Will we get an Imperial POV Movie?

[The Romulan Republic]

Can I just say, that we do have movies made for a country that is not exactly in the right and good? Say, the United States of America. Invading Iraq on false evidence, drone strikes, torture of enemy combatants, instigating coups for oil and money, regime changes, etc, etc, etc. We seem to be doing fine making war movies for this country and ignoring those bad things to boot!

I would make it about going after the Rebellion with the Imperials believing the Rebels are the bad guys. Nothing complicated there.

The thing is that I would argue that the US is much more of a mixed bag than the Empire. Obviously some would disagree, stridently, but while the US has a lot of bad shit, it also has a lot of good shit. That's not to excuse whitewashing the bad shit (film/television that doesn't fully acknowledge/downplays the fact that some of the "Founding Fathers" had slaves particularly offends me, though one could doubtless find other examples). However, the Empire is pretty much flat-out modelled, in part at least, on the Nazis, who in modern mainstream popular culture at least are probably the closest thing to a universally agreed upon example of unambiguous evil. You could probably find more apologists for Satan than for them. However much some people may want moral ambiguity or relativism, that really isn't the way the Empire (in the films at least) is written. At most, you can have relatively good people serving a vile regime because they're coerced or ignorant.

The Empire was founded not only on genocide, treason, deception, and theocracy (all charges one could level, to varying degrees, against the founding of the US, albeit not to the same extent) but on actual quantifiable metaphysical pure evil (which is a thing in Star Wars). It them became a full-fledge military dictatorship, and not only employed torture and slavery on its own populace (bad enough, but within the realm of mundane oppressive government shit), but also employed a strategic weapon on one of its own major worlds, not even one that was openly in rebellion, because its leadership were covertly funding and spying for the Rebellion. To make an example/demonstration. So you want to compare the US to the Empire, get back to me when the US government, say, nukes the state of Massachusetts to make a point.

Also, at least the US military has moved beyond barring certain races from its officer corps. (I don't know if the Empire officially does this, but the OT Imperial officers were all white human men, and even in the new continuity, Imperial alien officers are rare to non-existent).

[Gandalf]

Maybe you could do a Vietnam style film about stormtroopers, like Platoon or Apocalypse Now?

[The Romulan Republic]

I suppose that could be interesting.

I mean, their are ways you can do a good Imperial PoV film, sure. As long as it recognizes that the Imperial regime is monstrous.

[Lord Revan]

That's why I like the Death Star novel so much the writer doesn't shy away from pointing out that the Imperial regime is evil but at the same time does show that not everyone working for the imperials is an irrideemble monster and a big part of the drama comes the main characters coming to terms with the fact that they're in fact the "bad guys" and not the heroes they thought they were.

It's execelent depicting the Empire as monstrous without depicting every one of the imperials as irredeemble monsters.

[NecronLord]

The Empire is far more ambiguous in its evil then them Nazis were. Leaving aside old EU example of cartoonish evil like Tarkin doing a Mario buttstomp with a Victory Star Destroyer on a crowd of people or sucking a world dry because they didn't have enough dark side point, the canon Empire wasn't that terrible until the destruction of Alderaan.

They didn't have death camps,

The Spice Mines of Kessel are "a Death Sentence," in the words of Hera Syndulla. There's no difference between them and Sobibor.

didn't usually allow slavery of sapients,

Wrong. The Empire condemns Wookies to slavery and industrially raids Ryloth for 'dancing' slaves. These feature in Rebels, though the latter is offscreen, Cham Syndulla describes that as what the Empire is doing and we've no reason to think he's wrong. We see the Wookie slavery onscreen, including child-slavery.

In the comics (everything else I mention in this post is from the Rebels TV show) imperial weapons factories use a slave workforce.


Here's a picture of Luke Skywalker, infamous rebel, freeing slaves.

still had voters rights,

Except for free speech and assembly - Ezra Bridger's parents were imprisoned for anti-Papatinist speech (and executed for protesting while imprisoned) long beore the Senate was dissolved. Voting is meaningless if you ban opposition speech.

Additional and new from Rebels is the fact that Imperials are willing to throw treason charges at fruit vendors in the street who don't give their officers free products, they use child soldiers:



"You entered this facility as children, and in a few short weeks you will leave as soldiers."

And oh yes they also do this to their civilian employees:



"Personality sacrificed to productivity."

