I wondered twenty-some years ago why they didn’t just go back to Tatooine with Coruscant pocket change and buy Shmi’s freedom and set her up with a pleasant little retirement cottage or a condo in a senior-friendly complex in that Dinotopia-ripoff capitol city on Naboo. Yeah, yeah, Jedi code against attachments or whatever—but it’s not an “attachment” if she’s just not a slave anymore and living somewhere else that is not misery desert.
Anakin’s massacre of the Tusken raiders is also the wrong kind of step into evil, from a character perspective. We’re supposed to see Anakin becoming Darth Vader, and Vader is in the main a cold-blooded villain: implacable, determined, even a bit grusomely sardonic. (“Apology accepted, Captain Needa.”) An explosion of blind rage doesn’t fit. Anakin should have been a cop using excessive force, like maybe killing the alien who attempted to assassinate Amidala while trying to Jack Bauer information out of them.
Anakin’s massacre of the Tusken raiders is also the wrong kind of step into evil, from a character perspective. We’re supposed to see Anakin becoming Darth Vader, and Vader is in the main a cold-blooded villain
I’ve said for 20 years that Anakin’s fall, in the movies, comes off mostly as an ass-pull. The scene where he kneels to Palpatine and Palpatine literally seems to dream up his iconic villain name on the spot has always felt like exactly that. “Oh well, Windu fell out a window, guess I’ll be evil now!”
That’s probably why these fash weirdos are pumping the ROTS novelization rather than the movie itself, as I understand it sheds light on Anakin’s internal narrative in much more detail. I’ve always had the sense that Lucas was trying to say something about the (sadly still relevant) trend of American school shootings with both the Tusken massacre and the infamous youngling slaughter, but we don’t get enough time with Anakin in the movies to gain much idea as to why he would reach directly for mass violence. If you’re just going by the movies, the idea that he’s still carrying unresolved trauma from being enslaved carries nearly all that weight. And if that’s all you’ve got to go on, it reflects pretty badly on the Jedi not helping him with that for the 10-15 years he’s with them. The movies do seem to admit that the Jedi Order is a failing institution, but this conflicts with the shiny happy optimism of Luke growing into a Jedi in the original trilogy. Rian Johnson tried to square this circle later, but obviously he didn’t convince everybody.
If anything, Anakin’s interactions with Dooku are the most convincing bit. Hotheaded apprentice gets in over his head -> later matures just enough that he has to be pushed into taking murderous revenge. That points toward the violent-cop narrative you suggest, but we don’t spend nearly enough time with that storyline for it to breathe. My favorite fan works posit Vader as essentially being Palpatine’s slave, and thus psychologically beaten down to the point of near collapse. fialleril on AO3 is one of the most inspirational in writing this sort of stuff.
That’s probably why these fash weirdos are pumping the ROTS novelization
I bet they just heard that it’s an actual good book (sort of true, terms and conditions apply) and namedrop it so people might associate them with quality.
the idea that he’s still carrying unresolved trauma from being enslaved carries nearly all that weight
And like his time as a slave didn’t even seem all that bad, he looked like a clean and well fed kid who had time to pursue engineering as a hobby and would nerd out about local sport events.
The shape of the story feels like Anakin was aged down late in development and he was meant to cut a more harrowing figure as both a run down victim of generational slavery as well as a target of racism/speciesism all too eager to prove himself (wasn’t there a thing where the other kids were being demeaning to him about humans being too slow in the head to be good pod racers), and also old enough to catch similarly aged Amidala’s eye, instead of inadvertently turning her into a creep who ogles grade schoolers. And the jedi wouldn’t need to pretend that you must be like months old to start training otherwise it might not take, which implicitly turns them into baby snatchers.
The shape of the story feels like Anakin was aged down late in development and he was meant to cut a more harrowing figure as both a run down victim of generational slavery as well as a target of racism/speciesism all too eager to prove himself
I’ve never thought of it this way, but that does in fact make the most sense. Lucas swerved at the last minute to make Episode 1 a kiddy movie? I can’t imagine he would have needed to do that to secure funding for the then long-awaited continuation of Star Wars, but stranger things have happened.
wasn’t there a thing where the other kids were being demeaning to him about humans being too slow in the head to be good pod racers
Yes, this is a pretty critical plot point, Anakin can only participate as a human because he can use the Force.
Could be he decided it would be more lucrative to to aim for a harry potter situation, where the movies would get more serious as the intended audience grew up, while taking the older fans for granted.
The victim of racism angle also fits with him being completely ok with the empire being very much human supremacist.
I remember seeing Star Wars for the first time in '78 or something (we lived in Malaysia at the time and I believe it took some time to get there). I was dead center in the marketing targetting. And for a while I was dying to know about the Clone Wars and what Luke’s father was doing there.
God, Ep 1 was such a let-down.
