The grey area

Just like with any other kind of established dictatorship, we don’t expect for the Empire to be seen as being evil throughout the entire galaxy. The best example comes via The Force Awakens, with the Stormtroopers raised to believe all the propaganda the First Order fed to them. Could this be the case of the Empire as well?

Most likely, since Gareth Edwards said about Rogue One that the fight between good and evil won’t be so transparent, leading to “that polarized event that is A New Hope. It’s about the realities of war. Good guys are bad, bad guys are good – it’s a complicated place to set a movie.” (via Empire Online).

So, basically, the Rebel Alliance will be seen throughout the galaxy as being the evil ones, trying to overthrow the order which came with the Empire. Is this what the director says? Apparently, yes. And there is also another point of view in which we can see this grey area: the one of the shifting loyalties.

The Jedi are all but extinct, so they cannot act as beacons of morality – let alone fight with the Sith. Normal people will be the ones to do that – and normal people are much easier to corrupt then the Jedi. And this, basically, means that an Empire agent may have been infiltrated into the Alliance’s lines, or the other way around. And this is where it can get even more interesting.