Can we conclude that Sidious has been the Master of the Sith for no more than 10 years prior to TPM?

Ahhhh Palpatine....

His History is still shrouded in mystery, still so tantalizing to try to unravel.

From what we know, His Sith Master was Darth Plagueis the Wise, A Muun whom Palpatine eventually killed while he slept. Plagueis is credited with being the only one able to coax the midichlorians into creating life... Strongly hinting that he was still alive at least at the inception of Anakin Skywalker. How so powerful an experiment in Sith Magic as whatever was going on with Shmi and Plagueis fell into the hands of the Hutts leads me to believe that that incident (Either Anakin's Birth, or Inception) is wrapped up in Plagueis's Death... And Anakin, of course, is but 10 years old at the start of TPM.

This brings me to Palpatine's pollitical carear. I'm not sure the actuall timeline, but I believe Palpatine has been the Senator from Naboo for at least 10 years by TPM. Was this an office he had achieved before or after his Master's Demise? Had Plagueis placed his apprentice in the Senate for his own means, or was he setting up Palpatine's Empire for him?

And what about Maul? Trained from birth by Sidious, Maul is aproximately 25 or so during Menace. Was Maul trained secretly away from Plagueis? Was Maul a gift from Plagueis? Or Perhaps Plagueis himself was grooming Maul to Replace Palpatine, but Palpatine usurped Plagueis and stole his apprentice from under him.

Does anyone have any more information to help fill in this murky backstory?

 

It is said in the Eu that for a time Maul was Sidious' secret apprentice, until Plaguis was out of the way, of course.

 

From what I saw in TPM, Palpatine seems to be about 50 or so years old. Maul looks to be a fully grown young adult so lets say he is in his mid 20s. That would mean Sidious started to train him while he himself was in his mid 20s unless Maul wasn't trained from birth. That would mean that Plagueis was the Master of Sidious for possibly 25 years until Sidious as a young adult killed him while he was sleeping. So if Maul was 25 or so by TPM, he would have been a master for about a quarter of a century. Thus maintaining the rule of two.

Nowhere was it explained in the movies or from George Lucas that Plagueis had anything to do with creating Anakin. It doesn't mean he didn't know how to cheat death as he could have been much older while training Sidious. But then again, Sidious is a master of lies and maybe Plagueis never really had that power. Or maybe Sidious knows the secret but lies to Anakin when he becomes Vader. I mean he must have been in his mid 80s to about 90 by the time of ROTJ and it didn't look like he had any plans to hand over the Empire. Nor did it look like he was ill or sickly given that the walking stick he used while entering the death star suddenly wasn't necessary when walking down the throne room steps.

It all seems to fit to me.

 

The Darth Maul journal indicated that Maul had been trained by Sidious since he was very young so HLS's timeline seems to make sense.

 

Of course we cant rule out the possibility he's a hell of a lot older than that either. Different thread entirely, but its been well speculated he does know and has in fact manipulated the "unnatural" secret to preserving his own life beyond its normal course by the time we see him in the prequels.

I would certainly prefer to think Sidious has been planning what he ends up achieving for a lot more than ten years prior to TPM.

 

I agree, I look at it as Palpatine having set the stage and slowly moved everything into place for quite a bit more than 10 years. Plagueis may have taught Palpatine much of the dark side knowledge that he has, but I see the political machinations as almost all being done by Palpatine. And as said, the level of dark side usage that Palpatine has steeped himself in almost makes his age irrelevant.

The original timeline in the OP is interesting, but to me the key point that it relies on is the assumption that Plagueis did create Anakin... and I only see a vague suggestion of that given in the movie, based on a statement made by Palpatine to Anakin in an effort to capture Anakin's attention. I don't think that either Plagueis or Palpatine did anything with the dark side to create Anakin, but instead that he was created via the will of the Force itself.

