Lit Pellaeon and the Imperial Remnant (split from Thrawn thread)

Roan Fel was willing to do what needed to be done, even if it wasn't The Right Thing To DoTM.

 

Yeah I'd definitely agree he's more of Show Stannis. Both sacrificed everything both for the throne and to stop the Sith/White Walkers. That said, we don't really know how differently Book Stannis will act.

 

The force isn't some sort of God, that you surrender your problems too, you have to take action. It will help and guide you, but it will not win your battles for you.

 

Well, given that we have a preview chapter where he's shown making in-the-event-of-my-death preparations for his followers to continue helping Shireen try to take the throne, it's pretty safe to say he won't be burning his daughter alive for his own personal ambitions.

...what the heck does this have to do with Pellaeon, anyway?

 

*Pellaeon prepares to burn Tahiri*

 

Or sacrificing trillions of innocents. I wouldn't call someone who tries to kill two trillion civilians "good at heart".

 

Vialco
His only duty was to the Empire. Krayt's people were all traitors. You know what Kir Kanos said.

 

Kir Kanos needs to see a therapist about his priorities. I know it's "Un-Star Warsy" but I felt his story needed to end with Luke killing or redeeming him.

 

He had a good philosophy, but he was a blasted hypocrite about it. For whatever reason he just stopped caring in CEIII. I don't really like that comic anyway.

 

I heard there was a Luke vs. Kir Kanos issue planned but I don't know if it was supposed to be in the middle or end of the story.

Still, something wrong about a Imperial story where you only kill Imperials.

Maarek Stele at least killed a FEW Rebels.

 

That's the problem, if your going to do imperial stories you want them at least a little sympathetic, having them kill the "good guys" ruins that for a large number of fans.

 

If Crimson Empire was to be rebooted I think it should go like this:
The first arc would follow Kanos picking off the members of the Ruling Council, Dishonored style.
The second arc would be the downfall of Carnor Jax. It would end with Mirith Sinn vowing revenge on Kanos.
The final arc would be Kanos hunting Luke Skywalker. He would catch him off guard; Right before killing Luke, Mirith would shoot Kir Kanos. As he died she would tell him that he caused the Empire to fall and that he was the real traitor all along.
The way Crimson Empire turned out in the end was quite disjointed and strange. This is how I think it should've gone.

 

I think Star Wars fans are willing to follow you at least a little down the road with Jello to Adventure Journal-land.

I mean, did anyone REALLY object to Starkiller killing some of Ram Kota's militia?

Or fighting those jedi in the original Battlefront?

Plus, as Rogue One showed, it'd wouldn't be terrible to have SOME bad Rebels.

I still wish JAN had a bigger role.

 

I've been wanting to take a look at Dark Tide: Ruin for the past week, so here we go. Stackpole and Zahn were friends and close collaborators in the late nineties, to the point where the former has suggested that I, Jedi could be read between the two Hand of Thrawn novels to make a loose sort of trilogy. And the Dark Tide duology follows up on a lot from HOT, with Pellaeon and the Remnant playing a big role, the Empire of the Hand refusing to be written out of the story, Elegos A'kla being a prominent senator, Luke and Mara's Force philosophy being expounded upon, and more. The duology is a sequel to HOT in a way that no other parts of the NJO are, and it's not far-fetched to assume that Stackpole used Zahn as an advisor or, at the very least, someone to bounce ideas off of, while writing it. So let's take a look at how he handled Pellaeon and determine how consistent it is with Hand of Thrawn.

Ruin makes it clear just how much distrust there still is between the New Republic and the Remnant. Fey'lya permits Leia to petition Pellaeon for help against the Vong because Fey'lya will benefit politically whatever the outcome --- if they refuse, he can villify them, but if they agree, Fey'lya can still appease anti-Imperial citizens of the NR by claiming that Leia sleeps with the enemy while Borsk is still an heir to the Rebellion's traditions. Some Imperial citizens are living in poverty due to the availability of cheaply imported New Republic goods, Imperial industries have been crippled, and diplomatic ties between the two governments are only cordial because of the efforts of Talon Karrde. Many of Pellaeon's advisors have warned him that a New Republic request for aide will be a trap, designed to lure Imperial forces away from Remnant space so that the NR can wipe the Imperials out entirely.

In short: relations between the two governments haven't been all honky-dory since the peace accords. But Pellaeon does say one interesting thing when he first meets with Leia in the book: "I am not unsympathetic to your plight, and I, as well as many others in the Empire, do feel a responsibility for the people of the New Republic. They may have rejected us, but we have not rejected them. If we are able, we will help."

Does that quote paint Pellaeon as a moral crusader, ready to help the NR because it's the right thing to do? Well, Pellaeon hints in a meeting with the Moff Council that he's sending aid for very practical reasons --- if the Vong can beat the NR, then they can easily conquer the Remnant. Moff Ephin Saretti gives a big speech about honour and about how aiding the NR is the right thing to do, and Pellaeon is certainly grateful that Saretti's idealism aids his own goals, but there's no indication of how much he actually agrees with the young Moff. The next time we see Pellaeon, he's aboard the Chimaera aiding Admiral Kre'fey at Garqi, and musing about how much he had always wanted to find a New Republic task force in such a helpless position. He even smiles as he imagines ordering an ambush against them.

