WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Star Wars: Darth Vader #11, by Greg Pak, Raffaele Ienco, Neeraj Menon, and Joe Caramanga, on sale now.

One of the most controversial moments in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker came with the revelation of Rey's heritage. Contrary to earlier statements that she was a "nobody," she was actually the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine, who genetically created a son that ran away and had Rey.

After Rey buried Luke and Leia's lightsabers on Tatooine, she told a passerby that she was a Skywalker, forgoing her Palpatine family name for the Force-wielders who trained her. Star Wars: Darth Vader #11, Rey might well have been spot on because this comic hints she does indeed have Skywalker blood in her veins.

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As Vader investigates the Exegol temple and finds Palpatine's lab, the Emperor gets into his mind, pointing out that he's been using "the scalpel of creation." Most notably, Vader sees a right hand, which strongly implies that Palpatine might have collected Luke Skywalker's lost hand or possibly the one Anakin lost to Count Dooku for his own experiments. If either of those possibilities is true, that hand carries the midi-chlorian-rich blood of the Skywalkers.

As he sends his guards after Vader, Palpatine mentions that he could conjure a new Sith apprentice, which hints that Palpatine has been fiddling with Skywalker DNA.

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With all of that in mind, it stands to reason he could have spliced his DNA with any Skywalker DNA he had to create the son who would go on to be Rey's biological father. Thus, Rey might be both a Palpatine and a Skywalker on a genetic level. What also fuels this notion is Marvel already indicated Palpatine manipulated the midi-chlorians in Shmi Skywalker, which means he has a stable hold on Skywalker genes. Accordingly, the Skywalker limb could have provided the right elements for his son, which would then be passed down to Rey.

an image of dark side rey wearing a hood with a red saber

Seeing how the Emperor predicted the Force Dyad with Ben Solo/Kylo Ren, this could have been part of Palpatine's plan to create the ultimate Sith, a fate hinted at in the shots of Dark Rey. He told Mace Windu that Anakin would become more powerful than any Jedi in Revenge of the Sith, so it makes sense he wouldn't stop fiddling with his apprentice's genetics to push that power even farther.

This explains why Palpatine saw Rey as the vessel for his second coming and the key to victory. Had his plan fully worked, it would have been a perfect capstone to years of manipulating the Skywalker bloodline. If Rey had the blood of two Force-wielding families in her, this could explain why she was so powerful and conflicted and why

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