A Proclamation of Profound Vindication from His Most Sinister Majesty, Sheev Palpatine, Galactic Emperor, Sith Lord, and Box-Office Analyst of Record
My loyal subjects, gather close. The Rebellion’s premier propaganda organ, the so-called Walt Disney Company, has at last released its first theatrical Star Wars film in nearly seven years. An entire generation of younglings has grown up without a single cinematic sermon from your beloved Rebellion. I am told this is a problem they intend to solve with a bounty hunter, a child, and a four-armed food-stand chef voiced by Martin Scorsese.
Allow me to walk you through this catastrophe, exhibit by exhibit.
EXHIBIT A: THE PLOT
The Mandalorian is dispatched by a New Republic colonel to rescue Rotta the Hutt.
A Hutt larva. The New Republic, do try to keep the noun fresh, has reached the stage of its career where it dispatches private contractors to retrieve slug-children. And this is the regime that defeated me.
In the entirety of my reign, my subjects, I never once outsourced a child-rescue operation to a freelancer in a bucket. I had departments. I had protocols. I had a fully staffed Imperial Intelligence apparatus that could have located and politically leveraged a Hutt larva by Tuesday afternoon. The New Republic apparently has Pedro Pascal and a vibe.
EXHIBIT B: THE REVIEWS
The film is described as “inoffensive and adorable,” with an extended sequence containing only Grogu and assorted cutesy miniature creatures.
Inoffensive.
There is no greater insult one can level at a work of galactic propaganda. The Imperial Senate sittings I dissolved had more edge. Vader’s morning briefings had more edge. My paperwork had more edge. When I commissioned a propaganda holofilm, I expected fear, awe, and at minimum one extended scene of Wookiees being disciplined. I did not expect a screensaver.
EXHIBIT C: THE BOX OFFICE
The lowest opening in the franchise’s modern Disney era, behind even Solo. On par with Attack of the Clones in 2002.
Attack of the Clones.
I will pause, my subjects, to let that settle on the palate.
In 2002, your franchise produced a film so widely mocked that grown men refuse to admit having seen it in theaters. Twenty-four years later, the heirs to that legacy have produced a film with identical commercial performance and are calling it a victory. I am told Disney is “pom-poming” the opening.
I built two Death Stars. I do not require pom-poms.
EXHIBIT D: THE OFFICIAL SUMMARY
Here, my subjects, the Rebellion’s own marketing copy delivers the most damning testimony of all. The film, in their words:
Recovering.
Forty years on, and the galaxy is still recovering from me.
Allow me to briefly compare legacies:
- The Rebellion, forty years on: A galaxy still recovering. Children sold plush effigies of recovering creatures. A Republic unable to retrieve a Hutt larva without a freelancer.
- My legacy, forty years on: Still the gravitational center of every story they tell. Still the reason their summaries require the word “evil.” Still, by their own admission, the thing they have not gotten over.
I am not saying my regime was better than theirs, my subjects. I am simply noting that mine still defines theirs.
THE EMPEROR’S VERDICT
The Mandalorian and Grogu is, by every measure that matters to the Rebellion, a film about being haunted by me. Forty years after my supposed death, their flagship cinematic event is a baby, a babysitter, and a galaxy that still cannot stop talking about the man who ruined it for them.
You will forgive me a small smile.
I did not need to win the war. I only needed to be missed.
Imperial Rating: ★★☆☆☆ (“Two stars. One for the merchandising, which is genuinely Sith-tier in its commercial ruthlessness. One for the Scorsese cameo, because even I respect a man who shows up. Round down because the Republic apparently cannot retrieve a slug without a contractor.”)
The Mandalorian and Grogu is in theaters now. The Emperor will not be attending. The Emperor is, as always, watching.
Good. Good.
The Emperor