And of course, the palptinists actually do kidnap force sensitive children:



Both the comics and TV series show that the Empire has exterminated the population of Geonosis, an incalculable warcrime that far exceeds Alderaan in scope - Alderaan is sparsely populated, Geonosian cities are adorable bug-piles.



They have also attempted to exterminate the Lasat species, and have 'cleared' their homeworld, wiping out all but a handful within known space (there turn out to be more in the Unknown Regions, behind a navigational anomaly the Empire can't get through) and we have no reason to believe that Geonosians and Lasat are the only species targeted for extermination.

If anything, the Empire is more brutal in the nu-canon, not less. It certainly has large scale organized death programmes, just like the nazis.

If you're going to argue that the canon purge exonerates the Empire, at least learn the nu-canon somewhat before doing it. In short, it doesn't.

[The Romulan Republic]

So in addition to everything else, that's at least three counts of planetary-scale Imperial genocide in the new canon.

Add another galaxy scale genocide in the form of the Jedi purge (albeit one that began before the Empire was officially formed, though barely so and still carried out by the future Empire's head of state and troops as part of founding the Empire).

So at least four genocides to the Empire's name. Yeah, a lot of ambiguity their.

[NecronLord]

Well, while the jedi count as a genocide in strict terms, being a religious attack, they're so rare (the 10,000 knights figure was used in Rebels) that I wouldn't really put it in the same league, though it is certainly bad, and importantly speaks to what sort of a shit Palpatine is.

[NecronLord]

The nu-canon also shows that even the hoary apologist claim that the Empire promotes law and order is false; planetary-government Minister Maketh Tua, the sympathetic imperial (she lacks the 'imagination' to carry out the crimes against sapience Vader wants her to, and tries to defect), has business dealing with armaments (a type of disintegrator) that is banned in the Empire by the Imperial Senate, something which is explicitly against the laws of the Empire, which are shown not to be enforced. Mundane corruption is very much alive and well.

[FaxModem1]

It'd really depend on how far they want to take it. They could make Imperial men of honor, from the Republic Navy who stayed in as a sense of loyalty. Or you could show corrupt, lawless worlds that were made better due to Imperial intervention. I imagine all the human slaves were elated when the Empire came in and freed them from it. Though the scene would be rather bittersweet/hilarious to see humans getting their slave explosive chip and chains removed, while their alien slave brethren are told to get to work cleaning up the place.

The whole "made the trains run on time" myth could also be used. Portray Imperials making factories, bringing jobs, patrolling roads, building public works, etc.

Personally, I'd like to see a mixed bag. Imperials who are murdering and slaving scum, good people try to save the galaxy and their homes like MInister Tua, and working stiffs just trying to support their families in a harsh galaxy. But that would require too much nuance for the themes of Star Wars.

[NecronLord]

It'd really depend on how far they want to take it. They could make Imperial men of honor, from the Republic Navy who stayed in as a sense of loyalty. Or you could show corrupt, lawless worlds that were made better due to Imperial intervention. I imagine all the human slaves were elated when the Empire came in and freed them from it.

It did not do that. Why do people think it did?

Though the scene would be rather bittersweet/hilarious to see humans getting their slave explosive chip and chains removed, while their alien slave brethren are told to get to work cleaning up the place.

The whole "made the trains run on time" myth could also be used. Portray Imperials making factories, bringing jobs, patrolling roads, building public works, etc.

That myth is deliberately exploded in the nu-canon, it's shown that Imperial kit doesn't work as well as the Republic stuff (trooper helmets) and that the Empire suppresses free trade and interferes with people's lives pointlessly as well as displacing ordinary people from their homes (Tarkintown). And as for Imperial factories; you really don't want to work in one of those!

Personally, I'd like to see a mixed bag. Imperials who are murdering and slaving scum, good people try to save the galaxy and their homes like MInister Tua, and working stiffs just trying to support their families in a harsh galaxy. But that would require too much nuance for the themes of Star Wars.

Minister Tua, who is an arms smuggler. She's not actually a good person, she just got scared when they came for her.

[FaxModem1]

It'd really depend on how far they want to take it. They could make Imperial men of honor, from the Republic Navy who stayed in as a sense of loyalty. Or you could show corrupt, lawless worlds that were made better due to Imperial intervention. I imagine all the human slaves were elated when the Empire came in and freed them from it.

It did not do that. Why do people think it did?

We also don't see any human slaves in the Empire during the Original trilogy or in any spinoff media, while we know that human slaves were a reality in the Prequel trilogy. Absence of human slaves leads to the conclusion that the Empire did something about it.

