“It’s Treason Then” — How the Star Wars Sequel Finale Defiles the Grave of Palpatine

Written by Faisal Hay

“The Dark Side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be… unnatural.” These were the words spoken by Chancellor Sheev Palpatine to Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker in the opera scene of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, when the former recounted the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis “The Wise”, a Sith Lord who could supposedly manipulate the Force to prevent the inevitability of death. This would serve as one of many acts of manipulation by Palpatine, who was in actuality the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, in tempting Anakin toward the Dark Side of the Force and establishing him as the iconic Darth Vader; he then proceeded to use his position as Chancellor of the Galactic Republic to execute Order 66 against his enemies, destroying the Jedi Order and declare the beginning of a Galactic Empire which he would rule with an iron fist as Emperor Palpatine. With the entire galaxy under his heel and a vast imperial military at his disposal, it was only through the tenacious efforts of the Rebel Alliance, the stoic heroism of Jedi Luke Skywalker (whom Palpatine attempted to seduce like his father before him) and the redemption of Anakin Skywalker that his evil reign would be brought to a well-deserved end.

Sheev Palpatine, main antagonist of the Star Wars Original and Prequel trilogies, can easily be considered one of the greatest villains in the history of film, and a perfect example of the Evil Mastermind archetype. Sadly, this Palpatine — like many fan-favorite characters of the past — would have his character and legacy tarnished by the recently concluded Sequel trilogy. How they did it: by taking that quotable line from Revenge of the Sith’s opera scene and turning it into an entire film. Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker may well be considered the Alderaan of screenwriting; a cinematic disaster that fails at nearly every level of storytelling, from gaping plot holes to unnecessary McGuffins to even a blatant Avengers: Endgame rip-off for a climax. Yet, like the preceding films in the Sequel trilogy, Rise of Skywalker suffers most of all from its poorly-written characters, be they primary or secondary, hero or villain, older generation or new. Furthermore, the first two films have already seen a good number of these characters killed off, including the poorly written antagonist Supreme Leader Snoke, leaving Rise of Skywalker with the difficult task of taking the overarching conflict of those who remained and giving it a satisfying resolution. In doing so, however, it would also attempt to fill the antagonistic void left by Snoke; hence were the circumstances surrounding Emperor Palpatine’s sudden return as the trilogy’s final antagonist — “A surprise to be sure, but a welcome one,’’ right? Initially perhaps, but as it turns out Palpatine would not only find himself no exception to poor character writing in this trilogy, but perhaps one of the most jarring examples as well; in fact, the presence of Sheev in Rise of Skywalker and his role as its antagonist would go on to negatively affect the other storytelling aspects in this film as well, like the tentacles of a Diagnona ensnaring its victims within the trash compactor that is the Sequel trilogy.

It would be easy to label Palpatine in Rise of Skywalker as being not Palpatine at all, but rather a badly conceived clone or a talking corpse — and it would not simply be metaphorical. However, this opens up the first issue regarding Palpatine’s presence in the film: the presence itself, or rather the way in which he is present. Meaning, how is he still alive? As the Emperor himself admits after his unveiling in the film, “I have died before…”, something which Return of the Jedi made painstakingly clear when Vader threw him down the reactor shaft of the Second Death Star (which in turn was destroyed by the Millennium Falcon not long after). Yet, here he is in the flesh, albeit badly decayed flesh; but forget decayed; the chances of him having escaped complete obliteration in Return of the Jedi are extremely narrow (as if anyone needs to tell us the odds). So by all accounts even if Palpatine’s consciousness or Force spirit were to survive, his body clearly shouldn’t have; so how is it possible? Now, contrary to popular belief, this is not the first time Star Wars dabbled with the concept of Palpatine’s resurrection; the non-canon comic series Dark Empire featured him being kept alive through cloning technology Its not unlikely that Rise of Skywalker could have borrowed this concept — but then how would that explain the decaying body? Unfortunately, the closest thing we ever receive from Palpatine is a requoting of his own line from Revenge of the Sith regarding the Dark Side as a pathway to unnatural abilities. Evidently, the only thing more “unnatural” than Palpatine defying the rules of mortality is the way in which it is written in Rise of Skywalker.