 

According to the Wook, Plagueis died between 52?46 BBY, but Anakin wasn't born until 42BBY. The Zabrak was born in 54BBY, so that means he was between 2 and 8 years of age when Sidious took him. The Phantom Menace happened in 32BBY, so the oldest he COULD have been at the time of his death is 22. Sidious ran the Sith for 14-20 years, given those dates.

The years do not match up with Plagueis-Bio, or Palpatine's story about him, but the Muun's official date of death has yet to be stated...

EDIT; The best thing about Anakin's origins? All that we were given, from both sides of the story... were opinions. Qui-Gon's and Palpatine's... so its really up to the fans to figure out which way they want to lean.

 

y'see I always had it figured in my head that Plageuis had been killed many hundreds of years prior to TPM and that any hint of the force being manipulated by the dark side to create anakin had been done by palpatine himself - remember "he taught his apprentice everything he knew" which could of course be palpatine, assuming he's used the trick of preventing death on himself as mentioned before. lucas was originally toying with the idea that the sith created anakin, of that we know. but his original script included palpatine saying to anakin "you could think of me as your father". so i dont think it was ever the idea to have plageuis be the one who had created anakin. add onto this that "the tragedy of darth plageuis the wise" is "a sith legend" and everything about how that is phrased implies to me that it is a story that dates back many a generation.. not a few decades.

 

Plagueis is officially Palpatine's master...
[image=http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090514191620/starwars/images/0/06/Palpatineyouth.jpg]
but you are correct otherwise.


In the early drafts of ROTS, Sidious said that line to Anakin and followed it up with a play on the classic OT-line: "Search your feelings, you will know it is the truth..." or, something close to that. I can't remember which changed first, Anakin's turn, or the altered dialog about who made him. For a time, Anakin was undeniably the result of a Sith Experiment; and in truth... he might still be.

After all, Darth Maul called the boy on tatooine just that.
And that Maul story, is still very much canon.

 

Indeed, Massster Sx3 is correct (as is always the case in all matters "Sith" related.

Back in '05, on THIS TFN POST , Noel Gallagher posted this:

This is taken from Page 42 of the Making of Revenge of the Sith book, which contains storyline and dialogue from George Lucas' rough draft of the script....

"On Coruscant, PALPATINE completes his seduction of ANAKIN, who at first refuses to go over to the dark side-- until the Chancellor makes a startling confession:"

DARTH SIDIOUS-- "I have waited all these years for you to fulfill your destiny... I arranged for your conception. I used the power of the Force to will the midichlorians to start the cell divisions that created you."

ANAKIN-- "I don't believe you."

DARTH SIDIOUS-- "Ahhh, but you know it's true. When you clear your mind, you will sense the truth. you could almost think of me as your father."

ANAKIN-- "That's impossible!"

DARTH SIDIOUS-- "Nevertheless, you must decide."

So there are more than one parallel to the OT -- an "I am your father" type reveal, and Anakin's mirroring Luke's "That's impossible!"

(Edit to clean up link).
Kudos to Sx3!

 

Thta quote is a homerun! Great find Massster Chron!!
No wonder you always bat cleanup.



I sooo wish that hadn't been changed...

 

DARTH SIDIOUS-- "I have waited all these years for you to fulfill your destiny... I arranged for your conception. I used the power of the Force to will the midichlorians to start the cell divisions that created you."
If that line were left in, we still wouldnt know if it was true or not, because the Sith lie and the timing of Anakins birth could have been a coincidence that had nothing to do with the experiment.

 

I does make sense with the hole virgin birth and chosen one thing.

 

Remember, that Lucas intended for Anakin to be exactly that. A "Sith-experiment". The key in all of this, is that Darth Maul called the boy on tatooine by "that" name.

 

Wookieepedia's date of death for Plagueis is based off the New Essential Chronology, which lists his death under the heading with that timeframe (52-46 BBY Failing Republic, Thriving Sith) -- but it also lists Anakin's birth under that time frame, and all but says that Plagueis created him, stating he is the "apparent product" of Plagueis' research. I think it's an error (the timeframe).

