Characters The Enigmatic and Mysterious Count Dooku - Happy Life Day Sir Christopher Lee! (27 May)

Forgive my being distracted by your phrasing, but I'm now sort of enchanted by the idea of Dooku books or comics inside the movies, or at least inside the universe.

Yoda: Dark Rendezvous by Sean Stewart is excellent, though I feel I should point out that in some respects LLL and I interpret it very differently. I'll also note that I think he does his best work in the book with Dooku, Yoda, many of his own assorted OCs, and Whie (who is a very small bit part in RotS). Qui-Gon is very good, but for possibly obvious reasons he doesn't show up much. Palpatine is very... Palpatiney. (I measure this in part by the overwhelming urge to strangle him whenever he opens his mouth, but it's not the only criterion.) Obi-Wan and Anakin are pretty good, but they're not quite as well done as the more central characters. I'm not crazy about the depiction of Padmé, as I get the impression that Stewart felt obligated to include her but couldn't think of a way to work her into the plot. On the other hand, Yoda kindasorta plays her role in one spot, in my opinion, but I'll let that lie for now. Anyway, the Dooku in that book is fantastic; interesting, sometimes sympathetic, but at appropriate points we are also reminded that he's a Sith and he is really freaking scary.

I have not actually gotten hold of these myself, but I gather that Jango Fett: Open Seasons and Jedi: Dooku (which actually takes place while he's a Sith) are also quite good. Sabarte could give more information.

Labyrinth of Evil has some good pieces, but I think I wandered off and didn't finish it; should probably go back and do that when I'm in a more attentive mood. One interesting point is that at least some people can make a decent case that Dooku is undergoing a progressive mental breakdown, moving from the period of YR through LoE to RotS.

A lot of the Dooku material in Jedi vs. Sith is really neat; some of it is drawn from other sources, yes, but the author there does some really neat work in general with voice and POV, and there's original stuff in there too.

You might enjoy Legacy of the Jedi as well, since you like Watson. Personally, I like a lot of the concepts, but her writing style strikes me as distinctly condescending, as if she isn't used to writing for kids without talking down to them. I also don't think the summary she has Yoda give of the first section (when Dooku's thirteen) really makes a lot of sense; certainly it's reasonable to address what Dooku did wrong in the situation, but pride tends to be a level or two back

 

Persephone_Kore

Your post made me run out and buy Dark Rendezvous - well it is coming book rate anyway. I will let you know what I think.

azizah

 

Hmmmmmm, I wasn't really thinking of it that way, but sounds nice.

Thanks for the reviews! I've read Legacy of the Jedi. I liked it but I thought that Dooku was depicted as being too ambitious, too conveniently easy to go to the dark side, though other characteristics were OK. I'll have to look up some of the others.

 

We're going to get at least another Anakin/Dooku duel in the new Clone Wars movie, and since it's a series, I suspect he'll show up quite a bit. He made a couple of major appearances in the shorts series, and this one will have much longer episodes and the heroes can't very well fight Sids at this stage. The character design for him baffles, though, and still no word on the voice actor.

I, uh, like Labyrinth of Evil, but it may be a bit dense for some people's taste. It's aimed toward the continuity-obsessive, but has interesting Dooku bits. Most Dooku snippets in the EU are unfortunately pretty short. I don't think he ever gets a main story entirely to himself, and strong secondary is about the best he can get.

 

Jedi: Dooku???

*blinks*

What's that?

 

A double issue that was part of the Republic comic series. It lets Dooku be a little bit more of an alpha villain than he usually is. Mostly about Quinlan Vos, though.

 

Hmmmmm, someone posted a clip of The Clone Wars cartoon on youtube from SW Weekends (Disney might have already found it and killed it by now) and it was all battles and droids and Anakin and his new sidekick. I hope that there will be some decent Dooku in it. But I suppose for now they'll be selling the action.

 

I have a question that has to do with a crossover fic I'm writing featuring Dooku when he first finds out Qui-gon was killed. Does anyone know where he was when it happened (I don't have the novelization of TPM), and just how dark is he at this time. I know from what I read on Wookieepedia that he'd been considering that one could delve into the dark side without being corrupted by it, and that he was disillusioned even before this with the Jedi Council and the jedi's role in the Republic.

 

I don't know where Dooku was when he found out that Qui-Gon was killed. I don't think it would be in the TPM novelization since the character was not introduced until AOTC.

The Order for the Clones with Kamino was placed by Sypho Dias (sp?) presumably Dooku, since Tyranus (who was Dooku) recruited Fett, who had to be there at the very beginning since all the Clones are copies of him.

I've read online that some EU sources say that Dooku left the Order because Qui-Gon was killed, but I never use that in any of my fics. I think that Dooku must have been dipping into the dark side for awhile before then. Maybe Qui-Gon's death was the excuse he used for leaving the Order, but I think he already had plans for it.

