Star Wars’ Sith Are the Force’s White Blood Cells (& Palpatine’s Reign Proves It)

No matter which era of the Star Wars saga fans find themselves in, the Sith are a force of immense evil – a threat to freedom, safety, and any hope for a better future. However, as Star Wars‘ modern canon continues to expand, it’s becoming clearer and clearer that they do have a place in the natural order. Intentionally or not, the Sith act as the white blood cells of the Force – a violent immune system that identifies and eradicates serious threats before they spread.

In a preview of Star Wars: Darth Maul – Black, White & Red #1, Palpatine sends Maul to investigate a transport ship that has gone dark. The ship was transporting the leaders of a cult known as the Final Occultation, who draw power from the chaotic plane of existence known as the Netherworld. With knowledge of Palpatine’s true nature as a Sith, the Final Occultation have to be eradicated – and, Maul believes, stripped of their power so Palpatine can claim it.

This story is another in a growing list of occasions where the Sith’s foundational principles drove them to target and nullify a significant threat to the galaxy – and to the Force itself – before it could grow in power. But far from a fluke where the Sith’s ambition actually protects the galaxy, it’s starting to seem like this may be their purpose within the Force.

Sith Eradicated Major Threats from the Galaxy

Darth Maul’s New Mission Shows Why the Force Needs Its Dark Side

Recent comics have revealed several major threats that were handled by the Sith, effectively saving the galaxy. Star Wars‘ High Republic initiative unleashed the Drengir – vicious, plant-like predators who spread across the galaxy like wildfire. The backstory of the Drengir revealed that before their resurgence in the High Republic era, it was the Sith who discovered the species and eventually imprisoned them on Axamine Station. It’s been revealed that they did much the same with the Scourge of the droids – a viral machine consciousness similar to a zombie virus which was originally sealed away in a Fermata Cage time prison by the Ancient Sith.

The Sith also pursued and killed threats to the Force through more roundabout means. Ancient Sith Darkseekers sought out and executed any group they saw as opposing Sith power, but this also resulted in them eradicating groups who would have attacked the Force. For example, the Ascendant Cult developed technology which could reproduce the effects of Force mastery without any actual connection to the energy field itself. The Sith crushed the group just before they could finish developing the Spark Eternal – a master AI which would run their technology and effectively “replace the Force.”

These foes were major threats to life in the galaxy, but also to the natural order. The Drengir were driven by appetite and spread a powerful darkness that acted as a corruptive force. The Scourge was driven to consume all life – sentient and biological – and become the sole being in the galaxy. Even the Ascendant Cult, who wanted to better the lives of those who couldn’t command the Force, sought to give everyone in the galaxy Sith-like powers, and even planned to banish death itself. In each case, the Sith prevented an existential challenge to the Force itself.

The Sith Are Willing to Do What the Jedi Won’t

The Sith Have Canonically Saved the Galaxy Several Times

While the Sith destroyed these threats mostly to safeguard their own power, the end result was safeguarding the spiritual status quo of the galaxy and protecting the Force itself from the few threats that might radically change or even replace it. Since the Sith draw their power from the Force, they have a vested interest in ensuring its primacy. While they are a longtime threat to balance within the Force, they have a definite short-term efficacy in preventing more immediate threats.

The Scourge’s appetite and the chaos that the Final Occultation seek to unleash both had the capacity to rapidly and permanently transform the galaxy. What’s more, these threats are inherent to each group’s core beliefs or even biological reality, making them impossible to stop through diplomacy. While the Jedi strive for understanding and mercy, the Sith can be depended on to quickly erase any threat to the Force. Indeed, the Sith are so perfectly attuned to this role in the cosmos, it’s easy to speculate that this is no accident, and that the Force may actually use the Sith and Jedi in tandem – one to exterminate immediate existential threats, and the other to maintain longterm balance (and police the worst tendencies of the former.)

Star Wars’ Sith/Jedi Rivalry Works for the Galaxy

The Force Benefits from Both Types of Protection – Whether It Wants to or Not

Through the lens of the Force’s longterm ‘health,’ it makes sense to see the Jedi and Sith as complementary forces, each opposing larger threats to the galaxy’s status quo. Indeed, this fits into Star Wars‘ original depiction of the Dark Side. During the Legends era, the Dark Side was frequently treated as a natural extension of the Force, with the suggestion that darkness is part of life and the Sith are only so dangerous because they make it the entire focus of their being. In this reading, the Dark Side is a necessary aspect of the Force, and it makes sense that the Sith would have a purpose as part of the larger ‘ecosystem’ of the Force itself.

This view of the Force is less common in modern stories, which treat the Dark Side as more unnatural – a way of abusing the actual Force to the wielder’s advantage. However, both readings are still possible, and it’s beside the point whether the Force uses the Sith for protection or whether their beliefs protect it by accident. Either way, viewed in the longterm, the Jedi/Sith rivalry helps to protect the Force in two very different ways. That’s a benefit to the saga, since so many Star Wars stories take place in a world where fans already know what comes next. Predestination is almost baked into the average Star Wars story, so the idea of a larger, self-protecting ecosystem fits perfectly with stories like Star Wars: Darth Maul – Black, White & Red #1, where fans know that the Final Occultation aren’t going to win.

Palpatine May Have Been a Galactic Abberation

Sidious’ Heretical Ways Raise Major Questions About the Sith’s Purpose

Another fun extension of the ‘Sith as white blood cells’ theory is the idea that Palpatine was an aberration whose unique brand of evil put the Force’s Sith/Jedi balance at risk. Just as many modern stories have seen the Sith eradicate more urgent threats, many have also suggested that Palpatine had no true faith in the Sith religion. While the Sith believe in power and conquest, they do also have core tenets, such as seeking power through the Force over technology and holding to strict edicts like the Rule of Two. However, Palpatine showed no real favoritism in how he sought power – even as he trained Sith apprentices, he also sought to replace them via technological means.

Darth Vader accused Palpatine of heresy in Darth Vader #6 (from Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca) after learning of his investments in cyborg assassins designed by Cylo to mimic Force-sensitive abilities, and the preview above sees Maul doubt his master in a similar way, believing he wants to harness the chaos of the Final Occultation, not destroy it. Other acts – like Palpatine’s resurrection via scientific means, his implied training of multiple apprentices at once, and some of his experiments on Exegol – suggest that he saw Sith doctrine as just another weapon in his armory and had no actual faith in its doctrine, primarily using it to control his followers.

Palpatine being an aberration means that a lot of his actions – like partnering with the scientist Cylo and trying to harness the power of the Netherworld – aren’t necessarily the actions of a Sith, and could even have tipped any natural Sith/Jedi balance into extreme territory. Of course, viewed on a long enough time scale, even the fall of the Jedi Order and Palpatine’s reign of terror were only blips in the larger picture of the Force maintaining itself through its ‘antibodies.’

The Final Occultation Are Revealing the Sith’s Cosmic Purpose

Even in Hiding, the Sith Were Safeguarding the Galaxy

As Darth Maul embarks on a new mission to defeat the Final Occultation, fans are getting yet another story where the Sith protect the galaxy from an outsized threat that goes beyond politics, to the heart of the Force, acting with a brutal, merciless efficiency that the Jedi lack. As horrific as the Sith are and always will be, their selfishness frequently intersects with protecting the galaxy and the Force itself, inviting speculation that this is exactly how Star Wars‘ galaxy keeps itself healthy.