Lit Assassinating the Emperor: Impossible or Ingenious

Emperor Palpatine was the head of the Empire, he created it from the Republic and without him at it's head, it crumbled to dust. Seeing as how easily the Empire fell once Palpatine was dead, why didn't anyone try to kill Palpatine sooner?

We know of a few attempts, Headmaster Gentis's coup attempt comes to mind as the most successful, as he actually managed to mortally wound the Emperor. Palpatine would have died, had Vader not come to save him.

Another, less effective attempt was Trachta's ill-fated coup attempt, which failed miserably. You would think that Trachta, having witnesses Gentis's attempt personally, would have had a much better plan for killing Palpatine.

Who could have killed Palpatine and thus brought about the end of the Empire and how could this have been accomplished?

Note: Yes, I know Vader managed it at the end, at the cost of his own life, but I'm thinking more in terms of other beings, like Rebel assassins, Jedi survivors, Imperial traitors, etc.

 

Yeah, I'm really curious how exactly that went. Do we have details? Was Palpatine actually physically captured and put into a cell? Because I simply don't see how that would be possible by anything short of ysalamiri, and Palpatine very much strikes me as the kind of guy who would have had every ysalamiri wiped off the face of the galaxy if it was ever used against him in such a way. Or was he captured as in his ship was surrounded? I know I'd have an easier time buying the latter.

 

Ah yes, I remember reading about that. I also remember being annoyed that a fairly obscure RPG character was made to have apparently defeated the Emperor and captured him.

That said, I did not know about the Universal Energy Cage. If wookieepedia is to be believed, it almost seems like the essence of the ysalamiri in the form of technology. Of course, I'm now wondering how she managed to get him in that thing...

 

There were lots of attempts against Palpatine's life - and there probably would have been more, but the Emperor rarely exposed himself to a situation where assassination was an option. As his career went on he spent more and more time on his citadel on Byss, where he was basically untouchable since he'd pretty much removed free will from the minds of everyone there.

There may also have been some restraint exercised by various Imperials because they knew replacing the Emperor was impossible. If you kill Palpatine, but don't kill Vader, then the Empire instantly splits into pro-Vader and anti-Vader factions. Even if you kill them both, factionalism is probably inevitable. The Gentis coup attempt occurred mere months into the Emperor's reign, but in it we see that the members of the Empire are already prepared to turn on each other (rather than hand power back to the Senate or something) when he vanishes.

As far as the Rebellion is concerned well, the leaders of the Rebellion had a front-row seat to watch Galen Marek fight the Emperor, nominally beat him, and still end up dead with Palpatine free in the middle of the Death Star. Given that experience, I suspect they realized that conventional assassination simply wasn't going to work, which is why they ultimately went with the 'blow the whole space station up and take him with it' plan.

 

It's not exactly an original thought... the Empire was born out of a failed assassination attempt against Palpatine.

 

The various assassination attempts actually help explain the Imperial Mutiny in Dark Empire- Those that he found loyal Palpatine kept back at Byss, using the more treacherous and ambitious Imperials to lead the assault and then turn on each other, eliminating many of the threats to his majesty when he finally decided to reveal himself to the galaxy again.

 

Interestingly enough Mon Mothma actually forbade political assassinations to be used as a tool by her forces.

Much worse she is from a computer game, a very bad computer game

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars:_Masters_of_Teräs_Käsi

 

Being prominent in history is one thing. Defeating and chaining what's supposed to be the greatest threat in Star Wars is another entirely. I'm trying not to be too dramatic when I say that's the kind of thing that can completely shatter the integrity of a shared universe, and in turn diminishes Luke and Anakin's accomplishments.

The only way it makes sense in my mind is if "captured" means Palpatine's ship was surrounded and locked in by a few Interdictor cruisers, or with the application of ysalamiri or that cage thing Jello mentioned.

 

I don't think the emperor was in any danger from those incredibly sad cadets that couldn't even throw thermal detonators properly. The proof being that Sidious waltzed right in and electrocuted all of Gentis' army with absolutely no effort at all. He didn't even need to use his two lightsabers. Having both Sith (or even a force sensitive army instead of regular trained stormtroopers) was huge overkill in my opinion against Gentis. It was probably to send a message to what happens to traitors of the empire.

I think that the imperials are the least likely to assassinate the emperor. To become a high ranking imperial, there are certain personality traits, including greed and cowardice that are chosen on purpose by Sidious as to never be a serious threat to him. The most likely to succeed in assassinating the emperor would be the Jedi or Rebels, or assassins from crime syndicates.

 

The massive explosions method seems the safest. Blow up the Death Star, ram the citadel with a spacecraft, etc

 

Ah but good sir, these days you can emulate just about anything to be playable on PC.

 

Unless, of course, it was the Emperor's choice that he be "captured."

 

To me, killing the Emperor might as well be as achievable as punching a tornado. Luke won because Sidious was confronted with something he could never understand. Everyone else? Nice try but you can't destroy a force of nature without some sort of truly unique circumstance. See Galen Marek's attempt or compare to the Exile defeating Nihilus. Marek was an anomaly of power in the Force and the Exile succeeded because her nature within the Force countered Nihilus.

Zaarin, Gentis? They never truly had a chance in my mind. Sidious is beyond the basic restrictions of what we'd consider human limitations. It took Empatojayos Brand sealing Sidious' spirit and forceibly dragging him into the void to kill him. Policitcal coups and mutiny? Not only is it so beneath him as to be laughable but he's really too smart to be taken in by such petty plots.

 

Everyone can be assassinated.

And Palpatine still needs oxygen to breathe, water to drink, food to eat.

 

You confuse the shell for the being.

 

I tend to ignore DE.

But even if you take it into account he returned even more insane and senile, not the threat he was before.

 

So when had he figured out how to transfer his essence?

 

I prefer to believe he did it during ROTJ out of necessity which is why it took him so long to be fully reborn. But some sources claim he did it before that already... so whatever assassination attempt was successful.. he survived by bodyhopping! meaning.. some of those fools MUST have been successful.

So.. Zaarin, Gentis, Starkiller... who was the one that won but it got covered up by bodyhopping?

 

Oh, quite a bit later as far as I know. But Palpatine strikes me as the kind of guy who'd have been able to figure it out from beyond the grave if he absolutely had to. There's a reason it took the combined spirit of every Jedi who ever died to keep him from returning from beyond the grave, and it's not because he had a particularly weak will. As far as masters of the dark side are considered, Palpatine is it. The point of comparison for all others.