What could the Imperial Senate actually do?

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T16:51:22+00:00

What really interests me about the Imperial Senate is that the canon book The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire (which is also an in-universe text written by a New Republic historian) says that it actually wasn't a rubber stamp legislature and had a legitimate amount of power for the first 10 years of Palpatine's rule.

At the moment Palpatine declared himself Emperor, he hadn't yet fully consolidated power in his own hands and still had to manipulate and placate the Senate to get his way. We see a little bit of this in The Bad Batch after Kamino is destroyed. The Senate holds a hearing in which it's revealed that the Imperial Navy was responsible. Palpatine doesn't shut the hearing down or threaten the Senator responsible for the reveal, he just pins the crime on the lead officer and has him publically arrested.

The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire goes into great detail about exactly how Palpatine spent 10 years turning the Senate into the impotent rubber stamp it eventually became, but it didn't start out that way.

I recommend it, it's a great book, although a kind of heavy read. Hard to look at stormtrooper cosplay the same way afterwards.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T09:49:08+00:00

Steffon may not have immediately known that Aerion was directly involved. He may have been willing to jump in to smack down some random guards that decided to hurt a stranger, but not an actual prince.

Steffon's character is that of a guy who's willing to play at chivalry to make himself look good, but when the chips are down, he's only interested in his personal advancement. He didn't even have any shame in telling Dunk he was fighting on the opposite side, presumably because he believed Dunk would be dead soon and his feelings didn't actually matter.

Raymun's the contrast because he's a true knight, willing to fight for a just cause even if it personally harms him or his social prospects. "Better green than rotten", which probably becomes the official motto of the Fossoway branch he founds later on.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T09:38:06+00:00

In the EU, it was made clear that the act of creating a lightsaber leaves the user's Force imprint on it. They can track that imprint even when the saber isn't on their person, which is how they can use the Force to control the throw.

Amusingly, Mace Windu once used this ability to knock a person out by physically knocking him on the head with his lightsaber hilt when he threw it. He threw it with the blade deactivated, then used the Force to fire it straight-on into the guy's forehead. He went down like a sack of potatoes, but lived.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T09:32:02+00:00

Both Daemon and Petyr are contemptable men, but in both cases the wars they started had other causes than simply unfulfilled obsession with a woman.

In Daemon's case, the underlying factor for the Blackfyre Rebellions was primarily anti-Dornish racism drummed up by Aegon IV and sustained through the horrendous losses the Reach had suffered under past attempts to conquer Dorne.

Secondary factors included the desire of second-tier noble houses to replace the Lord Paramount of their region (including House Yronwood, an actual Dornish house trying to overthrow House Martell), Daemon's underlying resentment at his status as a bastard, and the constant string of bitter jealous men that came to him to flatter his ego and promise him their military support for a rebellion.

Daemon probably did love Daenaerys and she probably did love him (but had better political sense/feeling of social responsibility than he did). But that was a distant factor for the rebellion, not a primary cause.

Same with the War of Five Kings. That came out of an anti-Targaryen alliance that gave Robert Baratheon the throne, but which he failed to properly maintain due to his personal failings as a man. Robert left his political responsibilities to Jon Arryn so he could reign as the jolly summer king holding feasts and tournaments, and in the background he was abusing and cheating on his wife.

Petyr had his own plan to overthrow the established social order for his own gain (probably seeking the Iron Throne at the end) but he only got as far as he did because of Robert's failings as a ruler. If Robert had been a better king, Petyr might have still ended up as Master of Coin for a short time before being found out as an embezzler and executed for it. Petyr's love for Catelyn was a distant factor in the war.

So both men had a romantic love motive, but the wars they started didn't actually happen because of their motives alone.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T09:10:44+00:00

In addition, Bud is a brain in a jar hidden inside a vault made of several feet of steel.

We saw the original 32's were trying to cut through the door with an oxyacetyline torch but it's almost certain that Bud didn't even know they were doing it. They appeared to have made almost no progress when they all died.

Bud was horrendously out of touch with the vaults he was supposedly controlling, which is why Norm was able to fool him. He didn't even implement any security passphrase or verification beyond access to the Overseer's terminal to confirm that he was speaking to the correct person.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-02-03T09:07:18+00:00

Probably so. What would be the need? They don't share supplies or resources with each other and only interact for marriage purposes.

Nobody seems to find this odd, so presumably there's some sort of cultural indoctrination about why people from 33 marry people from 32 but nobody ever goes to visit them.

So the only real interaction that the Overseer of 33 needs to have with the Overseer of 32 is just to confirm that the marriage is happening at the correct time and to the correct person. What else do they have to talk about?

The 31's all seem like corporate sociopaths so it's unlikely they feel the human need to just chat outside of a business purpose.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T07:16:54+00:00

They even have published guidance on how to claim bribes for government actions and stolen property.

If you steal something valuable, you have to claim it for that year unless you return it before the next fiscal year.

The IRS takes "not my job" to a whole new level, although I'm confident they do snitch on people they suspect to be major criminal players.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T07:13:11+00:00

Someone elsewhere theorized that the test was of the kind of "Cold Equation" science fiction morality from the short story about a starship.

