KALLUZEB: AN UP TO DATE REFLECTION
I hope everyone has enjoyed Star Wars Celebration. Be it in person, or online, it’s been great seeing all these amazing cosplays, interviews and announcements for our favourite galaxy far far away.
As some of you may have seen, I have been VERY active over the last few days on the Kalluzeb socials. And with celebration out of the way and Andor Season 2 starting, I thought I’d do a little look back to how my favourite ship got to where it is today and what, with recent revelations, it might mean going forward.
For those who may not know, “Kalluzeb” features the relationship between the Rebellion’s Garazeb Orrelios and the Empire’s Agent Alexsandr Kallus in the animated show “Star Wars Rebels”. Two sworn enemies who spent almost 2 seasons fighting each other. That is until, they both crash land on an ice moon and rely on each other to survive and are finally able to put the traumas of their past behind each other. It was, without question, one of, if not THE most homoerotic pieces of media in all of Star Wars. While it may not have been intentional originally, the vibe and consequential shipping of the two as an enemies to lovers story came about very organically.
In season 3, after the experience on the ice moon, Agent Kallus turns against the Empire and turns Fulcrum spy for the Rebellion, saving the Ghost Crew’s lives several times. He gave up EVERYTHING, risked his life for the rebellion and truly earned his place at the table.
In the fandom, there was a lot of shipping from fans on social media, but what was surprising was that a lot of the shipping developed from the cast and crew from the show itself, which lead to conversations about it at fan conventions and Star Wars Celebration.
By the shows finale at the end of season 4, Kallus helped the Ghost Crew liberate the planet of Lothal. And after the events of the original movie trilogy, Zeb takes Kallus to Lira San, the secret original planet of Zeb’s kind. Kallus then realises he hadn’t destroyed the Lasat. They also welcomed Kallus to their planet as one of their own kind. Both Zeb and Kallus have a seemingly developed a very close and intimate relationship since Lothal’s liberation, to the point where Zeb covers Kallus’s eyes to surprise him and proudly wrapping his warm around him infront of his people. While their relationship was never directly specified, it was left in a neutral “maybe they are, maybe they’re not” position.
That being said, Zeb had given Kallus a new life, a new purpose, a new home, a new family and gave his soul and mind peace.
If that isn’t love, then I don’t know what is.
For a while, that’s all we thought we would see of them.
That is until, we saw the first appearance of Zeb in live action as part of the third season of “The Mandalorian” in 2023. He had a 30 second cameo and seemingly without Kallus. Safe to say, the conversation about the possibility of on screen Kalluzeb was re-ignited.
It’s also worth mentioning that in the credits of the episode in question, Zeb’s (well established) surname was excluded from the credits. This begs the question as to what is the status of his surname post-Rebels.
A few months later, the official Star Wars account released a video promoting the Darth Vader comic series with special anniversary covers of the Rebel’s characters. Agent Kallus was one of the covers and the video had the caption; “His pre-Kalluzeb days.”
This is the first time that Star Wars has used their ship name in official media. Fans (and Steve Blum himself) rejoiced.
That being said, Neither Zeb nor Kallus made an appearance in the first season of “Ahsoka”, the self proclaimed “Rebels Sequel.” Much to fan’s disappointment with Zeb’s name being mentioned only once as “training recruits.”
However, at D23 2024, a teaser trailer for the movie “The Mandalorian and Grogu” was released. And Zeb was revealed to be a part of the movie. Which proved to be VERY exciting for fans as Zeb is now going to be a movie star and finally getting his time to shine.
After that, over the next few months, the Star Wars socials posted things about the boys with very specific wording, using a specific shot of the two at Lira San and even a comment referencing to the boys as a couple.
They could have very easily used the term “best friends” in the post, but it’s the deliberate use of “partners” which is very intriguing.
Most recently, Agent Kallus was recently announced to have a classic action figure coming out in the summer of 2025, proving that Kallus is still on the radar of current Star Wars media.
(And yes, I have already pre-ordered mine.)
Which brings us to Star Wars Celebration 2025 where Lucas Animation unveiled a 20th Anniversary poster featuring all of their characters. In this poster, Zeb can be seen with his arm wrapped around Kallus in the same style as some of the other couples in the franchise. Both of them beaming brightly. Hunter from “The Bad Batch” is under Zeb’s other arm, but they’re not from the same show and anyone who knows “Rebels” knows the significance of the two being together.
Zeb was also announced to be a part of the second season of “Ashoka”. While only a few fan favourite characters have been announced to appear so far, I am hopeful that Kallus will be a surprise for the fans (hopefully Rex will be too).
Overall, when we consider how the Kalluzeb ship began and where it is now with the two characters, fans have hope now more than ever before that we will see the two interact again. While we might not know when or if live action Kallus will appear on screen, fans are still very eager and excited to see him with Zeb again.
While the ship is a gay ship, it is debatable whether or not Star Wars will fully commit to it. However, because of all of the support for it from fans, cast and crew, as well as all of the reasons l have listed up above, I choose to remain optimistic that we will see both Zeb and Kallus together on screen again. In my eyes, as well as many other fans eyes, they are as good as canon at this point.
Only time will tell as 2026 comes around and we enter what I am personal referring to as;
To finish off, enjoy this video of the best of Kalluzeb mentions at cons, celebrations and podcasts:
