10 Deadliest Star Wars Characters Of All Time, Ranked

In a galaxy far, far away full of all-powerful, magical space samurai, limitless armies, quasi-demonic dark forces, and unfeeling fascist dictators, the body counts get astronomic fast. And among those disparate groups, the deadly math doesn't always go the way diehard fans would anticipate.

To streamline our list of the 10 deadliest "Star Wars" characters of all time, we made the decision to rank these characters strictly by the number of deaths they're responsible for. This includes droids (yes, even battle droids), soldiers, and civilians killed by a commanding officer's direct order. This means that while there are certainly deadly "Star Wars" characters that would almost certainly kill you in a one-on-one-conflict (namely, Asajj Ventress, General Grevous, Maul, and Darth Vader), they might not strictly be among the deadliest characters when going by the raw numbers.

The absence of a handful of expected inclusions is made up for by the more surprising ones. A few idealistic heroes with body counts in the millions; the bureaucrats with nigh-incalculable blood on their hands; and the forgotten, legendary Sith Lord who made the deadliest use of the Force in "Star Wars" history.

Christopher Lee's Count Dooku is one of the few "Star Wars" villains to operate effectively on both a physical and political register. He's both a peerless duelist (as seen in his multiple two-on-one duels with Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi) and one of the most powerful Sith Lords in the entire franchise. He also comes by this lethality the hard way after being trained by the epitomes of the light and dark sides of the Force, i.e. Yoda (Frank Oz) and Darth Sidious (Ian McDiarmid), respectively. Indeed, Dooku's just as skilled in amassing political power, establishing himself as the face of the Separatist movement during the Clone Wars.

The latter power proves most deadly in Dooku's hands. He ultimately sends countless droids to their deaths during his ruthless campaign against the Republic, even killing roughly 1.5 million of them at once while attempting to destroy one of his own intergalactic cruisers. (Anything to destroy his two least favorite Jedi, along with his former apprentice, Asajj Ventress.) Chronologically, Dooku's first kill comes in the animated "Tales of the Jedi," in which the then Jedi murders several guardsmen loyal to the corrupt Senator Dagonet (Mark Rolston).

As a Sith Lord, Dooku kills many Jedi, soldiers, and civilians with his own saber, on top of those killed under his command. Of course, though he began on the light side of the Force and fell from grace in a more tragic manner than fans once expected, he never turned from Sidious' influence. Instead, he is killed by Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) during the Battle of Coruscant (as seen in "Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith") shortly after falsely revealing himself as the "Sith Master" the Jedi have been hunting for years.

Though you surprisingly won't find Anakin Skywalker on this list, the Skywalker clan are strangely represented by the most heroic of the bunch. Mark Hamill's Luke Skywalker probably isn't a character you'd think of as particularly "deadly" at first. In the original trilogy, he can't even stand toe-to-toe with Darth Vader (James Earl Jones) until the final film. And as much as "The Mandalorian" was able to imagine how dangerous Luke might have been in his prime, it's just not something fans have ever really gotten to see on screen — at least, not with a lightsaber.

On the other hand, fans immediately got to see how deadly Luke could be as a pilot with even the tiniest bit of Force sensitivity. In the very first "Star Wars" movie, he famously executes the nigh-impossible Death Star trench run, in which he famously blows up the planet-destroying base by exploiting a key weakness in its design (which was intentionally left there by its creator, as we later learned in "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story"). In the process, he kills north of 1.5 million Imperial crew members and stormtroopers, including Grand Moff Tarkin (Peter Cushing). But if the sheer volume of that bodycount weighs heavy on Luke's mind, he certainly doesn't show it — undoubtedly because the Death Star would've taken far more innocent lives had it been allowed to remain operational.

Trench run aside, Luke kills just under 70 other people throughout the original trilogy. After that, apart from the darktroopers in "The Mandalorian" and a fish in "Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi," he keeps his hands clean up until his own death in the latter film.

Luke Skywalker isn't the only Rebel soldier to rack up a hefty bodycount by blowing up a Death Star. A fan favorite character from the original trilogy, Billy Dee Williams' Lando Calrissian is best known for being charismatic, duplicitous, and good-hearted when all's said and done. Throughout "Solo: A Star Wars Story" (in which he is played by Donald Glover), his brief appearance on "Star Wars Rebels," and his first appearance in "Star Wars: Episode V — The Empire Strikes Back," we see him pick off a handful of unsavory individuals with a blaster shot here and there. But that's not where Lando does his best work.

As it turns out, Lando is quite the combat pilot — even without the Force boost Luke uses to take down the first Death Star. In "Star Wars: Episode VI — Return of the Jedi," Lando gets to pilot the Millennium Falcon during the final assault on the second Death Star. The larger space station needs a larger crew, all of whom are vaporized when Lando exploits yet another weakness in its design.

Ultimately, Lando kills roughly 1.8 million people in total with the Death Star II strike, making him the deadliest pilot of the Galactic Civil War. As of writing, he is still alive in the post-Skywalker Saga canon.