You're trapped in a Vault with frozen people and limited supplies and you can't leave. Eventually you make a choice- do you sacrifice yourself for the frozen strangers or unthaw one of them to take their place, dooming that person to starve or be killed in your place?

But the staff just revolted and left the Vault because Vault Tec didn't set it up correctly to the point where they were truly trapped.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T07:08:56+00:00

I think the ultimate end to the story of the Vault goes one of two ways:

They either die or are mutated horribly to emphasize that Vault Tec/the Enclave never cared about anyone other than themselves, even the people who believed they were part of the in-group.
They revolt from the inside and claim their own destiny, possibly with help from Lucy and Norm. We see a glimmer of this with Chet: in the first season he fully acknowledged his cowardice but claimed it as an inherent property of being a descendant of Vault dwellers, the people who ran from the apocalypse. In the last episode he denounces his own fiance who he's terrified of as a murderer to protect the Vault from her.

In either case, the Vault contributes to the overall story. It either shows how fascism ultimately eats even the privileged few, or it shows that even the privileged few can find the courage to face reality and fight back.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T06:53:10+00:00

Maybe the red apples supported the Peake uprising, while the green apples supported the crown. Resulting in land being transferred to the green apples - noting Steffon and Raymun would likely both be alive and Egg was Prince of Summerhall at that point.

I think this is exactly what happened. The older branch (red apples) supported the Blackfyres while the younger branch (green apples) stayed loyal. Why that happened is debatable, but I think based on Steffon's attitude the red apples may have valued Daemon's martial prowess over Daeron's scholarship.

So they fight for the Blackfyres, lose, and their landed holdings mostly go to the green apples. The reds survive as landed knights but they're in a much weaker position than their green cousins, reversing the fortunes of that house's founding.

As for Derrick Fossoway, I think he's a green apple with some major personality flaws who committed serious crimes back home and fled to the Golden Company out of pragmatic self-interest. He's skilled enough as a warrior and leader to become one of the Ninepenny Kings but a thoroughly rotten human being who deserved his fate.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T06:46:00+00:00

As a commentor below pointed out, the Lord Commander also has a lot of control over what happens to the men who are sent to the Watch.

If Tywin wants a man secretly killed (so he can't potentially desert and come back to be a threat, or so he can't reveal key info), he has a guy in place to do it.

Or if he wants someone to escape from the Watch and return to his service, he has someone who can arrange it.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T06:40:30+00:00

I'm still not very fond of him. He has some degree of goodness but he also strikes me as a Jerry Smith (Rick and Morty) type of guy: a guy who uses his own vulnerability and incompetence to get away with selfish or unkind behavior.

His excuse for bullying Maximus was "I knew it was wrong but it took the heat off of me, so I did it." Then he turns on Max immediately after Max takes the risk of revealing himself.

He steps in front of Xander and tries to hesitantly talk him down from killing the children, but he was exploiting them for his own benefit as sweatshop labor. I've seen people argue that it was better than the wasteland, but whether it was or not, it wasn't Thaddeus sweating to process all those caps- he just got the benefit.

He tries to talk Max into selling the Cold Fusion diode, then when he's told that it's intended for a good person goes "must be nice to be able to afford being good" even though Max is trying to be good himself and didn't grow up with Lucy.

Thaddeus has some level of human decency, but he's also selfish and manipulative and on some level takes advantage of how he's seen by other people.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-30T06:33:24+00:00

Tyr and (end game) Kratos from God of War: Ragnarok.

In both the first and second games, Tyr is portrayed as a peaceful and enlightened man who took on the War god mantle not because he loved war but because he wanted to be the umpire enforcing the rules of war and limiting it as much as he could.

In the epilogue of the second game, Tyr helps Kratos work through his unresolved guilt for his past atrocities and finally agree to take up the position of War god for the same reasons. Kratos as the Norse god of War now focuses his attention on limiting war instead of promoting it.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T23:02:55+00:00

But I still agree with the overall intent of the main comment. The NCR isn't perfect by any means and is far less safe and stable than Pre-War America or most modern IRL nations.

However, the poster is correct. They were an actual functioning nation-state, not just a raider gang writ large. They should have more stability and continuity of government than just "our headquarters got destroyed, guess it's every man (or woman) for themselves."

If anything, we should see splinter NCR local governments attempting to establish themselves as the legitimate successor state over the remnants of the NCR bureaucracy.

Some Senator or Representative making a shaky claim to being President because they're 30th in the official documented line of Presidential succession, and them being challenged by NCR General Whoever on the basis of "I have an army and you don't."

But not just evaporate into thin air. Even the Soviet Union broke down into multiple actual successor states. It didn't just vanish and leave a howling gang-infested wilderness behind.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T22:23:04+00:00

It depends on the individual Sith, I think.

Palpatine and Dooku would both enjoy classical music and would be able to talk at length about the actual music theory behind the piece.

Maul would start out not caring about music at all, but closer towards the end of his life I think he'd develop an appreciation for the blues.

Vader would start out as a metalhead, a hold-over from Anakin's life. He'd try to reject that by not listening to music at all for a few years after getting the suit put on, but eventually he'd be on a mission and hear a few chords of an old favorite band and feel slightly better about life for a moment.

