One Star Wars Retcon Perfectly Explains Why Palpatine’s Rise Of Skywalker Cloning Didn’t Work

There’s a Star Wars retcon that completely explains why Emperor Palpatine’s clone in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker failed. The choice to resurrect Palpatine in The Rise of Skywalker has long since been considered a controversial topic, particularly because of the mere “Somehow, Palpatine returned” explanation offered in the movie, but Star Wars has since been taking steps to explain how the iconic Star Wars villain truly returned. This has helped to rectify the situation, most notably where Palpatine’s failed cloning is concerned.

Still, there was one crucial part of Palpatine’s story that didn’t make sense at the time of The Rise of Skywalker. It was heavily implied that his resurrection took place shortly after the events of Return of the Jedi, which saw him killed over the forest moon of Endor at Darth Vader’s hands. This, however, makes little sense; more questions are raised with this timeline than answered. Star Wars, however, is now taking steps to amend this as well, particularly with a retcon that’s been subtly implemented over the last five years.

Star Wars Seems To Be Retconning How Quickly Palpatine’s Clone Was Created

The Timeline For Palpatine’s Cloning Is Expanding Into The Mandalorian Era

While the implication of Palpatine’s cloning timeline in The Rise of Skywalker was that his failed clone was created in short order, Star Wars is now changing it to be more drawn out. Project Necromancer has been named as the official title of Palpatine’s covert resurrection contingency plan via cloning. The establishment of this project, or at least its earliest stages, takes place in The Bad Batch – which is set just after the fall of the Galactic Republic during the execution of Order 66.

In contrast, The Mandalorian – where Project Necromancer was name-dropped for the first time at a meeting of the Imperial Shadow Council – takes place five years after the fall of the Galactic Empire. This gap between Project Necromancer’s introduction in The Bad Batch and its continuation in The Mandalorian proves that it took much, much longer than originally implied for Palpatine’s clone to be created. This is just one part of the retcon, as The Bad Batch is also taking the steps to explain why the cloning took this long.

The Bad Batch Revealed Genetic Samples For Cloning Degrade Over Time

The Degradation Of A Specimen Leads To Massive Cloning Problems

The Bad Batch reveals that cloning, particularly Force-cloning, is not as simple as it may seem. A necessary aspect of cloning is access to a high-quality genetic sample of the original DNA, which can degrade over time – in Jango Fett’s case, three to four years. The entire cloning operation was nearly jeopardized due to the degradation of Jango Fett’s original sample, which alone emphasizes the importance of having this type of sample on hand in order to yield successful results.

By the time Project Necromancer is seen in The Mandalorian era, then, at least five years have passed since Palpatine’s death. There’s no doubt that Palpatine’s original samples, then, had all degraded. This is what caused the delay in Palpatine’s cloning after his death; with no original high-quality samples left, those who were a part of Project Necromancer had no easy way of creating a suitable clone for Palpatine. Thus, Palpatine’s plan began to crumble piece by piece, as seen in The Rise of Skywalker.

This Mandalorian Era Perfectly Explains Why Palpatine’s Plan Failed

Palpatine Needed A Suitable Host – & All He Could Do Was Wait

While Palpatine was able to transfer his essence into a clone, that clone was unsuitable for him. The body could not contain Palpatine’s essence, thus causing the degradation of his clone’s body. With Palpatine’s high-quality samples also having degraded over time, this only became harder and harder to avoid. There was little to work with, and the strength of Palpatine’s essence made it nearly impossible to find a compatible match. This led to Palpatine’s plan ultimately failing, as his clone’s body continued to degrade.

Time only continued to work against Palpatine as Force-sensitivity became rarer and rarer to find in the galaxy – which is more than likely why high M-count targets were still being sought after in The Mandalorian era. As explained in The Bad Batch, a proper binder is required to replicate the M-count of a Force-sensitive person’s DNA, which seems to be just as rare to find as a person with an M-count is. In The Bad Batch, it’s Omega who fills this role, with the children – much like The Mandalorian‘s Grogu – being the ones to provide the M-count rich DNA.

Star Wars, then, is using multiple explanations in this retcon of why Palpatine’s plan ultimately failed in The Rise of Skywalker. Not only did the cloning take longer than originally implied, but it also came as a result of Palpatine’s high-quality genetic sample degrading in the years following his death. Without an M-count rich source to replicate and a binder to accept that source, Palpatine was left with no choice but to remain within an unsuitable host, which is where viewers see him in The Rise of Skywalker.