Star Wars the blog: 2009

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Sabé

Sabé is Queen Amidala's top handmaiden. Because of her physical similarity to the queen, whenever there is any sign of danger towards Amidala, Sabé is the first handmaiden chosen to act as Decoy. Once in full makeup and dress, she is virtually indistinguishable from the queen. She also imitates Amidala's voice and speech patterns and is encouraged to give orders so that she may keep up appearances.

In The Phantom Menace, Sabé imitates the Queen twice. The first time is during the escape from Naboo. Yes, that is HER in the black dress; not Amidala. She continues to be the decoy until she arrives on Coruscant. She then returns to her normal role as a handmaiden for the Senate scene and remains that way way until the return to Naboo, where she wears the queen's battle dress and attempts to appeal to the Gungans. Unfortunately, despite her training, she lacks the political finesse of the real Amidala, and they are forced to let the Gungans, Jedi, and the rest of the Naboo travelling party in on the ruse.

Not much is known about Sabé's personal life, but it is stated in The Queen's Amulet that Amidala and Sabé are best friends

Queen Amidala's handmaidens are, invariably, some of the most neglected characters of The Phantom Menace. They do more than merely follow the Queen wherever she goes.

Chosen equally for their physical resemblence to the queen as well as their combative abilities and knowledge of palace life, they are a force to be reckoned with as any of them will drop everything at a moments notice to protect their queen. Furthermore, all of them are capable of replacing the queen and acting as decoy, should any danger to the queen be presented.

We know for certain that in Episode 1, there are at least five handmaidens, however, it was rumored that there are, in fact, an additional eight lesser handmaidens that were never seen in the movie.