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British acting veteran Ian McDiarmid has spoken about plans for a scrapped “Star Wars” TV series based around his character of Emperor Palpatine.
Speaking at Spacecon 2026 in San Antonio recently (via IGN), McDiarmid briefly discussed plans for the cancelled series, which he was told of directly by George Lucas himself.
It seems Lucas pitched him the idea of starring in the project, one which never made it into production, which would’ve chronicled his rise in a way not unlike the Robert Carlyle-led “Hitler: The Rise of Evil” mini-series:
“[George Lucas] was talking about, I think I can tell you now, a television series. We had lunch one day, and he said ‘I’ve got this idea, and I hope you might want to be involved.
We could sort of follow the Emperor’s progress, like Hitler’s, some of that. There might be an assassination attempt, and of course it wouldn’t succeed.’ It sounded really exciting, and he also said that maybe you could direct one, and then I fainted. But sadly, that didn’t come to pass.”
McDiarmid didn’t mention the proposed series name but some have suggested it might have tied into Lucas’ lavish and long-gestating “Star Wars Underworld” series.
That would have bridged the gap between the prequel and original trilogies and would’ve gone for at least 60 episodes. That project was discarded after Lucas sold the franchise to Disney.
The post Lucas Wanted An Emperor Palpatine TV Series appeared first on Dark Horizons.
