RX-24

RX-24, later R-3X, and also known simply as "Rex", is a character from the Star Wars franchise, first introduced in 1987 as the Audio-Animatronic protagonist of Disneyland's Star Tours attraction. He is depicted as an RX-series pilot droid who works for the Star Tours travel company, where he pilots a StarSpeeder 3000 spacecraft.
Rex later appeared in the attraction's prequel, Star Tours: The Adventures Continue. Set roughly 5 years before the timeline of the original attraction, Rex appears here as a newly-delivered, yet malfunctioning, droid in the attraction's queue.
Rex's appearances in the Star Tours attractions are not considered part of the main Star Wars canon, but are instead considered part of the Star Wars Legends continuity. Rex was officially introduced into official Star Wars canon with his 2014 appearance in Star Wars Rebels, where he works as a pilot droid for Garel Interstellar Excursions. Some time after this appearance, he gained employment with Star Tours, where he would later crash land on the planet Batuu, and be reprogrammed into DJ R-3X, the house DJ of Oga's Cantina.
Rex's voice was portrayed by the late Paul Reubens in all of his appearances.
==Background==
Rex appeared as the pilot in the original Star Tours attraction. Much like all droids of the RX series, Rex has a talkative and friendly attitude, and focuses more on his guest interaction than the safety and the schedule of the flight. In the original attraction, a red REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT ribbon hangs from Rex's torso, which may serve to explain Rex's tendency to malfunction and bumbling nature.
Rex was the love interest of ROX-N, a feminine-programmed droid that worked at the L'Astroport Services Interstellaires – a story element that appeared only in the Disneyland Paris iteration of the original attraction.
==Appearances==
===Legends continuity===
====Star Tours====
In 4.3 ABY, Rex is tasked with his first flight with Star Tours: ST-45, also known as the "Endor Express". The flight went wrong almost immediately. Whilst preparing his StarSpeeder 3000 for takeoff, Rex took a wrong turn and proceeded to fly himself and his 40 passengers into the spaceport's maintenance bay, narrowly managing to steer up and out into space. He then instructed R2-D2 to make the hyperspace jump to the flight's intended destination: the forest moon of Endor.
However, StarSpeeder overshot its target, careening past Endor and into a comet field, with Rex having to escape by flying directly through one of the comets. After safely escaping, Rex prepared to make the turn around back to Endor, he and his passengers found themselves in the midst of a battle between the Galactic Empire and Rebel Alliance, where the StarSpeeder was caught in a tractor beam of an Imperial Star Destroyer.
A Rebel Alliance X-wing starfighter squadron made contact with the StarSpeeder, helping them break free of the tractor beam and then escorted Rex's StarSpeeder through their attack on an Imperial Death Star space station. Rex assisted the Rebels, using the StarSpeeder's laser cannons to destroy several Imperial TIE Fighters. The Rebels lead Rex down the Death Star trench, where one of their ships manage to destroy the Death Star by firing two proton torpedoes into the space station's thermal exhaust port. As the Death Star exploded, the Rebel squadron and the StarSpeeder jumped into hyperspace, with Rex piloting the StarSpeeder back to Star Tours' spaceport. Seemingly out of danger, Rex then narrowly avoided colliding with a fuel truck upon landing. Rex apologized to his passengers as they prepared to disembark, excusing himself on the basis that it "was [his] first flight, and [he's] still getting used to [his] programming."
====Star Tours: The Adventures Continue====
Set roughly five years before the events of the original Star Tours, Rex appears in the queue for Star Tours: The Adventures Continue, alongside several other newly-delivered RX-series pilot droids. The RX-series droids are seemingly intended to replace the contemporary AC-series pilot droids that Star Tours employed at the time. However, the RX-series droids in the queue are not quite ready for flight – they are marked with "DEFECTIVE – RETURN TO FACTORY" labels. Rex himself is malfunctioning, attempting to speak to the passengers that pass by him in the queue, and foreshadowing his future misadventures seen in the original attraction.
Former RX-24 Audio-Animatronics appear as various RX-series droids in the queue area of Star Tours: The Adventures Continue in the droid customs scene. The attraction, set several years before the events of the original Star Tours attraction, depicts the RX-series droids as newly-delivered to the Star Tours agency, which has marked them defective. One of these former Audio-Animatronics figures is actually RX-24, malfunctioning and randomly repeating his dialogue from the original attraction (plus one new line of dialogue in which he says he has technical difficulties). In the Tokyo Disneyland version of the attraction, another RX-series droid appears as a hitchhiking droid.
