The Star Wars saga has become a sprawling
epic, spanning numerous planets, alien races, and massive cosmic battles. In fact, there's so much stuff happening that
sometimes it's hard to keep it all straight. And that's why we're here to explain the entire
Star Wars story. The Star Wars story begins during a period
of relative peace in the galaxy. A thousand years before the events of the
Skywalker Saga, the Jedi Order defeated the Sith Order, seemingly for good. While the Jedi became the keepers of peace
in the Galactic Republic, the surviving Sith secretly began plotting to overthrow them. It was near the end of this millennium of
peace that Darth Sidious, a Sith Lord who was secretly Senator Sheev Palpatine of Naboo,
set in motion his plan to eradicate the Jedi and seize control of the Republic's government. As part of his plan for galactic domination,
Sidious acted as a secret advisor to the Trade Federation, ordering them to blockade and
ultimately invade Naboo. Once the Trade Federation arrived on the planet,
Sidious slipped back into his Senator Palpatine disguise and advised Naboo's queen, Padme
Amidala, that the current chancellor of the Republic wasn't acting in their best interests. Working with his his Sith apprentice, Darth
Maul, Sidious was able to manipulate and manufacture tensions in the Republic from both sides. Meanwhile, on a mission to protect Amidala,
two Jedi Knights, Master Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi, happened upon
a young Anakin Skywalker while repairing their ship on Tatooine. Qui-Gon discovered potentially unprecedented
levels of Force sensitivity in the boy. After taking Anakin with them, Qui-Gon urged
the Jedi Council to train Anakin, but the Jedi were reluctant. After Qui-Gon's death at the hands of Darth
Maul, the Council accepted Anakin as Obi-Wan's new apprentice. Palpatine was elected chancellor at Amidala's
urging, granting him a place of unprecedented power to further his plans. Following the events of The Phantom Menace,
tensions within the Republic continued to rise under Palpatine's leadership. Anakin Skywalker grew into a young Jedi Knight
of considerable Force talents. And finally, Darth Sidious took on a new apprentice,
former Jedi Count Dooku, who adopted the Sith name "Darth Tyranus." Dooku, at Sidious' urging, created tension
in the Republic by forming the Separatists. As numerous star systems threatened secession,
now-Senator Padme Amidala fought to keep the Republic together, and was nearly assassinated
for her trouble. Obi-Wan was dispatched by the Jedi Council
to find out who was behind the attempt on her life, while Anakin stayed behind as her
bodyguard. "What about Senator Amidala? She will still need protecting." "Handle that, your padawan will." "Anakin." Obi-Wan's investigation uncovered an army
of clones, seemingly ordered for the Republic by a dead Jedi Knight. This discovery led Obi-Wan to discover a Separatist
gathering on the planet Geonosis. Back on the Republic capital of Coruscant,
Chancellor Palpatine was granted emergency powers to use the newly discovered clones
in the fight against the Separatists, launching the Clone Wars. During this time, Anakin and Padme fell in
love, and Anakin's internal anger grew as he discovered the death of his mother on Tatooine. The Clone Wars raged for three years, with
Dooku as the figurehead of the Separatist movement and Palpatine as the increasingly
powerful chancellor of the Republic. The war raged across the galaxy, consuming
system after system as everyone picked sides. The Jedi Order were tasked with joining the
conflict as generals of the clone armies discovered during Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. As the conflict raged, Padme remained a force
in the Senate, working for unity while mistakenly believing she could trust Palpatine. Obi-Wan and Anakin fought on the front lines,
and Anakin even took on a Jedi apprentice named Ahsoka Tano. During this time, he and Padme fell deeper
in love, and they married in secret. However, as the war went on, Anakin's darker
tendencies grew. Ready for the final stage of his plan, Palpatine
allowed himself to be taken prisoner by Separatist General Grievous. This kickstarted a rescue mission, leading
Obi-Wan and Anakin to infiltrate Grievous' ship to rescue Palpatine. Once inside, they found Dooku, and in the
battle with the Sith, Anakin killed the Separatist leader at Palpatine's behest. With Palpatine rescued, the Republic pressed
their advantage in the war, and Yoda and Obi-Wan were both sent to the front lines in an effort
to finish the conflict once and for all. Back on Coruscant, Padme told Anakin that
