A short time after the liberation of Mandalore by the Mandalorian Resistance, and the reunification
of the Mandalorian Clans under Bo-Katan Kryze, as the new holder of the Darksaber, the Empire
returned to the planet with a harsh vengeance, shattering the homeworld of the Mandalorian
people and killing many of them. But how exactly did the Moff Gideon and the Empire decimate
Mandalore and slaughter so many of its people? So, I’m going to break down a few big theories
on how exactly the Empire may have pulled off such a devastating attack, with some very
familiar weapons and strategies.
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We know from the Mandalorian Season 1 that Mandalore was absolutely ravaged by the full
power of Imperial forces during the Great Mandalorian Purge, with Paz Vizsla, one of
the Members of Mando’s cult, The Children of the Watch, even saying that “Our world
was shattered by the Empire, with whom this coward shares tables.
The word shattered could be referring to two main things. Paz Vizsla could be talking about
the planet itself, being horrifically damaged and shattered to pieces, just like it’s
neighbour, Concord Dawn is, as well as many other worlds like Lola Sayu, where the citadel
was located. The other possibility however, is that Paz Vizsla is simply referring to
the brave and strong warriors of Mandalore being shattered by the pure strength and manpower
of the Empire's forces. So, I’ll go through both possibilities.
If Paz Vizsla is referring to the people of Mandalore being shattered and slaughtered,
it’s pretty likely that he is saying that the Empire was able to use ARC Pulse Generator
superweapon, also known as the Duchess, to melt almost every single Mandalorian warrior
in their traditional Beskar armor, eradicating most of the population.
For those of you who don’t know, the ARC Pulse generator was a a devastating superweapon
designed by the Rebel Sabine Wren, during her early days at the Imperial Academy in
mandalore. When activated, it’s user could target specific metals and other materials
to create massive electric ARC pulses, instantly heating the material to the point where it
would melt. The weapon was intended to be set to attack only Beskar metal, and when
used against the traditional battle armor of the Mandalorian people, and would incinerate
the person inside of the armor in only seconds. But of course, it was also later turned on
the empire and set to target the armor of stormtroopers.
Now because Bo-Katan did say to Din Djarin in the Mandalorian Chapter 11 that she fought
in the Great Purge, that suggests that a massive battle took place on the surface of Mandalore,
meaning the Mandalorians were not completely caught off guard by the attack. It also means
that if the ARC Pulse generator was used, it was not used at the start of the attack
on Mandalore, and potentially only as a last resort near the conclusion of the battle.
The weapon was of course destroyed in the final moments of the Mandalorian civil war,
with a forceful strike from the Darksaber, breaching the core of the weapon, and causing
it to explode into a huge fireball, taking Tiber Saxon’s Star Destroyer down with it.
Because of this, it’s very possible that Bo-Katan, as the leader of Mandalore at the
time and the holder of the darksaber, was firmly winning the battle with her warriors,
successfully pushing the Imperial invaders back, until the Empire pulled out the ARC
Pulse generator which she of course would not be expecting, because she believed it
was successfully destroyed during the last Mandalorian Civil war.
Now you might be thinking that if the arc pulse generator was destroyed, how can it
have been used in the battle. Well, this is the empire we’re talking about, Sabine obviously
had an incredible amount of supervision and guidance when creating the arc pulse generator,
meaning there were certainly other copies of the plans and designs. They were able to
reconstruct a second death star superweapon, so they would have absolutely no problem recreating
a superweapon which was on a much smaller scale. For there not to be a backup of the
superweapon plans, or even more copies of the actual weapon itself would be incredibly
unlikely, and pretty close to impossible, especially with the amount of influence Palpatine
directly had over Tiber Saxon.
It’s also very possible that one of the Project Codenames from the imperial data Vault
on Scarif contained the plans to this superweapon also, because we know it definitely had the
plans for the Empire’s other superweapon, the Death Star, which was codenamed Project
Stardust.
Interestingly, there was another project codename inside of the Scariff vault, called Project
Blacksaber, which would almost certainly contain all of the Empire’s knowledge of the ancient,
black weapon.
