#but no everything is anakin's fault!

[mirrorofliterature]

see the reason why I hold obi-wan accountable, and wish more people did so, for how he raised anakin and completely fucking fumbled it (canonically), is because he was given a child, a traumatised child who gave the jedi everything, gambled upon his own life to get them to coruscant, helped save naboo - and then this confident, precarious, kind child becomes an emotionally unstable, insecure and desperately starved for praise adult

and who was the main adult raising him during that time? obi-wan!

but to back it up... I have small children in my life - younger relatives, who look up and trust me. I have been in a position of authority over other children as a tutor.

and I just look at obi-wan and think:

how could anyone be so unkind to a child as to not cater for their needs?

obi-wan knows, for ten years, that anakin's mum is still enslaved. does shitall to help. he does nothing tangible to prevent anakin from seeing palpatine, or stop the bullying, or meet anakin where he is at and it is just-

callous and uncaring.

obi-wan cared more about his reputation as a perfect jedi than he did anakin. or, at the very least, that is how he acted, that is what anakin thought.

obi-wan is a great jedi, but objectively a shitty friend and mentor. I'd work with him, but I wouldn't befriend him

anyway be kind to children

if compassion defines jedi, as it should but does not in the PT and which is arguably their greatest flaw, anakin would never have become darth vader

[licorishh]

no way she's alive ?? yea those mental health breaks because social media makes people suck are wild huh

[fieldclover-leaf]

nobody follows me here so i can freely scream into tbe void :33

i'm constantly plagued by that scene from RoTS with ani and padme on the balcony on coruscant.... they're so genuine and so silly and padme is So Excited to start spending the rest of their lives together,,, and it all goes downhill so fast ,,, truly doomed by the narrative . anakin does everything he can to potentially prevent padme's death but it ultimately plays out exactly how his visions showed,, and the dichotomy of padme dying in white and brining new life to the world, while anakin is ultimately experiencing a rebirth into someone who will bring mass destruction,,,, and how the paths eventually converge down the line and return balance to the force i am so fucking emotional over them all the time. bwah

[itstimeforstarwars]

I like to think that Obi-Wan has weird plants that he keeps on the ship during the war because after living with Qui-Gon for so long it's weird not to have any plants and no Cody he doesn't even like plants why would you even think that--

[pilotskywalker]

“Everything is Anakin’s/Obi-Wan’s/the Jedi’s fault!” Have you considered that maybe people and even entities like the Jedi are incapable of perfection and that maybe they all contributed to Anakin’s fall in their own unintentional ways, which does not make them bad or evil or wrong

[myfanfictiongarden]

When you realise that the moment Osha puts on that helmet, its not just about finding the space to focus on the Force without outside influences, its also about her shutting out the world around her and disappearing into her own headspace.

[gayairbud]

truly fascinating to see someone say you cant blame palpatine for being evil because thats his narrative purpose but anakin is worse because he chose that path as if he just. woke up one day and said "hmmm i think today i will become evil" regardless of the 400 page essay in there somewhere about the nuance of his choice after years of textbook grooming and manipulation and trauma. like im obsessed with this idea that palpatine just blinked into existence one day old and fully 100% evil with zero events leading up to that and therefore gets a pass for being evil but if you get manipulated for 23 years WELL maybe you shouldve just been better at cognitive behavioral therapy have you considered that

[millionsofbooks]

ok so. gotten into star wars recently. and would just like to say that padme is finduilas if túrin had liked her back.

like. for those who have not read the children of húrin. please allow me to explain the situation.

pov you're an elven princess of a hidden kingdom. you had a fiancé but he went to fight in a battle later known as 'Unnumbered Tears' (it didn't go well) and never returned. but then it turns out he was taken captive and he's escaped and he's back! and he's brought with him a human he met on the way. your dad lets the human stay because your fiancé vouches for him. the human wears all black, introduces himself as 'Bloodstained, son of Ill-fate', and the first thing he does is ask the smiths to reforge his CLEARLY cursed sword, which he renames 'Iron of Death'. it's described as 'though ever black its edges shone with pale fire'. you fall in love with the human. you are not even a little discouraged when ur (ex-)fiancé reveals that the human is cursed by the local dark lord to bring ruin and destruction wherever he goes.

anyway, the padme amidala energy.....

