Yarna D’al Gargan

June 29, 2009 | By More


Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure Review

Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure ReviewThis is one of those figures that was definitely made for the collectors out there. Fans have been asking for her sinceshe first appeared on screen in “Return of the Jedi.” Kenner had her in the development pipeline for the vintage line until Lucasfilm axed the idea.  (Check out the prototype here.)

Who is she, you ask?  Yarna D’al Gargan is a dancer from Jabba’s palace.  As a matter of fact, in the original credits for ROTJ, she is listed as “Fat Dancer.”  Since that time, the universe has expanded and Yarna has had her story filled out a bit.  (Clickhere for the SW Databank entry.)   I’ll let you judge the EU stuff for your self.

Appearance:

Yarna is another of those quickly  glimpsed characters that have been turned into figures. And basically she looks like her film appearance.

She reminds me a bit of Baron Harkonnen from Dune with a grass skirt.  Obviously, as one of Jabba’s dancers, she is showing a lot of skin.  (Nope, going to pass over the joke.) My number one biggest problem with this figure is too much articulation.   All of the joints just stand out so much.  The ampleness of her form causes the joints to be so deep and so obvious, that she looks like pieces stacked up instead of a flowing humanoid form.

Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure ReviewMy second observation is her hands.  They are made from a different plastic and are painted.  This gives them the appearance of being mismatched.  They will hold her accessories, but not real well.  The right hand especially seems to be lacking detail and is sculpted too wide and open.

Overall, her paint is fairly good.  The wash on the skirt brings out the detail.  Same with her headdress.  Yarna is one those characters, that when ever I’ve seen pictures of her,  I couldn’t tell what was hair and what was in her hair.  This figure achieves that. Her face, like her hands, appears to be a different shade. However, some of online photos of her look the same way to me. I can easily dismiss that as some sort of beauty makeup.

Fun:

This isn’t a figure kids are going to be begging for so they re-enact some of the great Star Wars Battles.  Frankly, if your six year old is begging for this figure, I might be a bit concerned.

Oddly enough, as mentioned above, Yarna is fairly articulated. Now, some of that articulation is limited.  Her headdress pretty much eliminates any head movement.  Her skirt keeps her hip joints from being the least bit useful.   Her ankles and knees can be used to get Gargan on her tip toes, though (See bottom picture).

Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure ReviewGargan comes with a couple of accessories.  Neither of which I can remember her having in the film. The first is a glass in  smoky brown color.  This glass has some detailing on the outside that sets it apart from most of the cantina style cups we’ve seen over the years.

The second item is a can opener knife thingee.  It fits neatly into the sheath on her left hip.  It’s got a silver blade and a wrapped handle.  She can hold this small blade well enough in her left hand.

The last item is a droid piece.  Yarna is part of a Build-A-Droid series.  Instead of bases or coins, this year we get pieces of droids.   Since I very rarely get all of a series anymore, I have to say I’m not a huge fan of this idea.  I can see a small box of three quarters finished droid collecting dust under my desk at the end of the year.

Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure ReviewWhat would have been nice is a soft goods skirt.  She would have been more posable, which you want for a figure of a dancer.  In addition a little soft goods cord for her to dance with would have worked well.

Overall:

If you’re looking to fill out your Jabba’s palace diorama, Yarna could help you out.  She’s one of the more memorable background characters from the palace.  She’s recognizable enough that somebody that isn’t a huge fan would pick her out of a display scene.  Also, she’s one of the pre-digital dancers, so she deserves some respect.

However, if you are looking for a the next coolest action figure to fight clone troopers, I’d pass her by. Ironically, the things most often asked for in a figure have hurt her score a bit.  If she had came with soft goods and less articulation, I probably would have scored her higher.

Engineernerd Score: 85/100

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Yarna D'al Gargan, Return of the Jedi, Star Wars®, Star Wars Action Figures®, Jabba's Palace, Action Figure Review

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Comments (5)

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  1. Errex says:

    This is the one figure I really struggled to get at a reasonable price. For a while it disappeared where I live, and only a couple of weeks ago I got one on eBay at roughly the same retail price I would have paid last year for her, S/H included.

    So, yes, this is a Collector’s figure. As such I totally love it. Other than the gamorreans, this is one of the most memorable characters found at Jabba’s palace.

  2. K says:

    I would give her a 99 because you will never get the original and this is very good detail so I would give her a 99 for this and plus she was fat so she probably couldn’t move her head much anyway.

  3. Engineernerd says:

    99 seems high, but every figure has it’s fans.

  4. Carlo says:

    Yes I would give her more than 85 because actually this figure is very accurate and to me it completes my diorama of Jabba’s Palace, I would give it 100 because it’s awesome to me. I mean she wasn’t just a character, she was one of the dancers and really she completes the dancers as far as I know because she was the last one to be made I believe, I can’t remember any other dancers that have not been made yet. Anyway this one deserved a higher rating cause the actress went thru hell doing that character, she deserves a better rating.

    P.S. She did have that cup in the movie, try looking better.

  5. Engineernerd says:

    Thanks, Carlo. I will have to break out the DVD and watch for the cup.

    I think part of the reason I rated her a little lower at the time of the review was the fact we’d waited so long for her, I just was hoping she’d be a tad nicer. I respect your opinion though, I know recently rated the new Jar Jar higher than some folks thought he deserved.