What caused Palpatine's change of appearance?

It was the lightning that disfigured Palpatine. He used the dark energy of the Force to produce the lightning to kill Mace. When the latter deflected that power back to him, it disfigured Palpatine.

 

That last time I saw a lightsaber block Force Lightning before Mace Windu did it, it absorbed the Lightning, not deflected it.

[image=http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/1817/kenobi6tf.jpg]

Anyway, the bolts were flying back partly because Palpatine was laying down. And a total physical change is not caused by Force Lighting, or it would do it to everybody it comes in contact with.

 

Yeah, I think the strain of the whole thing is mostly what causes the disfiguration. That's what Knoll or Coleman says in the commentary if I remember correctly.

I don't think it was just the lightning scarring his face. When Palpatine says to Anakin, "I...I..can't hold it any longer..", I remember thinking when I first saw the film that perhaps he was talking about the facade of his physical appearance. He could also be talking about the lighting(which I think he's shooting out to keep Mace from just slicing him in two), but Palpatine often spoke to Anakin with double meanings.

Anyway, I tend to believe it was the dark side bubbling forth. And while he may have been partly physically damaged by the whole ordeal, he had already been hiding his true nature and this allowed him to drop the physical(palpable) charade.

 

If Palpatine became so disfigured because of Force Lightning then how come Luke does not look any worse for wear at the end of ROTJ?

 

Exactly, it isn't because of Mace disfiguring him so much.

Here's my theory.

Palpatine relies on the dark side of the force so much that it alters his appearance also with his old age making his Sidious face. BUT he has the power to cover his sidious face up to look like a normal old man. But Mace reveals his true form and the lightning causes him to not be able to turn back.

 

Close but no, It was the strain of using the most powerful DS attack(that we have seen) maby Sidious let out alot of Lightning cause he had more anger? I am not sure, but I do think it has to do with the strain or the lightning.

 

And what about the red/yellow evil looking eyes. Lightning didn't do that.

 

no that was his Anger.
When someone inters a constant state of Anger his/her eys glow Red/Yellow . Thats why Darth Mauls eyes never changed, he was always angry.

 

If you look closely, it's arcing into his face. Tearing into his flesh.




The Emporer was playing with Luke when he zapped him and most of it was going into his body.

 

I would like to think that his true nature was merely being unmasked through the intensification of his powers, but to just throw it out there i was always annoyed to learn that this was in the film in the first place. i always thought it would be cooler not to show why the emperor transforms but rather to leave it unexplained. for me, not seeing the emperor in ANH and only briefly in ESB, but finally seeing him again in ROTJ as an old frail man would simply show how the dark side has gradually decayed his body over the 20 years since ROTS, and although he has retained his power, he has unnaturally outlived his body. this would thus show that there are some nasty side affects to using the dark side and i think would have worked a lot better. thoughts?

 

If you look closely, it's arcing into his face. Tearing into his flesh.

The Emporer was playing with Luke when he zapped him and most of it was going into his body.



Please !

When Anakin is on the lava bank on Mustafar, full of anger, his eyes become yellow and even his face starts to diform a bit : you can see it and an ILM tech said as much in the ROTS official souvenir guide : they made him look like his master (sidious). See his forehead and cheeks just before and after he burns.

So it's anger, and the unleashing of dark side powers that diform him (or reveal him, depending on how you see it). The lightning is not tearing into his flesh. Makes no sense. Was Yoda diformed ? Neither was Luke.

 

i dont care what any of you think, mace deflected sidious' lightning back onto him because of the close proximity, you can see the damn lightning reflecting back onto sidious on the dvd! by the way in the making of book, samuel jackson mentions this fact as well

 

Does the ugly sidious make-up look like scars ?

His over grown, claw like nails look like ... scars ?

His Dracula-esque look ? voice ?

It's a whole new character from head to toe, hair to nails ! And he looks quite comfortable with it. Like a second, oooops, sorry, like a true nature ...

Anakin's burnt skin and battle damaged features, now *that* is scars. Scars that you hide. Scars that you hide.

 

By the way, don't tell me that Sidious hides his scars under his hood and robes.
That's his Sith robe. Period.

As for his SnowWhite-Witch rotten nails and hands he holds them quite visible, doesn't he ?

Senators, visitors, advisors, see Sidious face under the hood. Like we do.

Much better than the Viceroy did before Sidious revealed his true identity, before he was ... scarred.

