Rescue of Han Solo

After Darth Vader orchestrated a snare for Luke Skywalker on Bespin, Han Solo was subjected to carbon-freezing in carbonite and handed over to the bounty hunter Boba Fett. This was done so Fett could claim the bounty that Jabba the Hutt had placed on Solo's head.

Following the Galactic Empire's takeover of Cloud City, Lando Calrissian extended an offer to Leia Organa and Luke Skywalker to accompany Chewbacca to Tatooine. The purpose was to determine if Fett had already delivered the carbonite-encased Solo to Jabba. Lando voiced his hope that this hadn't occurred, as it would render any rescue operation, especially one aimed at retrieving him alive from Jabba's Palace, virtually impossible.

However, they discovered that Solo had not yet been delivered to Jabba. Fett had postponed his journey to participate in the pursuit of his longtime adversary, Nakano Lash, becoming deeply involved in the surrounding conflict. Subsequently, Fett made a stop on the moon of Nar Shaddaa to ensure Solo's survival during his carbonite stasis. However, he lost Solo while away from Doc Ragon's establishment, sparking a war among bounty hunters. Ultimately, Fett reclaimed Solo during the Attack on the Executor and successfully delivered him to Jabba.

Solo's comrades were contacted by Beilert Valance, who offered assistance in rescuing Solo. Valance attacked Jabba's Palace to deceive Jabba into deploying his Megadroid, a move that would have significantly complicated Skywalker and company's plans. Although Jabba initially believed Valance was there to rescue Solo, whose frozen form he observed during the attack, Fett persuaded Jabba to allow Valance to combat the Megadroid. Fett had secretly aided Valance's efforts, suspecting that the Megadroid's activation and deployment would jeopardize his position among Jabba's enforcers. In a Death Match on Tatooine, the Megadroid was vanquished by Valance, thanks to the intervention of the rest of T'onga's crew.

While the Rebellion strategized Solo's rescue, Organa sought assistance from Maz Kanata. During their rendezvous on Ord Mantell, the fugitive Organa faced and defeated the Ubese bounty hunter Boushh, seizing his armor at Kanata's suggestion. Shortly after this setback, Boushh was slain by the Black Sun after attempting to blackmail its members. While rumors circulated that Lord Gyuti had ordered Boushh's demise, the knowledge of the Ubese's death and the theft of his armor remained scarce when Organa began her impersonation.

Calrissian infiltrated the palace under the guise of "Tamtel Skreej" and secured a role as a guard. Skywalker journeyed to Tatooine, armed with a new lightsaber.

In anticipation of his arrival, Skywalker dispatched the protocol droid C-3PO and the astromech droid R2-D2 (who was concealing his lightsaber) to Jabba's palace, claiming to negotiate for Solo's release. After being greeted and questioned by a TT-8L/Y7 gatekeeper droid, they were intercepted by Gamorrean guards, led by Bib Fortuna. Upon informing Fortuna that they would only deliver their message to Jabba himself, they were escorted before the crime lord. R2 played a message from Skywalker, who presented the droids as gifts in an attempt to secure an audience with Jabba, much to 3PO's astonishment. The Hutt, however, declined the offer but chose to keep the droids nonetheless.

Taken to the droid "assessment" room, R2-D2 and C-3PO were presented before EV-9D9 to be assigned tasks within the palace. 3PO was designated as the Hutt's new translator—replacing 80-M, who was being dismantled as they spoke—while R2 was assigned to serve aboard the Khetanna.

Disguised in Boushh's armor, Leia Organa journeyed to the Hutt's palace, accompanied by Chewbacca, under the pretense of negotiating the bounty on the Wookiee's head. Following a minor altercation with Doallyn on the stairs leading to Jabba's throne room, C-3PO undertook his first assignment under Jabba, translating "Boushh" as "he" negotiated in Ubese. "Boushh" engaged in aggressive negotiations, threatening Jabba with a thermal detonator to ensure his acceptance of "his" deal of 50,000 credits. While Jabba's entourage was alarmed by the explosive threat, Jabba himself was impressed by "Boushh"'s tactics, and they settled on a payment of 35,000. With the deal finalized, Chewbacca resisted the Gamorrean guards as they escorted him to the dungeons.

