This article contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Bad Batch episode 3.In a surprising twist, Star Wars: The Bad Batch has suggested Count Dooku became something of a hero to the rebellion during the Dark Times of the Empire's reign. Palpatine began seducing Dooku to the dark side well over a decade before the beginning of the Clone Wars, and may even have pushed the Jedi Master to leave the Jedi Order. Dooku claimed his ancestral throne on the planet Serenno, a world that had often historically been an important leader among the planets of the Outer Rim. He used that position to become leader of a group known as the Separatists.
The Separatists began as a political movement, but the Sith always planned to use them to incite war across the galaxy. The Clone Wars were the ultimate Jedi trap, engineered to draw the Jedi away from Coruscant and kill them on battlefields far from the Galactic Core. Jedi are ill-suited to warfare; war is naturally aggressive, and a good soldier is one who desires dominance, but both these traits are of the dark side. Palpatine brought the Clone Wars to an end when he invoked Order 66, and few Jedi retained a strong enough connection to the light to sense the imminent betrayal. Dooku had already been slain, killed by Anakin Skywalker as part of his own turn to the dark side, and the Separatist leaders were soon slaughtered as well. When the dust settled from the Clone Wars, only Palpatine had truly won.
Dooku's Warnings About The Republic Were Fulfilled In Palpatine
Surprisingly, though, Star Wars is revealing Dooku was still revered by Separatists after the Clone Wars had ended. It's important to few knew of Dooku's fall to the dark side, with many believing he was simply a former Jedi who believed the Republic was becoming increasingly authoritarian. From this perspective, the end of the Clone Wars seemed to confirm everything Dooku had been teaching. He was proven right about the Jedi, who initially led the Republic army before turning on Chancellor Palpatine. And he was right about Palpatine, who - whether motivated by fear of the Jedi or simply lust for power - had transformed the Republic into an Empire. Every example of Imperial overreach simply reinforced Dooku's case; to paraphrase Princess Leia, the tighter the Empire squeezed the galaxy, the more reasonable Dooku's arguments became.
It's important to the movement that would become the early Rebel Alliance was not truly born in the Galactic Core. It was born in the Outer Rim, where Separatist convictions remained strong. The most committed beings tended to be non-humans, victims of the Empire's prejudice, and many of their races had been aligned with the Separatists during the Clone Wars. There's a strange sense in which Palpatine's Clone Wars created the necessary conditions for the Rebel Alliance - and Dooku's message was a massive part of that.
Star Wars Is Giving Dooku An Unexpected Legacy
All this is giving Dooku a very surprising legacy. He is the Sith Lord who championed those who would become the Sith's sworn enemies, and even gave voice to their ions. Since their origins, the Sith have been fascinated with visions of the future; Palpatine himself loved to claim everything had happened as he had foreseen. But he could never have anticipated the Separatist movement becoming the seed of the Rebellion, nor his apprentice having an unexpected legacy that would ultimately destroy the Empire. Star Wars: The Bad Batch really has given Dooku a much more complex,sophisticated role in the galaxy's history.
New episodes of Star Wars: The Bad Batch release on Wednesdays on Disney+
