ST POLL: What do you think of Palpatine returning in The Rise of Skywalker?

A poll to see where people stand after hearing Palpatine's laugh.

 

As long as they are able to convince me as to the 'how' and 'why' he's returning, then I'm okay with it.

 

I mean, I thought it was weird that in the process of undoing everything, JJ left out one accomplishment intact the OT, which was killing Palpatine and ending the Sith/fulfilling the prophecy. But hey I guess he fixed that.

 

I think it's the best possible decision considering how the ST's gone so far. If executed properly, it can answer a lot of important questions like:

• How did the First Order rise up after the destruction of the Empire?
• How did they build SKB?
• Who was Snoke and what was he doing?
• How did Kylo get turned to the dark side even under the supervision of Luke?
• Why did Luke go into exile on Ach-to after the temple massacre?

Also, I think it makes sense if we consider that the PT and OT are the saga of the Skywalker family and their nemesis Darth Sidious, so if you were to make a continuation of that story it would make sense to bring him back. It's already been established that spirits can survive beyond death through the force, so that doesn't seem like too much of a stretch to me. Plus McDiarmid is a fantastic actor and will give us plenty of memeworthy moments!

 

I voted for Choice 3. Yeah, his surviving death was great in the EU. But then Lucas said the Sith can’t survive death. That’s canon. Lucas almost broke with his canon in TCW with Revan and Bane. Filoni disagreed and cut the scene. We do see Bane, voiced by Mark Hamill, in what was the last episode of TCW until this new season. But that’s an illusion in Yoda’s battle with the dark side inside him.

So, Snoke really gets demoted. Or is Snoke Plagueis after all and he’ll be back as well.

Of course, it could be a flashback. Maybe that’s already been considered, but I’m on a short break before another class and then lunch break, so I haven’t read any of the responses.

EDIT: Oh, wait. This thread is only one page. The other Palpatine thread is the one that is15 pages already.

EDIT: I’ve read all the responses above. I agree with them all.

 

Honestly, if Palpatine is actually returning it seems like a bit of damage control to me. There wasn't really a large buildup to it but with Snoke seemingly discarded in TLJ and Ben continuing to come off as a bit of a petulant child it's pretty apparent that they needed a more ominous force pulling the strings from the sidelines. Palps makes a lot of sense here.

 

It ties up the complete saga and cements him as the saga’s main big bad.

 

No, it should not be a situation where he is physically alive; hopefully JJ was more creative than making him get stuck on the rail of the shaft he was thrown down.

This could really be a disaster if poorly done, but right now I am trusting they did a good job. It's encouraging in some ways because we see that JJ was serious about tying the saga together, and would go out on a limb to do so. I had my doubts about it at first, and thought it would just be about the remaining characters, so kudos to JJ for the effort and integrity.

 

pretty much what I'd have said.

 

They can't make it seem like he's coming back JUST for this movie. It has to be shown that he was back already but taking different forms after losing his body. Hell, make it so he ended up learning about cheating death from Plaguis and the only way to do so was to "infect" bodies.

 

I agree 100%. TROS will absolutely live or die by how well it incorporates Palpatine into the ST premise that was set up in TFA. If it were up to me I'd make it simple: Snoke was Palpatine, just in a messed up infected/cloned body. When Kylo killed him in TLJ he jumped to a new body and now they need to figure out how to kill him once and for all.

 

Honestly before this trailer, my response would have been ugh no we don't need that. But after hearing it today and the rush of excitement that I felt at Palpatine being back, I'm so glad about it.

And there are just so many great what if questions, plus he really ties it all together. He has been the overarching villain not just tormenting the galaxy but the Skywalker family. Almost like he created them just to toy with them. And I'm just excited to have true closure with him because it was still so hard to believe that someone as powerful as him would have been down in by a fall. His own electricity didn't kill him in RoTS, why would a simple fall do it? Of course he could be a ghost and it's some weird force graveyard in the Death Star now. Regardless I'm excited. That whole trailer did everything it needed to do.

 

I thought the emperors cackling laugh reveal in the teaser was epic.

That said it’s totally going to depend on how it’s done, but I’m really looking forward to seeing what it is.

 

It could be just from a hologram - this might be just a speculative tease by JJ......

 

No doubt the McGuffin is the key to ending all of this. I had felt like "Snoke" actually wanted Kylo to kill him to take his place. It was always the goal of Sideous to have a Skywalker take control of the dark side and taunted Kylo so much that he knew Kylo would take the bait. It's about having the dark side rule and a Skywalker had to do it. Could be the reason the Skywalkers were made. So the spirit if Sideous could then laugh when that goal was achieved.

But the Force had other plans. Introducing Rey.

 

I feel that it was somehow inevitable, given that Snoke was killed off and nobody is scared by Kylo.

 

It's the single best thing they possibly could have done to make this all work. The only way for this thing to be a well told story in the traditional sense is if the problem at the beginning is finally resolved at the end. This was the best way to do that. The ascent of Palpatine was the issue of TPM. He is the Phantom Menace. The idea that Episode IX will be about the final resolution of this problem makes perfect sense. Now, we just need Anakin back, and we should be pretty good.

 

Ironic. After all that hype that Snoke got as being a greater evil than old Emperor Palpatine, he gets killed off anticlimactically with Emperor Palpatine's grand return in IX cementing him as an inferior villain soon to be forgotten.

 

I think it's a great idea and partially being done for damage control. I think Disney had this "great idea" to make the Star Wars name there own by "letting the past die" and recreating the GFFA by getting rid of what has worked in the past and make an attempt to bring in a new generation of fans. What they didnt expect was everyone (including the new generation) would rather stay familiar to what Star wars has always been. Now they are throwing in Palpatine to let everyone know they are listening to what fans expect and want.

 

Did they ever come out and say he was a greater evil? Or is that something that started with the fans and then they ran with it to throw people off the trail? I mean if Snoke was just Palpatines puppet all along, for Palpatine's sake it makes sense to have Snoke coming off looking more powerful. If he is waiting to make his rise back to power he has to use someone else to do it while waiting in the shadows. Which is similar to what he did in TPM and prior to that. Flying under the radar is what Palpatine does best and is when he is at his most dangerous.

 

I think it's the best way to wrap the ST up, I do agree that it could undermine the accomplishments of the OT.

 

But much of the accomplishments in the OT are already undermined by the ST unless those accomplishments made it possible for the newbies to end it all.

 

They've brought back X-Wings, Tie Fighters, Star Destroyers, a Death Star like weapon, the Vader mask already, so of course they are going to bring Palpatine back.

 

I think it's a great idea because it is a genuine Lucas seed value, Yoda has spoken of luminous beings, we have seen Obi-Wan disappear before our eyes, we have seen Obi-Wan, Yoda and Anakin appear in force ghost form. The only thing standing in the way of an unauthorized hacker of the system gaining access to that kind of providential afterlife is that Lucas simply did not say it could happen. But in no way did Lucas ever say there were any rules standing against it.

And, this is using a standard that Lucas does not contraindicate something in the ineffable, unknowable, unquantitative, mystical domain. Entirely different from Lucas not contraindicating things in the realistic, knowable, quantitative domain that are simply stupid. Like Finn seeing Hosnian Prime from Toko Dana, a violation of high school physics. High school physics cannot be violated in a domain such as the Force, and who gains access to what powers in the Force. Cogent arguments about what a dark side Force user does get to, and does not get to do, are at a terribly higher and more erudite level, that has to be informed by Eastern philosophy.

Can Disney royally screw it up? Of course! I expect it.