Having established the undead Palpatine as the main antagonist, the film then proceeds to lay out his “evil plan” to the audience. While the First Order battles with the Resistance throughout the Sequel trilogy, we find Palpatine conspiring with fellow Sith occultists on the hidden Sith World of Exogol to regain absolute dominance over the Galaxy; their plan is to assemble a massive fleet of Star Destroyers equipped with Death Star lasers (because third-or-fourth time is the charm apparently), which they prepare to merge with the First Order fleet to create the supposed “Final Order”. This may seem like the ultimate doomsday plan, yet there just so happens to be a loose thread that would serve to unravel it all: the several Sith wayfinders which Palpatine (intentionally or otherwise) left scattered throughout the Galaxy, McGuffins which would provide the Resistance — and anyone else who stumbles upon them — with coordinates to locate Exogol, discover the Star Destroyer fleet (whose single weakness, like the Death Star weapons of previous films, renders them easily disposable) and foil Palpatine scheming once and for all.

More than anything, it feels as though Palpatine’s role as villain in the Sequel trilogy is a sloppy fusion of his roles as villain in both the Prequels and Originals; in the Prequels, he was the Evil Mastermind who used his political genius and connection with the Dark Side to strategically manipulate his way to greater power, secretly orchestrating conflicts that pitted whole worlds against each other and — after accumulating enough power as Chancellor — annihilating his enemies in one fell swoop, leaving few to stand in the way of his new Empire (in other words, he was “The Senate”); though not as present or nuanced in the Originals, Emperor Palpatine still served as a compelling antagonist in the background, using his craftiness in Return of the Jedi to lure the Rebel Alliance into a trap at Endor and almost succeeding in turning

Luke Skywalker over to the Dark Side; however, his unlimited power as Emperor cultivated within him a stronger sense of “overconfidence”, a weakness which proved to be his fatal character flaw. In the Sequels however, the Palpatine embraces his overconfidence when he dismisses the trail of breadcrumbs he left the Resistance to follow as part of another “trap”; but unlike in the Originals, he barely has any power or security to justify it; and unlike in the Prequels, when Palpatine used the element of subtlety to his advantage as he shifted between the public and private identities of Chancellor Palpatine and Darth Sidious (only having revealed himself when all the cards were in place), undead Palpatine apparently has no problem broadcasting his resurgence as the evil Emperor Palpatine to the entire Galaxy (as narrated in the opening crawl), essentially inviting his enemies to seek him out and destroy him in his most vulnerable state. As if undead Palpatine did not alone proven himself to be a poor character, his interactions with the other badly written characters of this film only reinforces it — starting with Kylo Ren. If Snoke was the Sequel parallel of Palpatine, then Kylo Ren is the parallel of his grandfather Darth Vader; a fallen Jedi who turned to the Dark Side and apprenticed himself to Snoke, following in Vader’s footsteps so as to “finish what he started.’’ After killing his Dark master (also like his grandfather before him) and assuming control over the First Order in The Last Jedi, Palpatine’s broadcast and Sith Wayfinders would inevitably draw him to Exogol; there, he discovers that it was, in fact, Palpatine all along who puppeteered Snoke and lured Kylo to the Dark Side; as he tells Kylo through shifting voice, “I have been every voice you’ve ever heard inside your head”. This revelation is taken rather well by Kylo (who was established earlier as an emotionally unstable character), despite the fact that everything he had done throughout the Sequel trilogy — from betraying his master Luke, burning the rebuilt Jedi Order back to ruins, slaughtering thousands in the name of the First Order — was all based on a lie. In fact, instead of collapsing into an Anakinstyle breakdown (as he or any other character in his situation would be expected to), Kylo would yet again submit himself to Palpatine’s for his own self-serving reasons; he would eventually redeem himself later on in the film (something which the previous two films had mislead the audience into thinking he would not do) and join the fight against Palpatine. However, in the brief period he spent yet another Dark apprentice, Kylo also brings another character into the fold, one whom Kylo shared a mutual Force connection and frequent confrontations throughout the Sequels and whose overall character arc would suffer yet again because of Palpatine’s presence: the Jedi protagonist Rey.

