ST Why Snoke IS Darth Plagueis

Question for you - did Obi Wan "die?"

 

I would have said the same thing about Palpatine way back before the PT. I thought he was some ancient, evil sorcerer kind of character based on his appearance. He looked unnaturally old. But then it turns out he's only like 80 or so in ROTJ, and he just had his face scarred by Force lightning.

Yeah, Snoke is severely injured, and surely used the Force to survive his injuries, but the ability to survive a crippling wound is not an ability unique to Plagueis. Maul survived bisection with the Force. And when Palpatine sees Maul again, he isn't the least bit shocked. Snoke could have cheated death without being Plagueis.

Andy Serkis had described the vulnerability of Snoke, indicated by his appearance, as suggesting his goal. And while I question just how much Andy knew about where the character was headed in episodes 8 and 9 at the time that comment was made, it is also said by Han that Snoke was using Ben for his power and then would destroy him when he got what he wanted.

What this means exactly was not revealed.

Perhaps he seeks Ben's power to help restore him to youth/strength and then he plans to murder him. We don't know. Hell, they might canonize the idea of essence transfer, as was common in the old EU.

Han may have been speaking in ignorance, but I doubt it. Ben seems to know there is some truth to it, as he becomes conflicted. Plus from a story telling stand point, it seems like foreshadowing.

Palpatine betrayed weaker apprentices in favor of stronger apprentices, but I never got any impression that Palpatine sought to destroy a apprentice UNLESS a more powerful one came along. But unlike Palpatine, Snoke is allegedly going to kill his most promising student after he gets what he wants. We don't know what that goal is. His main goal throughout TFA was finding Luke, but unless Snoke is going to kill Kylo Ren once Luke is dead, I'm not sure that's the goal that Han was alluding to.

Because I would imagine that Snoke's interest in Ben having the right balance of the light and dark sides has something to do with the goal too. If his ultimate aim was just to kill Luke, I'm not sure why he would want his apprentice to have any light in him.

 

I guarantee that snarky responses like this exchange won't do anything except further entrench positions.
Can we take a step back?
Here are some actual facts, in amongst the theorising.

1: the theory that Andy Serkis's villain would be Darth Plagueis was initially based on these ideas:

* that in order to up the stakes in a sequel trilogy, Darth Plagueis, the only Sith Lord mentioned but not named, would be a good way to create a threat believably more powerful than Palpatine.
* that the fact that there are vague references to power over death (though not actually specified or hinted as power to resurrect oneself) does give plausible wriggle room for bringing back a character whose murder has been described on screen.

So the theory never rested solely or principally on the idea that Plagueis didn't die. It was always a theory that relied on the "power over death" stuff to support it.

However, there was a fair bit of speculation (perhaps from fans who liked the idea of Plagueis, but didn't like the idea of a "back from the dead" character) that Plaguies had only been *thought* dead.

So here are the versions of the theory that have been debunked:

1: that Andy Serkis's would be playing Darth Plagueis is episode VII: debunked when Serkis's character was named as Snoke.

2: that Snoke would be revealed as Darth Plagueis in episode VII: debunked when it didn't happen

3: that Snoke is actually Darth Plagueis, who survived the attempted assassination by Palps and carried on from where Palps left off by running the first order under a different name: debunked when Pablo flat out said that Plagueis WAS killed.

4: that Snoke secretly goes by the name Darth Plagueis; debunked by Pablo when (call it picky if you must, but we know that tricksiness can be employed to keep revelations secret) he used the present tense to say that Snoke is not Plagueis.


What hasn't been debunked is:

1: that Snoke once went by the name of Darth Plagueis, and came back from the dead after being killed by his pupil, Palpatine, using his unique power over life and death. He then abandoned his Sith name as he was no longer part of that order.

Now, I can see why people will think that is unlikely or even why they might hate the idea, but it's by no means convoluted, and it doesn't involve much straw clutching; it's an elegant little theory, the specifics of which havent actually been addressed in tweets, despite this version of the theory being pretty much the consensus of what Plagueis theorists are getting at.


there is circumstantial evidence behind the scenes, on screen, in the soundtrack, and in canon sources from which one could make a convincing argument either way. It's fair to say that at the moment, there are a fair few options, and Lucasfilm have been careful not to entirely shut down any theorising.

 

I'm not invested in the Plagueis theory and I would except a brand new character and that could work really well. But if the Plagueis route is taken, I think the best way to do it would to have him use the Force to sustain himself and not actually die and then resurrect. I think that if a villian truly dies, then that should be it otherwise why bother? What Hidalgo said pretty much shuts down the Plagueis theory, but there is still some wiggle room. They could just say he excepted defeat and ceased being a Sith at that point. He then went into hiding to regain his strength and plot a new course. So then you can say that Plagueis is not Snoke and that Snoke is not Plagueis. Snoke is simply Snoke. I guess that's my blending of the two sides of the Plagueis debate into one.

