Birkhoff tries to talk Nikita out of her strike against the Oversight: "Now you wanna take out the entire Imperial Senate?" In TESB, Luke's ill-fated gunner says, "Right now I feel like I could take on the whole Empire myself." Birkhoff, being a nerd, replaces "Empire" with "Imperial Senate", bacause Emperor Palpatine did the *opposite* in the Star Wars movies: He disbanded the *Republic* Senate and took all power himself by declaring himself the Emperor.