Skip to main content

star wars - Is the title "Dark Lord of the Sith" reserved for the Sith Master?


For the Sith Order under the Rule of Two (i.e. from Darth Bane to Palpatine), does the Sith Apprentice hold the title "Dark Lord of the Sith"? Or is the title reserved for only the Sith Master?


In the (Legends) Bane trilogy, it appears to be reserved for the Sith Master. For example, from Dynasty of Evil:



That was why Bane had chosen Zannah as his apprentice: she had the potential to one day surpass even his own abilities. On that day she would usurp him as the Dark Lord of the Sith and choose an apprentice of her own.




Later, Darth Zannah affirms that the Apprentice becomes the Dark Lord upon killing the Master:



The Master will train his apprentice in the ways of the Sith, until one day she must challenge him. If she proves unworthy, the Master will destroy her and choose a new apprentice. If she proves the stronger, the Master will fall and she will become the new Dark Lord of the Sith, and choose an apprentice of her own.



However, Darth Vader -- who never became the Sith Master -- appears to hold the title. He is referred to as the "Dark Lord" in the movie scripts, as well as in the canon novel Tarkin (albeit always from the perspective of Moff Tarkin, who is not a Sith). Probably on this basis, Wookieepedia's canon article on the title says that the title was "shared" by the Sith Lords under the Rule of Two.


There appears to be a contradiction, in that the Bane trilogy reserves the title for the Master but the canon sources do not. How is this explained? Did the Sith Order start giving the title to the Apprentice sometime after Darth Bane and, if so, when? Is the Bane trilogy simply wrong to reserve the title for the Master (it's Legends, so canon supersedes it)? Or did Darth Vader not really hold the title?


The last option (that Vader didn't really hold the title, but was publicly assumed to hold it) seems possible for several reasons:



  1. Vader is never called the Dark Lord by Palpatine, and never calls himself the Dark Lord. He is only referred to as the Dark Lord from an out-of-universe perspective (e.g. in the scripts) or by non-Sith characters (e.g. Tarkin) who wouldn't know his true title(s). Within the Sith Order, it's possible Vader doesn't really hold the title.


  2. Palpatine was not known to be a Sith by the general public, so from the public point of view Vader was the only Sith and therefore the Dark Lord.

  3. Out-of-universe, there may be a bit of a retcon here: Lucas didn't initially intend Palpatine to be a Sith and started calling Vader the Dark Lord in the Episode V script; when the Emperor's character was changed to be a Sith, he was stuck with Vader's title.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Did the gatekeeper and the keymaster get intimate in Ghostbusters?

According to TVTropes ( usual warning, don't follow the link or you'll waste half your life in a twisty maze of content ): In Ghostbusters, it's strongly implied that Dana Barret, while possessed by Zuul the Gatekeeper, had sex with Louis Tully, who was possessed by Vinz Clortho the Keymaster (key, gate, get it?), in order to free Big Bad Gozer. In fact, a deleted scene from the movie has Venkman explicitly asking Dana if she and Louis "did it". I turned the quote into a spoiler since it contains really poor-taste joke, but the gist of it is that it's implied that as part of freeing Gozer , the two characters possessed by the Keymaster and the Gatekeeper had sex. Is there any canon confirmation or denial of this theory (canon meaning something from creators' interviews, DVD commentary, script, delete scenes etc...)? Answer The Richard Mueller novelisation and both versions of the script strongly suggest that they didn't have sex (or at the very l...
1 comment
Read more

Why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize Missy right away?

So after it was established that Missy is actually both the Master, and the "woman in the shop" who gave Clara the TARDIS number... ...why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize her right away? I remember the Tenth Doctor in The Sound of Drums stating that Timelords had a way of recognizing other Timelords no matter if they had regenerated. And Clara should have recognized her as well... I'm hoping for a better explanation than "Moffat screwed up", and that I actually missed something after two watchthroughs of the episode. Answer There seems to be a lot of in-canon uncertainty as to the extent to which Time Lords can recognise one another which far pre-dates Moffat's tenure. From the Time Lords page on Wikipedia : Whether or not Time Lords can recognise each other across regenerations is not made entirely clear: In The War Games, the War Chief recognises the Second Doctor despite his regeneration and it is implied that the Doctor knows him when they fir...
Post a Comment
Read more

story identification - Animation: floating island, flying pests

At least 20 years ago I watched a short animated film which stuck in my mind. The whole thing was wordless, possibly European, and I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine it... It featured a flying island which was inhabited by some creatures who (in my memory) reminded me of the Moomins. The island was frequently bothered by large winged animals who swooped around, although I don't think they did any actual damage. At the end one of the moomin creatures suddenly gets a weird feeling, feels forced to climb to the top of the island and then plunges down a shaft right through the centre - only to emerge at the bottom as one of the flyers. Answer Skywhales from 1983. The story begins with a man warning the tribe of approaching skywhales. The drummers then warn everybody of the hunt as everyone get prepared to set "sail". Except one man is found in his home sleeping as the noise wake him up. He then gets ready and is about to take his weapon as he hesitates then decides ...
Post a Comment
Read more

warhammer40k - What evidence supposedly supports Tau as related to the Necrontyr?

I've heard of rumours saying that the Tau from Warhammer 40K are in fact the Necrontyr. Is there anything that supports this statement, in WH40K canon? I just found this, on 1d4 chan 1 : Helping Necrons? Or are they Necrontyr descendants? An often overlooked issue is that Tau have no warp signatures, just like Necrons, hate Warpspawns and Warp in general, just like Necrons, have the exact same skull shape,stature and short lives, and the overwhelming need for Technology and beam weapons, JUST LIKE NECRONS. GW may have planned a race that simply prepares a pacified, multiracial galaxy for Necrons to feast upon, supported by Ethereals that have a C'tan phase blade. Then there is a reference of "dark seed in east" by the Deceiver, so the tricky C'tan might give Tzeentch the finger in the JUST AS PLANNED competition. Or maybe GW just has so little creativity that they simply made a new civ conforming to an Old One's standards without knowing it. Is this the connec...
Post a Comment
Read more