Emperor Reborn: A History of the Biggest ‘Star Wars’ Villain

From The Emperor Reborn: A Not-So-Brief History of the Biggest ‘Star Wars’ Villain and why he matters.

EPISODE IX
THE RISE OF SKYWALKER 

The dead speak! 

The galaxy has heard a mysterious broadcast, 

a threat of REVENGE in the sinister voice 

of the late EMPEROR PALPATINE. 

GENERAL LEIA ORGANA dispatches secret 

agents to gather intelligence, while REY, 

the last hope of the Jedi, 

trains for battle against the 

diabolical FIRST ORDER. 

Meanwhile, Supreme Leader KYLO REN rages 

in search of the phantom Emperor, 

determined to destroy 

any threat to his power….

In Star Wars, later subtitled Episode IV – A New Hope, the Emperor is briefly mentioned by Peter Cushing’s Grand Moff Tarkin, who tells his fellow Imperials that the Emperor has just dissolved the Imperial Senate, sweeping away the last remnants of the Old Republic forever.

Lucas continues to define the Emperor’s role. 
“The introduction of the Emperor is a major plot development. He may be the one who is saved for the end. When you get rid of the Emperor, the whole thing is over. The final episode is the restoration of the Republic.”

Lucas had produced a handwritten treatment that’s similar to Empire’s final script, minus one major revelation.
In Brackett’s first draft, based on the treatment, Luke’s father appears as a ghost to instruct his son.
Unfortunately, Brackett died of cancer before a second draft could be written, leaving Lucas to pen the next draft alone.
In this draft, he introduced a new plot twist: Vader as Luke’s father.

The Emperor appears to inform his apprentice that they have a new enemy: Luke Skywalker.

“The Force is strong with him. The son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi.” 

A subservient Vader persuades his master that the young Jedi would be a great asset if he could be turned to the dark side of the Force.

Palpatine becomes the ultimate personification of evil in Star Wars, replacing Vader as the central villain. As Kasdan notes in Star Wars: The Annotated Screenplays, “My sense of the relationship between Vader and the Emperor is that the Emperor is much more powerful… and that Vader is very much intimidated by him. Vader has dignity, but the Emperor in Jedi really has all the power.”

Makeup designer Phil Tippett talks about the Emperor’s look.
“The arch-villain was intended to be a Methuselah figure kept alive and intact by some unknown magic.”
Early art of the Emperor featured an age-wrinkled face with a large split cranium that was beginning to grow apart. This unused concept seems to have inspired the design for the Sequel Trilogy’s Supreme Leader Snoke.

The Emperor tells Luke to destroy Vader and take his place, but Luke refuses and declares himself a Jedi. Enraged, the Emperor tortures Luke with Force Lightning. Unable to bear the sight of his son in pain, Vader throws the Emperor into the Death Star’s reactor, killing him… or so we thought.

In an early draft of the script, Luke picks up Vader’s helmet and puts it on.
The Emperor leads his new apprentice to the controls of the Death Star superlaser to destroy the rebel fleet. Instead, Luke aims it at Had Abbadon — the Imperial capital, later identified as Coruscant — and destroys it.

The Trilogy That Wasn’t: The Sequels That Never Materialized
In these rough outlines, the Emperor doesn’t make an appearance until Episode IX.
There is no Death Star II. Luke and Leia aren’t siblings.
In this incarnation of Return of the Jedi, Han Solo dies during a raid on an Imperial Base.
Leia grapples with her duties as the newly elected Queen of her people, and Luke goes off into exile “like Clint Eastwood in the spaghetti westerns.”

Episode VII would focus on Luke’s life as a Jedi, while Episode VIII would see him reuniting with his twin sister, Nellith Skywalker, who is mentioned in Leigh Brackett’s draft of The Empire Strikes Back.
In Episode IX, Luke and Nellith would team up to battle the Emperor.