User blog:Doodpeal/PE Proposal: Grand Moff Tarkin

Again, as usual, gotta make it approved rather than non-approved.

What's the work
Grand Moff Tarkin is the main antagonist of the world-acclaimed 1977 space-opera film Star Wars. He is the commander of the top-secret moon-sized battle station known as the Death Star.

He also is the secondary antagonist of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, a direct prequel to Star Wars, which also further expanded upon his ruthlessness.

He appears as a major antagonist in the 2008 Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Star Wars Rebels, and a minor background character in Revenge of the Sith.

Who is he, and what has he done?
I'm sure the millions of people who have seen Star Wars will know most stuff or everything here, but those who haven't seen it, spoiler alert!

Grand Moff Tarkin, as previously mentioned earlier, is the commander of the Death Star. It's massive kyber-crystal power and size effectively makes the Death Star capable of destroying entire planets. His high power was effectively given to him via his influential Tarkin Doctrine, which emphasized military and use of such to "keep people in line", thus convincing the emperor to give him a lot of power. However, it could be considered a failure, as an example of one of his heinous actions rather motivated people to join the rebel faction against the Galactic Empire.

Onto his crimes, I guess now. Grand Moff Tarkin used his power in an irredeemably evil manner. Impressed by the irredeemably evil action that Orson Krennic had committed, that being the firing upon Jedha (on only low power), a populated city, he had stated that he would take control of the Death Star, given faults that occurred under Krennic's control.

When Tarkin was in control of the Death Star, arguably his most infamous crime occured, while he was interrogating Princess Leia. Tarkin repeatedly asked of Princess Leia to give away the location of a main rebel base, under the threat of rendering the Death Star fully operational by firing upon her home planet of Alderaan. She bluffs and states that the rebel base is on Dantooine, a very sparsely populated planet, where the rebel base once was before being abandoned. For a split second, Tarkin appears satisfied and you think he's going to just head over there and destroy it, right? Nope, he orders his crew to fire upon Alderaan anyway. He also forces her to watch the heavily genocidal event under Darth Vader's restraint. The destruction of Alderaan killed billions of innocent people, and almost entirely wiped out the Alderaanian race, with only a few ten thousand left. Once they scout Dantooine and find a deserted rebel base with nothing on it, Tarkin orders Leia's execution (which never happened).

When all aboard the Millennium Falcon were forcefully pulled into the Death Star and rescued Princess Leia, there was a tracking device snuck onto the Millennium Falcon, and the Millennium Falcon headed over for the moon of Yavin 4, the location of an actual rebel base. Tarkin ordered the Death Star to head to the Yavin system, to destroy the moon. However, the rebels retaliate and storm the Death Star via spacecraft. Tarkin is extremely arrogant; he underestimates the true power of the rebels, and ignores all the warnings given by his servants. (He also ignored Darth Vader's previous warning that the Force is astronomically more powerful than the station, which ultimately was his downfall!) As soon as Yavin 4 is in range, he orders a firing upon the moon. Before they can even succesfully fire, Luke via the force and torpedo, fires into the reactor core of the Death Star, as well as numerous calls to stand by. The Death Star is then destroyed, and Tarkin is killed along many others.

Heinous Standard
Star Wars villains typically are pretty evil indeed. For say, Darth Vader's tyranny and wide enforcement of bad crimes by the Empire, Count Dooku's de jure leadership of an opposing separatist faction (which is secretly a plan by Darth Sidious/Palpatine to eliminate Jedi and to gain nigh unlimited power, and Dooku probably knows), but the two previously mentioned villains are not remotely Pure Evil. Darth Vader did have compassion for others (Padme, Stormtroopers), and Count Dooku was affable. However, Tarkin is one of the "worst of the worst" type villains in the Star Wars media franchise, along with characters like Darth Sidious/Emperor Palpatine. Very few characters have orchestrated massively genocidal actions like Tarkin. Apart from Tarkin's technical ethnic cleansing of Alderaanian's in the name of keeping people in line, the most notable would be Sidious committing genocide against the Jedi, killing thousands, and starting wars being responsible for the deaths of billions. Many other characters are either too enigmatic, not heinous enough, or moral agency just isn't made clear enough.

Mitigating Factors
None whatsoever. He is not loving, given his apparent adultery once done. He is not a nice person, as him speaking in a "nice" manner to Leia was merely Faux Affably Evil. His massive destruction and death tolls in the name of security was merely outright terrorism, not extremism. His villainy was totally constant.

Final Verdict
Pure Evil. I'd say he could be considered the Heinrich Himmler of the Star Wars franchise.