Rey's New Star Wars Movie Will Confront Palpatine's Last Legacy

Summary Star Wars: New Jedi Order will explore the future of the franchise and examine the franchise's past, particularly Emperor Palpatine's legacy.

Rey's relationship with Palpatine and the restoration of the Jedi Order will be central themes in the new film.

The film will confront the unpopularity of the Jedi Order due to Palpatine's propaganda and the actual criticisms of the Jedi throughout the Star Wars timeline.

Star Wars will move beyond the Skywalker saga with Rey's New Jedi Order, but it still may have to address some of the issues of the franchise's past, particularly Palpatine's final legacy. New Jedi Order is set to move further into the future of the Star Wars timeline than any other Star Wars movie has gone before, starting about 15 years after Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. While it's an exciting push into the future of the franchise, New Jedi Order also seems set to examine the history of Star Wars stories that came before.

There aren't many confirmed story details about New Jedi Order yet, but there have been some clues as to what the next chapter of Rey's story will concern. After The Rise of Skywalker's reveal that Rey's father was Palpatine's clone, she'll likely need to address her relationship to the Sith Lord and Emperor. Though he suffered his second and final death in The Rise of Skywalker, Palpatine's relationship to Rey may not be the biggest problem he poses to New Jedi Order, and his final legacy could be even harder to solve.

Related New Star Wars Movies: Every Upcoming Movie & Release Date Here's every upcoming Star Wars movie in development - including Rey's New Jedi Order, the Dawn of the Jedi, and The Mandalorian & Grogu!

Palpatine Worked Carefully To Ensure The Jedi Were Unpopular

When Palpatine rose to power and established the First Galactic Empire, he made a few strategic moves to both ruin the Jedi Order's reputation and help the galaxy forget about them. He began a large-scale propaganda campaign that painted the Jedi as terrorists, and he claimed that Mace Windu and the other Jedi in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith attempted to assassinate him. Chris Kempshall's in-universe history of the Empire, "Star Wars The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire," explained exactly why Palpatine made those moves.

"His planned eradication of the Jedi would only be truly successful if the population either already hated them or did not care about their fate."

In essence, Order 66 wasn't enough to destroy the Jedi. If Palpatine had simply eradicated every individual Jedi, they would have been martyred in the eyes of the galaxy, and they might have inspired rebellion. To prevent that, Palpatine had to kill the idea of the Jedi, and rob the Order of its symbolic power. Making the Jedi unpopular benefited Palpatine and the Empire in the short term, but his propaganda campaign seems to have had much longer-lasting effects, and it seems to be Palpatine's last legacy in the galaxy.

Rey's New Jedi Order Movie Will Confront That Unpopularity Head-On

Close

Based on the propaganda Palpatine spread after Order 66, Rey could easily face quite a bit of opposition to her goal of restoring the Jedi Order. Even though Palpatine had been exposed as a Sith Lord and the Empire was largely seen as the atrocity it was, many people likely only learned about the Jedi through his propaganda. Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy hinted that Rey will have to prove the Jedi are worth restoring in New Jedi Order, especially after the death and destruction of the Skywalker saga.

"The question that we're gonna ask with New Jedi Order and with Rey, is does the galaxy need them anymore? Do they want them back? So there's a lot of food for thought in what we're doing, whether it's in the past, present, or future."

Palpatine's propaganda will be a massive part of the reason the galaxy doesn't want the Jedi to return, but there are also some actual criticisms of the Jedi. Objectively, the Jedi did at least contribute to quite a bit of suffering throughout the Star Wars timeline. They allowed Palpatine and the Empire to gain power, and the last attempt to bring back the Jedi, Luke Skywalker's temple on Ossus, resulted in Kylo Ren and the rise of the First Order. Rey will have her work cut out for her in New Jedi Order, and Palpatine's legacy will only make her work more difficult.

Purchase Chris Kempshall's "Star Wars The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire" on Amazon.