 

"think that if a villian truly dies, then that should be it otherwise why bother? "

I agree in principle, but in practice fantasy films have many instances where this isn't the case, which validates theorising

 

What is this term Straw Man? I'm sorry I'm not familiar with the term? Does it mean I'm a stubborn person?

 

That's true. Wasn't there actually an old rumor of a resurrection a few years back?

 

Oh, sorry; it means that you construct an alternative view to your own, which you then refute, without ever actually refuting the point that the opposition view actually has. It's sometimes done accidentally, but often done deliberately.

An example would be if someone said "I think Luke should have had a bigger role in TFA", someone else might say "oh, all these people seem to want Luke to have been the main character. Don't they understand that the story has moved on and Luke is never going to be the lead character?" - they've created the point they argue against.

 

Sooooooooooooo. I unlearned wut I learned?

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

 

I don't see how that would change anything.

PH does not make any of these decisions anymore than he made the decisions to connect Snoke to Plagueis whether by design, co-incidence or accident.

JW thinks Rey is Luke's daughter. Maybe he thinks Snoke is Plagueis so he reflected that in the music?

Either way JJ didn't stop him from connecting in Rey's music to aspects of the Skywalker clan (like Across the Stars) and Rey to Kylo Ren's music (who is part of the clan).

Snoke's music is evocative of both music heard at the opera that connects to Plagueis but also to Palpatine's Sith theme then add in the other connectors to Sidious and the path is certainly there if they have designs along those lines.

That could dampen speculation to a degree I suppose but mostly for those who seem desperate to not want it to go down that path anyway. The time for any real dampening has long past and could have been dealt with a long time ago.

What would really do it of course is an actual canonical event as opposed to the response of one person in the story group which really is an information source for JJ and the other directors of the movies.

So until they put out some new canon definitive story for Plagueis or Snoke in some form then the story is open to any number of developments.

To restate again I don't subscribe to Snoke being Plagueis or not Plagueis definitively one way or another because that is clearly impossible.

From an indicative way as presented so far in TFA itself it's a shade more likely so far than not.

As I said I thought going into TFA despite the pre-release speculations that it could be Plagueis I thought the movie would present Snoke in a way that would make the Plagueis idea seem extremely unlikely and that while still possible it'd be a reach.

It did not do that.

 

When I first started posting here, you did my head in a bit I must admit. But I think it was because we're actually quite similar in some ways. You're right, of course.

 

Person A. We should relax the laws on beer.

Person B. No, having relaxed laws on..........

The articles sed Person B was taking person A's words out of context. Wel 2 me it sounded like person A wanted less law enforcement on booze.

 

Please be joking

 

It's true that Pablo does not write the story, but he is a member of the Story Group and thus is privvy to story developments since he is a consultant and can tell the writers can and can't do. If Abrams for instance wanted a scene to take place on the home world of the Mon Calamari and call it Squidorin 5 and have the planet be a swamp, the Story Group would veto it because it's already established in canon that they are from Mon Cala and it's an ocean world.

He would be familiar with the sequel scripts. He would know what's going to happen. And if the Story Group held to the idea in canon that Plagueis is dead, then they could forbid the character from making an appearance in this time frame.

He doesn't write the story, but he is consultant olfor stories and would know if Snoke is Plagueis or not. And he would know if writers were tossing around the idea of making him Plagueis.

Unless you think that he's misleading people by saying that Plagueis is dead "from a certain point of view" in the same way that Anakin was "dead," then it seems pretty definitive that Snoke is not Plagueis. He would know what development that character is getting in Episode 8, he'd be a consultant in establishing that character's backstory, etc. And so if he, as a member of the story group, says that Plagueis is dead, then that would be the canon they seem to be holding to.

 

So its official then.

The Munn/Alien/Master of Sidious & Dark Lord of the Sith, Darth Plageius The Wise (A.K.A Hugo Damask. Chairman of the IGBC) is officially D. E. D.????

 

People seem to forget that the whole point of the Plaguies fable thematically is that the Sith can't cheat death individually. That no matter your wisdom, power, or ability to keep others alive, your mortality is an inevitability - and that the best mortals can do is to post-pone it with iron lungs, etc. The only way to become immortal is to accept death.

 

We don't even know what species Plagueis is ever since the Great Decanonization.

 

Here's why Snoke is not Plagueis.........Plagueis is dead, and in the Star Wars universe, once dead, you don't come back. People will say, "yeah but we never actually saw him die." But we never actually saw a lot of characters die, but they're still dead. And we never saw Plagueis alive either.