[sad-trash-hobo]

This..... breaks. My fucking heart

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[maidenvault]

It just bums me out how much of SW fandom clearly doesn’t appreciate the levels of magnificent bastardy that Palpatine achieved as a villain when they bitch about so much being the Jedi Order’s fault. As if the Jedi should have just looked harder under some couch cushions and then they would have found the solid evidence they could use to go after him and the Senate.

Palpatine was too smart for that! No Sith lord had ever aimed so high and achieved so much, and he only did it by playing a long game that started before Anakin was even born. People have to understand that when Dooku tells Obi-Wan that a Sith controls the Senate, that’s hard for him to believe because it is absolutely ridiculous and hard to believe! The Jedi don’t understand why the dark side clouds their awareness because the Sith have become masterful at hiding their presence, which was not the case throughout known history. It would truly be like hearing that Biden’s administration actually are all Satanists who traffic and eat children. Palpatine’s extremely powerful and cunning and unlike anything they’re used to dealing with, otherwise they might seriously consider that Sidious could have accomplished this without the Jedi having any idea. And where do you even begin investigating such a thing when it’s been covered up so well?

The Jedi were always gonna be outmatched against someone like Sidious because a Sith’s whole thing is amassing wealth, influence, and power, and Sidious was probably the best there ever was at it. The Jedi are the opposite, they’re not meant to have those things, and Sidious ended up with too much control of the government for them to have any real power to act. (Probably even if they had complete knowledge of everything, which they never did.) It makes sense that just a couple Sith can bring “imbalance” to the Force when you consider that the use of the dark side is inherently an imbalance of power and a destructive influence in the world this way.

You don’t have to scapegoat anyone else. Palpatine needed his apprentice and other pawns to move around but he really did almost all of it himself. He worked so hard and deserves the hate for his efforts, he really was that bad. :(

[starrdream]

Babysitter

Single dad!Anakin x female!reader summary: After babysitting his kids for a while Anakin thinks he might like you more than they do. includes: fluff

It started with a favor.

Anakin Skywalker wasn’t the kind of man to ask for help, but between work, responsibilities, and raising two wildly energetic children, even he had to admit he couldn’t do it all alone.

Anakin wasn’t expecting much when Obi-Wan recommended you.

“She’s very good with the younglings,” Obi-Wan said.

Anakin had narrowed his eyes. “Is this one of your schemes?”

Obi-Wan had only smirked. “Just give her a chance.”

And that was how you entered his life—just a temporary solution, a babysitter for Luke and Leia so he could handle Council meetings, missions, and the endless responsibilities that came with being a Jedi and a father.

“Y/n showed us how to balance without using the Force!” Leia said one night, practically bouncing in her seat at the dinner table.

“Yeah!” Luke added. “And they said I might be a really good pilot one day!”

Anakin frowned, feeling an irrational surge of�� something. “I told you that.”

Luke shrugged. “Yeah, but Y/n said it cooler.”

Anakin scowled. Ridiculous.

Then, it got worse. Because suddenly, everything was about you.

“Y/n would let us stay up later.”

“Y/n said that’s not how the Jedi Code actually works.”

“Y/n could probably beat you in a fight.”

“Can Y/n be our new mom?”

That last one had nearly made Anakin drop his drink.

And yet, somehow, he found himself putting up with it.

Because for all the ways you annoyed him—your smirks, your effortless way with the twins, the way you never let him get away with anything—he found himself looking forward to having you around.

A little too much.

It wasn’t just the twins, either. Ahsoka liked you. Which made things so much worse.

“She's great,” she had said one afternoon, using the Force to stack training remotes.

Anakin had glanced at her. “Who?”

Ahsoka blinked at him, unimpressed. “Seriously?” She scoffed. “Y/n, obviously.”

Anakin huffed. “You’ve barely trained with her.”

“I did actually. And, I don’t need to train with her.” She said. “She's cool. And she doesn't treat me like a kid.”

Anakin crossed his arms. “I don’t treat you like a kid.”

Ahsoka smirked. “You absolutely do.” Then, before he could argue, she added, “Besides, you like her.”

Anakin faltered. “I—”

She grinned. “You do.”

“Snips.”

Ahsoka laughed, hands on her hips. “When are you going to do something about it?”

Anakin groaned, dragging a hand down his face. “You and the twins are going to be the death of me.”

Ahsoka just smirked. “Not my fault you’ve got terrible game.”

It wasn’t dramatic.

There was no grand realization, no major moment of truth.

