Well I think we can safely assume that Palpatine was just plain “evil.”
I’ll never accept that. No man is 100.100% evil. Palpatine – as spiritually dead as he was – must have had at least one good spark in him. Personally, I believe he loved his mother – in spite of himself, in spite of the darkness he had embraced, he loved her.
When was Palpy’s mom ever mentioned in the prequels?
Robot Chicken’s version of Palpatine’s early life is in my personal canon. 😉