ST Grand Inquisitor survived and his name is Snoke

Hear me out. When I saw Snoke on the screen, I thought he looked a little familiar. I haven't watched a lot of Star Wars Rebels but I thought "Maybe Snoke is one of those Inquisitors left over from the Empire days".

Well, I took a look at some scenes with the Grand Inquisitor. He's tall, skinny, and I think Snoke kind of looks like a severely damaged version of him. It's true that the Grand Inquisitor fell to his apparent death into a burning reactor. But he could have survived, severely injured, and gone into hiding.

There's more. The Grand Inquisitor has no name, so you don't have to wonder why he changed his name. He's trained in the dark side of the force and is somewhat of a badass. He was trained by Vader, but he's not a Sith. Furthermore, this is the Grand Inquisitor speaking to Zare Leonis in Rebels:

"Compassion is the most insidious weakness of all..."

Here's something Snoke says to Kylo Ren in the novelization:

"Had Lord Vader not succumbed to emotion at the crucial moment ... the Empire would have prevailed."

The Grand Inquisitor seems to be in contrast to Vader's unstable emotional nature. He's critical of compassion. He's cool under pressure, emotional, and absolutely loyal to the Empire.

Snoke obviously loves the original Empire. He recreated it, down to the last detail. He could call himself 'Darth' but he doesn't want to. In fact, he sees Vader's emotional sentimentality as having destroyed the Empire. Sidious was a being that seemed to be on a quest for ultimate power. He loved power, and he manipulated the Republic and the Jedi in order to get it. He sought eternal life, and tempted Anakin with that concept.

If I was creating a post-Emperor villian, I don't think I could come up with someone more evil than Sidious, but could imagine someone more dangerous, more logical and less passionate. "The Sith follow their passions". I think Snoke would see this as a flaw. I think the Grand Inquisitor displays the same quality.

Want something else? Look at Kylo Ren's truth extraction technique. You never saw Vader or Palpatine do that. But you see the Grand Inquisitor doing it in Rebels.

 

Found more specific dialogue from the novelization:

Snoke: "You have compassion for her."
Kylo: "No-never. Compassion? For an enemy of the Order?"
Snoke: "Kylo Ren. It appears that a reminder is in order. So I will show you the dark side. Bring the girl to me"

 

I just can't see them using a character from a children's show as the "secret identity" of a major new character. Rebels is a fine show, but the general movie audience doesn't watch it so there would be no 'wow' factor for them if that was the big reveal in regards to Snoke.

 

Call it a children's show if you want, but it's canon. I think we're going to see some of these mysteries filled in by the Anthology movies and by the TV shows. By the way, I've located more pertinent dialogue from the novelization:

Snoke: "Kylo Ren, I watched the Galactic Empire rise, and then fall. The gullible prattle on about the triumph of truth and justice, of individualism and free will. As if such things were solid and real instead of simple subjective judgements. The historians have it all wrong. It was neither poor strategy nor arrogance that brought down the Empire. You know too well what did." Ren nodded once.
Kylo Ren: "Sentiment."

 

And I don't think that they necessarily have to have a big reveal. I don't think they have to say it outright. But if you're trying to have a character in the movies that somehow is as much or more of a threat than the Emperor, The survived Grand Inquisitor is a great starting point. Because he is old and powerful in the dark side, and sees, and thinks he can correct, the flaws which brought down Palpatine and Vader.

If the Sith are powerful, but ruled by their passion and emotion, Snoke is not distracted by that, and is instead ruled only by a love of order. He's recreated the Empire, and intends to have it last this time by eliminating sentiment and compassion.

 

Rebels is a show for all ages.

But anyway, it should be interesting to see what Snoke's identity is.

 

Their are lots of ways The Grand Inquisitor could be Snoke, but alas it isn't him.

The final look for Snoke wasn't finished till November. They couldn't even put recent pictures of him in the Visual Dictionary because the book was locked in October. The look for The Grand Inquisitor was done years earlier.
Secondly, Snoke has pale blue eyes. Even if the Sith yellow were gone, Pau'an have red eyes. Third, we know what Pau'an's look like from ROTS and they don't look like Snoke. I could understand the red marking on the scalp being removed by flame but not the red markings underneath the eyes.
Fourth, Star Wars Rebels and the production team for TFA are completely separate and something like this would never cross paths or be worked on in tandem.

I don't deny though that The Grand Inquisitor would have been perfect to fit the role of Snoke. There is lots there in similarity, but it isn't him.

 

Snoke doesn't have those forehead lines.

 

Honestly that's something ive thought of since first seeing Snoke on screen, he just has similarities in the way he speaks and expressions. Though the Inquisitor was a Pau'an, ultimately I don't think they're the same i'm sadly afraid.

 

Another thing about the Inquisitor....he studied and learned every single Jedi fighting technique AND who used it! So much so when fighting Kanan, he knew EXACTLY who his master was based upon his fighting style, that is IMPRESSIVE, MOST IMPRESSIVE. Who knows what else he learned.

 

How many character threads do we plan on having?

 

It definitely is for all ages, I love the show and I'm 41. I meant more that the reveal of an important character (if there is one, he may just turn out to be 'all-new') probably won't be one from a TV show or comic/novel as that will just be completely lost on the general movie goer. It would make for poor marketing. For instance, my sister (who is not a Star Wars fan at all and hasn't seen a Star Wars movie since 1984) she saw TFA and enjoyed it, she is now interested in seeing the first 6 movies to know the entire backstory. If she goes to see VIII and IX and it turns out that Snoke is the first Inquisitor from Rebels, that will be completely lost on her and it will just be a "wtf" moment . However it turns out to be a twist in relation to one of the new characters, or he is an established old character/relation to an old character that will have much more of an impact on her and any other general movie goer.

 

One for every character

Rey already has 26 threads, 18 discussing her parentage.

 

Snoke is clearly not the Grand Inquisitor, not even the same species.

 

I know, it's rediculous.

 

No way. If they were going to go with a cartoon character it would be Ah-Snoke-a Tano.

 

I don't think Snoke is anyone we've seen and I don't think his identity will be revealed in a TV show, book, comic or anthology movie. They'll save that backstory for Episodes 8 or 9. It's interesting to grasp disparate threads and attempt to find commonality. I just don't think they've left a trail of evidence for this…

 

You're probably right. But I think that Snoke appears to be someone more logical and analytical like the Inquisitors - like a midpoint between the dark side strength of the Sith and the organized ruthlessness of someone like Tarkin. That's played out in his two competing underlings.

 

This is speculation that could go in the general Snoke thread.