Later that night, as most of the court appeared to be asleep, Organa stealthily entered Jabba's main audience chamber to his trophy wall and liberated Solo from his carbonite imprisonment. Upon Han's awakening, Leia, still disguised as Boushh, explained that he was suffering from hibernation sickness and that his eyesight would gradually return. When Han inquired about who had come to rescue him, Leia revealed herself as "someone who loves him," and they shared a kiss. However, just as they were about to escape from the palace, they were horrified to hear Jabba's distinct laughter. A curtain to Jabba's dias was drawn back, revealing Jabba and several members of his court, who had anticipated Organa's attempt to free Solo. The smuggler attempted to negotiate with the crime lord, offering to triple his debt, but Jabba refused, having grown weary of Solo's delays. He ordered the captain to be taken to his prison, where he was reunited with Chewbacca.

Meanwhile, Jabba had other plans for Organa and instructed his guards to bring her to him. Organa warned the Hutt that he would regret capturing the rebels, but Jabba remained unfazed. Much to Organa's disgust, Jabba licked her face. Having decided to enslave Organa, Jabba commanded his servants Jess and Damaris to escort her to the women's quarters for cleaning and dressing in a dancing-girl costume. Organa was then chained to Jabba's throne and compelled to sit by his side at all times. As the night progressed, Organa kicked and shoved at Jabba whenever he attempted to draw her closer, but they eventually grew tired and fell asleep along with the rest of his court.

The following morning, Skywalker ventured to the palace himself. After overcoming resistance through mind tricks—convincing the Gamorrean guards he was Force-choking them, and Fortuna that Jabba had arranged to speak with him—the Jedi found himself escorted by the weak-minded majordomo to Jabba's audience chamber. Once Fortuna awoke Jabba to his outrage, Skywalker attempted to persuade the crime lord to release his friends using a mind trick, only to discover that Hutts were immune to such manipulations. His initial plan having failed, Skywalker telekinetically seized a DL-18 blaster pistol from a nearby guard, Nizuc Bek, intending to force Jabba's cooperation. However, before C-3PO could alert his previous master, Jabba activated a trapdoor that dropped Skywalker into the rancor pit, with the Gamorrean guard Jubnuk falling alongside him.

The two plummeted into the pit, and a gate on the far side of the pit ascended. As Pateesa emerged, Skywalker and Jubnuk attempted to escape through the barred windows of the pit, but their efforts proved futile; the beast devoured the Gamorrean in two swift bites. The rancor then turned its attention to Skywalker, who, although unable to evade the creature's grasp, managed to grab a bone from the floor. As the rancor lifted Skywalker towards its jaws, the young Jedi lodged the bone in Pateesa's mouth, distracting it long enough for Skywalker to drop. He briefly sought refuge in a nook in the wall before running beneath the rancor towards the gate he had entered from, but that end of the pit also lacked an exit.

With Pateesa rapidly approaching, Skywalker noticed a switch on his side of the gate. As the rancor passed beneath the gate, the Jedi picked up a skull—belonging to Bidlo Kwerve, ironically one of Pateesa's initial victims—and hurled it at the control, causing the gate to slam shut on the creature's neck, instantly killing it to the cartel's astonishment and anger. Shocked, the beastmaster Malakili entered the pit accompanied by Giran and Fozec. While Fozec and "Tamtel Skreej" secured Skywalker, Malakili confirmed Pateesa's death and wept with Giran. Enraged, Jabba had Solo and Chewbacca brought before him and sentenced them, along with Skywalker, to be cast into the Great Pit of Carkoon.

The prisoners were transported to the pit on a Bantha-II cargo skiff, accompanied by another skiff for security. Still disoriented from the carbonite, Skywalker reassured Solo to remain with Chewbacca and Calrissian for protection, as he would manage the situation, although Solo expressed doubt. To initiate his escape, Skywalker employed another mind trick to persuade one of the guards to remove his handcuffs.

