Palpatine/Legends

Palpatine (84 BBY - 4 ABY, spirit destroyed 11 ABY), also known as Darth Sidious, was the ultimate Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic and the founder and leader of the Galactic Empire. He was significant for being able to eventually revive the Sith empire after the Sith endured millennia of self-imposed hiding.

Early Days (before 32 BBY)
Palpatine was born on the peaceful planet of Naboo. At a young age, he was discovered to be Force-sensitive by Sith Lord Darth Plagueis, who, following the Sith tradition, gave his newfound apprentice the name Darth Sidious. Palpatine was taught in the ways of the Sith, so that the order might once again be able to stand against the Jedi, something they had not achieved since the Battle of Ruusan. Plagueis taught Sidious everything he knew, [except the secret behind his manipulation of midi-chlorians to create or preserve life(?)]. Sidious soon murdered his master, taking the mantle of Sith Master, and revelling in the irony of his master's ability to save everyone but himself from death.

Palpatine then started promoting himself as a political figure to gain influence in social groups which could help him achieve the Sith's ultimate goal - absolute power. He began his political career as a representative of Naboo in the Senate of the Galactic Republic. It is rumored that he orchestrated the abdication of Naboo's King Veruna, possibly hoping that his successor, Queen Padmé Amidala, would be too young to make rational decisions and would primarily rely on Palpatine during her reign.

As the new Sith master and practitioner of a Sith-variant Form IV lightsaber combat, Sidious took a Zabrak from Iridonia to be his apprentice. He dubbed him Darth Maul and moulded him into an unquestioning tool, who lived only to serve his master's wish of destroying the Jedi and claiming the galaxy for the Sith.

According to Supreme Prophet Kadann, Palpatine produced a son named Triclops some time during this period and banished him to the spice mines of Kessel. The validity of this story is not known, but it was commonly believed by high-ranking Imperial officers in 5 ABY.

The Naboo Conflict (32 BBY)
In 32 BBY, the shadowy figure entered into a deal with the Neimoidians of the Trade Federation, convincing them to blockade his own homeworld, Naboo, in protest of the taxation of certain trade routes. Sidious kept his other identity of Palpatine secret, wearing a long black cloak and only communicating with the Viceroy via hologram. Upon the arrival of two Jedi ambassadors and the escape of Queen Amidala, Sidious revealed that he held some power of the Senate, assuring the Viceroy that no action would be taken against them.

Using the turmoil created by the blockade, Palpatine convinced Amidala, who returned to Coruscant to seek the Senate's help, to issue a Vote of No Confidence against Supreme Chancellor Finis Valorum, whom he portrayed as weak, indecisive and responsible for the taxation the Trade Federation protested against. Palpatine was soon nominated for Chancellorship and, confident in his victory, asked Amidala to stay on Coruscant and wait until the election.

However, the Queen took a step Sidious and the Trade Federation did not expect: disgusted with the Senate's lack of action, she returned to Naboo, hoping to resolve the issue by herself. Darth Maul, who had earlier been dispatched by Sidious to help the Federation deal with the Jedi threat, confronted Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn and his Padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, in the Theed palace; although he succeeded in slaying Qui-Gon, he soon himself fell victim to Obi-Wan. Whatever Sidious' plans for Naboo were, they were abandoned, yet he now held the power of the Senate in his hands. He also discovered the young Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan's new Padawan, and took a great interest in his abilities.

The Clone Wars (22 BBY to 19 BBY)
After the death of his apprentice, Sidious realized he would not be able to train a new hand in the short time he wanted, and so he was able to convince maverick Jedi Knight, Dooku, to turn to his cause, using his distaste of the Senate as a lure. Dooku agreed, receiving the title of Darth Tyranus.

As Tyranus (not using the Sith title Darth), Dooku contacted the bounty hunter Jango Fett, recruiting him as a template for a clone army. Meanwhile, he united several commercial organizations - among them the Trade Federation - into the Confederacy of Independent Systems, thus forging the Separatist movement.

In 22 BBY, Palpatine used his powers to convince the Senate to grant him emergency powers to deal with the growing threat of the Separatists. What both the Jedi and the Senate failed to realize was that both the Separatists and the Republic were now under the control of Palpatine, and the coming war was little more than a plot for Sidious to seize more power. Palpatine's insidious nature also allowed him to conceal himself from the Jedi Masters, even when sharing the same room.

Palpatine used his emergency dictatorial powers to legalize the clone army secretly built on Kamino, calling it the Grand Army of the Republic, and use it to combat the Confederacy. This would later provide the basis for his Imperial reign, based largely on the military.

