I'm just saying that I don't think Palpatine ever intended to transfer his essence into a genetic mutation/strandcast, because that would have only been a temporary solution at best(assuming it was even possible in the first place.)
Point being: Palpatine choosing not to use Snoke as his host, and instead waiting for an ideal vessel to surface, doesn't automatically cap Snoke himself below the level of RotJ Palpatine.
Really? Even though he went on a personal mission after seeing Luke in defiance to the Emperor. The fact that he even brings up 'you lied to be about Padme' to Sidious seems to suggest a lot of conflicts. I think its actually a nice bridge to the ROTJ conflict.
^ I'm curious to see how the comics flesh that out.
Because we know that by the time of RotJ, Vader was essentially redeemed in Palpatine's eyes. So any "conflict" he was experiencing is either gone, OR buried so deep that Palpatine can no longer sense it(hell, it might be buried so deep that even Vader himself isn't aware of it.)
...Otherwise Vader logically wouldn't be back at Palpatine's side again.
Probably not by itself, though I do think it makes for a very strong case. At the end of the day, the body Palpatine did choose was in far worse shape than Snoke was in and couldn't even survive without a device, so I believe that the deformities Snoke did have would have been irrelevant to Palpatine, unless those deformities prevented Sidious from inhabiting Snoke at all, but I don't think that was ever suggested. It's only implied that for one reason or another none of the creations created on Exogol were going to give Palpatine what he wanted, which was a long lasting body like you said. However, we know that Palpatine did choose the body he chose for a reason, and I think the most likely reason is that it was the only body capable of holding Sidious at least for a time. And if that's the case, then it would put Snoke below ROTJ Palpatine.
I mean, IF Snoke was equally as powerful as ROTJ Palpatine, well given how good he was able to get around on his own as of TLJ without needing a device to survive and to move(almost just as good as ROTJ Palpatine himself), then that would kinda indicate that Palpatine chose the inferior vessel, which I doubt to be the case.
Overall, I think what actually all but confirms Snoke to be inferior to ROTJ Sidious, is the fact that he is confirmed to be weaker than even undead Sidious, who is likely weaker than ROTJ Palpatine, given that the clone body Palpatine did inhabit was imperfect and wasn't ready by the time he did die in ROTJ, forcing him to inhabit a vessel that could barely support the power he had in his original body.
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
Undead palpatine wasn’t necessarily less powerful than ROTJ Palpatine though. He was physically weaker, obviously, but his power was still immense. That’s the entire reason he was deformed; his body was decaying because it could not contain all that power. When he originally transferred his essence to the clone however, the body was not deformed yet; it was a perfect clone, so of course he would transfer his essence to the perfect clone rather than a strand cast like Snoke.
It seems that Palpatine had attained the power of all the sith after ROTJ and the clone body was not capable of containing that power. Maybe it would have been able to contain the power of ROTJ Palpatine though. The ROS novelization points out that when Kylo met Palpatine for the first time, his power was greater than anyone else he’d met before. That doesn’t sound weak to me.
So just because Palpatine transferred his essence to the Palpatine clone rather than Snoke, doesn’t rule out the possibility that Snoke is not equal to ROTJ Palpatine.
I mean, we don't even know if it was possible for Palpatine to just transfer his essence into any being he wanted, at any time -- let alone a failed genetic strandcast. If that were the case, you'd think he would've just had Kylo strike him down(which Kylo was fully prepared to do at the beginning of RoS), hop into his body, and be done with it. /shrug
That's why Palps choosing not to try and transfer his essence into Snoke, and instead using Snoke as a puppet/servant to help further his own agenda, doesn't automatically cap Snoke himself below the level of RotJ Palpatine. Imo.
I meant "gone" from the POV of Vader and Palpatine.
ie. Maybe Vader actually does think he killed-off those emotions entirely(or perhaps even turned them into strength), and Palpatine himself believes the same -- which would explain why Vader's #2 status has been fully redeemed by RotJ.
...But then when Luke enters the picture at the end of the film, the emotions/conflict begin to resurface again. /shrug
Dunno. That's why I'm curious to see how the comics flesh it all out.
Falling...Falling...Falling... down a massive shaft, the betrayal sharp and stinging, a figure high above, black clad and helmeted and shrinking fast. His very own apprentice had turned against him, the way he himself had turned against Plagueis...whose secret to immortality he had stolen.
Plagueis had not acted fast enough in his own moment of death. But Sidious, sensing the flickering light in his apprentice, had been ready for years. So the falling, dying Emperor called on all the dark power of the Force to thrust his consciousness far, far away to a secret place he had been preparing. His body was dead, an empty vessel, long before it found the bottom of the reactor shaft, and his mind jolted to new awareness in a new body--a painful one, a temporary one.
It was too soon. The secret place had not completed its preparations. The transfer was imperfect, and the cloned body wasn't enough. Perhaps Plagueis was having the last laugh after all. Maybe his secret remained secret. Because Palpatine was trapped in a broken, dying form.
