Dooku/Legends

Count Dooku was a Jedi Master who fell to the Dark Side, becoming the apprentice of Darth Sidious. He formed the Confederacy of Independent Systems.

Count Dooku was once an esteemed Jedi who served as an apprentice of Yoda. While Yoda taught Dooku in the Jedi Temple, Thame Cerulian was Dooku's true master. Dooku later became the master of Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi's old teacher. Dooku was a Jedi for many years, and his bust was displayed in the Jedi Archives, along with the rest of the Lost Twenty, the only Jedi ever to resign their commission from the Jedi order. Dooku left the order around the time of the Battle of Naboo, under the belief that it was a blind pawn to the corrupt Senate, and retook his family title as Count of Serenno. It is unknown when or how Dooku met Darth Sidious, but Dooku fell to the Dark Side of the Force and became Sidious’ Sith Apprentice, Darth Tyranus.

As Darth Tyranus, Dooku recruited the mercenary Jango Fett to become a template for the Army of the Republic's Clone troopers to be used by Chancellor Palpatine and the Republic. Ten years later, the machiavellian Count Dooku reappeared on Raxus Prime heavily criticizing the Republic and the Jedi Order for their decadence, hypocrisy and corruption. Dooku, a mastermind, publicly called for entire systems to secede from the Republic and join the Separatist movement, culminating in the formation of the Confederacy of Independent Systems. The first meeting of the CIS was hosted on the planet Geonosis, where Obi-Wan Kenobi was captured by the Geonosians and accused of espionage. Dooku cleverly claimed that he had no power over the decision.

Later, when Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala arrived to rescue Obi-Wan, they were also captured and sentenced to death. They were to be executed in a Geonosian fashion, but the executions were interrupted by the sudden arrival of Jedi reinforcements, led by Mace Windu. Though the new droid army of the CIS overwhelmed the Jedi, Yoda soon rescued them, leading the very Clone Army Dooku had helped create, forcing a Separatist retreat.

While the Clone troopers advanced and decimated the droid forces, the Separatists called for a full retreat, all the while Dooku pretended not to know how the Republic had gathered such a powerful army in such a short time. Poggle the Lesser, Archduke of Geonosis, commanded a full retreat and proceeded to turn over the plans to a Death Star weapon to Count Dooku to keep the Jedi from finding them.



Count Dooku fled to his secret hangar, but he was followed by Obi-Wan and Anakin. After injuring Obi-Wan, he dueled with Anakin, who proved to be a challenge to the aging Jedi Master, but the battle ended when Dooku severed Anakin's weapon arm. Before he could escape, one last Jedi, his old teacher, Yoda, confronted him. After a battle of Force powers, Dooku insisted on settling their contest with a lightsaber duel. Ultimately, the duel went unfinished; Dooku used the Force to drop a crane on the wounded Obi-Wan and Anakin to distract Yoda long enough to make his escape. Count Dooku soon arrived on Coruscant where he met with his master, Darth Sidious, and informed him that the Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems were officially at war.

During the Clone Wars, Dooku took up a few apprentices of his own in Asajj Ventress and General Grievous. At the Battle of Coruscant, Dooku, with the help of Grievous, "captured" his master in an elaborate plan to be captured himself. They both knew that the only rescuers likely to arrive in time would be Kenobi and Skywalker. The plan would be for him to kill Kenobi, but be 'defeated' by Anakin. He would then, in captivity, turn on the CIS by surrendering to the Republic forces and claiming to have only recently learned of the extent of the atrocities committed by the CIS, and specifically General Grievous, who would be the perfect scapegoat on whom to hang all of the CIS's war crimes. He would later ostensibly emerge as Emperor Palpatine's right hand man in the new Empire, leading a new Sith Army of dark side force-wielders to replace the Jedi Order and bring order to the Galaxy.

Two things disrupted his plans. First was the fact that Kenobi's and Skywalker's saber skills had improved dramatically since they last met, although they initially do not let on to this and allow Dooku to believe them to be swordsmen of a significantly lesser caliber. Dooku is barely able to render Kenobi unconscious before being disarmed (literally having both arms severed) by Anakin.

It was then that Dooku realized the second deception: Palpatine never intended him to survive, nor for him to be his apprentice; he was simply a place-holder for Darth Vader, whom Skywalker would become. At the Chancellor's urging, Anakin reluctantly executed his fallen opponent - who was effectively incapacitated - driving one more Dark Side wedge into his soul.

Dooku’s dying thought was, "Treachery is the way of the Sith."

Traits
Count Dooku was regarded as one of the greatest Jedi in the order for his strength of character as well as the Force. With his deep voice and veneer of elegant charisma, this political idealist and wealthy Count of Serenno displays class and intelligence. The elderly librarian Jocasta Nu once stated, "He was one of the most brilliant Jedi I've ever had the privilege of knowing." He had been a practitioner of the Force for nearly eight decades, and Dooku and his student Qui-Gon Jinn would have surely sat on the Jedi Council if it were not for their maverick views. In addition, Dooku is a master swordsman, specializing in the seldom-used Form II art (see lightsaber combat), which makes use of his special curved saber hilt.