As Organa had been spared from execution, Jabba brought her and several of his guests to observe from his luxurious barge, the Khetanna. C-3PO briefly reunited with R2-D2 before the astromech stealthily moved to the top deck, while the protocol droid had to relay Jabba's words to his prisoners via microphone. On the plank of the skiff, Skywalker warned Jabba that it was his final opportunity to avert death, a threat the crime lord dismissed, ordering Pagetti Rook to push him in. Saluting R2-D2, the young Jedi leaped off the plank, catching hold of it as he fell and springboarding himself back onto the skiff with a flip. Upon landing, R2 launched his master's lightsaber into his waiting hand. Skywalker promptly activated the weapon and began defending his position on the skiff. Kithaba and Velken Tezeri tumbled over the skiff's railing while attempting to avoid the lightsaber blade; the latter became the battle's first casualty when he fell directly into the pit, followed shortly by Rook and Rintel Aren.

Calrissian also assisted in incapacitating some of the guards and was engaged in a struggle with the Kajain'sa'Nikto pilot Vedain when, from aboard the Khetanna, the weapons master Vizam mounted a Gi/9 antipersonnel laser cannon and commenced firing on the rogue skiff. One of the shots caused Calrissian and Vedain to fall overboard; the human managed to grab a rope, while the Nikto lost his grip and fell in.

Further complicating matters, Fett rocketed to the commandeered skiff and promptly engaged Skywalker. The Jedi swiftly severed the bounty hunter's EE-3 carbine rifle as it was aimed at him, only for Fett to launch a whipcord at Skywalker; however, he quickly cut the cord and, in the same motion, deflected another blast from the sail barge, temporarily disabling Fett.

As the other skiff swung around, the young Jedi leaped onto it and began incapacitating the guards onboard—Barada, Brock Starsher, Lathe, Yotts Oren, and their pilot Pote Snitkin—unaware of Fett rising and aiming his Dur-24 wrist laser at Skywalker. Solo, who had seized Rook's abandoned BD-1 Cutter vibro-ax to aid Calrissian, was alerted to Fett's presence behind him by a wounded Chewbacca and frantically swung the ax around, causing Fett's Z-6 jetpack to malfunction, sending him crashing into the side of the Khetanna, tumbling off and into the sarlacc pit.

Meanwhile, onboard the Khetanna, Organa capitalized on the chaos, using the microphone to smash Jabba's room controls, causing the barge's windows to shut. In the darkness, she proceeded to choke Jabba with her chain, an act that demanded all her strength and compelled her to unconsciously draw upon the dark side of the Force for assistance. Solo, in the meantime, had extended the ax over the skiff's deck to help Calrissian, only for another shot from the sail barge to cripple the skiff, pushing Calrissian further out of reach. Solo, with Chewbacca now holding his feet, continued to reach out to Calrissian, but the sarlacc had wrapped one of its tentacles around his feet and began dragging him towards its maw.

Skywalker, noticing the heavy fire the skiff was receiving from Vizam aboard the Khetanna, had jumped onto it and fought his way to the upper deck, killing or incapacitating Vizam, Wooof, Nysad, and other guards. Meanwhile, with the sarlacc having finally claimed Kithaba, it was now only pulling at Calrissian's feet. Solo, after being handed Tezeri's DL-18 blaster by Chewbacca and having regained just enough sight to aim accurately, shot the tentacle, which released its grip on Calrissian and allowed him to grab Han's ax and be pulled back onto the skiff's deck.

R2-D2, meanwhile, employed his arc welder to break Organa's chains after she had strangled her erstwhile captor. Noticing Salacious B. Crumb was ripping out C-3PO's right photoreceptor, he shocked the monkey-lizard, freeing his protocol companion. Organa, R2, and 3PO made their way to the upper deck, where Organa hijacked the barge's Me/7 double laser cannon and aimed it at the deck while Skywalker finished off Klaatu and the remaining guards, with Taym Dren-garen managing to land a shot on his mechanical hand in the process. The droids then tossed themselves overboard, landing half-buried head-first in the sand, while Skywalker and Organa swung to the first skiff on a bolt rope after activating the cannon. The group of rebels picked up the droids using magnetic clamps on the skiff and sped off as the Khetanna exploded.