Though the scene would be rather bittersweet/hilarious to see humans getting their slave explosive chip and chains removed, while their alien slave brethren are told to get to work cleaning up the place.

The whole "made the trains run on time" myth could also be used. Portray Imperials making factories, bringing jobs, patrolling roads, building public works, etc.

That myth is deliberately exploded in the nu-canon, it's shown that Imperial kit doesn't work as well as the Republic stuff (trooper helmets) and that the Empire suppresses free trade and interferes with people's lives pointlessly as well as displacing ordinary people from their homes (Tarkintown).

Personally, I'd like to see a mixed bag. Imperials who are murdering and slaving scum, good people try to save the galaxy and their homes like MInister Tua, and working stiffs just trying to support their families in a harsh galaxy. But that would require too much nuance for the themes of Star Wars.

Minister Tua, who is an arms smuggler. She's not actually a good person, she just got scared when they came for her.

Well, we have canon proof that Tua was doing some good:



Unless you're saying that it's all Imperial propaganda and that Tua was secretly building deathcamps for the citizens of Lothal to be imprisoned in?

[NecronLord]

Have you watched the show? That's intended to be funny out of universe. Minister Tua was stealing people's farms (homes which are also businesses) note, and forcibly resettling them on much less valuable land. Look at those buildings, they're practically one-room why would you want to move from a farmhouse to that?

As for human slaves, by that same standard can I claim a Toydarian genocide? I haven't seen any Toydarians in the Empire, therefore they must not exist.

[NecronLord]

Here's a farm on Lothal, for comparison, with the Imperials there to arrest the owners and burn it down, during Tua's tenure as interim governor. Note how it is multi-building, and follows the Tattoine moisture farm pattern, so is presumably mostly underground.

[FaxModem1]

Here's a farm on Lothal, for comparison, with the Imperials there to arrest the owners and burn it down, during Tua's tenure as interim governor. Note how it is multi-building, and follows the Tattoine moisture farm pattern, so is presumably mostly underground.

Conceded. I haven't watched the episode since it originally aired. I just took the holonet news at face value and assumed Tua did some good things in addition to the bad.

[NecronLord]

It's actually worse than that; looking at it and comparing, that's the Tarkintown set. Tarkintown where there is neither running water, nor food nor floors inside those buildings.

[Thanas]

I don't really think this would work. The Imperials are the bad guys, the idiots and the criminals. Kinda hard to sympathize with them.

[MKSheppard]

Feh.

If you go to Mike's old Episode 3 reactions page it mentions a quote from the Ep3 novelization on Grevious:

The Separatist Supreme Commander is an abomination of nature, a fusion of flesh and droid- and his droid parts have more compassion than what remains of his alien flesh. This half-living creature is a slaughterer of billions. Whole planets have burned at his command. He is the evil genius of the Confederacy. The architect of their victories.

Planetary depopulation events were quite common in the Clone Wars; and this is why nobody on the Death Star went and challenged GM Tarkin when he ordered the big gun fired at Alderaan -- or why Vader let him do it.

Because what's sacrificing one planet in order to prevent Clone Wars II from arising with the Rebellion?

Also, the Empire is most definitely not a utopian dystopia -- mass events like planetary scale Force-Brainwashing to force compliance with the New Order don't exist, along with other advanced dystopian compliance systems; and the Empire is seriously under-militarized for it's scale.

[Rogue 9]

Another example of this done fairly well, I think, was the Imperial administrator Tua on Lothal in Rebels. Though authoritarian and an Imperial, I get the sense that she really believed in the Empire and didn't understand how bad it was, and was utterly out of her depth dealing with monsters like Tarkin and Vader. And unlike Finn (probably) and Lando, she didn't get a happy ending. When she realized how screwed she was, she tried to defect, and got murdered for it, with the Rebels framed for her death.

She knew she was screwed anyway, though. The writers made it painstakingly clear that she knew exactly what was about to happen to her. Watch these two scenes in sequence:





Pay special attention to Tarkin's final line in the first clip and Tua's conversation with Vader starting around 1:07 in the second. Oh yes, she knew precisely what was coming either way.

[Patroklos]

I don't get why people want to see the Empire portrayed positively, unless they're just fascism fans. The Empire is a regime founded by a dark wizard on treason, war crimes, deception, and fucking genocide, and maintained, in part, through torture, racism, slavery, and the use of strategic weaponry on civilian population centres. Trying to paint them in a positive light is like trying to paint Nazi Germany in a positive light.

