After the prisoner Luke Skywalker lifted C-3PO into the air using the Force, the Ewoks released the rebels and ultimately agreed to fight alongside the rebels against the Galactic Empire on Endor. After the newly formed alliance triumphed over the Empire, Leektar joined the celebration that were held in Bright Tree Village.
Leektar was an Ewok that lived in Bright Tree Village on the forest moon Endor as an elder of the Bright Tree tribe. In 4 ABY, the human Princess Leia Organa was brought to the village as a guest after traveling to the moon to fight the Galactic Empire there. Several of Organa's allies were later captured by a scouting party from the village led by the Ewok Teebo and brought back to the village's center bound to wooden poles. Leektar was stood with Chief Chirpa by the entryway to one of the huts surrounding the village center when Organa emerged to see the new arrivals, who were being prepared to be cooked for a feast in the honor of C-3PO, another ally of the princess who the Ewoks had mistaken for the deity known as the Golden One.
At the behest of the prisoner Luke Skywalker, C-3PO tried to convince the Ewoks to spare his friends and drew Leektar and other Ewoks attention when he announced that if they did not stop, he would become angry and use his magic. The Ewoks then continued as planned until Skywalker, a Force-sensitive Jedi, used the Force to lift C-3PO and his throne into the air. As the Ewoks rushed around in panic, Logray quickly ordered that the prisoners be released. That night, Leektar stood behind Chirpa's throne in the chief's hut while C-3PO shared stories with the Ewoks about he and his companions fight against the Empire. After hearing the stories, Chirpa announced that the rebels were to be accepted into the tribe and that the Ewoks would aid them in destroying the Empire's shield generator bunker on Endor.
The next day, the Ewoks and the rebels attacked the Empire and successfully destroyed it, allowing an Alliance fleet above to destroy the Empire's Death Star II superweapon. That night, the rebels and Ewoks celebrated their victory in the village, with Leektar playing a pair of drums next to Teebo during the celebration.
Malcolm Dixon portrayed Leektar
Leektar was portrayed by Malcolm Dixon in the 1983 original trilogy film, Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi. The Ewok village scenes were filmed between January 18 and February 2, 1982 on Stage 3 at Elstree Studios. In the current Star Wars canon, Leektar was first identified in the 2015 reference book Star Wars: Absolutely Everything You Need to Know.
The character's name was first established in the Star Wars Legends continuity, where it was created by Andrew Gilbertson for a databank entry that Gilbertson wrote with Arthur Papadam for the StarWars.com Hyperspace feature "What's The Story?," which was published on November 18, 2005. Gilbertson created the name by playing around with the letters of the exclamation "Yee-cha," as used by the Ewok character Wicket Wystri Warrick in the 1994 video game Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, to find something phonetically similar, as the author considered the exclamation a definitive Ewok sound.
- Journey Through Space
- Star Wars: Absolutely Everything You Need to Know
- Star Wars: Absolutely Everything You Need to Know, Updated and Expanded