The heretics of the Sith Eternal toiled, splicing genes, bolstering tissue, creating unnatural abominations in the hope that one of these strandcasts would succeed and become a worthy receptacle. The heretics would do anything, risk anything, sacrifice anything, to create a cradle for their god-consciousness. Nothing worked, but their efforts were not entirely in vain.
^According to the novelization the clone body wasn't enough to contain the power of ROTJ Palpatine from the beginning, so it wouldn't make sense for him to add more power it. That'd be like trying to fill a container with more items when the container is already on the verge of shattering. So it seems that as of ROTJ Palpatine was already capable of harnessing the power of all the sith.
I'm not sure why he wasn't willing to inhabit Ren, and we may never know.
But we do know that Palpatine was creating strandcasts specifically to hold his spirit, but since the experiments were imperfect and incapable of holding his spirit, it seems he used a Snoke strandcast in his place since he couldn't live through one himself.
I mean, why would he waste time creating strandcasts if he had no way of entering one? I'm assuming that however he entered his clone would be the same way he would enter a strandcast, provided that any of them would have been strong enough to hold him.
__________________
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
In other words, if Snoke's body was capable of harnessing as much force power as ROTJ Palpatine, then Palpatine would have logically used the Snoke strandcast (regardless of deformities) over being stuck in a body that couldn't even move on it's own. At least Snoke was capable of getting around almost as good as Palpatine in ROTJ.
If there is another reason that Palpatine couldn't inhabit a Snoke strandcast other than them just not being strong enough, then its not even hinted at in the novelization. However, Based on this line:
And it was through that eventual union, unexpected as it was, that Rey was born. The perfect vessel. Strong enough to contain all the power of the Sith. His granddaughter."
...it seems that the issue with the vessels created on exogol was that they were just not strong enough to hold the power of Sidious. Nothing more.
__________________ "The power of the dark side is an illness no true Sith would wish to be cured of" -Darth Plagueis
Last edited by Dominis on Jan 9th, 2021 at 08:49 PM
Registered: Dec 2019
Location: Imperial Throne Room
Vader was also far weaker than he usually operates at, the Emperor specifically states that he once had 'unimaginable strength'. Of course a weakened Vader would be able to be easily manipulated with the force.
I'm sure we'll never know... RoS was a giant clusterf*ck that way, lol.
My only point is that if we're going to nitpick why Palpatine didn't transfer his essence into Snoke, then it's only fair to nitpick why he didn't transfer his essence into Kylo. Because by ALL accounts, Kylo's power/potential = Rey's... Yet Palpatine still opted not to transfer his essence into Kylo, despite Rey(his equal) being considered the "perfect vessel."
That being said, I think it's reasonable to assume that Palpatine may not have been able to transfer his essence into just anyone... And perhaps that's why, massive deformities aside, the Snoke clones were considered failures: they simply were not capable of receiving his essence at all(like a phone without a SIM card.)
As mentioned: if Palps *would* have been capable of hopping into any Force-sensitive being he wanted(at any time), then he would have logically just allowed Kylo to strike him down(which he was fully prepared to do at the beginning of the film), and transferred his essence into Kylo's body... Because if Rey was the "perfect vessel", then Kylo should have theoretically been an optimal host as well.
...But that's obviously not what Palpatine wanted. So I think it's equally as possible that Kylo and Snoke simply may not have been capable of becoming "receptacles" for his "god-consciousness" at all. That could be why no attempt at proper essence-transfer was ever made on them. I mean, the novelization almost seems to indicate that, for the transfer to be successful, specific biological elements were required in the host body -- which would help explain why Rey(a Force-sensitive direct decedent of Palpatine's own bloodline, born through purely natural methods) was evidently the *only* possible vessel for him. But that's neither here nor there...
tl;dr
I don't think ABC logic(ie. "Snoke wasn't used as a vessel, therefore he must be inferior to RotJ Palpatine") necessarily works here -- it doesn't seem that cut and dry to me. /shrug
The VD states that after the events of RotJ, Luke sensed the "continued/growing presence of the dark side" within the Unknown Regions, and heard whispers of "a resurgent enemy from the past." That's why Luke started searching for the wayfinder/Exegol in the first place -- he was trying to figure out what was going on. But even IF Luke suspected that Palpatine was still alive, he was never stated to have sensed the presence of Palpatine himself... It was implied to be more of a generic disturbance in the Force, which puzzled Luke.
It's also strange because you'd think if Luke truly believed that Palpatine was alive, he'd devote ALL of his time/effort into tracking him down, and not give up his search the second the trail went cold. /shrug
But either way, an unconfirmed suspicion(at best) that Palpatine was alive doesn't diminish the power of Snoke.
I don't see how his note in the journal was "retconned" by anything released thus far, tbh.
Luke did seem to liken Snoke's power to that of Palpatine... And headcanon aside, nothing I've seen explicitly contradicts that assertion. /shrug
Jan 8th, 2021 08:37 PM
