Animation anthology Star Wars: Visions is Star Wars free from the stuffy restraints of canon. Over the course of the first two volumes, we’ve seen alien rock bands, samurai Jedi, and plenty of adorable creatures, but the show’s biggest strength is how it pushes action scenes to their limits. With the shorts being non-canon, literally anything is on the table, while the medium of animation means the laws of physics can be broken at will.
In Visions Volume 3, we’ll revisit a handful of Season 1 storylines, including an acclaimed short that sparked a spinoff novel. But Visions is also set to completely change how we look at lightsabers.
In the Visions Volume 1 short “The Duel,” Sith character Kouru wielded a saber we’d never seen before: a parasol with lightsaber blades instead of spokes. It was a fearsome weapon, especially when spun, but it probably couldn’t exist in canon because each blade needs its own Kyber crystal, which are rare.
We know Season 3 will include a sequel to “The Duel,” and it looks like it will one-up the original. In the trailer, we see a character wielding another weapon with multiple blades that looks like a claw.
It’s a fascinating and terrifying weapon that probably won’t make it to canon, especially since we don’t see many Sith in the current Star Wars era. But within Visions, these innovations prove that Star Wars is bigger than its canon — it’s a blank slate for all kinds of creators who probably used to doodle such wild lightsabers on their schoolbooks. Maybe, if fan reaction is as strong as it was for the saber-parasol, something this cool might just sneak into the modern canon after all. As General Grievous and Darth Maul have proven, if you can find a way to wield more than one lightsaber, you’ll go down in Star Wars history.