Interesting point: Obi-Wan was knighted and was going to take Anakin as his padawan immediately after Qui-Gon died. This implies to me that Obi-Wan was hanging around the Temple a bit, at least initially after Qui-Gon's death. But Dooku didn't meet Obi-Wan until AOTC. That implies to me that Dooku was typically absent from the Temple even when he was a Jedi and that his break with the Jedi was done long distance.

 

Actually, Dooku wasn't Sipho-Dyas.

 

Aaaaaaah, I haven't seen that part the back story before. From just watching AOTC it isn't clear if it was Sifo-Dyas who commissioned the Clone Army or if it was Dooku impersonating him to cover his tracks.

 

Yeah, I thought it was Dooku, too until I saw that on Wookiee.

 

I did gather that Sifo-Dyas had an independent existence from AotC, since the conversation among Obi-Wan, Mace, and Yoda mentioned that he had died. It was entirely plausible at that point that Dooku had placed the order under his name... or that Sidious had, I suppose, since IIRC Sifo-Dyas was at some point in the script drafts supposed to be Sido-Dyas and merely an alias for Sidious.

I don't think Dooku was planning to leave the Jedi prior to Qui-Gon's death. If he was, he almost certainly wasn't planning to become a Sith. It is established that he was becoming more frustrated and disillusioned, but part of what threw the Jedi off the scent was that much of what he was saying after he left was the same stuff he'd been outspoken about before--it wasn't purely blindness to the obvious, as his image was consistent with what he'd argued with them about in the past--but he was doing (and hiding his involvement in) a lot of things that he'd previously sincerely opposed.

I think Stewart did a particularly good job with the whole "I'll break my own arm" incident in YDR; he doesn't explain the parallel half a dozen times the way some authors probably would, but you can just see some part of Dooku's subconscious responding to Sidious's recruitment attempts by thinking in the direction of the Jedi Council, "You want me to compromise with politicians? Sure, I'll show you what happens...."

 

I'm inclined to think that Dooku was unhappy with the whole Republic long before he considered leaving the Jedi Order. And that he did not decide to leave the Order until he had joined Sidious.

Sidious was under the Jedis' noses for years without them knowing; he easily could have taught Dooku how to do that. And someone had to be on the inside to change the Archive records about Kamino. I don't think Sifo Dyas would have done that; he was killed before he could tell people what to do.

Dooku has been in the last 2 episodes of the Clone Wars cartoon, but so far he's just doing the bad guy thing. I hope the devote a little time to some motives for Dooku about why he became a Sith.

 

I'm not claiming he left the instant Qui-Gon died. His dissatisfaction with the Republic--or more specifically with the way he considered its government to be failing both the ideals it claimed and those it ought to have, and with the effects of working with it on the Jedi--would have to have been growing for a while, and I would guess that Sidious as Palpatine might have been cultivating him for some time if he had the opportunity. The desire to cut through the bureaucracy and corruption and Fix Things would probably have been a profitable angle for establishing a relationship and stoking Dooku's discontent. But I don't think Sidious revealed himself to Dooku or recruited him as a Sith until after Maul's death, and I rather suspect Qui-Gon's death was one of the proverbial last straws in his... state of mind. (Not that this would offhand seem to make the Sith more appealing, but my personal theories include some vengefulness, and Sidious's recruitment strategies do not seem to be notably interfered with by having their targets know he's been destroying who and what they care about.) So he was temporarily both officially a Jedi and really a Sith, but I don't believe it was for as long a period of time as you seem to prefer.

My original preferred theory was that his fall was after his departure from the Order was after TPM, but sometimes story ideas generated using EU material work better if I use something closer to the official ordering, which (as I understand it) is laid out in Labyrinth of Evil with Dooku's first conversation with Sidious-as-Sidious occuring after TPM, and his joining the Sith and leaving the Jedi both occurring before Sifo-Dyas even placed the order at Kamino.

On the other hand, I've also written scenes assuming a timeline where he was still officially a Jedi when he killed Sifo-Dyas, and personally reported the death with circumstances to account for the missing body. (He, er, kept it for several years. With usable blood, which could suggest that up to a point Sifo-Dyas might have been revivable.) Presumably the other order would still allow for him to call them with news of the tragedy, say, or to plant evidence on the subject.

 

I agree that Sidious's best lure for joining the dark side is the promise of making everything right in the galaxy. That's what he used with Anakin. And I agree that Sidious likely did not reveal himself to Dooku until after Maul, when he was looking for a new apprentice.

Before they found out he was a Sith, the Jedi Council thought that Dooku was a 'political idealist'. So, he must have expressed political views before leaving the order. He might have even given them as his reason for leaving.

I'm kind of glad that I haven't read the EU back story about Dooku keeping Sipho Dyas's body on ice. The whole blood thing seems a bit creepy for Dooku. Perhaps they were thinking of Christopher Lee?

