Boba Fett is still one of the most popular characters in the Star Wars universe, despite the franchise’s Holy Trinity overshadowing him. Even background actor Angus MacInnes (Gold Leader “Dutch”) speaks about the frustrations he felt when fans chased after Jeremy Bulloch for an autograph in the documentary Elstree 1976. Apparently, the famed bounty hunter was almost a major part of Return of the Jedi, which would’ve probably meant worse things for MacInnes.

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Image via Lucasfilm

Craig Miller, who worked as the official fan relations officer for Lucasfilm during the age of George Lucas, spoke to Inverse about the much larger role originally planned for Boba Fett.

Originally Boba Fett was set up in Empire as a character, and the third movie’s plot was going to be more about Boba Fett rescuing Han Solo and all of that. Boba was gonna be the main villain…That was set up, why he was taking Han Solo away, why there was a thing with him in the Christmas special. When George decided not to make a third trilogy, he completely jettisoned that story line, which is why in the first ten minutes, Boba Fett gets bumped into and falls into the mouth of a giant monster. So he took what was planned for the third trilogy, which was the confrontation between Luke and Darth Vader, and the battle with the Emperor, and that got squished down from three movies to one movie. And that became the plot of Jedi.

Fans may still get to see more of Boba Fett in the future, if those earlier reports circling the Web in the past still hold water. While Rogue One (about the a plot to steal the plans for the Death Star) and the Han Solo prequel story were officially announced, word was that Boba Fett was being considered for another anthology film. Word was that Josh Trank was going to tell the story, but then everything with Fantastic Four hit the fan and he eventually dropped out of the project. Assuming it still happens, it won’t be for a few years. According to the current release schedule, Rogue One has 2015, Episode 8 has 2016, the Solo pic has 2017 followed by Episode 9 in 2018 and the third anthology film in 2019.

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Image via Lucasfilm