Palo Torshan is a bit of a complicated subject. We can very briefly see this character over Han’s shoulder working to restrain a bucking Tauntaun. The story goes that there was another actor set to portray a Tauntaun handler in that scene, but he was having trouble managing the mechanical puppet- to the annoyance of Harrison Ford.  Richard Bonehill was supposed to play a deck officer in the scene, but was pressed into Tauntaun duty instead. If that name is familiar, it should be. Bonehill, who passed away in 2015, also portrayed several Imperial troopers and masked characters in ESB and ROTJ- notably Ree-Yees and the non-puppet Nien Nunb.

Despite his relative brief appearance, Palo Torshan is one of the possible models for the original vintage brown vest trooper. The thing to key on here is that, like the vintage figure, he has goggles on his hat, but no scarf. It’s a tentative link at best, but it’s something. His obscurity counts against him a bit, but he was also one of the Hoth Rebels to appear on a Decipher card, though the image there uses a promo shot, but with the image flipped and the character is superimposed to be leaning on some canisters instead of a Tauntaun.  For some reason. Those cards were weird.