During the Clone Wars, Palpatine further consolidated his power. He continued to control the Confederacy of Independent Systems through Count Dooku, eventually having them 'kidnap' him from his office in 19 BBY. Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker led a rescue, eventually meeting with Palpatine and Dooku in the flagship of General Grievous, the Invisible Hand. Whilst Obi-Wan was rendered unconscious, Anakin was able to defeat Dooku, and beheaded him upon the Chancellor’s urging. By this point, Palpatine had long desired to take Anakin as an apprentice, and he needed to have Dooku removed to do so. Over time, the Jedi began to grow distrustful of Palpatine, fearing what this ever increasing power might mean for the Republic.

End of the Republic (19 BBY)
At the same time, Sidious was sowing similar seeds of doubt into the mind of Anakin. Young Skywalker saw a vision of his wife, Padmé Amidala, dying after giving birth to their child. Palpatine promised Anakin to open his mind to the Sith knowledge of the Dark Side, which - as he claimed - was the only way to escape Padmé's death. Eventually the inevitable confrontation emerged, and Anakin delivered the revelation that Palpatine was really Darth Sidious, the Sith master for which they had been searching for over ten years, to Jedi Master Mace Windu.

Mace ordered Anakin to remain in the Jedi Temple, while he and a team of Jedi went to arrest the Chancellor. Palpatine quickly dispatched the rest of the Force, dueling Mace alone. Sensing Anakin's arrival, Sidious feigned defeat, knowing that the only way to break Anakin’s connection to the Jedi was to force Anakin to choose loyalty to the Jedi, or to Sidious' promises of the power to govern life and death.

Anakin chose Sidious, severing Mace’s hand. Sidious then took the opportunity to blast Mace from the building with Force lightning, removing one of the greater threats to his power. He dubbed his new apprentice Darth Vader, and commanded him to remove the Jedi. Meanwhile, he unleashed Order 66 to the clone army, and so removed the majority of the Jedi Order - with the only survivors being Obi-Wan and Master Yoda - as a threat to him.

Using his new face, deformed by his own Force lighting during the fight with Windu, as a proof of the Jedi Order's attempt to assassinate him and usurp the power over the galaxy, Palpatine gained additional sympathy among the Senate and the Republic citizens. He declared a boldly unificationist policy, symbolically changing the name of the government from Republic to Empire, with himself as the first Emperor.

Obi-Wan and Yoda eventually caught up with the betrayal and deceit, realizing that Anakin had slain everyone in the Jedi Temple, including younglings. Obi-Wan begged the old master not to send him to battle his former Padawan and friend, but there was no choice; Yoda thought the new Emperor would be far too powerful for Obi-Wan. As Obi-Wan confronted Anakin on Mustafar, Yoda met with Sidious on Coruscant. Yoda was unable to stand against the might of the Emperor, and so fled, whilst Obi-Wan succeeded in wounding his former apprentice, leaving him for death. Sidious eventually found his apprentice, and commanded that he be rebuilt using prosthetic replacements. Sidious lied to Vader, telling him that he had killed Padmé in his anger, and rage finally consumed him completely. Meanwhile, Yoda and Obi-Wan fled into exile, carrying Anakin's twin offspring.

The Empire (19 BBY to 4 ABY)
Emperor Palpatine proceeded to gather power and eliminate his rivals following the end of the Clone Wars, establishing a New Order. The Commission for the Preservation of the New Order (COMPNOR) was established during this time, including the pervasive Imperial Security Bureau (ISB). His militaristic regime was centered around the Imperial Navy, although this branch would also prove the most insubordinate, and a tension between the Coruscant government and the fleet admirals existed throughout this time period, hence the need for the ISB as an internal police. COMPNOR's Coalition for Progress established monitoring agencies to keep track of all aspects of life.



Although this attempted totalitarian regime remained fairly weak, it was continually strengthening until the breakup of the Empire in 4 ABY. Examples of its broad scope include an Imperially-promoted aesthetic style of military-inspired simplicity, in contrast to the opulence and ornamentation Galactic Republic-era. Non-humans and women were excluded from much of this New Order, and atrocities committed by powerful regional governors were common.

In 0 BBY, the Emperor dissolved the Senate, erasing the last institutional remnants of the Old Republic. Around this time, Grand Moff Tarkin promulgated a fear-driven principle of governance later called the Tarkin Doctrine, most infamously demonstrated with the Death Star, an orbital battlestation that completely destroyed the Core world of Alderaan.

Unlike his Sith predecessors, Palpatine probably did not intend to be inherited by Darth Vader. Since the Dark Side energies that flowed through him ravaged and wasted away his body, he kept many clones of himself to replace him. He used Spaarti cloning cylinders to create a supply of younger bodies, and employed an ancient Sith technique to transfer his consciousness into a waiting clone.