 

Ah, just for clarification, Dooku did not drink Sifo-Dyas's blood. He used it on Grievous to improve the healing process. Supposedly, while they don't stick around, an infusion of blood with extra midi-chlorians is supposed to be beneficial. (This makes me wonder whether Jedi, or at least people who tested at or near Jedi-eligibility levels and are currently in a less physically demanding career, get a whole lot of invitations to blood drives.) The logic of a cross-species blood transfusion is more than slightly strained, but hardly the silliest thing Star Wars has going (and I say this with the utmost affection).

Not, mind you, that the whole thing isn't still pretty creepy. Freezing Sifo-Dyas's body and keeping it around on Serenno is actually nowhere near as disturbing as what he does to Grievous, although it may be weirder.

 

I wonder if Dooku was trying to impart some Force ability to Grievous with the blood, since he was training him in the 'Jedi arts'. It does sound a bit silly. And, I think, unsuccessful. Kenobi didn't seem to have much trouble 'disarming' Grievous.

If blood transfusion were a reliable way to transfer Force ability then the Jedi would have a problem with people trying to 'steal' their abilities. Perhaps the blood stuff is a Sith thing? That does sound like the sort of thing that Sidious might encourage.

 

I think there was some confusion over that, possibly among both authors and characters. As far as I know, the current version is that they were testing to see if they could give Grievous Force abilities, but didn't really expect it to work. They did expect it to help with healing, and apparently this was also confirmed.

Of course, it occurs to me that one might speculate about the tendency of the Force to respond to one's expectations ("I don't believe it!" "And that is why you fail.") and wonder to what extent Dooku deliberately or even subconsciously messed with the results.

 

Wow... That's some really freaky EU back-story action... I had never heard the bit about the blood thing... Though, with Christopher Lee playing Dooku... well, double the eerie... Oh well...

It would be interesting to see them go into the Dooku story a bit more with The Clone Wars cartoon, but I doubt that we'll see anything like that. I figure it's going to be more Obi-Wan/Anakin/Ahsoka(SP?)/Grevious/BattleDroid heavy, but it never hurts to hope...

 

OMG.





These EU people. Haven't they ever heard of BLOOD BANKING??

Freezing a corpse for several years in order to keep the blood sounds like the most cumbersome, inefficient, and possibly nonworkable way to do it I ever heard of.

Don't these folks do any research?

 

I think that maybe that whole frozen corpse thing was put in there for the horror and the drama factor. I suppose. And maybe the writer was thinking 'Christopher Lee' and not 'Dooku'. Maybe they were thinking of doing more than just blood and using body parts, too, but never got around to it.

When they put in details like that, it looks like they're hand-waving the medical reasons.......which you can do a lot in the GFFA.

 

The blood bit is all new to me as well. Don't recall that tidbit.

 

I just can't buy that kind of thing.

 

Hello everyone. Though I've been a member of the Fan-Fiction community for a few years now (well, one who's taken a hiatus here and then, anyhow), this is the first time I've posted on the Dooku thread.

One thing that always appealed to me about Dooku (and this is why I LOVED the Dark Rendevous depicted and utterly loathed Stover's depiction of him in the ROTS book) is the sense I got that he was doing what he was doing because deep in his heart, he wanted to do what he felt was "the right thing", as best as he was able, at any cost, regardless of whether or not it "followed the rules". Granted, he had many moments where he was downright wicked and scary, but I always felt that in his soul, he wanted to do some good for the galaxy (at least in the beginning), and he felt that what he was doing as a member of the Jedi Order was not allowing him to do so to any meaningful extent. I guess you could say that I never saw him as the "downright vile evil" that I see Palpatine, Exar Kun, Bane, Malak, and other such Sith being. Dooku screams more "misguided" than anything else; a man who had good intentions and very valid frustrations, and let those things influence him on choosing to follow a path which made him lose total control of the steering wheel. And I certainly buy the idea that stuff like Qui-Gon's death and the lack of effective function the Republic showed in this era were the key driving points in pushing him "over the edge".

All of this makes me help but wonder just what could have happened had Dooku actually found something in the Jedi/Republic before his fall that could hearten him enough to keep him from falling. A source of inspiration, if you will; maybe even someone or something he could latch onto (and maybe even mentor) to help him make the others in the galaxy understand what was wrong. The obvious thing is a Qui-Gon survival, but I wonder how favorable Dooku would have been to helping out and perhaps mentoring someone who realized what was wrong with the Republic and was more than willing and able to help change it into something more "effective", yet just. Someone, like, say, a certain Queen-turned-Senator who had already defied the Republic "status quo" once and constantly showed a willingness to stand against all the more corrupt elements that Dooku himself loathed as he was being disillusioned from the Republic...

Specterace