Toong

Last Updated: 12/1/2023

Name: Toong

Humanoid: No

Classification: Alternative

Homeworld: Toong’L and Tund

Coloration: Green, Blue, Purple

Biology: The Toong are considered a peculiar looking species, even within the already peculiar Star Wars universe. They are short with stout bodies. They lacked any sort of neck, and their mouths and chin almost reached down to their torsos. Their arms and legs were extremely long and lanky, sporting pointed four-fingered hands, and three-toed feet with long claws.

Their lips were rather long and their faces/bodies were triangular, with the sides of their bodies also making up their cheeks and a massive central philtrum extending from the middle to the bottom of their face. Their lips were also very large and distinct, unlike their nose and eyes which were generally small and close set. Their pupils were generally abnormally large for the size of their eyes, although the actual size and spread of their eyes varied from Toong to Toong. The entrance to their ear canals rested approximately the same level as their eyes, but were usually hidden under headwear or clothing.

Their cheeks had pouches inside that allowed them to store large amounts of food. This lead researchers to believe they had evolved from rodents instead of their original theory that the Toong were descendants of amphibians. Depending on the individual, they sometimes had long pointed appendages protruding from the sides of these cheeks and a line running down the middle of their face, from the bottom of their nose to their lips. They also generally had two to three tentacle-like growths sprouting from their head that they treated like hair and seemed to have no control over (although some, presumably the young, did not have these at all).

Other things that varied between individuals included height, ranging anywhere from 1.4 to 1.8 meters (on rare occasions growing as tall as 2.4 meters), as well as the color of their leathery skin. Pigmentation ranged from tan to yellow to gray to blue to most commonly green, with some spots, stripes, and other variations found among them. The lifespan of a Toong is unknown, and they could speak Galactic Basic, albeit with a distinctive nasally sound and/or accent. Their native tongue was actually known as Toongese, which was said to be much more fluid yet complex than Basic.

Lore: Not a whole lot has been revealed about the Toong’s society. It is a well known fact that they are incredibly anti-social, more so towards non-Toong, but even often among themselves. Nearly all of them suffered from social anxiety, acute agoraphobia, and had a hard time communicating, especially with non-Toong, speaking with a constant stutter or whining noise.

The Toong originally lived on the forest-covered planet of Toong’l. However, in 45 B.B.Y. two massive asteroids struck their planet, decimating most of the surface and killing a good number of the Toong people. Most of the Toong fled to the nearby planet of Tund, something of a tropical paradise. Others stayed on their homeworld to repopulate, but had troubles because the now lack of a forest constantly around them constantly triggered their extreme agoraphobia.

Within a year of colonizing Tund, the species was finally discovered by the Galactic Republic. The Toong had no idea that other sentient life existed in the galaxy, and they all collectively panicked, sending their entire race into turmoil. They began fighting each other for survival, believing this was something of another apocalypse, and a war broke out across the entirety of Tund, causing the Toong to slaughter each other in sheer panic and preservation instinct. The Republic had been monitoring them from afar, and up until this point had been astounded by how peaceful and prosperous they had seemed, but this sudden change in behavior shocked Republic scientists. It took them much longer than it should have to finally establish a civil connection with the surviving Toong leadership, which eventually calmed the rest of the populous down. The Republic was actually so afraid that they were going to kill each to the point of extinction that they were forced to call the Jedi in to intervene.

After joining the Republic, unifying under a single planetary government, and getting a seat in the senate, they quickly began to assimilate to the galactic landscape. Their technological and societal growth was surprisingly quicker than most species, and they rapidly began to increase in numbers. They were wary of leaving Toong’l and Tund, but eventually began to expand throughout the galaxy, generally traveling in clusters and trying to colonize every planet they visited. They also became invested in galactic sports, including things like podracing. Eventually they became a fairly frequent sight throughout the galaxy, even working as loading and docking crews for groups like the Pyke Syndicate, Black Sun, and Crimson Dawn.

Legends/Canon: Most of the information above exists only within Legends, aside from some of their more obscure biological details, their involvement with podracing, and the different crime syndicates. However, the information does not really conflict with anything in Canon at the moment, so it could technically be treated as a tentative history until more information about the Toong is released later on down the line (which is fairly unlikely to happen).

Unexplored: So the Toong were actually explored more in Legends than I initially thought. Apparently they evolved from some kind of rodent, and it would be interesting to see what this creature looked like. We also don’t know the details of their time traveling to Tund, what happened to those that stayed on and recolonized Toong’l, nor what happened during their panic-induced world war. Their economy and political structure was also never really explored after they joined the Republic, and we have actually never seen them during the Galactic Civil War onwards, so that whole era of their species is still open to explore.

Additional Notes: When starting to research the Toong, I didn’t have very high expectations regarding their backstory. They were just kind of a joke character after all, right? I mean, their name is even just a play on the word “cartoon” because of their ridiculous visage. But they actually have one of the most tragic histories of any species I’ve covered up until this point. From natural disasters to separations and panicked wars, they’ve been through some stuff and were almost pushed to the brink of extinction. And it actually made me happy to learn of their survival and expansion. So while visually it may be fairly hard to take them seriously as a species, in a written format I think they are incredibly interesting and hold much more potential as a race and society than we were initially led to believe!

Additional Images: