Yeah. So is mine. It's the only practical way to explain all those multitudes of planetary dictatorships. While there are individual Imperial High Nobles (such as the brand-new and first-ever Archduke of Deneb) who try their best to make the Imperium over into a benevolent dictatorship, it remains an impersonal bureaucracy - a Grey Imperium. The darn thing is just too big and humans are just too uncaring/insular when it comes to conditions beyond their immediate sight for it to be otherwise.

Another very real factor at work in creating this Imperial Greyness is that the Empire and it's agents actively work at keeping the Empire from getting openly involved in Doing Good. Any such actions tend to get an Official Response along the lines of: "Why did you waste scarce Imperial resources - including your precious time and attention - on X Good Deed, when Y Minimal Response would likely have accomplished the same end? And without creating a dangerous precedent of Imperial Involvement In Local Affairs?"

On the other hand, *secretly* Doing Good - such as prompting locals to solve the problem of a megalomaniac ruler on their own, with a bare minimum of undercover aid from the Imperium - tends to get the Official Response of no comment, then a quiet promotion and consequent reassignment to even harder duties elsewhere.   

  

There was a bit in one of the Ian Banks "Culture" novels where the protagonist - from a ~TTL 6 world - had a locally-made handgun to which he was quite emotionally attached. IIRC, this was essentially a Dardick Revolver:  https://www.nrablog.com/articles/2016/9/a-brief-history-of-the-peculiar-dardick-revolver-and-tround/

Anyway . . .

He despaired of ever finding additional rounds for it, while travelling in the wider universe. That is, until he happened to mention this to someone on the ship he was on at the time. The response was: "Oh? That's no problem. Is 50 rounds enough? [taps on a control pad for a few seconds] They'll be waiting in your cabin when you get back." 

Of course, Bank's Culture is a post-scarcity entity. But something similar should be possible in most TUs - at least those which feature gun-nut PCs - given that current real world 3D printers are quite capable of making functional bullets: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/23/3d-printed-bullets_n_3322370.html