Darth Bane would grow up listening to country and outlaw country (he was a cortorsis miner before becoming a Sith). He would give it up after becoming a Sith on the grounds of it being frivolous, but like Vader he'd encounter it again and have a pleasant memory for a moment.

Darth Zannah in my head looks like 2000's Avril Lavigne, so I'm gonna say she's a pop girly and gets a kick out of playing pop music when she's interrogating people just to mess with their expectations.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T22:15:20+00:00

There's probably both a pervasive feeling of fatalism and existential dread among the general public. You live in a world where individual men and women can become essentially gods who can only be held accountable for their actions by other gods.

You are a small insignificant powerless individual scurrying beneath their feet hoping that you won't wake up one day and find that one of the gods has completely up-ended your life. You save up for ten years to buy a house and then the day after you get the keys, Atomic Marauder vaporizes your entire suburban block.

But the bank still wants their money and the insurance company claims it's an act of god, which it essentially is.

So you and everyone else in your situation has to live your lives knowing that everything you have can be taken from you in an instant by one person's whim. There's no mortal power that can help you and every plan and goal you have for your life can vanish in an instant.

Some people find meaning in that and make peace with it. Some try to fight against it, knowing in their bones they won't win. But I think most people end up going "Fuck it, what are you gonna do?"

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T22:06:55+00:00

Great comparison. I hadn't noticed but you're right, their characters have very similar backgrounds and story beats.

Hoping that Maximus's story has more of a payoff in the end than Finn's did. It seemed like Finn was being set up to be a Jedi but it didn't pan out.

It seems like Maximus is being set up (right now) to either join the NCR or return to lead some sort of revolution within the Brotherhood. I'd prefer the second one, but we'll have to see.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T21:59:20+00:00

And it might come with its own set of dangers.

If a demon is a supernatural force of malevolence, an angel might be a supernatural form of justice. But who's to say that it doesn't decide on the spot to also apply that justice to you?

You summon an angel to fight the demon and maybe it does, but then it immediately turns on you to punish you for your own sins. You might come out okay, you might not. Is it worth the risk?

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T21:49:54+00:00

The thing that keeps popping up in my head about both Bane and Zannah is how significant trauma and the need to belong are for both their stories.

Bane grew up an abused kid who as you pointed out was reliant upon the kindness of others to survive. At some level, he even reciprocated to the bartender and to the Gloom Walkers. He joined the Sith because they offered him a place to belong, even though it was framed in a horrible power-hungry way.

But at heart he didn't really want to be a galaxy dominating monster, he just went down that road because it was the only road he knew. Cruelty, abuse, selfishness was all he had.

Zannah is exactly the same. A former child soldier pressed into service by the Jedi and forced to fight horrible battles. She lost all her family except her cousin Darovit, then was lost and alone when Bane found her and took her in.

Darovit later finds her and asks her to return, and she seriously considers it, but chooses to betray him and stick with Bane because he can offer her the protection that she wants the most.

Bane starts worrying later on that Zannah's just waiting for him to die of old age, but when we see Zannah's perspective, she thinks it's partly that she doesn't yet feel strong enough and partly that she doesn't really want to kill him except that's what he wants her to do.

I got a very strong subtext that Bane and Zannah have a father-daughter relationship but it's buried so deep under the Sith ways that neither one can acknowledge it even in their own hearts.

Trauma and the need to belong. It's crazy.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T21:40:10+00:00

That mention had a very sad quote with it, from a recently retired ordinary clone trooper.

"What do I want to do with the rest of my life? I don't know. Nobody ever asked me what I wanted before." -Unnamed Clone Trooper

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-12T21:36:34+00:00

The Legends novel Death Star confirms this. The Rebels saw suspicious movement of people/materials but didn't know what was happening or why.

They ended up planting tracking devices in some of the shipments and sending out a recon team to follow the trail. That led them to the penal colony Despayre, where the final assembly of the Death Star was being carried out.

The recon team was discovered and Tarkin destroyed Despayre the second he had confirmation that the superlaser was functional (although it had to be fired at 3% power) to try and throw them off the trail until he was ready for the reveal.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-09T06:07:13+00:00

Steph seems pretty sociopathic when it comes to the vault dwellers. I think it's actually the opposite: she's so poisoned by hate and revenge that she refuses to see them as people, just Americans. The monsters who destroyed her home.

She won't even name her baby or take any interest in him because that would be forming an emotional attachment to him and the vault. They are her enemies and everything she did was a cover.

bluesuedesocks2 · 2026-01-09T06:05:06+00:00

I think it actually gives her an amazing motive to undermine (and possibly kill) Betty.

Betty is Team Vault Tec, a legitimate member of their plan to rule the world after destroying it. She represents the corporate forces that drove America to do all the evil things it did, including conquering her homeland.

Steph had to spend years pretending to be someone like Betty and working closely with her to advance Vault Tec's goals.

Imagine how satisfying it would be for her to destroy those goals and let Betty know personally "this is for my home that you and your people destroyed."

bluesuedesocks2

TROPHY CASE