she was pregnant, and his dreams became troubled by visions of his wife dying in childbirth. Anakin grew even closer to Palpatine, especially
after the chancellor hinted he might have knowledge that could prevent Padme from dying
during childbirth...or ever. "Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis
the Wise?" To push his plan into its final stages, Sidious
revealed himself as a Sith Lord to Anakin, while also promising him knowledge of the
Dark Side. Anakin reported Sidious to Mace Windu, who
attempted to arrest the Sith Lord. During the battle, Anakin chose to save the
Sith, all in the hopes that Sidious could save Padme's life. With Mace Windu dead, Anakin pledged himself
to the service of Darth Sidious in the hopes he could prevent Padme's death. Sidious dubbed his new enforcer "Darth Vader,"
and then ordered him to slaughter everybody inside the Jedi Temple. This began the Great Jedi Purge under Sidious'
Order 66, which required all clone troopers to terminate their Jedi generals on sight. Only a handful of Jedi, like Obi-Wan and Yoda,
were able to fend off their attackers. Meanwhile in the Senate, Palpatine used his
power to declare the Jedi outlaws, and turned the Republic into the Galactic Empire. To end his self-orchestrated war, Sidious
sent Vader to the planet Mustafar to kill the remaining Separatist leaders and shut
down the clone army. Then, Obi-Wan and Yoda made their move. Obi-Wan went to fight Vader on Mustafar while
Yoda confronted Sidious on Coruscant. Unfortunately, Padme reached Vader first,
and when she tried to convince him to see the error of his ways, he nearly choked her
to death. By the end of Revenge of the Sith, Sidious
fought Yoda to a stalemate, while Obi-Wan defeated Vader and left him to die. After facing the Sith, Obi-Wan and Yoda regrouped
with Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan. Clinging to life after her husband nearly
killed her, Padme gave birth to twins named Luke and Leia before passing away, leaving
the children effectively orphaned. Leia was adopted by Organa and his wife, while
Luke was sent to Tatooine to live with Schmi Skywalker's relatives, the Lars family. Obi-Wan moved to Tatooine to keep watch over
Luke, while Yoda moved to the swamps of Dagobah to live in solitude. In the absence of the Jedi, Emperor Palpatine
quickly consolidated his vast power with Vader by his side. However, even as he celebrated his victory,
a small group of leaders were already sowing the seeds of rebellion. One soon-to-be rebel leader was Han Solo,
a Corellian orphan living on the streets and working for a local crime lord. When he failed to escape the planet with his
girlfriend, Qi'ra, Han enlisted in the Imperial Navy. After three years, Han deserted and joined
up with an outlaw named Beckett to earn a new life for himself as a pilot. His journey led him to reunite with Qi'ra,
now a trusted lieutenant in the Crimson Dawn crime syndicate. Together they embarked on a journey to steal
a valuable shipment of coaxium fuel for Crimson Dawn boss, Dryden Vos. Along the way, Solo met his best friend, Chewbacca,
and obtained his trademark ship, the Millennium Falcon. At the end of the adventure, Qi'ra chose to
betray and leave Han, leaving Han to work as a smuggler for the next decade. In the years after the Great Jedi Purge, the
empire tried to exterminate any former jedi still in hiding. Meanwhile, a small band of resistance leaders
grew more and more organized, and the Rebel Alliance began to take root. Nearly two decades after the fall of the Jedi,
there was a breakthrough thanks to Galen Erso, a Rebel sympathizer who'd been forced to work
on the Death Star. Erso planted a key flaw in the Death Star
that would allow the Rebels to destroy it. During an all-out battle at Scarif, Jyn Erso
and Captain Cassian Andor gave their lives to steal the Death Star plans. Nearly 20 years passed between the end of
the Clone Wars and the Battle of Scarif, and during that time, Leia Organa and Luke Skywalker
had grown up on their adoptive homeworlds. Leia, now princess of Alderaan, was a key
member of the Alliance and managed to flee Scarif with the Death Star plans. When she was captured by Vader, she hid the
plans in R2-D2, who escaped to Tatooine in a pod with his counterpart, C-3PO. On Tatooine, the plans fell into the hands
of Luke, a farm boy with dreams of being a Rebel pilot. After viewing a message from Leia directed
at Obi-Wan Kenobi, he sought out the old man, and when the two met up, Obi-Wan revealed
he was once a Jedi Knight. Determined to get the plans to Alderaan, Luke
and Obi-Wan booked passage aboard Han Solo's Millennium Falcon. Unfortunately, Alderaan had been obliterated,