This describes nearly all regimes in human history up until recently where it changes to most, just replace strategic weaponry with whatever the state of the art military weapon is at the time and swap wizard with God Emperor/divine right King/etc. We don't generally portray every person working in and under those regimes, those regimes, or even the leaders of the regimes as evil to the core.

It can be done. People just want a more believable and thus relate able worldwhich means something less unspeakably evil than even Nazis for the bad guys, and something less goodie-too-shoes than My Little Pony for the good guys. There is nothing wrong with that. And no that does not mean I am saying a good story can't be told and has not been told here in the binary model, only that lots of people want something more than that.

I mean, is it really that hard to believe that in a world of billions of planets the Empire is actually a pretty decent deal for several thousands of them? That the Empire actually maintains pockets of near utopias specifically to draw recruits and reward loyalists? Is that not exactly what the Assads, Kims, and Saddam's of the world do for the likes of their kin clans or Republican Guard equivalents? That may not be a perfectly moral position to take but its not serving evil for the sake of serving evil even if it is selfish and myopic. And along the same lines are we really supposed to believe that the Rebels, with likely millions of direct and indirect members and cells scattered everywhere and supposedly formed in reaction to generally unspecific but always described as heinous atrocities, never get the type of people that saw off POWs heads or bomb loyalist hospitals or schools? Is that what we learned from the insurgents of WWII, Vietnam, Iraq, etc? Everything is just a little to black or white glove for my taste. Mix it up a bit.

[NecronLord]

Feh.

If you go to Mike's old Episode 3 reactions page it mentions a quote from the Ep3 novelization on Grevious:

[...]

Planetary depopulation events were quite common in the Clone Wars; and this is why nobody on the Death Star went and challenged GM Tarkin when he ordered the big gun fired at Alderaan -- or why Vader let him do it.

Because what's sacrificing one planet in order to prevent Clone Wars II from arising with the Rebellion?

Also, the Empire is most definitely not a utopian dystopia -- mass events like planetary scale Force-Brainwashing to force compliance with the New Order don't exist, along with other advanced dystopian compliance systems; and the Empire is seriously under-militarized for it's scale.

Remind me again, who Grievous reported to in that movie?



The Clone Wars did not arise organically, they were the product of the archtraitor Palpatine, and we see clearly in Phantom Menace that he was goading the proto-Seperatists to commit war-crimes ("I will make it legal."). Any concerns about them are simply the misinformation of the Empire, while it is obvious that the Empire's in universe supporters should believe such things, the films have no incentive to present such claims as fact.

This describes nearly all regimes in human history up until recently where it changes to most, just replace strategic weaponry with whatever the state of the art military weapon is at the time and swap wizard with God Emperor/divine right King/etc. We don't generally portray every person working in and under those regimes, those regimes, or even the leaders of the regimes as evil to the core.

However, the Empire existed on the heels of a thousand generations of peace and justice, so that 'Game of Thrones' approach is wholly inapplicable for Imperial apologism. The empire was a state that was bad for its time and compared to the cultural mores of its people, led by an archtraitor who tore down institutions that protected sapient rights in order to obtain power for himself.

[NeoGoomba]

I'd like to see a movie like the support material that was for the Tie Fighter games.

Imperial pilot, recruited, and he spends tours going after pirates and the like, maybe even stepping in to stop a civil war that is killing thousands, etc.
Then, eventually, when he serves under the really high ups, he learns what the Empire is at it's core, and has to make a decision about serving loyally, resigning, or defecting.

Yeah TIE Fighter would be a pretty cool Netflix series, actually. Plenty of time to see the instances that the Empire acts for "good" (IE what is in its best interests happens to be for the good of everyone) from the pov of John Q. Starfighter. John Q. Starfighter also happens to become the best damn Imperial pilot this side of Vader, and gets involved in desperate, critical missions that the Empire needs to keep under wraps. Chasing down the Tantive IV, maybe. Aiding in tracking down Admiral Harkin as he defects with his battlegroup to some anarchists simply for financial gain, or the techno-traitor Zaarin. You can add in intra-Empire intrigue from the Secret Order. And assassination plots on old prune-face himself, for a great episode where he/she teams with Vader. Then the pilot helps to suppress a rebellion and the pilot happens to see something that doesn't jive with what the Empire is telling its populace.

