animated series Star Wars Rebels.

Comics[]

Bane also appears in the five-part Marvel Comics comic book miniseries Star Wars: Darth Maul, set before the events of the prequel trilogy, where he aides the titular character in kidnapping a Jedi Padawan.

Legends[]

In April 2014, most of the licensed Star Wars novels and comics produced since the originating 1977 film Star Wars were rebranded as Star Wars Legends and declared non-canon to the rest of the franchise by Lucasfilm.^[2][3][4] Cad Bane has appeared in several comics and video games set in the Legends continuity.

Characteristics[]

Character creation[]

The character was created as a recurring antagonist for the 2008 Star Wars: The Clone Wars television series set during the prequel film trilogy. The season one finale "Hostage Crisis" director Giancarlo Volpe compared Cad Bane to another Star Wars bounty hunter, Boba Fett, stating:

The crew loves Cad Bane, and I really think the fans will, too. He brings a serious bad-ass sensibility to Star Wars. He's a lethal and ruthless bounty hunter, and you see that right away in the episode. Unlike Boba Fett, Cad doesn't take prisoners.^[5]

Originally, supervising director Dave Filoni and series writer Henry Gilroy planned to create the Durge character that was already introduced in the 2003 micro-series. Durge would instead be redesigned as a human character but this exploration was short lived after the suggestion of series producer and Star Wars creator George Lucas to go Western. Lucas took inspiration from western film actors such as Lee Van Cleef's portrayals of Angel Eyes in The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly and of Colonel Mortimer in For a Few Dollars More while Corey Burton uses Peter Lorre's voice as inspiration.^[6][7] These characters' Western influences help to bring Bane to life while still containing the features of the Duros species in the Star Wars universe with his own original characterization. Burton's voice would then be modified on the computer by the series' sound production team. While Filoni researched the character, he happened to come across an unlabeled concept art of a gun-toting bounty hunter with a wide-brimmed hat from the original trilogy and that concept helped bring the character to life.^[6] Filoni speculated on George Lucas' original idea for the character that became Bane:

Something you notice about George Lucas after a while is that he'll mention a name like 'Mace Windu' in a [1973] version of Star Wars, and then it pops up in 1999. So, this, I guess might have been an idea George had for the character Cad Bane way back when, and now finally he's getting around to bringing him to the screen in The Clone Wars.^[6]

Promotion and reception[]

Cad Bane has been featured in two Hasbro toys concerning himself, his blaster and his ship respectively,^[8][9][10] as well as one involving him merged with his ship in a crossover for Transformers.^[11] Both Cad Bane and his speeder were included as part of the Lego Star Wars toy line.^[12][13]

Cad Bane also appears as a playable character in two prominent Star Wars mobile games, both available for iOS and Android, Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes and Star Wars: Force Arena.^{[citation needed]}

In 2009, UGO Networks ran a feature on Cad Bane, noting his cool looks and calling him "quintessentially cold, cruel and calculating".^[14] IGN listed him as the 31st top Star Wars character, praising his first impression and saying his creators succeeded in introducing "an inarguably cool and effective villain". IGN also noted he "continued to be an excellent foil" to the main protagonists in his later appearances.^[15] IGN's Eric Goldman said that Bane was a successful attempt at creating a new ongoing villain,^[16] and later called him a "very cool and effective new villain".^[17] Goldman also called Bane's introduction and his torture of Bolla Ropal (a Jedi) two of The Clone Wars's darkest moments, adding that Bane lived up to the hype that surrounded him in his introduction.^[18] Christian Bauvelt, writing for Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch, said that one of the three top reasons the "Evil Plans" episode worked for him was because Cad Bane appeared in it, and noted Bane's similarities to Angel Eyes from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.^[19]

References[]

External links[]

• Cad Bane in the StarWars.com Databank
• Cad Bane on Wookieepedia, a Star Wars wiki