I think Palpy's clones are empty vessels into which he can move his own soul essence, in effect occupying them when his current body is destroyed or gives out.
I disagree. Partly because it doesn't jive with
how Lucas thought of how the force worked,
or how the Sith thought about what lies beyond death, but mostly because tRoS was so poorly thought out that I have no qualms about ignoring it's BS explanations, and just head-canoning what happened in order for it to actually make some sense.
My contention is that Palpatine actually died. His energy became one with the cosmic force, just like it does with everything else. Being immersed in the dark side, he was unable to retain his individuality, let alone return from the netherworld. So he's gone.
That thing on Exogol was a janky m-count enhanced strandcast clone possessed by the Sith Throne, which is in fact an artefact that acts much like the Nightsisters' altar or the Rur crystal (both of which are essentially really esoteric pieces of technology.) It captures and contains the memories and knowledge of every Sith Lord that has claimed it (basically a super-holocron), with the imprint of Sidious being the most recent. That's why he's bound to that place unable to leave, and why his bodies keep rapidly decaying; he can't exist apart from it. He's not Palpatine, he's just an echo. A crazed shadow of a shadow, surrounded by deluded cultists on a dead world. Even his plan was futile; possessing Rey's body wouldn't have allowed him to leave either, just given him a more viable host . . . for a time.
Feel free to disagree of course. But I think this makes way more sense, does less damage to established lore, and still fits in with what's said in the movie . . . bearing in mind that Palps was as mad as a sack full of kowakian monkey-lizards, and thus not a reliable source of information. Hell, he wasn't even consistent about what he wanted from one scene to the next!