It'd be pretty damn interesting.

[Galvatron]

They could always re-canonize Soontir Fel and make a movie about him. I think he's the epitome of what the OP probably has in mind.

[Patroklos]

The Clone Wars did not arise organically, they were the product of the archtraitor Palpatine, and we see clearly in Phantom Menace that he was goading the proto-Seperatists to commit war-crimes ("I will make it legal."). Any concerns about them are simply the misinformation of the Empire, while it is obvious that the Empire's in universe supporters should believe such things, the films have no incentive to present such claims as fact.

However, the Empire existed on the heels of a thousand generations of peace and justice, so that 'Game of Thrones' approach is wholly inapplicable for Imperial apologism. The empire was a state that was bad for its time and compared to the cultural mores of its people[/b], [/i]led by an archtraitor[/i] who tore down institutions that protected sapient rights in order to obtain power for himself.

1.) The "thousand generations of peace and justice" is obviously not literally true, as the time frame between phantom menace and the start of the Clone Wars is a good 20 odd years. On top of that the Trade Federation was up to its shenanigans and powerful enough to believe it could do so through its own strength at the start of that. We have no idea how long that state of affairs existed before that but presumably decades at least.

And here is where the BS have your cake and eat it too writing of the prequels fucks everything up. The Trade Federation has no idea who Palpantine is. We don't even know he is evil as the audience except for the fact that we have foreknowledge and the Trade Federation never receives any information in movie to make us thing they are intentionally doing evil. Selfish? Sure.Illegal? Yeah. Assholish? Sure. Thats not the same thing as evil, and depending on how gritty we assume this galaxy is, that we are dealing with a British Empire and the East India Company vice the United States and Walmart, things like gunboating one of a billion planets may not be as heinous as some ascribe to it. The opening crawl of TPM makes it clear the reaction to Naboo specifically is the culmination of events, the straw that broke the camel's back, not the single point of contention. How long has the Trade Federation been doing this shit? Decades? Centuries? Are they the only ones...

The real problem is that because we have no reason to think the Trade Federation is doing what it is for EVAL LOLS, we have to assume it has some legitimate goal its working for either for its organization or its race from their perspective. The things it is doing have to be somewhat accepted for it to do so in the open as an almost matter of normal buisness. Sure they have clandestine help from Palpantine, but since they don't know who he is they have no idea exactly what his help will be. Its not like they know how influential in the Senate he is or even that he is a senator. He is just some dude who has gotten some shit done that they think can give them the edge. Long story short, the Trade federation is who they are because they were allowed to be that way in the environment that actually exits as a demonstrable fact shown on screen, and this a bettor window into reality than some self serving throwaway humblebrag by a random Jedi.

2.) Which brings us to your second claim regarding "bad for the time." This is demonstrably false. The Separatists where not created by Palpantine, they were exploited and manipulated by him (along with everyone else). We could go with Palpantine actually creating the Separatist factions outright, but that obviously doesn't work unless we assume the rot and decay in the Republic dates to whenever Palpantine became an adult and also went to the dark side and also developed the skills to use the dark side. He is a known personality on Naboo so he is a Mk I human, presumably they would know it if he was some ancient dude. He is what, 50ish in TPM? So how many years of manipulation as a Sith Master does that give him prior to that? 20 years? And having to do it clandestinely to boot? Sorry, not possible.

The Separatist factions, and the friction Palpantine exploits, has to existed prior to his coming to the scene. And they were not evil either. Even just prior to the Clone wars Dooku is still maintaing the facade of righteous political rebellion to motivate them on Genosis. He wouldn't have to do that if Palpantine had created them as products of Evil Incorporated (TM). In a loose political union like the Republic with its scope and breath you can still claim those factions were morally repugnant relative to what would become the Republic Loyalist faction, but all of them are products of that original Republic enviroment. They had to make up 25-50% of the original Republic to the credible threat we see in AofC and RotS, so they ARE a significant part of the Republic citizenry before and after the war. Their morals, their methods, their asparations ARE the contemporary measures of such things.

Think of it this way. If the Separatists were in fact wholly creatures of Palpantine from foundation to steeple, and legitimately so evil be be completely at odds with contemporary Republic wide morals and beliefs in decency, and they make up and/or control a large portion of Republic citizenry, why is it a good thing to keep them in the Republic and avoid war? All that idealism of Padme and her pretty one liners about Democracy go up in smoke as nothing but appeasement to avoid war if its business as usual to just let evil live comfortably as long as its on the other side of the tracks in your own country. Ironically all the machinations to keep the Republic together by the artificially inserted and overtly "our contemporary world" moralists only show how acceptable the everyday activities of the soon to be rebellious Separatists were.

