E.K. Johnston has become the de facto choice to author any young adult novel about a female character in the beloved galaxy far, far away. After her Queen’s trilogy and Ahsoka compelled readers with their character development over plot focused storytelling, Johnston has picked up her pen once more to explore a character, Qi’ra, that audiences have been chomping at the bit to learn more about.

While this addition to the canon does not reach the heights of her former installments, Crimson Climb’s subtle progression through Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs gives readers a look into how and why Qi’ra became the kind of person who would willingly choose to abandon the man she loves in favor of Crimson Dawn and Maul. That decision, a form of self-actualization (the final tier on the Hierarchy), is made well before Solo. It is made when Crimson Dawn provides her with her…

1- Physiological Needs

Physiological needs include all of man’s basic biological needs for survival, a la food, water, shelter, and sleep. These needs must be meet in perpetuity in order to purse the other tiers, as the hierarchy is not a straight line. The base needs of one tier must be present before the “harder” tiers can be pursued, but one’s focus, depending on their life circumstances, may lead them up and down the tiers in a non-linear fashion.

Qi’ra, as a member of the White Worms and resident of the sewers of Corellia, has spent the majority of her existence just pursuing her physiological needs only. On numerous occasions Qi’ra hides food or rations her food because she doesn’t know where her next meal is going to come from. Similarly, when she gets a new jacket (after she was assaulted and her’s was stolen), she refuses to take it off for fear of it being stolen as well. This is life as a White Worm. Survive. Just survive. Only when she leaves the White Worms and has an abundance of food, shelter, and clothing, can she pursue…

2- Safety and Security

Safety and security needs revolve around family, friends, society, and the ability to experience predictability, order, and control in one’s life. Essentially, can one feel safe in their everyday life?

For Qi’ra the White Worm the answer is no. Mostly. With Han she had some sense of family, but the moment she got trapped on the wrong side of the door it disappeared. She is unable to fully accept the safety and security she is provided within Crimson Dawn because she has learned the hard way. “It was a lesson Qi’ra knew all too well. She’d seen it happen over and over again, and then it happened to her. A canister of coaxium and the promise of a boy who’d always had stars in his eyes. It had been too easy to make the mistake, but the suffering after it had hardened her. She knew she wouldn’t fall for something like that again, but she understood the temptation of things that seemed too good to be true.” Due to this experience, Qi’ra is never fully able to make it “out” of this tier in order to completely pursue love, belonging, self-esteem, and/or self-actualization.

That is not to say that she does not grow within this tier. As a member of Crimson Dawn she is able to, to an extent, let her guard down. Her physiological needs are being met and she does not have to continually look over her shoulder. While it is dysfunctional, Crimson Dawn does become her family, and thus she is able to build a more solid foundation. Nonetheless, her scars from her time as a White Worm are never going to fully heal. From Qi’ra’s perspective, “It was a trap, just as sure as the White Worms were a trap. “

Even so, within that trap she finds…

3- Love and Belonging

While it would be hard to argue that a crime syndicate is made up of people who love each other, Qi’ra certainly finds a sense of belonging that the hasn’t had since Han’s escape. With Cerveteri’s group, she learns that being able to be a part of a community, even if she is only partially invested in them, is good for the soul.

She gets, to some extent, to be normal. As her and the rest of Cerveteri’s crew are walking the streets collecting payment, “Qi’ra could almost forget that she was working and pretend that she and Eleera were just out for a stroll, maybe going to a cafe or a concert. It was normal, and the strangest part was that this version of normal felt less and less strange. Qi’ra had settled in, and for the first time in her life, she was growing because she wanted to, not because she was being forced in one direction by someone much stronger than she was.”

This belonging becomes more and more ingrained as the story progresses, allowing her to even overcome the knowledge that Dryden Vos would willingly abandon her to die as they escape the party set up by the mysterious crime syndicate leader. Johnston writes, “Qi’ra had never felt so alone in her life. Not when she was dragged away from Han. Not when she was locked in the dark on Proxima’s orders. Not even when she was a child, starving to death in the Silo without a single person who even knew that she existed, let alone cared if she died.”

In order for one to feel that level of loneliness, one must have felt a sense of belonging, even one built on the shaky foundation of crime syndicate membership. Here Qi’ra knows that Vos would leave her for dead, that Crimson Dawn does not truly care about her as a person, but after she kills Vos she still stays with Crimson Dawn. For someone who went so long without that belonging, it becomes like a drug. There was no way that Qi’ra was ever going to abandon Crimson Dawn because it gave her that belonging and it helped her build her…

4-Self-Esteem

To some extent Qi’ra has always had a sense of self-esteem. Even as a Worm she knew what she was good at; she just wasn’t able to actualize it due to being in a constant state of survival. The game changes when she becomes a member of Crimson Dawn and recognizes that, “she’d get upward mobility in Crimson Dawn through subtlety, which played to her strengths anyway.” This realization pushes her forward, motivates her to become more and more ingrained in the syndicate and loyal to the man who allows her to build that self-esteem.

This is where things become truly toxic for Qi’ra, as she seeks that validation of Dryden Vos in order to maintain and build her self-esteem. After escaping the attack on the aforementioned party, Qi’ra’s virulent dependence on Vos shows. As Johnston writes, “This time, when Qi’ra met his gaze, she actually felt like he believed she was his lieutenant and not just a playing piece he could lose and still win the game.”

Qi’ra’s entire existence has become tied to Vos and Crimson Dawn. They have provided her food and shelter. They have provided her safety and a sense of security. They have given her somewhere she can belong, whereas Lady Proxima gave her somewhere to exist. Most importantly, they have helped her believe in herself, despite it being built upon a foundation of toxic codependency. So when she is faced with the decision between going with Han or taking the reins of Crimson Dawn, Qi’ra chooses…

5- Self-Actualization

Even as a Worm, Qi’ra wanted more. This drives her forward, allows her to accept the previous stages of the Hierarchy when they are provided to her, and eventually leads to her taking the ring off of Vos’s dead body. That is the moment she truly self-actualizes, at least in her view, but that does not mean that is the moment her character ends. According to Simply Psychology, “The growth of self-actualization (Maslow, 1962) refers to the need for personal growth and discovery that is present throughout a person’s life. For Maslow, a person is always ‘becoming’ and never remains static in these terms. In self-actualization, a person comes to find a meaning in life that is important to them.”

For Qi’ra, that meaning is trapped within Crimson Dawn. Throughout the book it is clear that she still thinks about Han, still wants to be with him. But when given the choice, she chooses the crime syndicate, chooses to live at the tip of Maul’s blade. Her story is not one of joy, not one of self-discovery as a guide for audiences and readers. Rather, Qi’ra’s story is a tragedy, a testament to what happens when the “least” among us is left to find their own way. The trap of darkness is there, disguising itself as light, promising a better future. It then wraps that gift in a guise of meeting one’s needs, but the darkness remains inside that gift of fear, servitude, and codependency. When it comes to Qi’ra, that darkness wins.