When he sits down to have a chat with Kre'fey and Luke, he's very much on the same page as Kre'fey: They need to share military intelligence with each other before the politicians arrive and complicate things. This attitude is consistent with his disdain of the Moffs from Hand of Thrawn, and it does wonders to paint Pellaeon as a sympathetic hero within Dark Tide's larger themes of military = good, politicians = bad. Two weeks later, when he greets Kre'fey, Luke, Wedge, and Gavin at the official reception aboard the Tafanda Bay, Jaina senses "a wave of emotional warmth" roll of of him. These are military men he can respect, and he's enjoyed working and strategizing with them. However, at one point while planning with them, he shrugs and outright admits that if he had known about the Empire of the Hand a few years earlier, he probably would have used their forces to "Carve a new Empire from the New Republic." It seems that both he and the reader are gradually realizing how much in common he has with the New Republic, no matter how hard old habits die.

When the defense of Ithor fails and Pellaeon is recalled to Imperial space, he shakes Kre'fey's hand and says that he's found working with him fascinating and enlightening. He closes with "This is not the last you shall see of me, my friends. Right now, my people are afraid of helping you. There will come a time when they are more afraid of not helping you. I will return then. I just hope it won't be too late."

What can we conclude from Pelly's role in Ruin? He's not suddenly a hero or anything at the beginning of the book; rather, Stackpole write him very consistently with his Hand of Thrawn depiction --- fed up with the Moffs and with politicians in general, planning military strategy for practical reasons that have to do with the survival of the Remnant, and still dreaming about what it could have been like to conquer the New Republic even while he's openly working with them. However, by having him work alongside his former foes, Stackpole gives him character development. He realizes how much he as in common with them, he enjoys working with them, and when he takes their leave he considers them friends.

I argued in my earlier posts that while he was a protagonist of Hand of Thrawn, he wasn't one of its heroes. In Dark Tide, however, it seems that he's both. In this duology, the politicians are bungling the war while the military are doing everything right. Pellaeon is firmly in the latter camp and is painted by Stackpole with a very sympathetic brush. But like I said, he does have a character arc and significant development within the pages of Ruin --- that is, him being a good guy doesn't come out of nowhere.

Circumstances have placed him and Kre'fey in the same bed, and they're both willing to lie in it because they're so practical --- they know that working together is the best chance of driving off the invaders. They may end up becoming friends, and Pellaeon may be a hero of this story, but he's still a very practical man. You still get the sense that if the Vong were suddenly defeated tomorrow, he would be happy to retreat to Bastion and continue plotting the day that the Empire reclaims its glory. His character development has begun, but it still has a ways to go before he's firmly a good guy who's commanding the GA military in Dark Nest.

 

Also: there aren't that many rebels to kill to begin with. Have too many stories with imperial protagonists killing rebels, and you run into the problem of how there are any rebels left to win the war.

(Though yeah, Kir Kanos working with the New Republic always felt a little weird.)

 

The next time we see Pellaeon in the NJO is Destiny's Way. And boy, what a contrast it is.

But first, let's take a look at what the Remnant is up to between Ithor and Ebaq 9. In Hero's Trial, there's randomly a Remnant Star Destroyer, the Erinnic, serving as flagship of a New Republic fleet at Ord Mantell. A New Republic General is in command of the task force, so both he and the Imperial Vice Admiral are on the Star Destroyer's bridge during the battle. Moff Sarreti is also aiding the New Republic, although it's kind of hinted that he may be doing so on his own initiative ("At present we're trying to determine if Emperor Palpatine had any knowledge of the Yuuzhan Vong, as he did the Ssi-ruuk. Thanks to the generosity of Moff Ephin Sarreti, we've been given access to Imperial records relevant to the Outbound Flight Project.").

A hologram of Sarreti joins a meeting of high-ranking NRDF officers and says that by now they know the real reason that Palpy sent Thrawn to the Unknown Regions --- he had learned that the Chiss had been fortifying their territory against the threat of an unknown aggressor. Could the Vong be that aggressor? They dunno, because Nirauan won't talk to them. Jedi Eclipse also establishes that the Vong are harassing Bilbringi despite "holding actions by the Imperial Remnant." After that, we don't hear much about the Remnant or Pellaeon until Destiny's Way.