3.) As to being led by the "arch traitor," nobody knows that in universe, so its irrelevant to use to judge most of the people who follow Palpantine morally. We know for a fact the Separatist leaders didn't know. The clones didn't know, their actions were compelled. We are not shown a single non-clone military leader who was in the know. We are not even shown senators being in the know. The best we get is people sharing knowing smiles but that can easily be attributed to them just liking where Palpatine is going publicaly without knowing he is a traitor. You may consider that in itself a moral failing, but Palpantine being a traitor is irrelevant to judging the his followers. They don't know that.

As for tearing down institutions for his own benefit, you again are shoe horning in your own self serving perspective. Emperors and Monarchs have enjoyed both technocratic, aristocratic, buearocratic, and poplar support throughout history. Sometimes they have all of them at the same time. Athens and other Greek city stats swapped from oligarphy to democracy to monarchy and back again very often with most everyone's willing and enthusiastic support. What resistance do we actually see on screen to Palpantines moves? The Jedi are opposed to it, but they are not a sovereign member of the Republic and are numerically small and they were nutrealized as known traitors as far as the entire galaxy is concerned. We see a few butt hurt Senators fleeing the scene but at the same time see most of the Senate cheering. The fact that the Senators have to flee should tell you how popular their position is. Are their scenes of millions of sapients protesting in the streets? Any indication whatsoever that the rank and file of any constituency opposed the transition to the Empire? Nope.

4.) So lastly, and this is relevant to the OP, we have to think about how Palpantine came to power. Unlike Hitler, Lenin, Mao and many other of the most famous dictators and their movements people like to make analogous, Palpantine did not grow his movement overtly. Hitler was never shy about the core tenets of his ideology. From the very beginning his activities were replete with fyers and manifestos publicly distributed. He was an open member of specific political groups who broadcasted their objectives. He was very intentional in flagging himself and his beliefs with uniforms, pageantry, marches and speeches. They didn't have to interpret his actions as opposed to his words to determine motive for the most part. In short, anyone who was a supporter of his or collaborated, even if they did not believe or agree with everything he said, knew exactly what he was all about. Or at least could and should have known.

The Empire is not the same thing. As far as we know Palpantine never spoke openly or offically about what his true ideology and intentions. Even his declaration of the Empire at the end of RotS didn't mention Sith stuff or even that it was all about him, it was still couched in talk of unity and order and justice and peace. From that perspective even people who supported him then as the new Emperor, even if you you consider them morally repugnant for that alone, were just as much victims of his deceit and machinations as when he was doing the same thing as the champion of the Republic. Arguably he does the same thing when he suspends the Senate. He again couches that in language that makes it seem reasonable to the average spectator and is divorced from his true intentions. And yeah, sure, the analogue Hitler was not always totally honest about the specifics of some things but compared to Palpantine he was pathologically honest.

All this is to say treating the rank and file of the Empire as Nazis or even any of our overt ral world dictator's supporters is a bad comparison. The mary sued republic fantasy to the EVIL EMPIRE is a gradual transition not a coup. The Empire is just the Republic, and everyone serving it with the exception of Dooku and Palpantine and later Vader has no idea what it actually is during any of its incarnations. If you assume Palpantine pulled off what is portrayed as his greatest accomplishment, that he manipulated the Republic and most of its citizens to willingly transition from Republic to Empire and at the same time think it was mostly their own great idea, the people involved can't just be evil. If they are just evil anyway none of what Palpantine did matters. He could have just played it straight up.

[NecronLord]

1.) The "thousand generations of peace and justice" is obviously not literally true, as the time frame between phantom menace and the start of the Clone Wars is a good 20 odd years. On top of that the Trade Federation was up to its shenanigans and powerful enough to believe it could do so through its own strength at the start of that. We have no idea how long that state of affairs existed before that but presumably decades at least.

