One of my favorite alien species ever is on this particular section. Let's get into it.
21. Akwin. The Akwin are a seal-like aquatic mammal species, who are fairly sophisticated and believe that the humans they have encountered on the surface are stupid and inferior, because they think the Akwin are mere legends.
Rating: 2/5. While the Akwin have a charming design, there's nothing charming about their attitude. If there was evidence they were playful about their legendary status, I might give them a score as high as 4/5, but it sounds mostly like they're kind of jerky about it.
22. Alashan. Ooh, boy, this one's kind of a doozy.
We know next to nothing about the Alashans. All we know is that they built a city called Forever. This city had an immensely powerful guardian, naturally called the Guardian of Forever. It was a giant, seemingly reptilian monster thing that apparently could destroy spacecraft in orbit from the ground (and so only its name is ripping off Star Trek).
Rating: 3/5. Oh, Chris Claremont, whatever shall we do with you? Bringing the name of a famous Star Trek entity into Star Wars? How could you?
That aside, the Guardian of Forever is amusingly totally unlike its Star Trek name twin, and while the information on actual Alashans is nonexistent as such, if they created that guy, they had to be at least sort of awesome.
23. Aldereenian. The Aldereenians are insectoids. Their most notable known feature is that, when Luke Skywalker was trying to travel to the Alderaanian embassy for Leia's wedding to Han Solo, he was mistakenly taken to the none-too-proximate Aldereenian embassy.
Rating: 3/5. While I tend to be annoyed by such sketchy details, the fact that it was mostly a gag makes up for it a bit. Also, according to at least one source, there are a million different sapient species in the Star Wars galaxy, so the fact that this kind of thing didn't actually happen more often is really a bit mystifying-it's nice that at least one author acknowledged that it was a possibility.
24. Aleena. The Aleena are a diminutive species whose best-known member is probably the podracer who screamed just before smashing into a low-hanging stalactite. (Another rather well-known Aleena would be the somewhat insane Jedi Kazdan Paratus, who was a boss in the video game The Force Unleashed.) Supposedly, Aleena have a tendency to travel the galaxy in sight-seeing family groups. In effect? A species of tourists.
Rating: 3/5. While the whole "species of tourists" designation is a bit weird, and while I don't much care for tourists, I do like their charming design, and the fact that there has been a fairly diverse array of Aleena characters is to the various writers' credit.
25. Alpheridian. We know two things about the Alpheridians. First, they were outnumbered on their own homeworld by a ratio of more than ten to one by immigrant refugees. Second, Greedo saw some go into the Mos Eisley cantina once.
Yeah, that's a pretty sketchy amount of information.
Rating: 1/5. There's potential there, I'm sure of it. But they're too neglected to be very interesting, since we apparently don't even know what they look like.
26. Altiri. The Altiri are a "near-human" species (i.e. they might resemble humans enough that they essentially could be considered a human subspecies) who are deeply spiritual and want to expand their knowledge of the universe through "peaceful, scientific means." They are also locked in perpetual warfare with their planet's other native species. Uh...
Rating: 3/5. While they're not that interesting, they get a point for having blatantly silly and contradictory cultural aspects.
27. Altorian. "Altorian" can refer to one of two intelligent species.
Rating: N/A. Sigh, stupid disambiguation pages.
28. Alzarian. Just... Go read Prince Plooz's bio. Seriously. You'll learn a few hundred times more than you would from reading about the Alzarians.
Rating: 3/5, if only for this image. Otherwise, as a group they appear to be rather amusingly egg-shaped.
29. Amani. The Amanin (the "n" is the plural signifier) are sapient planarians, which is the coolest underused alien design idea ever. They are warlike primitives with the ability, like many creatures of the particular animal orders they are from, to regenerate from almost anything. They can also roll into wheel shapes and roll around to get around the fact that they can't walk very quickly.
Rating: 5/5. They're sapient flatworms, and that's all you really need to know.
30. Amaran. The Amarans are a species of fox people who are noted traders. Their primary appearance is in the book The Wildlife of Star Wars: A Field Guide, as incidental characters in the book's illustrations.
Rating: 2/5. Animal aliens are too common, although they get points for specifically being fox aliens (in fact, they are the only "fox aliens" in Star Wars at the moment).
I might be worried that I'm not making much progress, but that's kind of the point-if I could go through all the species quickly, it would both be less fun and it'd provide a lot less blogging fodder, now wouldn't it?
-Signing off.
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