When the first season of Star Wars Rebels ended with the appearance of Darth Vader, the bar was immediately raised. Vader is the icon of Star Wars and bringing him onto the show for season two changed everything.
Concept art from Star Wars Rebels season two. All Images: Disney XD/Lucasfilm
Now, this concept art gives a brief glimpse into what happened when Vader was introduced. Disney XD and Lucasfilm have exclusively provided us with these concept images and sketches from season two of Star Wars Rebels (which hits Blu-ray on 5 October), and you can see the love and care put into bringing Vader to the show.
This image, in particular, is fascinating. You can see the reference of the original mask, and the ways it was tweaked to try and get a good balance of it staying recognisable as Vader and animated in Rebels‘ style.
Here are some more concept images of Vader too.
But wait, there’s more! We’ve also got some cool work on what went into bringing some other characters, like the droid AP-5 and Hondo Ohnaka, onto the show.
Finally, here are a few early concepts of the finale, including none other than Darth Maul and Ahsoka Tano.