During the development of Star Tours: The Adventures Continue, RX-24 was still supposed to be a part of the ride, instead of C-3PO, who filled his role.
===Canon appearances===
====Star Wars Rebels====
RX-24 appears in the Star Wars Rebels episode "Droids in Distress", voiced once again by Paul Reubens, who is famous for the portrayal of the character Pee-Wee Herman. RX-24's appearance in Rebels is the first official appearance in Star Wars canon.
In 5 BBY, he flies Star Commuter 2000 shuttle ST-45 for Garel Interstellar Excursions from Lothal to Garel. When passengers Ezra Bridger and Chopper are fighting, Maketh Tua asks for the Astromech droids to remain with her, but RX-24 corrects her, citing Imperial law by stating all traveling droids ride in the back of the craft, including Maketh's interpreter C-3PO.
====Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge====
After his employment with Garel Interstellar Excursions, RX-24 was hired as a pilot droid for the Star Tours travel agency. Some time later, he crash landed on Batuu, where he was reprogrammed and upgraded by Mubo at the Droid Depot in Black Spire Outpost. He was officially redesignated R-3X (or Rex for short), and given to Oga Garra, the proprietor of Oga's Cantina. Oga then employed Rex as the cantina's house DJ during the events of the war between the First Order and the Resistance.
Oga's Cantina serves as a bar at Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, a themed land at Disneyland that opened on May 31, 2019. An identical version of Galaxy's Edge (and Oga's Cantina with it) is set to open on August 29, 2019, at Disney's Hollywood Studios at Walt Disney World. Rex is again voiced in these appearances by Paul Reubens.
===Other appearances===
====Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar====
In Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar in Disney Springs is the airplane code, "RXE 2-4" used on a salvaged airplane, referencing Rex. He is one of several Star Wars characters alluded to in this way.
====Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant====
Storyboards of RX-24 and Star Tours decorate this restaurant in Disney's Hollywood Studios.
==Gallery==
==Trivia==
*Rex's poor flight skills may be due to a transparent red ribbon hanging from his body reading "REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT."
*Rex made a cameo in Disney Sing Along Songs: Disneyland Fun in the Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah song where guests explore the Star Tours attraction.
*His look inspired the design of AC-38, a droid from Star Tours: The Adventures Continue.
*In the queue line of the original attraction, the announcer proclaims that the new RX droids are the newest, safest, and most advanced pilot droids in the galaxy. In Star Tours: The Adventures Continue. it was further revealed that this was a lie or exaggeration as the Star Tours company bought him from a shipment of defective RX units.
*Rex utters Pee-wee Herman's iconic laugh several times during the attraction, and also utters a similar scream. He also says "I meant to do that", which is what Pee-wee said after it looked like he fell off his bike while imitating a BMX stunt in Pee-wee's Big Adventure.
*Rex went through several personality changes during the attraction's development. At first, he was conceived as a witty tour guide. Later, he was conceived as a brazen veteran-a deranged and broken-down droid left over from the Clone Wars named "Crazy Harry".
*In Oga's Cantina, Rex mentions the Star Tours droid, Aly San San, and saying that "she was the droid he was looking for", implying that they are in a relationship together.
*He formerly shared the same name and title as the clone soldier from the Star Wars: The Clone Wars TV show.
*RX droids were created by Reubens Robotics Systems in the Star Wars ''Legends'' lore, an allusion to Paul Reubens who voiced Rex. The Star Wars Rebels novel Head to Head later established Industrial Automaton as the manufacturer of RX droids in official Star Wars canon.
*He is credited as compiler of Oga's Cantina: R3X's Playlist 1, a album compiling music from Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge.
==External links==
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Category:Star Tours characters
Category:Theme park characters
Category:Pilots
Category:Characters in Disney parks
Category:Droids
Category:Heroes
Category:Live-action characters
Category:Star Wars Rebels characters
Category:TV Animation characters
Category:Animated characters
Category:Comic characters
Category:Characters in video games
Category:Star Wars Galaxy's Edge characters
Category:Disney XD characters
Category:Star Wars characters