The Emperor also constructed a secret throne world in the dangerous Deep Core on a planet called Byss. There, his supply of clones was kept and guarded by loyal Dark Jedi. Palpatine would also visit the ancient Sith graveyard world Korriban for advice from long dead Sith Lords. He also unlocked secrets of the Force from a captured Jedi Holocron.

Vader probably knew it and asked his son, Luke Skywalker, to join him and rule together the Galaxy after destroying Palpatine.

Fall of the Empire (4 ABY)
However, Palpatine had his own plans for Luke. When Vader brought the young Jedi to Death Star II during the Battle of Endor, the Emperor tried to convert Luke to the Dark Side and convince him to taking Vader's place as Palpatine's apprentice. His plan almost succeeded, but at the last moment Luke refused to continue fighting his father, realizing that he had already started transforming into his likeness - "more machine than man". The Emperor, outraged, attacked Luke with Force lighting - and finally, seeing his helpless son being tortured by this maniacal monstrosity, Vader returned to the Light Side and, despite being seriously wounded, found enough strength to kill his master by throwing him into the reactor core of Death Star II.

Without Palpatine's spiritual aid, the Imperial fleet was scattered, and the station itself destroyed. The Battle of Endor was treated as the end of the Empire; formally continuing to exist, it never rebuilt itself to its former strength, eventually shrinking to the small and insignificant Imperial Remnant.

Palpatine Reborn (10 ABY)
Palpatine would return, however, in a series of clone bodies and wreak vengeance on Luke Skywalker and the New Republic. He would only be defeated completely in 11 ABY. He was forced to journey in the maddening, bodiless existence of the void. Only by sheer will he retained his identity, and crossed the depths of space to Byss where he would take possession of a clone body. There, in Byss, he would remain for years and would rebuild his strength and Empire.

Palpatine's rule was so absolute that his apparent death at the Battle of Endor fragmented the Galactic Empire. Without a heir, opportunistic moffs and warlords set out to carve their own kingdoms wherever they could. This worked to the advantage of the New Republic which succeeded in reclaiming much of the galaxy. One warlord who nearly succeeded in defeating the New Republic was Grand Admiral Thrawn, the only non-human to hold that rank. His cunning tactics and unerring strategies brought the Imperial Remnant to the brink of victory in 10 ABY had it not been for betrayal by the Noghri Rukh.

Encouraged by Thrawn's successes, the remaining Inner Circle of Imperial warlords staged a devastating attack on the galactic capital Coruscant. Much of Imperial City was laid waste as a result, and the New Republic was forced to evacuate. Once on the surface, the Imperials splintered again, and skirmishes dragged on in the devastated cityscape.

It was then that the resurrected cloned Emperor struck. Using his dark powers to create a powerful Force storm, he swept Jedi Master Luke Skywalker to Byss. There, he revealed himself to Luke, and revealed the power of the Dark Side. Faced with an immortal foe, Skywalker did the unthinkable -- in order to defeat the Dark Side from within, he knelt before Palpatine, and submitted himself as the Emperor's new apprentice.

Skywalker was too enmeshed in the Dark Side to successfully rebel against his master. Although he sabotaged some of Palpatine's military projects including the World Devastators during the Battle of Calamari, he still could not free himself from the grip of the Dark Side. It was only by his sister, Leia Organa Solo, that he gained the strength that he need. Together, the pair were able to defeat the clone Emperor temporarily onboard his flagship the Eclipse during the Battle of Pinnacle Base.

Having returned in yet another clone, Palpatine continued his scourge against the New Republic. Armed with the deadly superweapons, the Galaxy Gun and his second Eclipse-class Star Destroyer Eclipse II, Palpatine forced many New Republic worlds to submit to Imperial rule. Despite his growing Empire, Palpatine was again growing frail and weak. Worse, he was again defeated by the New Republic which succeeded in destroying his throne world and most of his fleet.

His clones had also been sabotaged by his own physician. With his body wasting away rapidly, he went to the Sith world Korriban to consult the ancient Sith Lords. They advised him to enter Leia's newborn son Anakin Solo. During the attempt to possess the baby, Han Solo shot the dying Emperor in the back. Before his soul could enter Anakin's body, Palpatine was intercepted by the Jedi Knight Empatojayos Brand who had survived the Purge. Cut off from a host body, Emperor Palpatine's spirit was destroyed once and for all. Darth Sidious, the greatest Dark Lord of the Sith, was finally dead.

Abilities
Darth Sidious possessed a superior intellect, had a cunning understanding of the human mind, and was skilled in the use of the Force in foreseeing the future, so he could manipulate events as though he were a dejarik grandmaster moving pieces on a board. Therefore, he had a penchant for complicated schemes, and such was his patience that he could wait years to see them come into fruition. Sidious had a broad expertise in areas such as psychology, bureaucracy, and philosophy. The Dark Side energies flowing through his body were so intense that they ravaged his mortal frame. Lord Sidious was a gnarled, ancient man with pale skin, searing, sickly yellow eyes, a heavy dark cloak, and a glossy black cane.