And here is where the BS have your cake and eat it too writing of the prequels fucks everything up. The Trade Federation has no idea who Palpantine is. We don't even know he is evil as the audience except for the fact that we have foreknowledge and the Trade Federation never receives any information in movie to make us thing they are intentionally doing evil. Selfish? Sure.Illegal? Yeah. Assholish? Sure. Thats not the same thing as evil, and depending on how gritty we assume this galaxy is, that we are dealing with a British Empire and the East India Company vice the United States and Walmart, things like gunboating one of a billion planets may not be as heinous as some ascribe to it. The opening crawl of TPM makes it clear the reaction to Naboo specifically is the culmination of events, the straw that broke the camel's back, not the single point of contention. How long has the Trade Federation been doing this shit? Decades? Centuries? Are they the only ones...

Are you saying that the East India Company wasn't evil? Heh. I'm not going to bother rebutting it, I'll just say that yes, you can dial down into a level of relativism that will make the Empire look good - that doesn't mean that it's a probable or good idea to present them as good in major pop-culture movies. Just like the East India Company, their only recent appearance in big-budget Disney live action films is as villains to make pirates look sympathetic.



Note how this is a triumphant scene where the protagonists mercilessly gun down the East India Company and its sailors. The East India Company are exactly the sort of people who make good cinematic villains.

As for the Trade Federation, in the films, they cringe at the idea of murder and have to be pushed along verbally by Palpatine.



"This scheme has failed, we dare not go against the Jedi!"

"Kill them immediately..."

"Yes..." then faltering, then "yes my lord."

There's no indications in the films (and given that Disney has done virtually no prequel EU material I imagine the nu-EU either) that they were murdering people before they met him.

The real problem is that because we have no reason to think the Trade Federation is doing what it is for EVAL LOLS, we have to assume it has some legitimate goal its working for either for its organization or its race from their perspective. The things it is doing have to be somewhat accepted for it to do so in the open as an almost matter of normal buisness. Sure they have clandestine help from Palpantine, but since they don't know who he is they have no idea exactly what his help will be. Its not like they know how influential in the Senate he is or even that he is a senator. He is just some dude who has gotten some shit done that they think can give them the edge. Long story short, the Trade federation is who they are because they were allowed to be that way in the environment that actually exits as a demonstrable fact shown on screen, and this a bettor window into reality than some self serving throwaway humblebrag by a random Jedi.

You are applying an in-universe standard of evidence, I'm not saying that. I'm saying the audience knows it. And if you think the average audience member doesn't think that the Jedi and Republic stood for justice, I want what you're smoking.

2.) Which brings us to your second claim regarding "bad for the time." This is demonstrably false. The Separatists where not created by Palpantine, they were exploited and manipulated by him (along with everyone else). We could go with Palpantine actually creating the Separatist factions outright, but that obviously doesn't work unless we assume the rot and decay in the Republic dates to whenever Palpantine became an adult and also went to the dark side and also developed the skills to use the dark side. He is a known personality on Naboo so he is a Mk I human, presumably they would know it if he was some ancient dude. He is what, 50ish in TPM? So how many years of manipulation as a Sith Master does that give him prior to that? 20 years? And having to do it clandestinely to boot? Sorry, not possible.

And yet, people are consistently shocked by the brutality of the Empire. Even children get it.



"I'm not that old, but I remember a time when things were better on Lothal, maybe not great, but... not like this."

Yeah, no.

3.) As to being led by the "arch traitor," nobody knows that in universe,

Except Bail Organa. What with his having been in conversations where people talked about how he was the other sith lord, and having helped with the attack. Or do you think Bail Organa went in to rescue Yoda from Palpatine because he expected an unarmed normie politician to beat the Grand Jedi Master in personal combat?

Bail Organa, a leader of the Alliance to Restore the Republic. Interesting that.

so its irrelevant to use to judge most of the people who follow Palpantine morally. We know for a fact the Separatist leaders didn't know. The clones didn't know, their actions were compelled. We are not shown a single non-clone military leader who was in the know. We are not even shown senators being in the know. The best we get is people sharing knowing smiles but that can easily be attributed to them just liking where Palpatine is going publicaly without knowing he is a traitor. You may consider that in itself a moral failing, but Palpantine being a traitor is irrelevant to judging the his followers. They don't know that.

Good point I was talking about audience perspective hey?

As for tearing down institutions for his own benefit, you again are shoe horning in your own self serving perspective. Emperors and Monarchs have enjoyed both technocratic, aristocratic, buearocratic, and poplar support throughout history. Sometimes they have all of them at the same time. Athens and other Greek city stats swapped from oligarphy to democracy to monarchy and back again very often with most everyone's willing and enthusiastic support. What resistance do we actually see on screen to Palpantines moves? The Jedi are opposed to it, but they are not a sovereign member of the Republic and are numerically small and they were nutrealized as known traitors as far as the entire galaxy is concerned. We see a few butt hurt Senators fleeing the scene but at the same time see most of the Senate cheering. The fact that the Senators have to flee should tell you how popular their position is. Are their scenes of millions of sapients protesting in the streets? Any indication whatsoever that the rank and file of any constituency opposed the transition to the Empire? Nope.

