Emperor Palpatine cheating death was one of the most chilling aspects of the Star Wars sequels, but I recently realized his return was much darker than most of us thought. The team behind Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker went out of their way to really make Palpatine a “Phantom Emperor,” a ghoulish monster rotting away in the deepest depths of a dark fortress. His laboratory was riddled with other unsettling experiments to illustrate how messed up Exegol was.
I thought this was as dark as Palpatine could get, at least until I revisited some of the recent Star Wars TV shows. One line of dialogue reveals an aspect of Palpatine’s return I hadn’t thought of before, probably because I had always analyzed it through the lens of the original Star Wars Expanded Universe. After prying into the lore surrounding Exegol, I don’t think I’ll ever look at Palpatine in the sequels the same way again.
I’ve Always (Wrongly) Assumed That Palpatine’s Canon Return Was The Same As Legends
It’s similar but seems to have one key difference
I think the biggest reason I never realized how dark Palpatine’s return was in canon is that I assumed it was similar to how he came back in the Expanded Universe, now known as “Legends.” In Star Wars: Dark Empire by Tom Veitch and Cam Kennedy, Palpatine revealed he was alive and waged war on the New Republic. He told Luke Skywalker he cheated death by transferring his spirit into a clone body.
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Palpatine even revealed that this wasn’t the first time he had used this technique, as the body that was destroyed on the second Death Star was also a clone. Because Palpatine had perfected the cloning process and instantly transferred his spirit in Legends, I’ve always imagined he did the same thing in the new Disney canon. However, one detail stuck out to me during a recent rewatch, suggesting this may not be the case.
Palpatine’s “Project Necromancer” Wasn’t Complete In The Mandalorian Season 3
The Imperial Remnant hadn’t yet delivered any results
The Mandalorian season 3, episode 7 “Chapter 23: The Spies” confirmed that the Imperial Remnant was working on something called “Project Necromancer.” All that was known was that it had something to do with cloning, and since Moff Gideon was also trying to create Force-sensitive clones of himself, many fans theorized that this was an early attempt to clone Palpatine. This assumption was all but confirmed in the third and final season of Star Wars: The Bad Batch.
Shortly after the birth of the Empire, Palpatine ordered his cloners at Mount Tantiss to begin work on Project Necromancer. Although a Palpatine clone was never clearly visible, the scientists were attempting “M-count replication,” meaning they wanted the clone to have enough midi-chlorians to make the body Force-sensitive. It’s hard to believe that this could be anything but Palpatine’s early attempt to create a clone vessel for himself.
However, I finally realized something about The Mandalorian season 3… Project Necromancer wasn’t ready yet. Captain Pellaeon specifically said that Commandant Hux still needed time to deliver on the project, and since the show is set more than five years after Return of the Jedi, this could mean Palpatine didn’t immediately transfer his spirit when he died. This led me to consider the horrifying possibility of where Palpatine was if not in a lone body.
Palpatine’s Spirit Must Have Spent Years In Star Wars’ Version Of Hell
He had to be brought back from the world of the dead
If Palpatine didn’t transfer his spirit to a clone body right after he was destroyed, then he may have spent several years in Chaos, the Star Wars equivalent of hell. According to Star Wars: Dark Legends by George Mann and Grant Griffin, Exegol was a vergence where the boundary between life and the Netherworld of the Force was unnaturally thin. This is likely one reason Palpatine made Exegol his secret lair, especially if he was planning to cheat death.
PURCHASE STAR WARS: DARK LEGENDS
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this was always part of something called “Project Necromancer.” After all, a necromancer is someone who conjures the spirits of the dead, and Palpatine himself was well-versed in Sith alchemy. Maybe I assumed that Palpatine already had a flawed clone that he hoped Project Necromancer would improve on, but I never considered that it may have been all he had at that point.
If Palpatine did spend years in Chaos before being resurrected, this adds entirely new context to some of his words and actions. He wasn’t exaggerating when he told Kylo Ren he had died before, and perhaps this explains how he seemed so much more powerful even before he absorbed the energy of the Force dyad. It makes Emperor Palpatine‘s fate even darker and gives more weight to the final chapter of the Star Wars Skywalker Saga.
Emperor Palpatine / Darth Sidious
- Died
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Star Wars: Episode IX- The Rise Of Skywalker
- Alliance
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Sith, Empire
- Race
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Human