 

Unless you're Darth Maul. Or a ghost. And the whole point of Plagueis is that he goes against that assertion because he is capable of doing that which other characters cannot; cheating death.

 

Other characters can. Maul did.

The fact that Maul could cheat death in TCW makes Palpatine a liar retroactively in ROTS, since more than one person had the ability, not just Plagueis.



And the Witches of Dathomir could do all kinds of things, including reanimating the dead.

In the grand scheme of things, there doesn't seem to be anything special about Plagueis based on Palpatine's story alone. Anakin is meant to think there is, and he's meant to think that Palpatine hasn't unlocked the secret, but that's because Anakin needed to be convinced that only he could do it, if he grew powerful enough in the Dark Side. It was a story to manipulate Anakin. Because not only does Maul cheat death, he says he used Palpatine's training to do so. And chronologically, this happened before Palpatine told Anakin the story of Plagueis.

After Vader fell, there was really no further mention of Plagueis. He gets mentioned a couple times in Tarkin, but that's about it. There's no indication that he and Vader are working together to discover Plagueis' secret. And one of the times Plagueis is mentioned in Tarkin, it's in the context of Palpatine believing Plagueis' goal of mere immortality to be unambitious.

In ROTS he is built up to be a legendary figure that could do things that others couldn't, when we now know that others could cheat death. Palpatine also talks about working together to discover the secret, yet Maul's dialogue implies Palpatine already knew how, since he taught Maul how. And while Palpatine builds up the ability to cheat death as a holy grail of Force powers, he speaks of it as unambitious in the Tarkin novel.

The tragedy in the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise was that he could save others from death, but not himself, and he lost his power when his apprentice murdered him.

He does not seem to be greater than any other Sith. And the fact that it's a Legend is a lie, since it's only existed for a generation or so, and Palpatine was there.

Plagueis may have existed, but the whole story around him was tailored to tempt Anakin. That there was knowledge out there that the Jedi were consciously denying him, when in reality, none of the Jedi would have known of Darth Plagueis.

 

The whole Maul and the Witches thing was added long after the dialogue between Anakin and Palpatine was written, so I do believe Lucas originally intended Plagueis to be unique in that regard. Generally, the Witches and what they're capable of feel a bit out of place.

That being said, I do agree with you regarding the role of Plagueis: The whole story being told by Palpatine really is intended as bait. There's not a lot more to it really. It was never intended to be a fully fleshed out character, though given how vague the information is about him, there's no real reason why he can't become one.

 

I understand that, but at the same time Snoke was added long after ROTS, when it was asserted that Plagueis was dead. Things get changed in retrospect and the story has to adapt. Vader wasn't originally Luke's father, and Leia wasn't originally his sister. At the time that ROTS was released, I thought the Plagueis story was true. That Plagueis was the only one to have discovered the power to cheat death, and Palpatine sought that power, and that he wanted to work with Anakin to discover the secret (because Palpatine tells Yoda that Darth Vader will become more powerful than either of them, and Palpatine seems excited by the prospect of having such a strong apprentice). But even in the EU at that time (which is now non-canon), there were characters like Vitiate (now called Valkorion) in Bioware's The Old Republic MMO that put Plagueis to shame.

As far as canon goes, Lucas decided to "resurrect" Maul. They explained it by him having used the Dark Side to cheat death. Which makes Palpatine a liar in retrospect.

And the books, comics, and TV shows thus far haven't really given any indication that Palpatine is preoccupied with achieving immortality. He hardly seems to be working with Vader at all. Vader is off hunting Rebels and killing Jedi while Palpatine is a recluse on Coruscant.

Really, I'm not partial to Plagueis appearing as a villain superior to Palpatine. Especially some 30 years after Paplatine's death. There's plenty of room in Star Wars for new villains. Stronger, weaker, or equal to Palpatine. I'm not keen on the idea that the only people with any Galactic prominence are Palpatine and his master. Mother Talzin rivaled Palpatine, and in TCW, the Mortis trio put Palpatine to shame in ability.

And while the time frame is now a blank slate, we do know that the Sith had once ruled the Galaxy before. Palpatine was not the first Sith to do so. Not only that, but it's shown in Rebels that Palpatine is interested in finding Jedi/Sith artifacts. The teachings of the past still have something to offer Palpatine as he studies the Force. There were surely great Jedi and Sith of the past. And while Palpatine had the Death Star built, we see in Rebels that the ancient Sith had also built a super weapon that Darth Maul intended to use. The existence of these great villains is implied, though we've not seen them since that time period has not been explored in canon.

