Star Wars: Plagueis' Canon Story Can Be Improved By Naboo's Forgotten King
Naboo’s forgotten king holds the key to improving Star Wars’ Darth Plagueis. When Disney acquired George Lucas’ franchise, many of the books that expanded the Star Wars universe became classified as “Legends,” stories that would no longer be considered canon. The lines between the two aren’t always clear, and Disney continues to draw Star Wars’ Legends material into canon, Palpatine’s ascension to the Senate being affirmed through Marc Sumerak’s Secrets of the Sith, for example. Yet there are other, much lesser-known characters hiding in Legends that still have an opening to impact the greater canon storyline.
Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace introduced Palpatine’s home planet of Naboo. Over time, Legends stories began to shed more light on the luscious world, which was also home to Padmé (Naberrie) Amidala, Anakin Skywalker’s future wife and mother to Luke and Leia. James Luceno’s Darth Plagueis, a Legends novel, added some significant information regarding King Ars Veruna, Queen Amidala’s predecessor. While the canon novel Queen’s Peril by E.K. Johnston has partially retconned Veruna, saying that instead, Queen Sanandrassa was Amidala’s direct predecessor, there is still space for Veruna to have ruled earlier and made his connection to Plagueis known.
Johnston’s upcoming novel, Queen’s Hope, which features Anakin and Padmé’s wedding day, could still solidify Veruna’s place in canon, potentially building up Darth Plagueis' story. The move would answer many questions surrounding what happened to Naboo’s forgotten king, and now is the perfect time to bring him back and prove how important he is to Star Wars and one of the most mysterious Sith Lords of the franchise. Although Luceno’s Darth Plagueis is now a part of Legends, Johnston’s Queen’s Hope has the opportunity to canonize one of Plagueis’ most diabolical acts: death by midichlorian manipulation.
Thanks to Johnston’s Queen’s Shadow and Queen’s Peril and Claudia Gray’s Master & Apprentice, the only time the Naboo monarch is canonically unknown is during the years 39 to 36 BBY. Given that Luceno’s canon Tarkin, which focuses on the Grand Moff to be, refers to a Naboo king approximately 20 years prior to the events of the book, placing it around 34 BBY, it would not be unreasonable to think Veruna was the king between 39 and 36 BBY. Queen’s Hope is set during the Clone Wars, and Padmé is a Senator while, of course, Palpatine is still the Supreme Chancellor. Surely Padmé will interact with the Sith-in-disguise at some point during this novel. As such, this is a great opportunity for Palpatine to reintroduce Veruna, a character he would have interacted with when he was Senator of Naboo.
Palpatine said that Darth Plagueis the Wise was able to “keep the ones he cared about from dying” in Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, but what some might not know is that he was also able to kill others through midichlorian manipulation. Veruna was the first victim of such a heinous act committed by Plagueis in the Legends novel, Darth Plagueis. Veruna’s death showed the absolute power of Plagueis, that he was not just known for his ability to stop people from dying, but that he could use that same life-giving power to slowly and painfully kill his victims.
A lot of mystery still surrounds Darth Plagueis that will surely be addressed within the Star Wars canon. Given that Queen’s Hope is right around the corner, perhaps the inconsistencies in Naboo’s monarchy timeline will finally be addressed and used in a way that can bring justice to Ars Veruna’s character. The Darth Plagueis novel is not Star Wars canon any longer, but that doesn’t mean pieces of his Legends story can’t be included in the canon going forward, making him stronger, and more feared in the process.
Source: Screenrant
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