PT Who was Palpatine referring to?

....when he said, “To cheat death is a power only one has achieved.”

The obvious answer would be Plagueis, but his story in the opera house directly contradicts that. If Plagueis did die (I see no reason to think he didn’t), then I don’t think that means he cheated death.

 

I think he's Plagueis could cheat death for other people.

 

Agreed. "It's ironic. He could save others from death, but not himself."

 

It was Plagieus.

Remember, his power was apparently to prevent other people from dying, something Anakin really wanted to have. The hook is that Plagieus “taught his apprentice everything he knew”, so Anakin figured Palpatine also had that power.

 

Yeah, i think he meant Plagueis. But in the case Plagueis and Snoke aren't the same person, retconning this remark to be about Snoke also has its merits...

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Perhaps. But in any case the reference in his remark is strikingly dark & unclear.

 

Himself

 

What if this is the truth and Palpatine was the apprentice of Plagieus's apprentice. All three could have known each other, but instead of going down like it did with Dooku, Anakin, and Palpatine, it went down like Luke, Vader, Palpatine, or Rey, Kylo Ren, and Snoke. The master is killed and there is a new Master and Palpatine become the formal apprentice. Then Palpatine killed his master before learning to prevent other people from dying.

 

Sith can't cheat death.

As far as I'm concerned, Sidious thinks he's referring to Plagueis, but he's mistaken. Plagueis never had the power that Sidious thought he did.

When Sidious says, "To cheat death is a power only one has achieved," he is ironically one hundred percent correct. But that person is Qui-Gon Jinn, as we find out at the end of the film.

 

I think that remains to be seen. We'll find out in December.

 

I'm sure you'll find out. Personally, I'm not really concerned with what J.J. Abrams and the Walt Disney Company have to say on the matter. They're not telling the same story.

 

Oh I see.

Ah well, as I have always said to you, we are all free to take the bits we like and discard the rest.

 

Yes, and as always, I agree one hundred percent.

e: But I'll point out that this isn't some arbitrary distinction. There's an important theme at play in the story Lucas was telling. It's the idea that compassion and selflessness are the only path to achieving immortality of the soul. Whereas hate and selfishness can only preserve the physical body in an unnatural state of living death, like with Grievous and Vader.

The Jedi give of their spirit to others, and so their spirit survives in others after their physical death. The Sith drain the spirit from others to fuel their own material ambitions, and so when their physical bodies die, there's nothing else left. The Emperor's body was clearly destroyed, and since that's all he ever cared about, so was he. But Anakin gave his own life so that Luke could live, and so Anakin's soul is able to live on after his body fails.

This is a very important part of the meaning of the whole story. It was done this way for a specific reason. Though I obviously haven't seen the new movie yet, I have no reason to believe that the current creative team cares even slightly about these deeper aspects of the story Lucas was telling. I think they just brought Palpatine back because they thought it was a good way to get butts into seats. I think that's literally the only reason.

 

I think it's preposterous to exclude the possibility that Palpatine didn't die in ROTJ and maybe even wasn't corporeally around on the Death Star, with all the implications that might have.

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Palpatine is referring to Plagueis since that's the context of his dialogue as established in the movie.

That's correct.

 

Really? It's preposterous to think that Palpatine definitely died after being physically flung into a bottomless pit and literally exploding, shortly before the station whose core he was flung into also literally exploded? That's a preposterous opinion to have, but your theory that he was some sort of tangible Force hologram is totally reasonable?

Okay.

 

Yes I agree. Then again there is cheating death to put more time on the clock and their is cheating death to live forever. Could Sidious have a way to keep living beyond any normal means. So he'd be putting more time on the clock. Something that is not 'live forever' but if he can keep repeating this over and over and no one stops him, then he would live forever. So it's not so much that he dies, its that he found a way to cling on to life, even if it's only on spiritual level, and then return fully.

 

I fail to see the real difference here. It also strikes me as inordinately technobabbly for a process that's supposed to illuminate profound spiritual concepts.

But in any case, the whole idea is that the Sith can't preserve the spirit beyond death. Once the body goes, so does the spirit, because the survival of the spirit beyond death requires a state of total compassion and selflessness. That's something a Jedi can achieve but a Sith can't.

 

Why so aggresive?? Do you have a problem with other peoples thoughts and opinions that don't match with yours?

If Palpatine wasn't hyped so much for TROS and according to a certain spoiler post

Spoiler

revealed to be alive

i would concur. But the events of the sequel trilogy already hint at the possibility that he was still manipulating the fate of the galaxy all the time since his apparent demise.

So actually it doesn't matter if he died on the death star or not. The Sith are still around. So what apparently happened at the end of ROTJ, may not be what *really* happened.

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(removed)

I asked nicely. Also, no personal attacks. /heels

The difference is Obi-Wan and Yoda vanish body and all into the Force. They are dead. They are no longer alive but they still maintain their identify. They are spirits in the Force. A Jedi can do this because they totally let go of self and their own personal wants. A Sith can't do this because of their greed.

The other side of that is someone whose body is killed but through Force Magic they can cling to life. I think it has something to do with midichlorians. So while the flesh dies their spirit, soul, force essense, Midicholroians, whatever you want to call it somehow holds on to the corporeal world even after the body dies. This is very different than the transcendance of the soul Yoda and Obi-Wan have. I'm saying in this bodyless state a Sith can still be killed. There is no killing Yoda and Obi-Wan after they vanish away. They exist on a different plane of reality. And they don't cheat death. They transcend it.