courtesy of the Death Star. After our heroes found Alderaan destroyed,
the Millennium Falcon was pulled into the Death Star's tractor beam, giving Luke, Han,
and Chewbacca the opportunity to search for Leia, while Obi-Wan disabled the station's
tractor beam. A battle broke out as Luke, Han, Chewie, and
Leia shot their way out of the station, while Obi-Wan dueled Vader in a long-awaited rematch. Sadly, the Sith Lord killed Obi-Wan in front
of Luke. Back at the Rebel base on Yavin IV, the Alliance
formed a plan to assault the Death Star. Luke volunteered to join the fight, while
Han left with the reward money he earned rescuing the princess. At the last moment, Han returned to help in
the battle, shooting Vader out of the sky and leaving Luke free to destroy the Death
Star. With the help of the Force, Luke saved the
Rebel base and handed the Empire its biggest defeat yet. Three years later, Vader finally located the
Alliance base on Hoth and launched a full-scale assault, prompting a Rebel evacuation. Han, Leia, Chewie and C-3PO fled in the Falcon,
while Luke left with R2-D2 in his X-Wing to seek Jedi training from Yoda on Dagobah. The Falcon made its way to the gas planet
of Bespin, where Solo met his old friend, Lando Calrissian...who unwillingly gave the
Falcon and her crew up to Vader. Luke, sensing his friends were in danger,
went to Bespin against Yoda's wishes to save them. After the bounty hunter Boba Fett froze Han
Solo in carbonite to take him to Jabba the Hutt, Vader and Luke fought in a lightsaber
duel. During the fight, Vader cut off Luke's hand
and revealed that he was his father. Devastated and heartbroken, Luke leapt away
from Vader rather than join the Dark Side, but fortunately, he was rescued by Leia, Lando,
and Chewie. Months passed as the team developed a plot
to rescue Han. Both Leia and Lando infiltrated Jabba the
Hutt's palace while in disguise, but Leia was captured after getting Han Solo out of
the carbonite. Luke sent C-3PO and R2-D2 ahead as "gifts"
for Jabba, before entering himself. Jabba managed to capture Luke, and tried to
have both Luke and Han executed by throwing them into a Sarlacc pit. Luckily, Luke had hidden his new lightsaber
in R2-D2's body, and with the help of Han, Chewie, and Lando, Luke destroyed Jabba's
bodyguards. Meanwhile, Leia strangled the giant worm with
her own chains. After rescuing Han, Luke returned to Dagobah
to find Yoda dying. After Yoda's passing, Obi-Wan's Force ghost
informed Luke that Leia was his sister. Determined to complete his training and restore
the Jedi, Luke returned to his friends. But in the midst of the war, the Empire had
constructed a second Death Star. The second Death Star was fitted with a shield
around its entire exterior, generated by a satellite dish located on the forest moon
of Endor. The Rebel strike included a covert attack
to destroy this shield generator, along with a full-scale fleet assault to destroy the
Death Star itself once the shield was down. Luke, Han, Leia, and Chewie led the Endor
team, while Lando, Admiral Ackbar, and Wedge Antilles led the fleet strike. Meanwhile, Luke turned himself in to Vader
so he could face his father alone on the Death Star. As their battle commenced, Vader brought Luke
before the Emperor, who attempted to convert the young Jedi. Luke resisted Palpatine's control and fought
against Vader. However, after realizing he was becoming just
like his dad, Luke refused to kill Vader. Enraged by this, the Emperor tortured Luke
with Force lightning, which led Vader to pick up his master and throw him into the station's
reactor core. On Endor, Han and Leia destroyed the shield
generator with help from the native Ewoks, and the Rebel fleet completed its mission,
destroying the Death Star and effectively ending the Galactic Empire. As the New Galactic Republic began to form
with help from major Rebel Alliance figures like Leia and Mon Mothma, the remains of the
Empire retreated to the Outer Rim. There, they fell under the command of a mysterious
Force user named Snoke. The ashes of the Empire then gave birth to
the First Order. Meanwhile, Han and Leia had a son, Ben Solo,
who showed the Force prowess of the Skywalker bloodline. Luke made good on his promise to rebuild the
Jedi and started a temple where Ben was a student. Unfortunately, Snoke began to influence Ben,
and the young Jedi turned on Luke, converting some students and slaughtering others. Heartbroken, Luke went into exile. Sensing the threat of Snoke and the First
Order, Leia formed an underground movement separate from the Republic, a group known
as the Resistance. With his military commander, General Armitage
