Star Wars Clarifies Palpatine’s First Order & Final Order Differences

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker revealed that Palpatine, aka Darth Sidious, was behind the Empire’s First Order from the beginning, controlling them from afar while preparing himself and the Final Order for their assault on the unsuspecting galaxy. While both regimes are under Palpatine’s control, there are notable differences between the First Order and the Final Order. As the galactic Emperor, Palpatine rules the galaxy through the might of the Empire for years following his fascist coup at the end of the Clone Wars. Though Palpatine seemingly died during the Battle of Endor, his ideology endured for decades through the First and Final Orders.

After the Galactic Empire formally surrendered at the Battle of Jakku, Imperial loyalists continued to oppress the galaxy through holdout factions, like The Mandalorian’s Moff Gideon and his forces. Within the New Republic, Imperial sympathizers with fascist leanings, in addition to those who secretly harbored loyalty to the Empire, festered within the government through the Centrist political party. Slowly but surely, they assimilated with Imperials who fled to the Unknown Regions to form the First Order.

Meanwhile, the Final Order had been in development in various forms since some of the earliest days of the Empire, with Palpatine (resurrected by the Sith Eternal) intending them to be his primary military force once he was ready to resurface. As revealed in Star Wars: The Secrets of the Sith, Palpatine ensured that the Final Order was an even purer version of the First Order. While the First Order’s Stormtroopers were trained and indoctrinated since birth, the Final Order’s military forces were subjected to an even more intense upbringing of brainwashing, having been born on the Sith world of Exegol and being the offspring of Sith Eternal cult members.

While the First Order revered the Galactic Empire and sought to restore its fascist grip on the galaxy, the regime was notably distant from the Sith Order that birthed the Empire. This was perhaps due to the secrecy of the Sith Order, with few Imperials understanding the true scope of The Emperor and Vader’s Sith identities. The First Order’s original Supreme Leader was Snoke, an unaffiliated dark side-user, despite having been created on Exegol as a proxy ruler for Palpatine. Unlike the Empire, whose dark side users were either Sith or Inquisitors (who were Sith in all but name), the First Order’s dark side warriors were the Knights of Ren.

The Knights of Ren were powerful dark side warriors with a fundamentally different philosophy than the Sith. The Sith Lords ruled over the dark side and sought to subjugate the galaxy. The Knights of Ren served the dark side like a deity, allowing it to direct them across the galaxy to pillage and kill whoever and whatever they please. Snoke was killed and usurped by Kylo Ren, putting the First Order directly under the command of the Master of the Knights of Ren. The lack of understanding of the Sith Order led to skepticism among First Order leadership when the Sith resurfaced, as shown in The Rise of Skywalker.

The First Order was never intended to rule the galaxy, as far as Palpatine was concerned. The regime was merely a placeholder and a public face for the remnants of Palpatine’s fascist ideology. The Final Order was a purely Sith-aligned regime with absolute loyalty to Sidious. The First Order was absorbed into the Final Order shortly before the Battle of Exegol, with Imperial veterans like Enric Pryde instantly pledging loyalty to their resurrected Emperor. The Knights of Ren, true to their philosophy, served the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, as he’d become the embodiment of the dark side by this point. The full scope of Palpatine’s plans was revealed in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, with the First Order making way for the even deadlier Final Order.

About The Author

David Miller
(623 Articles Published)

David Miller is a staff writer for Screen Rant, indie comic writer, and life-long lover of all things Star Wars, Marvel, and DC. He was born and raised in New York and has a degree in English from Rider University. He relates to Peter Parker maybe a little too much.

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