A disemobided Sith has cheated death but still exists in the same plane of reality as a living person. My guess would be a Sith can only do this by having a huge amount of attachment and greed for their own life. They someone compel the midichlorians that typically disperse upon death into the Cosmic Force to remain bound in the world of the Living Force. They are like a specter or phantom.

Techno babble is when they drop heavy physics on us in Star Trek and then use laymen's terms to fill in the no-eggheads. This is spiritual. It's not techno babble.

I hope it's straight forward. Obi-Wan and Yoda become one with the Force. Sith stay one as themselves but without a body.

The fable we hear about Darth Plagieus isn't that he grants forever life, but he cheats death for those he cares about. And what does a Sith care about? Power. So my guess is Plagious had people he still needed to forward his plans. Imagine a person dies to escape the Sith Lord but the Sith Lord has the power to bring that person back to life in order to continue with their plans.

My theory is Sidious died and Plagiues brings him back to life.... or the apprentice of Plagieus brings Sidious back to life. By dying and being brought back, Sidious figures out how to cheat death for himself. What he doesn't learn is how to bring other people back. But he doesn't really care as long as his can keep living. Sidious could be very very old. Sidious could be the Sith Lord the Jedi killed when they think the Sith were wiped out.

And this very had to kill Sidious can wait. When he gets too old he dies again and comes back. He's playing the long game becasue he no longer needs to worry about victory in a lifetime. And can wait 800 years for the Jedi with first hand experience with the Sith to die off. He can go slow. He can learn new powers. He can take his time.

That's where the "ironic" line comes from in his speech to Anakin. I think there is a whole lot more backstory to this than we know yet. And I think Sidious could be older than Yoda. Once he extended his life span beyond the limits of the body, Sidious handled things in a new way from the Sith before him.

Hopefully in December more light is shed on this.

But the sure thing slam dunk we thought was the end of Sidious may not be that. It might be the end of Palpatine. But Sidious may be able to return as someone else.

 

In theory, I don't see how the Sith can not figure out how to cheat death. It's just a Force technique that needs to be figured out. Non Force sensitives, regardless of whether they are good or bad, can not become Force ghosts. The Jedi have been around for a long time and have done many good deeds, but it wasn't until Qui Gon that they invented the technique. The Sith may or may not have already figured it out, but in theory, it's possible.

If many Jedi found out the technique separately from one another but he Sith never have, then I might suspect that it is somehow inherently incompatible, or at least more difficult, with the dark side. But from the data we have, all we know is that it is extremely difficult to figure out, regardless of which side of the Force you use.

When I first watched TPM, I also suspected Sidious was a Sith who fought the Jedi a millennium ago. I was thinking he might be a ghost (works with the word "phantom" in the title) who learned how to possess people (it might have taken him 1000 years to perfect the skill so that he can still unleash his full power using normal people's bodies). This could explain why the Jedi thought they all died but they still managed to come back. But there was no further evidence so I dropped the possessing part, though I still wonder how old Sidious is.

It's still possible that he's over 1000 years old, either because the Force extends his lifespan, or because he's a different species whose natural lifespan is that long. He might move to a different planet every few decades so no one knows his age. I don't think his lifespan is infinite though, otherwise he wouldn't have to be so obsessed with getting a powerful successor.

 

Is that what we see when Palpatine's face melts as he is hitting Mace Windu with lightening?

Agreed. That's what I can't figure out. Sidiosu seems geniuenly proud of Anakin. And more than that proud that Anakin could become the greatest Sith of all.

Unless getting a powerful successor is somehow part of his plan to keep living.

Sith and Force Ghosts, my understand is it's a Catch-22. Yes a Sith Lord is powerful enough to become a Force Spirit like Yoda or Obi-Wan. But to unlock that power requires a level of complete selflessness and letting go of ones own needs. For a Sith to reach this mental state they would need to let go of their own ambitions so completely that they'd no longer be a Sith.

That's what happened with Anakin.

Even the typical Jedi doesn't know how to let go so completely that they physically vanish into the Force. We don't know much about how it works, mostly from the Clone Wars. And we learn that Qui-Gon can barely return as a voice except under special conditions. Yoda and Obi-Wan went further with the training and can appear in a physical form. Not sure if there are limits where they can appear. Obi-Wan is in a cockpit, Hoth, Degobah, and Endor. Yoda is on Endor and Ahch-To.

The next movie could 25 seconds about Force Ghosts and double what we know.

 

Hmm...possibly. It's not really clear why exactly his face changes.

I think Sidious accepts that he will die eventually. If his life was prolonged via the dark side, it probably only slows down the aging process, not stopping it entirely. If his natural lifespan is long because he is a different species, then there must be a limit too. It could be, say, 1200 years, and he knows he's approaching the end of it.

I just don't see why selflessness would be a prerequisite for Force ghosts. Unless the Force is a conscious entity who chooses to ban Sith from that technique.

It's like saying selflessness is required to get 100% on all your final exams. I don't see how that would work. Unless, say, the teachers decide to give selfless students full exam booklets, while giving selfish students exam booklets with missing pages.

Well the Jedi have been around for a long time, so I'm pretty sure there must have been some in the past who fully embrace their ideology.
It looks like Qui Gon is the first to invent the technique, and taught it to Yoda and Obi Wan, who improved on the technique so they can become full Force ghosts. They probably told Qui Gon their discoveries, but it's been too long since Qui Gon's death, so it's too late for him to become a full Force ghost. Anakin's body was cremated (same way Qui Gon's body was dealt with) on Endor. We know that Yoda and Obi Wan went there as Force ghosts, so they probably helped Anakin become one.

Yeah we're not really sure what the limits of Force ghosts are. It's possible that they continued to improve the technique so that it would be even better for Luke in the future.