Darth Sidious was an enormously talented fighter. Apparently, the only Jedi ever known to defeat Sidious in battle was Mace Windu, though Anakin Skywalker intervened and Sidious won afterall. It is also possible that the loss itself was merely a ploy on Sidious' part to attempt to turn Anakin. As Palpatine, he had gained a reputation for being a good and modest man from Naboo, an extremely humble and peaceful backwater world. As both Senator and Supreme Chancellor of the Republic, he promised to bring justice to the government, which had been mired in corruption and chaos. Actually the Dark Lord of the Sith, he had in fact used his intellect to become the most powerful tyrant in galactic history. In his roles as Senator and Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic, he appeared as an unassuming old man with elegant robes.

Disfiguration
It is not known which of Palpatine's guises was his 'true' face. Several possibilities have arisen. Apart from the obvious understanding that he was disfigured because of the Lightning, there is also the possibility that Sidious had been deformed since he had become a Sith.

He used therefore some kind of Force trick in order to cloak his Sith form and appear like a normal person to others, even Jedi. But during the battle with Windu, he lost concentration and temporarily revealed it. He then decided to present it to accuse the Jedi, and then as an Emperor, because there was no need to hide any more.

Another theory suggests that, since Sidious had never overtly used his considerable power before, the Dark Side took a heavy toll on his body when his powers were finally unleashed. The fact that Sidious' eyes changed to the sickly yellow common among Sith at the same time lends some credence to this idea.

Behind the Scenes


Like many personalities in the Star Wars universe, Palpatine's character has clear similarities to certain historical figures. Parallels to Julius Caesar, Napoleon Bonaparte, George W. Bush and Adolf Hitler can all be found in the Galactic Emperor's words and actions (in many ways he is an amalgamation of the two Caesars -- Julius Caesar and Caesar Augustus -- and Lucius Cornelius Sulla). In writing the original drafts of the Star Wars films, during the mid-1970s, George Lucas has said he was influenced by then-US President Richard Nixon.

In many ways, Palpatine is an archetypal villain, who does not appear to have any understandable motivation. He relies on deception and manipulation to control and corrupt individuals throughout the films, and as a result is a classically diabolical character. As Emperor, he appears to be a frail, weak old man, but is actually quite supernaturally powerful. Palpatine may be viewed as the quintessential wolf in sheep's clothing. Palpatine's motivations are more easily explained when viewed in the context of his alter ego Darth Sidious.

Palpatine's full name (assuming he has any names other than "Palpatine" alone) has never been revealed. The usage "Emperor Palpatine" suggests that Palpatine is in fact his only name, though the use of titles such as "Senator Palpatine" suggests it may be his family name. Of course, Palpatine might be a name of state, as the name Amidala is, so it may mean that neither Palpatine's given nor family name is known.

Nevertheless, the original version of his character in Lucas' early scripts was named "Cos Dashit" and many Star Wars fan fiction writers have quite incorrectly adopted the name "Cos Palpatine" in their stories and web pages -- so much so that it has become "fanon." The name "Dantius Palpatine" has also been adopted, though its origins are more ambiguous, seeming to come from SuperShadow, a website of fraudulent Star Wars material, including "synopses" for Episodes VII - IX. On the official website, it is stated that Palpatine's first name, if he has one, has not yet been revealed.

Both the middle aged Palpatine and the elderly Emperor Palpatine are played by actor Ian McDiarmid, although the holographic image of the Emperor that briefly appeared in The Empire Strikes Back was played by an unnamed actor (a woman with the composited image of a chimpanzee for the eyes) and was voiced by Clive Revill. For the 2004 DVD release of the Star Wars Trilogy, the scene in Episode V was reshot with Ian McDiarmid replacing Revill as the Emperor, with new lines recorded for both McDiarmid and James Earl Jones (the voice of Darth Vader). In the Clone Wars cartoon series, Nick Jameson voiced Palpatine.

The origin of the name "Palpatine" is not known. It may come from the word "palatine," meaning "relating to a palace," which is fitting for a supreme dictator. Some have speculated that it refers to Leonard Harris' character in Taxi Driver, Senator Palantine (note the difference in spelling.) Another theory suggests he was named for Palatine Hill, where Romulus and Remus were found and raised by she-wolf according to Roman mythology and where the palace of the Roman Emperors was located.

Styles of Address

 * Senator Palpatine of the Sovereign System of Naboo.
 * His Excellency Supreme Chancellor Palpatine of the Galactic Republic.
 * His Imperial Majesty Emperor Palpatine of the Galactic Empire.
 * Darth Sidious, Dark Lord of the Sith.