So I was having a discussion with someone on youtube, and I realize that a lot of people didn't enjoy Rise of Skywalker's Palpatine because they feel that he wasn't a master manipulator and that his plan in the movie made no sense. But to me, it made perfect sense.
Palpatine always planned to use Rey's body as a vessel. He only told Kylo Ren that he wanted her dead, as he knew that if he convinced Ren that Rey was a threat to him, then Ren would want to use Rey to help him destroy Sidious. Sidious fed Kylo Ren the information about Rey being his granddaughter and having her parents killed so that Ren would use that information to seduce Rey into joining him to kill Sidious together.
Up until Leia brought Ben back to the light, Kylo Ren was unknowingly doing exactly as Sidious wanted. That's why Palpatine told General Pride that Leia had disrupted his plans, because he counted on Ren and Rey coming to Exogol together, and from there would would possess Rey and force Ren to be his new apprentice, which is what Kylo Ren was being groomed for for all those years: to be the heir apparent to Lord Vader.
Palpatine was just using reverse psychology on Kylo Ren.
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
I watched ROS all the way through like 5 times, and I really enjoyed it each time. A lot of flaws, for sure, but I don't think Palpatine was one of them.
And oh yeah, you think so? What did you think about Luke?
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
Yeah, other than Palpatine declaring his true intentions to Rey when she went to Exogol, it wasn't made too clear. But between Palpatine revealing that he wanted Rey alive to live inside her and the novelization saying that Palpatine allowed his son to live so that he could one day provide a strong enough offspring for Sidious to inhabit, I think the only logical interpretation was that Palpatine was just using reverse psychology on Kylo Ren when saying he wanted her dead.
What makes it confusing, is how Kylo Ren was seemingly about to kill her just before Leia intervened, but maybe he wasn't. Perhaps he was just going to injure her enough so that she couldn't continue to resist him, IDK. But I think it's pretty clear that Palpatine himself never wanted her dead.
As for Kylo Ren being groomed to fill Darth Vader's place, I think that has been established throughout the sequels, on top of some of the expanded material, such as the ROS Visual Dictionary.
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
I like your interpretation, and it's a good way to help reconcile some of the jumbled mess that is RoS... But it's still muddled to me because Palpatine was actually pressing Kylo to kill Rey a few different times in the film.
First at the beginning: "Kill the girl. End the Jedi. And become what your grandfather Vader could not."
Then once more about midway through: "The Jedi apprentice still lives. Perhaps you have betrayed me? Do not make me turn my fleet against you... KILL HER!"
*The second quote in particular is essentially Palpatine issuing a threat: ie. "If you don't kill Rey ASAP, I will destroy you." So within the confines of the film itself, it did seem like Palpatine's original intent was for Kylo to actually kill Rey(even though he seemingly needed Rey to transfer his essence into.)
Yes, I still believe there was a biological element that was required for the transfer to be successful(which the novel also alludes to), otherwise Palpatine would've just had Kylo strike him down at the beginning of the film, transferred his essence into Kylo, and been done with it. So from that perspective, pushing Kylo to kill Rey at all makes no sense whatsoever, given that Rey was the only "suitable vessel" in the galaxy. It would have fit the story a lot better if Palpatine had ordered Kylo to bring Rey before him alive(like he did with Luke), but I digress...
__________________
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Last edited by Galan007 on Jul 27th, 2020 at 03:00 PM
Sidious did the same thing in Phantom Menace though, he kept pushing for the Queen to sign the treaty and all that but in reality he could care less about that, he really just wanted the Chancellorship so there IS precedence for him pushing hard for something that he doesn't actually want
That's an interesting observation. In TPM, the treaty to legitimize the Trade Federation occupation of Naboo seemed to be little more than a set of car keys Sidious was dangling in front of Gunray to distract him:
"Hey, you guys should totes blockade and occupy Naboo to pressure the Republic into rescinding the taxes levies on your trade routes. If the Queen signs, it'll keep the authorities and the Jedi from fvcking your shit up. You better get her to sign it, at all costs."
So Gunray thinks the treaty is the objective and so he relentlessly pursues Amidala at all costs and puts the screws to her people, which is what Sidious really needs to push Amidala and the Republic into ousting Valorum and a sympathy vote to usher in Palpatine as his replacement.
Convoluted and Machiavellian, but that's Sheev for you.
TROS could've made the muddied plot line a bit clearer, but it seems that Sidious's ultimate goal was to simply push and test Rey emotionally and physically using Kylo.
When he later tells Pryde that the Princess of Alderaan has disrupted his plans, I thought it was because Leia triggered Kylo's redemption. After this thread, I'm thinking it was because Leia's redemption triggered Rey into healing Ben and thus stopping her from giving into her rage on Kef Bir.
It was quite clear that Sheev's goal in TPM was to become Chancellor; exactly how the various pieces served that purpose, specifically the treaty, wasn't always clear.
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It's one thing to push for a treaty that wouldn't have mattered in the long run. It's another thing to push Kylo to kill Rey when she was apparently the only person he could transfer his essence into.
There was nothing particularly wrong with Palpatine's characterisation, in that Palpatine in the ST was still essentially Palpatine. But to take away his ROTJ "death" of him unable to see Vader's love for his son being his downfall and replace that with just shoot lightning back at his face... Ughh
The problem here is that he told Rey this. Why would she strike him down if she knew that doing so would allow him to possess her? Makes no sense. He should have just pissed her like he did Luke in ROTJ.
He did the same thing to look in ROTJ, right as Luke was poised to kill Vader: "Good! Good... your hate has made you powerful. Now fulfill your destiny and take your father's place at my side."
All that urgency Palpatine was placing on Ren to kill Rey was most likely just to make it more believable to Ren that he truly viewed Rey as a threat that needed to be killed right away. Palpatine knew that if Ren believed he feared her that much, Ren would use the information Palpatine provided him to seduce Rey to the dark side so that he could use her against Palpatine, which would have just played right into Sidious's hands.
I mean, the only other alternative would be to assume that Palpatine was lying to Rey when he told her that he never wanted her dead, but Considering how, up until he discovered the dyad thing, Rey was his only option for a new vessel, it makes much more sense that he was just playing Kylo Ren.
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
Jul 27th, 2020 05:40 AM
