Star Wars: Original Baby Yoda Concept Designs for The Mandalorian Are Horrifying

Not only did “Baby Yoda” quickly become one of the most talked-about creatures in all of Star Wars following his debut in The Mandalorian, but the character took the entire world by storm with his cuteness, but original concepts for the character offer a much different look from the adorable alien we saw in the finished series. Understandably, creating an infant version of the Yoda’s unique species came with a number of challenges with finding the right balance of cuteness with otherworldly features, with some of the early plans for the character leaning much further into the world of grotesque than adorable.

“We got lots and lots of drawings,” series creator Jon Favreau revealed in the latest episode of Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian. “Some of them were too cute, some of them were too ugly, some of them were the wrong proportions.”

You can check out some of those abandoned designs below.

Favreau noted that it was ultimately a piece of art from Chris Alzmann that won him over.

“It was finally that one image that Chris Alzmann did that had him wrapped up in what looked like a piece of a flight jacket or something,” the creator confessed. “And his eyes were a little weird, and he looked a little out of it, there was something a little off with it. But we found it charming, and that became the rallying image that we said, ‘This is good.’”

Fans of the character will likely recognize the above image, as it has since been emblazoned on a number of pieces of merchandise to celebrate the show.

Making the character even more adorable is that he was created through a practical puppet on set, despite some of the minds behind the series considering creating the character with CGI. Star Werner Herzog, however, considered it to be cowardly to have a contingency plan for the character.

“It was a phenomenal achievement of sculpting mechanically. When I saw this, it was so convincing, it was so unique,” Herzog previously shared with The New York Times. “And then the producers talked about, ‘Shouldn’t we have a fallback version with green screen and have it be completely digitally created?’ I said to them: It would be cowardly. You are the trailblazers. Show the world what you can do.”

Fans will get more of Baby Yoda‘s adventures when Star Wars: The Mandalorian Season Two debut this fall.

What do you think of these original designs? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!