Count Dooku

Dooku was a Force-sensitive human male from Serenno who served as a Jedi Master during the waning years of the Galactic Republic before falling to the dark side as the Sith Lord Darth Tyranus. As Count of Serenno and Head of State of the Confederacy of Independent Systems, he led the secessionist movement through the Clone Wars. He was the second apprentice of Darth Sidious, whose plan to conquer the galaxy depended on Dooku building a pan-galactic rebellion against the Republic, all while the Count remained unaware that he was merely a pawn in his master's design.

Jedi Master#

Born in 102 BBY during the High Republic Era, Dooku was taken by the Jedi Order after being abandoned by his family and trained as the Padawan of Grand Master Yoda. He later took the maverick Qui-Gon Jinn as his own apprentice and trained others in the art of the lightsaber, becoming one of the most skilled swordsmen the Order had known, a master of the second form of combat, Makashi. A political idealist, he grew disillusioned by the corruption of the Galactic Senate and by what he saw as the complacency and rigidity of the Jedi.

In 42 BBY Dooku left the Order and returned to his homeworld of Serenno, where he reclaimed his title of Count and overthrew his corrupt brother, Ramil. His former peers believed his departure misguided but continued to hold him in high esteem.

Fall to the dark side#

Introduced to Senator Sheev Palpatine on Coruscant, Dooku did not know that the man was secretly Darth Sidious. The Sith Lord saw in the Count a potential leader for a Separatist movement and exploited his frustration with the Republic and the Jedi to begin turning him to the dark side. After the death of Qui-Gon Jinn at the Battle of Naboo, Dooku embraced the dark side fully and took the name Darth Tyranus.

Through the first decade of Palpatine's chancellery, Dooku used his wealth and charisma to recruit entire star systems to the Separatist cause. At the same time he oversaw the creation of the two armies that would be set against each other: the Separatist Droid Army built on worlds such as Geonosis, and the Grand Army of the Republic bred on Kamino. Posing as a Jedi, he commissioned the clone army and, with Sidious, retooled the clones' biochips to trigger Order 66.

Leader of the Confederacy#

After years of maneuvering, the Clone Wars began when the Republic Military invaded Geonosis in 22 BBY. As Separatist leader, Dooku delegated military command to a cadre of subordinates he trained himself, including the cyborg General Grievous, whom he had reconstructed and instructed in lightsaber combat, and the dark assassin Asajj Ventress. He fought Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi on numerous occasions across the war, and pursued schemes to draw the Hutts and other powers into the Separatist fold.

Faithful to the Rule of Two, Dooku was forced to betray Ventress when Sidious grew suspicious that his apprentice was training a successor. Though he later sought to replace her with Savage Opress and then Quinlan Vos, he remained beholden to his master's will. When his former apprentice Maul tried to turn him against Sidious, Dooku refused, knowing his master was more powerful than they realized, though he played along long enough to engineer Grievous's rescue and Mother Talzin's defeat.

Betrayal and death#

By the third year of the war, Dooku and Grievous succeeded in abducting Chancellor Palpatine from Coruscant in 19 BBY, exactly as Sidious had planned. During the ensuing Battle of Coruscant, Dooku dueled Skywalker and Kenobi aboard Grievous's flagship. He bested Kenobi but was disarmed by Skywalker, who severed his hands. At the Chancellor's urging, Skywalker beheaded the defenseless Count. With Dooku's death, the Jedi lost a crucial link to unraveling the mystery of Darth Sidious, and Skywalker would soon take his place as the Sith Master's apprentice, becoming Darth Vader. His role as Darth Tyranus, hidden during his life, was uncovered only long afterward and made known to the wider galaxy.