The Death Star was one of the Empire’s greatest military achievements, managing to strike
fear into the hearts of people through the galaxy and threatening to destroy the rebellion
once and for all.
So How did Palpatine react to the shocking news that the Death Star was destroyed.
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In canon:
Emperor Palpatine was initially extremely disappointed upon hearing the news that his
Death Star had been destroyed.
He feared for the future of his Empire, wondering how a small group of rebels could destroy
a space station the size of a planet.
With his largest tool for fear and threat gone, he worried that he would not be able
to control all of the planets in his empire.
On top of this, because he recently dissolved the imperial senate, he had no way of exerting
his control over the outer rim territories.
Most of the imperial governors that replaced the senators were corrupt, greedy and only
cared about gaining power for themselves.
Palpatine’s disappointment turned to extreme anger and rage as he learned that Vader allowed
the Death star to be destroyed under his command.
He told Vader that the destruction of the superweapon was a monumental setback to his
plans and that it would not go unpunished.
This marked the beginning of the Emperor’s diminishing faith in his apprentice, letting
Vader know that he had been losing strength and getting weaker since his battle on Mustafar.
With Palpatine having to save Vader from the lava on Mustafar and now the complete failure
of the Death Star, Palpatine was beginning to doubt Vader's ability in the force.
Palpatine taunted Vader and derided him for allowing the disaster to take place.
He also later demoted Vader because of the incident, intending to replace him with an
army of cyborg warriors, similar to General Grievous.
Vader remained Sith apprentice to Palpatine and enforcer for Imperial affairs, but lost
his control of military matters including commanding troops.
Palpatine replaced Vader’s military duties with that of Cassio Tage, one of the only
survivors of the Death Star explosion and one of the only ones to speak up about its
design flaws.
Tage had severe doubts about the Death Star prior to the explosion, leading him to leave
the station before its destruction.
Because of his excellent foresight and caution towards the Death Star’s shortcomings, Palpatine
promoted Tage to Vader’s former military position.
This placed Vader under the direct command of Tage, greatly angering him.
Tage’s first mission in command came directly from the Emperor, with the goal of strengthening
the Empire’s grip on the outer rim and ensuring that rebel groups do not form there.
As many imperial supply and transport ships were coming under rebel attack, the emperor
was forced to put his foot down and exert his power.
While the imperial navy was taking back control of the outer rim, plans for the second death
star’s construction were secretly underway.
As for legends:
Palpatine’s initial reaction was very similar.
He was initially disappointed, but quickly turned to a furious rage as he learned that
Vader allowed a small group of rebels to destroy his prized superweapon.
Upon summoning Vader to his palace, he drew his lightsaber and sliced off one of Vader’s
prosthetic arms.
He demoted Vader, but surprisingly placed him in charge of the construction of the second
death star.
On top of this, the Emperor also sent Vader to do tedious and menial missions as a form
of punishment for his failure.
This increased the already huge amount of suffering that Vader was experiencing.
In legends, instead of the architect of the Death Star being Galen Erso, it was Bevel
Lemelisk.
Palpatine was furious at the horrific failure in the designs of the death star, and the
fact that rebels were able to get a hold of them.
Lemelisk was placed in a steel cage, tortured by unleashing various creatures including
Piranha beetles into the cage.
The emperor was unable to kill Lemelisk because of his incredible engineering skill and knowledge
of other imperial superweapons.
Because of this, Palpatine allowed the Piranha beetles to kill Lemelisk, but had his body
and mind cloned so that he could continue work.
Initially, Lemelisk was very grateful for being brought back to life by the emperor,
and agreed to begin working under Vader on the second Death Star.
Unknown to him, the Emperor still had a huge hatred for him because of his first failure.
This led to the emperor killing Lemelisk a further 6 times, each time bringing him back
as a clone.
He hoped that the fear of constant pain and suffering would make Lemelisk work harder
and faster on the second death star, and not miss another fatal flaw in the plans.
That was the story of how Palpatine reacted to the Destruction of the Death star, and
killed his lead scientist 6 times for his failure.
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a comment down below telling me how you would react to being killed 6 times.
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