Hux, Snoke developed a massive system-killing weapon known as Starkiller Base. Meanwhile, Ben Solo, now known as Kylo Ren,
sought to find Luke Skywalker. Skywalker's location was hidden on a piece
of starmap obtained by Resistance pilot Poe Dameron and hidden in his droid BB-8. The droid was ultimately found by a Jakku
scavenger named Rey. Together with a First Order deserter named
Finn, Rey stole the long-dormant Millennium Falcon and left Jakku, only to run into Han
Solo and Chewbacca. While stopping off at the planet Takodana,
Rey discovered Luke's original lightsaber, before getting kidnapped by Kylo Ren. With Han and Chewie's help, Finn was able
to return Luke's map to Leia and the Resistance. General Leia Organa and the Resistance launched
a desperate attack to destroy Starkiller Base, while Finn, Han Solo, and Chewbacca tried
to rescue Rey. While there, Han confronted his son, Ben. Hoping to prove to Snoke that he'd truly turned
to the Dark Side, Kylo Ren murdered his father. Up on the surface of the base's planet, Rey
took up Luke's lightsaber and defeated Kylo Ren with her newly-discovered force powers. After the battle, Rey journeyed with R2-D2
and Chewbacca to a remote island on the planet Ahch-To, prepared to ask Luke for guidance. Following Starkiller Base's destruction, the
First Order sent a fleet to the Resistance base on D'Qar. Poe Dameron led a massive attack on the First
Order fleet against Leia's wishes, losing most of the resistance's fleet in the process. While the Resistance fled, Rey found Luke
was unwilling to offer her any assistance. Rey was ultimately able to convince Luke to
help her, but Rey began sharing secret, Force-connected conversations with Kylo Ren. Ultimately, Luke and Rey had a falling out
when she tried to convince him that Kylo was capable of redemption. Rey fled the island, while Force Ghost Yoda
burned down the first Jedi Temple with ghost lightning. Leia and Vice Admiral Holdo staged a last-ditch
effort to save the Resistance from the approaching First Order. On Snoke's flagship, Rey allowed herself to
be captured so she could try to convert Kylo, who initially seemed to be on her side. Rather than watch Rey die, Kylo betrayed his
former master, and killed Snoke. But after fighting Snoke's guards together,
Kylo asked Rey to join him in ruling the galaxy. "The jedi, the rebels. Let it all die. Rey, I want you to join me." Rey declined and fled to the Resistance on
Crait. After Vice Admiral Holdo flew the Resistance
flagship into the First Order fleet, crippling their starships, new Supreme Leader Kylo Ren
led a ground assault on the last of the Resistance on Crait. There, Luke faced down the First Order assault
and bought the Resistance time to escape on the Millennium Falcon. However, the Luke on Crait was a Force projection,
while the real Skywalker was still back on Ahch-To. The strain of projecting his consciousness
across the galaxy was too much, and while the Resistance lived to fight on, Luke became
one with the Force. As Rey trained with Leia to further develop
her Jedi abilities, the resistance discovered that Emperor Palpatine had returned. Palpatine made Kylo Ren an offer: Kylo could
rule the galaxy as a new Emperor with the help of a long-hidden fleet of planet killers
if he agreed to kill Rey. Meanwhile the Resistance went in search of
a Sith Wayfinder which could point the way to Palpatine and stop his fleet before it
launched. As her anxiety built during the mission, Rey
discovered a new layer of darkness in her. Rey's anxieties over who she was built to
a peak when Kylo Ren told her that he knew her true heritage: She was the granddaughter
of Palpatine himself. After learning the truth, Rey nearly killed
Kylo in battle, but healed him after Leia intervened to save her son with her dying
breath. Luke's spirit urged Rey not to give up, and
Rey journeyed to Exegol to confront Palpatine. There, the revived Emperor revealed his true
plan: To convert her to become the new Empress and leader of the Sith. Rey refused his offer
and fought Palpatine with the help of a redeemed Kylo Ren. In the end, both the Emperor and the fleet
were defeated, and the galaxy was saved. In the aftermath of the battle, Rey forged
her own lightsaber and buried those of her teachers in the Tatooine desert. Finally, she revealed that she had taken a
new name: Rey Skywalker. "Again, it's like poetry, sort of, they rhyme. Every stanza kinda rhymes with the last one." Check out one of our newest videos right here! Plus, even more Looper videos about your favorite
movies are coming soon. Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the
bell so you don't miss a single one.