And I feel like when we assume that Plagueis is greater than Palpatine because he was his master, you can endlessly create a chain that then says that Plagueis' master must also have been great. And so on. And all of these Sith were probably powerful in their own right. There were powerful figures in the Dark Side that existed before Palpatine, concurrently with Palpatine, and after Palpatine. Snoke appears old enough to have existed concurrently with Palpatine, though as to where he was and what he was doing, we don't yet know. How did he learn the Dark Side? did he know Palpatine personally? was he associated with the Empire at all? how did he know that Vader was redeemed and killed Palpatine? All questions we don't know.

But I think there's plenty of room in the Galaxy for another powerful Force user. And with how much of a gold mine Star Wars is, I wouldn't be surprised if they keep making movies beyond Episode 9. In which case, they probably can't milk Plagueis and Palpatine as villains forever.

As far as Snoke's backstory, he's a blank slate and there are any number of explanations that could be used to explain him.

-He could be from the Unknown Regions and was discovered by the First Order who made a pact with him that they would pledge loyalty to him, if he helped them conquer the New Republic.

-He may have been a student of Luke's (his first student) who in pursuit of knowledge made contact with the Imperial remnants and gained access to Sith artifacts that were once Palpatine's and Vader's and was corrupted by the Dark Side and sought to usurp Luke, creating the Knights of Ren as the new Order (and being crippled in his Rebellion). This could explain why Han and Leia know of him and how he knows what happened on the Death Star.

-One of the novels mentions that there were elements within the Empire that believed they needed to seek out the source of the Dark Side (which Palpatine believed existed in the Unknown Regions). Snoke may have been a non-Force using Imperial that discovered this source and was imbued with power.

-If they re-canonize the idea of essence transfer, Snoke could be a vessel that Palpatine inhabited upon his death, going by the name Snoke to fly under the radar. The New Republic seemed not to believe Snoke or the First Order was much of a threat, but if they found out that Palpatine had survived, they probably would have resumed the war. This theory is highly unlikely, since it's been stated that the Sith no longer exist, and it would seem odd for Palpatine himself to abandon the Sith. However, it would reveal how he knows what happened on the Death Star. Also, Palpatine is the only one to explode with Dark Side energy upon death. What that means, I don't know.


-He could have been the last surviving Inquisitor following the defeat of the Empire who fled into the Unknown Regions, became stronger and returned. I doubt this though.

-He might not be nearly as powerful as we believe him to be. Andy Serkis has described him as vulnerable (as indicated by his incredible injuries). Han also states that Snoke is using Kylo Ren for his power. Snoke might be a guy that has access to Sith/Dark Side teachings but isn't particularly strong himself and gives Kylo Ren access to teachings in exchange for his service because despite having knowledge, he's weak. Han's statement seems to imply that Kylo Ren is more powerful than Snoke, or has greater potential (just as Palpatine said that Vader was going to surpass him, before Vader was crippled). It was established in canon that ancient Sith could drain the life of others to sustain their own lives. It's possible that Snoke was once powerful but is now weak, and is using Kylo Ren to be a sacrificial lamb who he will drain to restore himself to youth/power. Talzin also sacrificed people to increase her own strength in TCW.

-It's said that the Sith destroyed themselves until only Darth Bane remained, and then he started the Rule of Two. But with how often that rule is stretched. Or with the possibility that other Sith other than Darth Bane survived. The Knights of Ren may have existed as an offshoot that survived in the Unknown Regions, that did not adhere to the Rule of Two, and that Bane's line was unaware of.

-He could be a powerful Sorcerer kind of like Talzin was. Palpatine knew of Talzin and vice versa, but they made no move against each other for a long time. So it could be that Snoke knew of Palpatine and vice versa, but they left each other alone until Palpatine died, creating a power vacuum.

etc.

I think there are plenty of alternatives to Plagueis. And I think it makes the Galaxy larger and more interesting, to have such other powerful characters out there other than Palpatine.

 

The part I bolded is the most intriguing part of this entire Snoke debate for me. The guy looks like death, like a reanimated body or something that was as close to death as one can get. His backstory with the injuries, in my opinion, almost has to tie into some sort of juicy backstory that directly fits in with the story.

It doesn't necessarily have to tie into the whole "Plagueis cheated death" thing, but something significant to the story happened to him. Was he on one of the Death Stars? Was he a victim of a lightsaber to the head and/or force lightning from a Sith? Was he indeed Palpatine's assassination victim from the Plagueis story and Snoke is just an alias? Did he and Luke fight and Luke gave him his wounds?

I can't wait to find out the answers as to what happened to Snoke that has made him so vulnerable and seemingly "behind the scenes" or in the shadows for at least the past 30 years in the Star Wars universe, if not longer, since he appears to be old as dirt/ancient.

 

If Snoke didn't recieve those injuries from Sidious, my guess is that Luke gave them to him.