With the other code names being:
Project Stellar Sphere Project Mark Omega
Project Pax Aurora Project War Mantle and
Project Cluster prism,
One of those could project code names could definitely relate to the duchess, or even
the Empire’s plans for the great purge. My bet is probably on Project War Mantle,
because that sounds like a project targeting a planet, and stripping it bare of all of
its resources. But let me know which one you think might relate to it down below.
This also leads us into the next theory, of how exactly Bo-Katan lost the Darksaber. Based
on what Bo-Katan asked the imperial Captain on board the stolen Gozanti Freighter in Chapter
11, it’s pretty clear that she didn’t lose the Darksaber in a fair, traditional
Mandalorian battle, but instead in a very sneaky, or dodgy way. Because of this, I think
it’s very possible that the hilt of the Darksaber itself was vulnerable to the ARC
pulse generator super weapon, forcing Bo-Katan to drop the ancient weapon and flee the battlefield.
If you think about it, the unique, sword-like hilt of the darksaber is almost certainly
made out of Beskar metal. As it was created by the first and only ever Mandalorian to
be inducted into the Jedi Order, what better metal would there be than Beskar to honor
his rich culture, while creating his Jedi blade.
But let me know what you think about Bo-Katan losing the darksaber because of the ARC pulse
generator targeting it’s hilt, and forcing her to drop it, because I think it is a genuinely
possibility and would tie perfectly into the story of Star Wars: Rebels.
Now of course if Gideon did use the ARC pulse generator to steal the Darksaber without fairly
winning it in combat from Bo-Katan, it probably would have melted her body inside of the armor,
and even the hilt itself, making the saber completely useless. So the obvious solution
to that is that he simply changed the power to a lower state, still making the blade far
too hot to hold on to, but preserving it’s ancient beskar hilt, and also keeping Bo-Katan
alive inside of her armor.
From Star Wars: Rebels, we of course do already know that it was possible to adjust the intensity
of this horrific superweapon.
The Duchess superweapon could also explain how the Imperials collected so much Beskar,
and why it offended Paz Vizsla so badly. Of course it would still be horrible for the
empire to invade Mandalore and strip mine the entire land to salvage all of it’s beskar
supply, but it would be even more disgraceful and disgusting if the Empire’s supply of
beskar came from the melted down and collected armor of his fellow Mandalorians.
Now this leads us to the second possibility, that the shattering of Mandalore actually
refers to the world of Mandalore being cracked or partially destroyed by the Empire. This
one is much less likely, but would certainly be possible and connect very well.
There is a possibility that the Empire used the Death Star on Mandalore a short while
after the great purge took place, as the event almost certainly took place before 0bby, where
the superweapon was destroyed.
In Chapter 11, Din Djarin said to Bo-Katan that Once the Empire knew they couldn’t
control Mandalore, they made sure no one else could either. He could be saying that they
kill anyone to go to the planet on sight, which is not likely with how thinly the Imperial
remnant is now spread, or more likely that they used the Death Star’s single ignition
firing on the planet around a year after the purge. With the Great Mandalorian purge likely
taking place in 1BBY, the Mando would be set around 10 years after it, being the perfect
amount of time for rumours and mystery cautionary tales to form around the planet.
The first firing of the weapon was of course in Jedha City, before it was moved to Scarrif,
where it again decimated the surface of the tropical world. After that it was moved to
Alderaan, where it of course destroyed the planet, leaving no survivors. It is in this
very small gap between the destruction of Alderaan and when it was moved to Yavin base,
where it may have had the chance to fire on Mandalore, leaving the planet cracked, and
shattered like it’s neighbour concord dawn.
Now this might seem like a very tight window for the Empire to use the weapon, and I agree
this would be a very precisely planned action by Palpatine, but it is surprisingly possible.
Mandalore just happens to sit in a straight line bath between the former location of Alderaan
and the location of Yavin 4.
I’m not fully on board with this theory, but I have seen a lot of you guys mentioning
it, so It’s definitely worth sharing.
So those are some theories on how Moff Gideon and the Empire could have destroyed Mandalore.
Thanks so much for watching, really hope you enjoyed the video. Cheers guys, hope to see
you in the next one!