In her quest to find the Sith Wayfinder McGuffins for the Resistance, Rey is met with another one of Rise of Skywalker’s “shocking” twists as Kylo Ren reveals to her that yet another Palpatine continues to exist, one who is neither clone or corpse, but a relative; as Kylo may well have put it to Rey, “he is your grandfather”. This revelation practically serves as a w of The Last Jedi, which previously put an end to rumors surrounding Rey’s unknown character origin by dismissing them as “nothing” and her parents as “nobody” (a subversion of the “I am your father” legacy in other words). Furthermore, it can also be interpreted as a means of justifying Rey’s supposed “Mary Sue” label, something which has affected her character arc throughout the Sequel trilogy; after all, it only makes sense that a character who continually breaks the logic of storytelling by surpassing her friends and enemies in everything from piloting to lightsaber dueling (with little to no training whatsoever) would just so happen to be related to someone who now recently managed to break the logic of storytelling himself. However, in trying to answer the trilogy-long question of “what is Rey’s origin”, Rise of Skywalker unintentionally

opened the way to begging another; that is “when and how did Dark Lord of the Sith Sheev Palpatine find himself a wife and children?” It would also seem as if the Palpatine was just as confused as the audience, as he — the Sith Lord with a long history of converting Jedi to the Dark Side — apparently cannot decide whether he wants Rey killed by Kylo or made the “heir” of his new Sith Empire. Nonetheless, the movie still tries to use this revelation as the new source of Rey’s inner conflict, summarized by the moral of “Never be afraid of who you are.” Interestingly that conflict turns out to be a losing battle for Rey, as the film ends with her unofficially adapting the name “Rey Skywalker”, not dissimilar to how the villain of Rise of Skywalker attempted to usurp the name of “Palpatine”.

On the topic of usurping, this brings up one final character affected by undead Palpatine, a character whose name and legacy had been stolen and what remained of him — figuratively and literally — buried in the sand. When Anakin Skywalker pledged himself to Palpatine and the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith, it was so that he could attempt to unlock the means of preventing his wife Padme from dying as the tragedy of Darth Plagueis entailed. However, after using Palpatine to justify Rey as a Mary Sue, Rise of Skywalker went on to grant her the ability to “stop people from dying” via her discovered Force Healing ability (and like with Palpatine, no real explanation is given as to how it even happened). Furthermore, when Darth Vader sacrificed himself to save Luke in Return of the Jedi, it was initially believed that he not only destroyed the Emperor, but in doing so had fulfilled the ancient Chosen One prophecy that foretold of a Jedi who would “destroy the Sith and bring balance back to the Force”. But as it turns out, not only would Palpatine still be active thirty years later, but it would be Rey who end up taking the kill when she obliterates Palpatine with his own lightening in the films Avengers: Endgame climax and bringing back the balance that should have been restored thirty years ago; at the very least she could have shared the moment with Kylo, the last remaining Skywalker by that time — but apparently the movie thought it more convenient to have him sidelined from the final standoff, then reenter the scene to revive a mortally wounded Rey with Force Healing before dying himself...maclunkey. Couple that with the fact that Luke would later be killed in The Last Jedi and it is easy to conclude that, aside from “moral redemption”, Vader may well have died for nothing (then of course, given his failure to “save those he cared about from dying” unlike Rey, his moral fall would have been all for nothing too).

Thus is the tragedy of Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker, a film that thought it could save the Sequel trilogy from death, but could not even save itself. Just as the overarching theme of The Last Jedi can be interpreted as “let the past die”, the theme of this film (if any) would be “no one is ever really gone”; as Palpatine’s necromancy demonstrates, Rise of Skywalker seemed to take that theme quite a bit too seriously. That said, the concept of bringing Palpatine back from the dead predates this film as mentioned earlier, and it might not have been a bad idea to bring this concept back to the main canon if done so carefully, especially helping to give greater narrative significance to the tragedy of Darth Plagueis and serving as the bridge between Kylo and Rey’s interconnected relationship. Unfortunately, the mechanics by which it came to be in Rise of Skywalker made little to no sense in regards to the narrative, concepts and themes that had been established in previous films, and the attempt to rekindle the villainy magic of Palpatine from the Prequel and Original trilogies, Rise of Skywalker only succeeds in creating a pale imitation of both; in other words, he is just another Snoke. This, along with the other gaping flaws of this film, constitutes a very disappointing end to the Star Wars saga.