With Solo rescued, the Rebels—excluding Skywalker, who journeyed to Dagobah to reunite with Yoda—returned to the Alliance fleet. Calrissian then participated in the Battle of Taanab, which earned him a promotion to general. Subsequently, they attended a briefing regarding the impending Battle of Endor.

The absence of anything resembling order on Tatooine was directly caused by Jabba's demise. To ascertain the precise circumstances surrounding his death and put an end to the disputes concerning his will, the Hutt Clan conducted an examination of the Khetanna's remains. The sole discovery was a holorecording depicting Organa strangling Jabba in his final moments. The Hutt Clan tracked down the majority of the distributed copies of this recording and their distributors in order to prevent the spread of evidence that revealed their own weakness. His palace-dwelling courtiers anticipated the arrival of a new Hutt to assume his position, but when none materialized, they eventually departed, with the beastmaster Malakili among the last to leave.

Despite the heavy losses of life that occurred on the Khetanna, some individuals survived, including Fortuna, J'Quille, Tessek, and Max Rebo Band members Maximilian Rebo and Sy Snootles. The band dissolved not long after the incident. Fortuna, on the other hand, went back to Jabba's palace and took control.

For nearly a year following the rescue, the Red Key Raiders, Jabba's rivals, were blamed for his death. The Kessel spice trade experienced significant power vacuums as a result of Jabba's death, leaving trade routes that were once protected by Hutt-employed mercenaries exposed. Although Fett was presumed dead, he managed to escape the sarlacc. However, he lost his armor to Jawas and was captured by a tribe of Tusken Raiders. Eventually, law was re-established by Cobb Vanth, a sheriff who discovered Fett's Mandalorian armor in a Jawa sandcrawler and used it to impose law on the lawless planet in Mos Pelgo.

Boba Fett, accompanied by Fennec Shand, stormed the palace. Fortuna greeted Fett there, expressing his shock at seeing the former bounty hunter despite the rumors of his demise. Fett's only response was to shoot the Twi'lek crime lord and take his place on the throne with Shand by his side. As the new Daimyo on Tatooine, he took over the reins of Jabba's old empire and tried to consolidate it under his leadership as the new crime lord, opting to rule through respect rather than fear or privilege, and he refrained from using coercion or flaunting material wealth.

Because of Jabba's death, a large number of the Hutt's slaves were freed, which led the Niktos, one of the species most frequently enslaved by the Hutts, to admire Organa for killing the crime lord, giving her the title "Huttslayer."

In the years that followed Jabba's death, a Huttese song called "Jabba Flow," which was written by the Shag Kava band, was named in honor of Jabba, as was a non-alcoholic beverage known as "Jabba Juice."

The film Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi, which came out in 1983 and was the last film in the Star Wars original trilogy, featured the Rescue of Han Solo at the beginning. While it is widely believed that George Lucas came up with the opening, it was actually the brainchild of director Richard Marquand and script writer Lawrence Kasdan. The fact was eventually revealed via transcripts of meetings from The Making of Return of the Jedi.

The sequence was quite different in the rough draft of Return of the Jedi. Some characters, like Boba Fett, were absent. In this version, after a fistfight with the Rebels, all of the guards on the skiff transporting Luke and Han were thrown into the sarlacc pit. Jabba then ordered his Captain of the Guard to shoot them, disregarding his own men. The Khetanna exploded as it did in the finished version, but Jabba and his court, including Bib Fortuna, survived the explosion only to be knocked into the pit and devoured by the sarlacc.

Lawrence Kasdan suggested killing Jabba during the rescue, while Lucas came up with the idea of having Leia Organa strangle him with her chain as an homage to Francis Ford Coppola's 1972 classic film The Godfather, mirroring the scene in which Luca Brasi is garrotted to death by Virgil Sollozzo and his men.