True to his nickname, clone commando CT-9903 — "Wrecker" (Dee Bradley Baker) — demolishes his enemies on a level unlike any of his brothers in the "Star Wars" canon. For those who haven't been keeping up with the animated series, he was first introduced in the seventh season of "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" in a storyline that explicitly set up the subsequent spin-off "The Bad Batch." Wrecker is a member of the titular squad, formally known as Clone Force 99. Each member is unique to the rest of the Republic's clone army for being genetically modified. Wrecker specifically is bigger, stronger, and more durable than the average Kamino clone.

From his first appearance, fans get to see how Wrecker tears through droids with ease. The only clones who approach his extraordinary level of personal lethality are Captain Rex and Captain Fordo, the latter of whom is an ARC Trooper who (in the Legends continuity of Genndy Tartakovsky's "Star Wars: Clone Wars") is notorious for shredding droids even when greatly outnumbered. As for Wrecker, his own kill count can be attributed to his singular talent for demolition. In "The Clone Wars" Season 7, Episode 4, "Unfinished Business," he even manages to blow up multiple Separatist warships at once, causing the deaths of over 2.4 million crew members.

It's a little shocking, and perhaps ironic, that Wrecker is on this list, seeing as he's also one of the sweeter, almost child-like clones that fought alongside the Jedi. He protects the lives of his comrades and loved ones closely, but he's ready to destroy his enemies without a second thought.

Barriss Offee (Meredith Salenger) went from being a background extra in "Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones" to one of the most psychologically and morally complex characters in the entire franchise. Her story expands greatly in the official "Clone Wars" series, in which the Jedi Padawan grows disillusioned with the Jedi Order and Republic at large. Determining that she had spent the war fighting on a side that sees life as expendable in the pursuit of military dominance, she chose to rebel against her former allies, masters, and friends.

The vast majority of Barriss' kills come from "The Clone Wars" Season 2, Episode 6, "Weapons Factory," in which she and another Padawan featured on this very list destroy a Geonosian droid factory, killing over 3.5 million droids in the process. The event is the single-largest confirmed droid mass casualty event in the franchise to date (though there are very likely larger droid casualty numbers factored into the lethal acts discussed below). Droids in the "Star Wars" universe are interchangeably treated as sentient and functionally human or entirely inhuman and morally expendable. We'll leave that debate for another time — for now, this factory explosion earns Barriss Offee a place among the galaxy's most deadly.

That being said, this isn't the event Barriss is most remembered for. In "The Clone Wars," Season 5, Episode 17, "Sabotage," she executes an attack on the Jedi Temple that claims the lives of over two dozen Jedi, clones, and civilian workers combined. This leads to her expulsion from the Jedi Order and subsequent arrest. Over a decade later, "Star Wars" picked up her storyline in "Tales of the Empire," showing her eventual redemption (and seeming death) after becoming an Imperial Inquisitor.

And who was with Barriss Offee when she destroyed that droid factory on Geonosis? Why, her close friend Ahsoka Tano, of course! Ashley Eckstein's fan-favorite character (one of the best created during the post-George Lucas era of "Star Wars") was first introduced as the snippy, unpredictable Padawan to Anakin Skywalker (voice by Matt Lanter in "The Clone Wars") before gradually coming into her own as a conflicted hero. Unfortunately, her old pal Barriss nearly frames her for the Jedi Temple bombing, leading her to be ruthlessly tried by the Republic courts — an ordeal that drives her away from the Jedi entirely.

As of writing, Ahsoka is (at least in terms of raw kill counts) the deadliest light side Force user in the "Star Wars" canon. Though she and Barriss share credit for killing the most droids in a single act, she eclipses the fallen Jedi's total number of victims by about 500,000. The remainder of that number largely comes from some of her first missions in the franchise during "The Clone Wars" Season 1.

In Episode 19, "Storm Over Ryloth," she commands an attack that destroys a Separatist blockade — and some 200,000 droids in the process. (This is part of a gambit in which Anakin feigns surrender to destroy an enemy, a dubiously ethical tactic he performs several times throughout the Clone Wars. The Separatists fall for it every time.) Earlier, in the much-maligned "Downfall of a Droid," Ahsoka and her clones also destroy about 300,000 more droids in a single engagement.

Now, we begin to encounter the most deadly force in the history of the "Star Wars" universe — the Galactic Empire. The lives taken by Lando Carlissian and Luke Skywalker were likely viewed by the Emperor and his disciples as inconsequential compared to what they lost in terms of weaponry. This isn't just because the Empire sees its own loyalists as universally expendable, but because each of those combined three-plus million lives (of a military overflowing with limitless manpower) were essentially exchanged for multiples of those belonging (or related) to the endangered Rebel Alliance.

