Palpatine/Darth Sidious reborn

This is key. Basically, before Endor Palpatine didn't have any clear cut targets. Now he has fleets and planets to target. You could ask why he didn't just destroy the Rebels on Yavin but he had just built the DS and wanted to play with his fun new toy. (He also wasn't there)

-The Rebel Gungan

 

I was talking about accelerated degeneration.

 

Perfect. Palpatine couldn't very well manipulate himself to the top of the New Republic's political hierarchy six years after the Battle of Endor. He certainly didn't have the time --- it took Borsk Fey'lya over a decade, and Palpatine was looking to crush the New Republic while it was still relatively young, before it had the chance to unite the entire galaxy. Palpatine wasn't making the mistake of underestimating them as he did with the Rebel Alliance --- he allowed the Galactic Civil War to go on for years, largely concentrating on keeping the galaxy in line while he left his military commanders to go after the Alliance --- with the New Republic, Palpatine knew that he needed to defeat them quickly. As such, superweapons such Eclipse and the Galaxy Gun were necessary, as were his Force Storms and Wormholes. The New Republic also had Jedi on its side, so his Executioners and Dark Side Minions were (theoretically) pretty handy, too.

I think that it's also important to take Thrawn into account. While consolidating his forces in the Core, Palpatine was aware of Thrawn's campaign to crush the New Republic. Whatever his reasons for not joining him, it's likely that at some point (either before or during his own campaign), he realized that his forces coupled with Thrawn's would have defeated the New Republic, and wanted to make up for that error by making his forces as strong as possible, with the aid of superweapons and mega-dark side energy.

 

IMHO the clone Emperor used brute force more than guile and deception in the DE trilogy because that is how his character was developing. Palpatine had always believed in the superiority of the dark side of the Force but after it literally helped him cheat death, he believed he could do anything with the power of the darkside. Basically, he came to believe that he could solve all his problems with brute force and that subtlty was now beneath him. Also, I think he purposely let the New Republic establish itself before taking it down because he believed that if he actually took the galaxy back by military force, the galaxy would come to understand that it was destined to be ruled by Palpatine; that rebellion was futile.

 

Interesting theory, but I disagree that he let the New Republic establish itself. I don't think he was ready to launch an attack until 6ABE, as he was consolidating and building up his forces at Byss until that time. If he had had the resources to launch an attack all along, I think that he would have allied with Thrawn. Their forces together could crush the New Republic, and afterwards, Palpatine could dispatch of Thrawn should any power challenges occur. The Empire may have respected Thrawn, but their true allegiance had always been to Palpatine.

Also, guile and deception weren't quite beneath the Emperor in Dark Empire --- look at his attempts to lure Luke and Leia to the dark side.

 

I'd say Episodes 7, 8, and 9 are The Thrawn Trilogy.

 

Hey, 1992 called. It wants its rumor back.

 

I tend to see the Reborn Emperor not as "Palpatine the Uber-Sith", but as essentially a personified vessel of The Dark Side (capitalized out of contextual preference -- as well as to irk Ulicus ). Pre-Endor, he was Palpatine, the uber-powerful Sith Lord. But after his return, while he was still Palpatine in terms of his consciousness/identity, he was far more than "just" Palpatine -- he was, for lack of a better term, a physical avatar of The Dark Side.

 

Since I've recently adopted the stance that Palpatine was directly unbalancing the Force through his own power before his destruction, I disagree with this (admittedly pretty cool) idea because I prefer to think Palps is weaker in DE than he's been in a long while. (Scary huh?)

Sure, he tells Luke that he's grown even more powerful, but I no longer buy it any more than I buy the stuff about his having died before Vader killed him.

The reborn Emperor is ridiculously powerful, sure... but is that because he's ridiculously powerful - as was once the case - or because he's on Byss, which is documented as increasing the abilities of dark siders? My guess is he's compensating for his weakness (relatively speaking).

 

I'd contend that he's weaker as an overall nemesis because he's completely kriffing snapped, but he's not weaker in the Force, especially not in the Dark Side. If, for once in my life, and only for the sake of arguement, I buy that hateful retcon (Chee, was it? or Pablo?) that Palpatine was lying when he said that Endor was not his first death, then he likely hadn't mastered the trick. If he hadn't mastered the trick to guarantee his immortality, and if he knew, perhaps as early as his training with Plaguies, that the crude matter of a body was not an adequate vessel for the full potency of the Dark Side, then he would have certainly exhibited self control, as we see with him not doing anything more spectacular than Force Lightning.

Once he's solved the problem of bodies that cannot contain his Unlimited Powah, he's free to Unleash the Force within him. All the power he's capable of, he can now harness with no fear of the consequences. He's no longer the schemer that he was because scheming is no longer necessary when you can bend a whole world to your will, and populate a massive Star Destroyer with your Force Slaves and spread that will throughout the Galaxy. Who needs to connive when you can swallow the Rebellion in Force Storms and Force the rest of the Galaxy to bow to you.

Therefore, although not necessarily more powerful, the Emperor Reborn is chained less by the limitations of his physical form, and free to unleash all the badassery he wants.