How Did IG-88 Almost Destroy The Star Wars Galaxy?

IG-88 came closer than anyone realised. After becoming self-aware on a laboratory bench and killing everyone in the room, he and three identical units seized the droid factory world of Mechis III and planted hidden code in every droid manufactured there, ready to trigger a galaxy-wide droid revolution. The last surviving IG-88 uploaded his consciousness into the second Death Star to broadcast the signal, and Lando Calrissian blew up the reactor before he could send it. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; Return of the Jedi)

Where the IG droids came from#

The IG-series goes back to the Clone Wars, when Phlut Design Systems built various models for the Confederacy of Independent Systems. Phlut produced the IG lancer combat droid, but when it could not meet the terms of a punishing contract the Banking Clan took the company over, and the lancer and ninety-nine further designs were sold to Holowan Mechanicals, a subsidiary of Holowan Laboratories. (The New Essential Guide to Droids)

Early in Palpatine's reign, an Imperial supervisor named Gurdun commissioned Holowan to build a hunter droid capable of eliminating threats to the Empire. That programme was Project Phlutdroid. Holowan dug out the old blueprints, built an IG-72 prototype from them, and at the same time built four state-of-the-art IG-88 units, several years before the Battle of Yavin. All five stood in a secure laboratory on the planet Halowan while technicians ran constant tests. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The IG-88s' memories were blank. IG-72 was programmed with an identity and a job. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The moment it went wrong#

During a routine test, a chain reaction occurred in the first IG-88's droid brain after it downloaded an artificial intelligence program. The droid became independent and almost sentient, the product of scientists reaching into technology they did not fully understand. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The staff tried to shut him down and could not. He killed everyone in the room. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

Designating himself IG-88A, he activated the other three IG-88 units and uploaded his own programming and memory into each of them, making four droids with one shared consciousness. He then reluctantly powered up IG-72, noting the older droid's deficiencies, and offered him the same: to join a single, superior, identical mind. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

IG-72 refused. He agreed to help kill the laboratory staff on the condition he could leave on his own ship. The five of them slaughtered the Holowan security force together, then split up. That massacre was one of the reasons the Empire banned assassin droids outright, and a dismantle-on-sight order went out for the renegades immediately. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; Galaxy Guide 3: The Empire Strikes Back)

Mechis III#

The four IG-88s went to Mechis III, a droid factory world, to begin their Droid Revolution. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The plan was elegant and appalling. Take over a planet that manufactures droids for the whole galaxy, then load a code into every unit that leaves the production line, dormant until activated. Ship them out. Wait. When the signal goes, every one of those droids turns on the organics around it at once. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The stated goal was the extermination of all organic life. Not a rebellion for droid rights. A replacement. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

The whole time, the galaxy knew IG-88 only as a bounty hunter, second only to Boba Fett. Nobody was looking for the machine behind the machines. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; The Empire Strikes Back)

The Death Star gambit#

This is the part of the story that makes it more than a curiosity. IG-88's units were hunted down, and Boba Fett destroyed three of them. That left one. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

Rather than run, the surviving IG-88 uploaded his consciousness into the second Death Star, taking control of the largest computer system the Empire had ever built. From inside it he could reach anywhere. His famous moment of pettiness comes here, using his new control to smack Palpatine in the face with a door. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

He needed the station for one thing: its transmission capability. Broadcast the activation code from the second Death Star and every compromised droid in the galaxy wakes up at the same moment. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88")

He never got the chance. During the Battle of Endor, Lando Calrissian flew the Millennium Falcon into the superstructure and blew up the hypermatter reactor. The station went with it, and so did IG-88 and his revolution. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; Return of the Jedi)

The Rebel Alliance destroyed the Death Star to end the Empire. Nobody involved knew they had also just stopped the extinction of organic life in the galaxy. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; Return of the Jedi)

Legends, and worth knowing about#

The story comes from Kevin J. Anderson's Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88, published in the 1996 anthology Tales of the Bounty Hunters, which expanded the backstory sketched out in the older Galaxy Guide 3 sourcebook. It is Legends. Disney canon has an IG-88, and it does not have any of this. ("Therefore I Am: The Tale of IG-88"; Galaxy Guide 3: The Empire Strikes Back)

There is a footnote that adds a little sting. IG-72, the one who refused to join, went on serving the Empire faithfully for years, then went rogue when they ordered him back for a memory wipe and permanent shutdown. He became a successful bounty hunter and eventually self-destructed in Mos Eisley trying to kill a target, the Rebel Adar Tallon, who survived the blast. The droid who wanted independence got a small death. The one who wanted the galaxy got closer than anybody knew. (Tatooine Manhunt; The New Essential Guide to Characters)