In "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story," we're introduced to Ben Mendelsohn's Director Orson Krennic, an elite Imperial intelligence officer, bureaucrat, and military researcher who plays an instrumental role in creating the original Death Star. He also bears the horrifying responsibility of being the first being in the galaxy to deploy such a weapon. At the insistence of Grand Moff Tarkin (portrayed by Guy Henry, using the digital likeness of the late Peter Cushing in the 2016 film), Krennic first demonstrates the weapon on the holy city of Jedha. However, he uses but a fraction of the station's full, planet-killing power (described in the film as a "single reactor" strike), killing over 11.3 million lifeforms. 

The casualties overwhelmingly consist of innocent civilians, as well as countless Imperial droids and stormtroopers. Most notable among the dead is Forest Whitaker's Rebel Saw Gerrera, who chooses to die on the planet rather than flee (and has a notable bodycount himself, having killed some 40,000 Imperial soldiers in an attack on a Freighter in "Star Wars Rebels"). The destruction of Jedha is seen as a victory by Tarkin and the Empire, who immediately commandeer the Death Star project from Krennic.

Of all the characters responsible for wielding planet-killing weapons in the history of science fiction, Peter Cushing's Grand Moff Tarkin is by far the most iconic and infamous. This is due in large part to Cushing's performance and the overall cultural ubiquity of the first "Star Wars" movie — though it's worth noting, for our purposes at least, that he's the only "Star Wars" villain to use such a weapon more than once.

By the logic we've been using throughout this article, it would be reasonable to assign the casualties from the destruction of Jedha to Tarkin as well, given that he specifically ordered the weapon be tested on that particular location. What's more, after taking over the project from the furious Director Krennic, Tarkin wastes no time making himself at home and even elects to use the Death Star for a second, reduced-capacity strike on the Imperial base planet of Scarif. To recap: During the Galactic Civil War, Scarif is infiltrated by Rebels (including Felicity Jones' Jyn Erso and Diego Luna's Cassian Andor) seeking to transmit the plans to the Death Star to their allies. In an effort to prevent this, and to cover up further evidence of their plans, Tarkin used his new toy to destroy the area surrounding the planet's transmission tower. This act bears the distinction of being the least-deadly Death Star strike in "Star Wars" history — the small blast is used on an isolated area of an already remote planet. Casualties were likely in the tens of thousands at most (and could be much lower).

What earns Tarkin the #3 spot on this list is, of course, the destruction of the planet Alderaan in the first "Star Wars" film. Tarkin orders the strike to eliminate the resolve of Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher). The planet's population is estimated to be 2 billion, all of whom are killed.

The expanded "Legends" canon of the "Star Wars" franchise is full of wild feats, including characters of immense power – such as Starkiller from the "Force Unleashed" video games — who would logically break the universe as we currently know it. In this crowded field of contenders, though, nobody had quite the raw destructive capability of Darth Nihilus.

The Sith Lord (dubbed the "Lord of Hunger" by those that feared him) was introduced in the 2004 video game "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II." It takes place thousands of years before Luke Skywalker joined the Rebel Alliance and remains, at least as of writing, far outside the scope of the current official "Star Wars" canon. Nihilus' title comes from his unique ability to absorb the life force of other living things. Fans have long described him as something akin to a "Force vampire" and have noted how his ability has been eerily mirrored by the decisively canon light side skill of Force healing.

Whether or not the introduction of that mechanic in the Disney-era of "Star Wars" lays the groundwork for Nihilus' introduction, there's no way his greatest crime would be canonized — if only for the fact that it would stand as, by far, the single most effective use of the Force ever. Specifically, during the First Jedi Purge of the Old Sith Wars, the last remaining Jedi attempts to lure Darth Nihilus to the planet Katarr so that they might destroy him. Instead, he somehow used his Force drain ability on the entire world, killing over 6.5 billion individuals. It's the most deadly act perpetrated by a Sith Lord in any piece of "Star Wars" media and would be disturbing proof of Yoda's maxim "size matters not."

Believe it or not, one of the most forgettable characters in the "Star Wars" franchise remains one of its most consequential. The Disney-produced sequel trilogy is notorious for basically taking characters and storylines from the original trilogy and recycling them for moviegoers in superficially "bigger" ways. Daisy Ridley's Rey is an exaggerated Luke Skywalker; Adam Driver's Kylo Ren is an exaggerated Darth Vader; and so on.

This is all to say that, when it comes to Domhnall Gleeson's Admiral Hux, it's fairly obvious that he's just a "bigger, badder" Grand Moff Tarkin wielding the First Order's Starkiller Base, a comically over-powered and under-designed space station-slash-superweapon that is essentially the Death Star III in purpose and visual presentation. The only difference is that, instead of destroying one planet, it can destroy multiple ones simultaneously.

Hux uses the Starkiller Base to destroy the Hosnian star system, eliminating the entire New Republic government and killing about 155 billion beings in the process. Yet, the franchise never meaningfully reckons with this fact in Hux's character arc. He somewhat impulsively tries to change sides (sort of) and is unceremoniously killed when the plot is done with him. With that being said, it's admittedly appropriate that the deadliest person in the "Star Wars" universe is a self-centered fascist bureaucrat with no particular skill, charisma, or vision for the lives of everyone else beyond dominance.