So Leia and Han show up at Bastion to ask Pelly for the Empire's old hyperspace routes through the Deep Core. They meet Pellaeon on the surface after first docking aboard a Super Star Destroyer that's said to be eight kilometers long (lol), where he says that they only need to talk to him and not the Council because "The Empire is not run by committee" and that he picks and chooses what information he shares with the Moff Council. He's also wearing a Grand Admiral uniform and has put on ten kilos, and in his garden he learns how to "cull the weak and unfit, and to encourage the strong and vigorous." Leia muses that she can't possibly travel to Bastion without "being reminded what the Empire was really about," and mentally comments that it's a totalitarian regime. Pellaeon is willing to give up the hyperspace routes, but the Moffs (whom he hates) will want something in return. So Leia gives him everything that the New Republic knows about the Yuuzhan Vong (which I guess he doesn't bother to read prior to Remnant when he's helpless against a Vong attack). But he refuses to formally make an alliance with the NR, because:


'"Because, quite frankly, the New Republic is losing its war. Your forces are undisciplined, your government is in disarray, your capital is lost, and your Chief of State was tortured to death in his own office. Why should the Empire join such a debacle? If we join with you now, you'll only drag us down with you. That's what the Moff Council would say." That's what you say, Leia translated.'

...


"If the Empire could retain any worlds we took from the Yuuzhan Vong, it would impress the Moffs considerably. Not any worlds that still have your population on them. Only those the Yuuzhan Vong have remade for themselves."'

Leia and Han have an enlightening convo on Pellaeon later on:

~~~~~~


"What Pellaeon really wants are concessions ahead of time, and then to be at the peace table when it's over. He wants a peace that serves the Empire's interests."

Han began slicing up charbote root. "And here I was starting to think that Pellaeon was a good guy."

Leia made an equivocal motion of her hand. "I'm not saying he isn't., at least by Imperial standards. But he's a head of state, and he has to look out for that state's benefit. He didn't persuade the Empire to end the war with the New Republic on the grounds that it was the moral thing to do, he did it by persuading the Moris that it was in the Empire's best interests. Right now the Remnant has barely recovered from the last war-why should Pellaeon get into another life-and-death struggle unless it's to his advantage?"

~~~~~~

The Pellaeon we get in Destiny's Way is one who's been sitting idle on Bastion while the galaxy burns, eating cakes in the shade and using his garden to relive the days of Imperial glory. Promoting himself to Grand Admiral and scorning the concept of checks and balances from the Moff Council. He tries to blame everything on the Moffs, but Leia knows that he's using them as a scapegoat for his own cowardice. He's actively trying to enlarge Imperial Space through negotiations, and everything he's doing is with the Remnant's advantages and best interests in mind. After all of the character development in Ruin that began the process of turning Pellaeon into a good guy, Walter Jon Williams takes a decidedly different approach to Pellaeon and the Remnant in general.

He takes care to remind the reader that they're totalitarian and evil --- he only uses the word "Remnant" twice in the entire book to describe them and just calls them "the Empire" every other time. They're not anything new or progressive; they're the Empire that we all remember from the movies. They're the bad guys. Han's "And here I was starting to think that Pellaeon was a good guy" line is very on point, as it represents how the reader's feeling as well. Stackpole may have wanted to take Pellaeon and the Empire in a new direction, but Walter Jon is having none of that. He's a simple man who likes his beer cold and his Imperials evil.

Exactly one book later, though, Sean Williams and Shane Dix return us to the Pellaeon from Ruin, and his transformation into a full-fledged hero is completed. Sorry, Walter Jon.

 

I don't think of the "remnant" as the Second Empire's genesis. The "First Galactic Empire" (Palps' words) is actually a misnomer, because of the Sith Empire back in the day. Palps' Empire would be, so far as I know from EU Lore, the 2nd Galactic Empire. The Remnant was just an extended time of the 2nd Galactic Empire, which the Fel Empire was as well, since the Fel Empire conquered the GA from the rise of the remnant to true Empire again.

 

I think Palpatine's Empire was the first one. The old Sith Empires, IMO, never accounted for more than half the galaxy as the established galactic government.

 

That I actually don't know. You would have to talk to someone more versed in historical EU lore than me lol. I do know Sith Empire space in some timeframes and maps has as many planets and systems as Republic space during various Jedi vs Sith wars.

 

The Sith Empire under Vitiate did manage to attack Coruscant, but they didn't end up controlling it, using its occupation as leverage in peace negotiations. Even during the New Sith Wars, the Sith never exploited the Republic's weaknesses because they were often too busy fighting amongst themselves, especially in the decades leading up to Kaan and Darth Bane.

 

Hey how does everyone pronounce Gilad Pellaeon? The dude who narrates this video says it exactly the same way I do. Ditto Natasi Daala.

 

The Galactic Empire isn't a Sith Empire by nature though. It's Sith nature was extremely secretive. Even during Dark Empire, it was mostly Imperials, Old Republic nomenclature rather than any direct Sith leadership.

 

Also you can't really call it the "2nd Sith Empire", because there were MANY Sith Empires prior. Off the top of my head, I would guess the proper term might be the "6th Sith Empire". I don't think the Galactic Empire should be called a Sith empire. Also the Remnant is a separate entity. It's been stated quite clearly that the original Empire was completely eradicated after CE2. The Remnant was not a direct continuiation; It was more of a revival.