STARWARS ACTION FIGURES The Unofficial Collector's Guide to Star Wars Action Figures

Luke’s Yellow Lightsaber – Which Movie Was That In?

Remember that awesome part in A New Hope when Luke pulled out the yellow lightsaber and…wait no, that never happened. Oh, but remember in Empire Strikes Back when Luke was fighting Vader and he pulled out his yellow lightsaber and…hmm no, no. Oh, oh, remember that part though in Return of the Jedi where Luke had to remake his lightsaber and he made it yellow! What? Green? Are you sure? Hmmm, you’re right. So then when did Luke use a yellow lightsaber?

Never. So then why the hell did Kenner make the original Luke figures lightsaber yellow? It makes absolutely no sense. Ben’s was blue. Vader’s was red. Luke’s was yellow. Why couldn’t they have just made it blue like Ben’s? I’m sure there’s an answer. I don’t know what it is. Maybe one of you readers do, and if so, please comment! For now though we’ll just assume it was to make the color assortment a little more interesting. Regardless though, the fact remains, Luke’s saber for the original tatooine dress figure, was yellow.

So let’s talk lightsaber colours for a second. Aside from that one error, the rest of the figures were all pretty damn accurate. Ben always had a blue saber. Vader always had a red saber. The ESB Luke Bespin figure had a nice blue saber (the kind that wasn’t built into the arm, so kids could lose it! yay!), and then there was the ROTJ figure. The Luke Jedi figure, decked out in that badass black Jedi garb. That figure came in TWO colours. Blue and green. Now we all know that figure’s lightsaber should be green. Afterall, in the movie, Luke’s saber (and the most bad-ass lightsaber in all the films in my opinion), is clearly green. There were a small number of figures released however with the blue saber. From what I understand it was a matter of getting rid of some overproduced blue sabers from the ESB Luke figure, and so there do exist some figures out there where black Jedi Luke is sporting a nice sky blue lightsaber. They’re rare, and they’re notably more valuable than the green saber version of the same figure.

As with anything rare though, fraud warning. Now this one isn’t a huge deal because the price difference isn’t that huge, but people do in fact make fake sabers for these figures. Most of the time it’s harmless and it’s just a way for people to replace the lost weapons for the figures in their collection. I myself bought a couple of reproduction weapons to stick in the hands of some of the loose figures I have on display. Some folks though, will take that repro. green saber, stick it in that black Jedi Luke figures hand, and try to sell it to you as an original. Or worse, they’ll recard it as we’ve talked about in previous articles. So when you’re buying a loose Luke Jedi figure with a green saber, remember, it’s very difficult to tell a repro saber from an original. It’s possible, but not the easiest thing. So don’t go crazy with the check book just because a figure has a green saber