HAve you noticed how Sidious' face is visible when he adresses the TF leaders on Mustafar, just before Vader arrives ?

Sidious feels very, very comfortable with his ugly monster face.
More than Vader or Grievous with their mutilated, scarred bodies (well, organs and face for Grievous).

 

Yoda is already Prune Faced, Dooku had baby lightning and Luke has +25 clothing attachments with Immunity to Pruning.

 

Agreed. I think the "deformed Sidious being in Episode III" was really just an excuse to give people the "RotJ Emperor vs Yoda" fight.

This is touched on over in the "Palpatine gets younger between II and III?" thread in the prequel forum.

http://boards.theforce.net/prequel_trilogy/b10669/22232778/p1/?46

 

I think it was better to have shown how his natural face is revealed or else you'd be wondering about it in Ep V and VI. The only people who would understand why looks like that are the ones who read the books and play KOTOR and know that using the dark side alters your appearance. And the makeup in ROTJ looks terrible when compared to ROTS. Even though I should compare them the opposite way. ROTJ to ROTS not ROTS to ROTJ.

 

i actually think that his deformed face make up looks a lot better in ROTJ than in ROTS

 

His eyes became yellow but his face didn't start to diform. For that matter Dooku would look like Sidious the whole time. I'm pretty sure it's the lightning what causes it, there are many evidences. The OS and the visual dictionary clearly states it. If you watch the scene frame by frame you clearly see that his face gets a bit more scarred after every blast of lightning that he suffers.
And the argument that Luke didn't change... how many times has it been explained that this is different, becasue it is his same evil energy being deflected back at him, and flowing through his body in a close circuit?? I think it's not so difficult to understand the difference.

 

Dear Jedi Ethan ,

here is an excerpt from the official movie guide, which was released lasr May. I'm translating from french, but I'm sure you'll find your copy quick enough to check that I'm not making this up.

It comes from an interview about EpIII Vader with Roger Guyett, p79 :

(...), when Anakin burns on the lava bank, the dark side becomes visible on his face. "We added something which looks like Sidious' ugly face. It's atrocious."


Sidious' ugly face is the face of the dark side. The face of evil. It's not a scar caused by lightning.

What's your interpretation of Sidious growing claw like nails, Jedi Ethan ?

 

If Lucas is saying in the DVD commentary that he's being deformed by the lightning, then that's what it is. But in my opinion, it's hard to accept when there are so many cases in the trilogies that suggest otherwise.

 

I say it's all in the interpretation.

For example, in ROTJ, Lucas could say that Palpatine WASN'T killed by his fall down the reactor shaft.

Then after everyone argues about it for a couple of years, Lucas could give an interview and say:

"Well, he wasn't. It wasn't the fall that killed him. It was the sudden stop at the bottom."

My own interpretation is this - I say that the lightning caused Palpatine to be deformed, revealing his true appearance.

 

This is an intriguing puzzle... If you consider that Palpatine's change of appearance was caused by his lightning, then how come Mace didn't have the same effect when Palpatine used his force lightning on him... And even on Luke during the ROTJ...

I know that you all are going to respond that the reflection on the lightsaber dobled the power of the lightning and changed Palpatine's appearance... In the case of Mace, and even Luke, the lightning hit directly to the opponent without reflecting in an object such as a lightsaber...

Still, it is a complete mystery and GL wants everybody to assume...

 

mon interpretation mon ami, est très simple. et je ne sais pas pourquoi c'est si difficile a comprendre.

This is a movie right?? a fantasy movie. It doesn't all have to make perfect and logical sense. Sidious had to look like that in the end, he had to look like Palpatine in the beginning. So let's create a scene that justifies the change. You don't need to break your mind as much trying to find logic and direct consequences of everything. Like lucas said "you don't need to know how a teleporter works" so you don't need to know exactly how the lightning changed his appearence, you just have to know that it caused it. Let's say it's the evil energy that twists his body and makes him an image of evil. If using the dark side can make your claw grow, I don't understand why suffering and intense close circuited amount of dark side energy can't do it.

 

And yet the UGLY VOICE (his true voice?) that goes with the UGLY FACE slips out at several points in the film before he uses the lightning.

Does this slipping out of the UGLY VOICE not indicate that Palpatine is not what he appears to be? That perhaps his NORMAL VOICE (and FACE) is the false one?