It is not really a planet in the normal sense of the word, but rather, a landfill in space that has accumulated enough mass to be held together by gravity. Depending on the storyline, it has been depicted as either a traditional spherical planet or as an elongated slab. (In the original movie art and storyboards, the Planet of Junk was intended to be a spherical planet, with several rounded slabs seeming to rise off of its surface. In the end, only the "northernmost" rounded section of the planetoid was retained on film.)