| “ | Oh, it's beautiful. | „ |
| ~ Orson Krennic after watching the first test of the Death Star on Jedha City, resulting in its complete destruction. |
| “ | Are we BLIND? DEPLOY THE GARRISON! MOVE! | „ |
| ~ Orson Krennic's most famous quote. |
Director Orson Callan Krennic is the main antagonist of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
He was a high ranking official of the Galactic Empire, who worked with Galen Erso during the construction of the Death Star I. Due to how he resorts to extreme measures of destructive warfare in maintaining his chain of command, Krennic is one of the biggest legitimate negative points on the Empire's track record and reputation among the citizens of the galaxy. He is the archenemy of the Rogue One squad (especially Galen's daughter Jyn Erso) and Grand Moff Tarkin's arch-rival.
He was portrayed by Ben Mendelsohn.
What Makes Him Pure Evil?[]
- During the Clone Wars, he massacred civilians and noncombatants who were affiliated with the Separatists.
- He orchestrated a war on Malpaz, incriminating the planet for opposing the Galactic Empire due to its supposed terrorist attack on the Project Celestial Power facility, which claimed the lives of ten thousand people.
- It actually, it happened due to experiments ordered by Krennic to test the energy output of the Death Star.
- He was behind the creation of the Death Star (though this credit was later stolen by Tarkin).
- He blew up a facility full of engineers who wanted to back out of the Death Star project.
- He tracks down Galen and tries to use his wife Lyra and his daughter Jyn as hostages to force him to return to the project.
- When Lyra turns up and aims a blaster at him, Krennic at first tries to talk her down, but when she stands up to him, Krennic orders his guards to open fire and the Death Troopers kill Lyra. He then sends troops to capture Jyn and has Galen's house burned down.
- He tests the Death Star on the civilian city of Jedha, obliterating it and destroying the Rebel Saw Gerrera and his Partisan cell, and calls the destruction "beautiful."
- He also wanted to destroy the entire moon at first, but even Tarkin felt that was too much and ordered him to scale down.
- Informed that one of the scientists is a traitor, he orders their immediate execution upon nobody coming forward.
- Although Galen admitted he was the traitor and not any of his scientists, Krennic regardless orders all of Galen's scientists to be killed and slaps Galen, knocking him to the ground, then psychologically tortures him by gloating about Jedha City's destruction.
- He holds Jyn Erso at gunpoint as she's about to transmit the Death Star plans, gloating that she's too late to stop him, before trying to kill her.
- He shoots Cassian Andor during the battle on Scarif while he was trying to transmit the Death Star plans, nearly killing him.
- His death is portrayed for satisfaction as he was killed by the thing that he created and planned to use to hurt countless people.
- While he does have some comedic moments, they do not detract from his villainy and the other characters take him seriously.
- Despite being dead by the time of A New Hope, he still played an indirect role in the destruction of Alderaan due to being the creator of the Death Star.
- Despite being friends with Galen before, he clearly no longer has any care for him as he got his wife killed as well as tried to capture Jyn only to make him work on the Death Star by force.
- Despite the heinous standards of the Star Wars franchise, he has low resources, which allows him to stand out for the aforementioned crimes that he committed.
Trivia[]
- Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel includes additional backstory for Krennic, which reveals his heinous actions during and after the Clone Wars before the events of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, thus giving Krennic the necessary traits to qualify as Pure Evil. While one could argue that Krennic isn't as bad as Grand Moff Tarkin due to the chain of command and Krennic's apparent lack of resources in comparison to the vile Grand Moff in the movie, the novel demonstrates that Krennic wasn't too different than Tarkin and would have done anything like him to further his own career.
- In the Rogue One novelization it's hinted that Krennic had some remorse for Lyra's death, as he notes he would have preferred not to kill her out of "cordiality" to Galen. However this isn't canonical since Lyra dies differently in the novel (as she shoots Krennic first and is then killed by his troopers in retaliation, while in the film Krennic orders her gunned down himself). Also even if he was conflicted at first he later mocks her death when he confronts Galen on Eadu so it's clear he no longer feels bad about it.
- Krennic is the only Star Wars Pure Evil to appear in the movies that wasn't from the Skywalker Saga.
External Links[]
- Orson Krennic on the Villains Wiki
- Orson Krennic on the Star Wars Wiki
- Orson Krennic on the Wikipedia
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 Pure Evils
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 Pure Evils
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