 

Remember - "To cheat death is a power only one has achieved, but if we work together, I know we can discover the secret."

So, either Palpatine lied about Plagueis teaching him everything, or Palpatine lied about there being such a power to begin with. His statement would also contradict the (dropped) dialogue about Palpatine having created Anakin using this power.

 

A "plot hole" in Palps being Vader's father 'seemingly' occurs where we first meet the Emperor in TESB. He calls Vader "my friend." Would a father call his son by that title?

Yes, the cut lines say "you could think of me as your father," and since there is no biological connection, only a "forced" relationship, Palpatine would not have 'technically' been Anakin's bio-dad.

Maybe this is ultimately why Lucas dropped the OT analogy of Vader/Luke with a PT one for Palpatine/Anakin. It was one more thing that might confuse the existing fan base.

But having Plagueis create Anakin before he died, perhaps even immediately before he fell asleep and his 'apprentice' killed him (exhausted as he would have been after his creative exercise)? Now that scenario would have worked just dandy for me. And it would have dovetailed nicely with the Opera dialog, some of the best in the entire PT, IMO.

Alas, GL ultimately left it up to us to decide. Was that a cop out, or just a nice way for him to reconcile/allow each of the possibilities?

 

It may be called a "Sith legend" by Palpatine when he first mentions it, but the ROTS novel directly stated that Plagueis was Palpatine's master, and Lucas left that in. So the use of the word "legend" is not so significant here. Even without the novel, the strong implication of the so-called "opera" scene is that Palpatine was Plagueis' apprentice.

Or Plagueis never actually achieved the power to "cheat death", as indicated by the books Death Star and Dark Lord, while Palpatine never actually claimed that he had done so.

 

Well my interpretation that it is a story that dates back many a generation (perhaps more than a few hundred years) and the idea that Palpatine was Plagueis' apprentice are not at odds. I acknowledge Palpatine was Plagueis' apprentice (I'm fond of the idea) but I'm also suggesting Palpatine may too be a few hundred years old himself.

 

Ah, d_arblay and his "interpretations"...

 

Courtesy of THIS SITE :

leg·end
/'l?d??nd/ Show Spelled[lej-uhnd] ? noun
1. a non-historical or unverifiable story handed down by tradition from earlier times and popularly accepted as historical.
2. the body of stories of this kind, esp. as they relate to a particular people, group, or clan: the winning of the West in American legend.
3. an inscription, esp. on a coat of arms, on a monument, under a picture, or the like.
4. a table on a map, chart, or the like, listing and explaining the symbols used. Compare key1 ( def. 8 ) .
5. Numismatics . inscription ( def. 8 ) .
6. a collection of stories about an admirable person.
7. a person who is the center of such stories: She became a legend in her own lifetime.
8. Archaic . a story of the life of a saint, esp. one stressing the miraculous or unrecorded deeds of the saint.
9. Obsolete . a collection of such stories or stories like them.

I highlight #1, #7 and #8 as my plausible interpretations regarding Lucas' use of the term, except Plagueis was not a saint in the normal definition of the word. A "Sith saint" would be an oxymoron, but I've included it as one possible was to explain Palpatine's 'veneration/admiration' of his now deceased master.

 

A 'Sith Saint' could be any past Sith that the present guy considers to best exemplify what they find 'good' about the Sith. If a past Sith did something 'noble' like overcoming terrible odds to 'prove' themselves worthy, and then 'stregthening the galaxy' by killing off the weak, they might consider that saintly.

 

St. Sidious

 

y'know i phrased it like that just for you

 

Let us not forget Palpatine's plea to Anakin: "I need your help, son."

Also, cheating death and creating life... they aren't the same power, right? Yet on-film, they are used almost interchangeably. Loves me sum SW continuity.