I believe there are 2 kinds of nerds - those that accept that there will just be mentions of the lore and it’s basically flavor, and those that just need to know and explore the lore down to the last minutae. Let me tell you, the image I had of the Clone Wars as an 8 year old was way fucking cooler than what appeared in Ep 2. And Vader?? Please let me keep my personal backstory.
I bet they just heard that it’s an actual good book (sort of true, terms and conditions apply) and namedrop it so people might associate them with quality.
I wondered twenty-some years ago why they didn’t just go back to Tatooine with Coruscant pocket change and buy Shmi’s freedom and set her up with a pleasant little retirement cottage or a condo in a senior-friendly complex in that Dinotopia-ripoff capitol city on Naboo. Yeah, yeah, Jedi code against attachments or whatever—but it’s not an “attachment” if she’s just not a slave anymore and living somewhere else that is not misery desert.
Anakin’s massacre of the Tusken raiders is also the wrong kind of step into evil, from a character perspective. We’re supposed to see Anakin becoming Darth Vader, and Vader is in the main a cold-blooded villain: implacable, determined, even a bit grusomely sardonic. (“Apology accepted, Captain Needa.”) An explosion of blind rage doesn’t fit. Anakin should have been a cop using excessive force, like maybe killing the alien who attempted to assassinate Amidala while trying to Jack Bauer information out of them.
I’ve said for 20 years that Anakin’s fall, in the movies, comes off mostly as an ass-pull. The scene where he kneels to Palpatine and Palpatine literally seems to dream up his iconic villain name on the spot has always felt like exactly that. “Oh well, Windu fell out a window, guess I’ll be evil now!”
That’s probably why these fash weirdos are pumping the ROTS novelization rather than the movie itself, as I understand it sheds light on Anakin’s internal narrative in much more detail. I’ve always had the sense that Lucas was trying to say something about the (sadly still relevant) trend of American school shootings with both the Tusken massacre and the infamous youngling slaughter, but we don’t get enough time with Anakin in the movies to gain much idea as to why he would reach directly for mass violence. If you’re just going by the movies, the idea that he’s still carrying unresolved trauma from being enslaved carries nearly all that weight. And if that’s all you’ve got to go on, it reflects pretty badly on the Jedi not helping him with that for the 10-15 years he’s with them. The movies do seem to admit that the Jedi Order is a failing institution, but this conflicts with the shiny happy optimism of Luke growing into a Jedi in the original trilogy. Rian Johnson tried to square this circle later, but obviously he didn’t convince everybody.
If anything, Anakin’s interactions with Dooku are the most convincing bit. Hotheaded apprentice gets in over his head -> later matures just enough that he has to be pushed into taking murderous revenge. That points toward the violent-cop narrative you suggest, but we don’t spend nearly enough time with that storyline for it to breathe. My favorite fan works posit Vader as essentially being Palpatine’s slave, and thus psychologically beaten down to the point of near collapse. fialleril on AO3 is one of the most inspirational in writing this sort of stuff.
I bet they just heard that it’s an actual good book (sort of true, terms and conditions apply) and namedrop it so people might associate them with quality.
And like his time as a slave didn’t even seem all that bad, he looked like a clean and well fed kid who had time to pursue engineering as a hobby and would nerd out about local sport events.
The shape of the story feels like Anakin was aged down late in development and he was meant to cut a more harrowing figure as both a run down victim of generational slavery as well as a target of racism/speciesism all too eager to prove himself (wasn’t there a thing where the other kids were being demeaning to him about humans being too slow in the head to be good pod racers), and also old enough to catch similarly aged Amidala’s eye, instead of inadvertently turning her into a creep who ogles grade schoolers. And the jedi wouldn’t need to pretend that you must be like months old to start training otherwise it might not take, which implicitly turns them into baby snatchers.
I’ve never thought of it this way, but that does in fact make the most sense. Lucas swerved at the last minute to make Episode 1 a kiddy movie? I can’t imagine he would have needed to do that to secure funding for the then long-awaited continuation of Star Wars, but stranger things have happened.
Yes, this is a pretty critical plot point, Anakin can only participate as a human because he can use the Force.
Could be he decided it would be more lucrative to to aim for a harry potter situation, where the movies would get more serious as the intended audience grew up, while taking the older fans for granted.
The victim of racism angle also fits with him being completely ok with the empire being very much human supremacist.
I remember seeing Star Wars for the first time in '78 or something (we lived in Malaysia at the time and I believe it took some time to get there). I was dead center in the marketing targetting. And for a while I was dying to know about the Clone Wars and what Luke’s father was doing there.
God, Ep 1 was such a let-down.
I believe there are 2 kinds of nerds - those that accept that there will just be mentions of the lore and it’s basically flavor, and those that just need to know and explore the lore down to the last minutae. Let me tell you, the image I had of the Clone Wars as an 8 year old was way fucking cooler than what appeared in Ep 2. And Vader?? Please let me keep my personal backstory.
Yeah, they don’t strike me as the reading type.