Have you watched Star Wars Rebels?

Because Star Wars rebels is hours of televised Star Wars in part focusing on the ground-level experience of living in the Empire.

4.) So lastly, and this is relevant to the OP, we have to think about how Palpantine came to power. Unlike Hitler, Lenin, Mao and many other of the most famous dictators and their movements people like to make analogous, Palpantine did not grow his movement overtly. Hitler was never shy about the core tenets of his ideology. From the very beginning his activities were replete with fyers and manifestos publicly distributed. He was an open member of specific political groups who broadcasted their objectives. He was very intentional in flagging himself and his beliefs with uniforms, pageantry, marches and speeches. They didn't have to interpret his actions as opposed to his words to determine motive for the most part. In short, anyone who was a supporter of his or collaborated, even if they did not believe or agree with everything he said, knew exactly what he was all about. Or at least could and should have known.

The Empire is not the same thing. As far as we know Palpantine never spoke openly or offically about what his true ideology and intentions. Even his declaration of the Empire at the end of RotS didn't mention Sith stuff or even that it was all about him, it was still couched in talk of unity and order and justice and peace. From that perspective even people who supported him then as the new Emperor, even if you you consider them morally repugnant for that alone, were just as much victims of his deceit and machinations as when he was doing the same thing as the champion of the Republic. Arguably he does the same thing when he suspends the Senate. He again couches that in language that makes it seem reasonable to the average spectator and is divorced from his true intentions. And yeah, sure, the analogue Hitler was not always totally honest about the specifics of some things but compared to Palpantine he was pathologically honest.

All this is to say treating the rank and file of the Empire as Nazis or even any of our overt ral world dictator's supporters is a bad comparison. The mary sued republic fantasy to the EVIL EMPIRE is a gradual transition not a coup. The Empire is just the Republic, and everyone serving it with the exception of Dooku and Palpantine and later Vader has no idea what it actually is during any of its incarnations. If you assume Palpantine pulled off what is portrayed as his greatest accomplishment, that he manipulated the Republic and most of its citizens to willingly transition from Republic to Empire and at the same time think it was mostly their own great idea, the people involved can't just be evil. If they are just evil anyway none of what Palpantine did matters. He could have just played it straight up.

You are clearly setting a standard of evil that requires the footsoldiers of evil to conciously swear their loyalty to the Dark Lord. You can certainly see a perspective even for the orcs from The Hobbit as not seeing themselves as evil. That doesn't mean it's marketable to make a film about Lord-of-the-Rings orcs in their setting.

Likewise, it's simply not a viable proposition as a major motion picture, it's inconsistency with the direction Disney has taken, which is to emphasize the evil of the Empire even in very petty ways - threatening fruit-sellers in the street and stealing peoples' farms - and requires the audience to forget what it already knows about the evil of the Empire and its child-murdering leaders.

Try and unfuck your head. I'm not saying the evidence suggests that the in-universe Empire is evil all the way down - I've even said I'd include Jerjerrod's deleted scenes in my cut of Return of the Jedi, which generally show him to be a humane person - nor anything so stupid. Do I think it's marketable as a major motion picture? No, not really. Do I think it has special merit as an artistic proposition? No. Could it be done - yes, concievably. But I don't think it should be the focus of their effort in any way.

Things like TIE fighter have been done and are good (in point of fact I was replaying TIE fighter literally yesterday after the steam bundle) but they're worthwhile in media like comics where you have endless resources, or games, where you want an excuse to fly the cool military gear of the bad guys. They're not working propositions as motion-pictures.

The topic is 'will we get an Imperial POV movie' - there's no indication of that, and as I've posted, there's every indication that Disney is doubling down on the evil of the Empire - they started their last movie with the Empire-successor randomly massacring people for literally no reason, and Rebels and the nu-EU show a whole wave of petty evil. If you want my answer of 'did any otherwise-moral people support the Empire' go post a new thread with that question.

[Khaat]

They could twist Tag & Bink Are Dead, and make them Imperials trying to desert instead?