It was just… you. Sitting across from him late one night after the twins had gone to sleep, nursing a cup of tea, looking so at home in his space.

He should have been exhausted, but instead, he found himself watching the way the light caught the curve of your face, the way your presence settled something deep in his chest.

And just like that—he knew.

“I need your help with something,” he said, setting down his drink.

You raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

He leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. “It’s about Luke and Leia.”

Immediately, your posture straightened, full focus on him. “Are they alright?”

He smirked. “They’re fine.” Then, after a pause, he added, “They just won’t stop talking about you.”

You laughed. “They do tend to go on.”

Anakin tilted his head. “So I figured, maybe it’s time I see what all the fuss is about.”

You blinked. “What?”

He exhaled, bracing himself. “Let me take you out.”

A slow smile tugged at your lips. “Are you saying you trust the twins’ judgment?”

“Absolutely not.” He huffed out a chuckle. “I trust mine.”

Hope you guys like it

[mirrorofliterature]

'obi-wan is such a poor little tragic meow meow'

me, vibrating: obi-wan dug his own grave and he KNOWS it, stop erasing obi-wan's explicit narrative role in creating darth vader. he knows he fucked up when raising anakin, he did fuck up when raising anakin, he DID fail anakin. it's a pretty explicit part of the PT and OT.

them: obi-wan never did anything wrong and anakin, the child, was simply too difficult for obi-wan, the grown ass adult. everything is anakin's fault and obi-wan suffers the most out of every star wars character

me: *throws up my hands in the air* look at what you did to the perfectly flawed complex failed mentor figure. you woobified him into a 2D cariacature, look OSP agrees with me: 'great character, not so great mentor'

[antianakin]

See, but this is why I don't say "the Jedi failed" ever. Because even if you say it with sympathy, it's an inherently negative statement. More people will view it the unsympathetic way than the sympathetic one. And you CAN describe it in other ways that are inherently more sympathetic towards the Jedi. "The Jedi were tricked." "The Jedi were betrayed." "The Jedi nearly won, and one person's selfish choice doomed them all." Or in the case of the corrupt government thing, "The Jedi were protecting as many innocent people as they could." "The Jedi stuck with the system that had allowed them to help as many people as possible in the past." "The Jedi were the only ones really taking any canonical action against said corrupt government TO BEGIN WITH, and they get criticized for doing that too."

I don't mind having the conversation about how the Jedi's choices were all bad, I don't mind discussing how the Jedi had to infringe on their own morals in order to protect people, I don't mind discussing the fact that they DID lose, but by phrasing it as "They failed" I feel like it inherently puts the responsibility ON THEM when that's never the point and it's never true. The Jedi failed only in the sense that they lost. They did everything right. They fought the war, they protected as many people as possible, they took out all the enemy leaders, they recognized the corruption in their OWN leader and the inevitable consequences if he remained in power, and then they made moves to remove said corruption so that the government could try to become LESS corrupt, and the ONLY REASON that this doesn't work is because Anakin chose to betray them all. That's it. That's the reason they lose. One person's selfish greed. If Anakin had been like two minutes slower in getting to that office, the Jedi would've won. Palpatine would be dead, the Separatists would have lost, the war would've been over. Even if Palpatine's stooges had tried to continue it, I don't think it would've lasted very long given that everyone actually running things from both sides would've been gone. The Jedi would've still been around, the clones wouldn't have been turned against them, and this would give the Republic a pretty major advantage. And if we bring in the Loyalists in the Senate, Palpatine's death gives an opportunity for them to step in and make changes they couldn't have made before perhaps.

But by starting with "The Jedi failed," it just removes all of that nuance from the conversation for me. They DIDN'T fail. ANAKIN failed. If you don't start with it being ANAKIN'S choice and ANAKIN'S responsibility and ANAKIN'S failure, then it scrapes away all of the things that make the story meaningful. It was not and is not and has never been the story of how the Jedi failed. It's the story of how ANAKIN failed (and the OT is the story of how Luke succeeds where Anakin failed). Making it about the Jedi's failure is just inaccurate and removes the focus of the story from where it's supposed to be. As relatable and sympathetic as Anakin is meant to be, as much as he is ostensibly supposed to be "trying", it's still his failure, and no one else's. That's the story.

But by saying "The Jedi failed," that story goes away. It's gone now. Because no one reading that statement is ever going to read it sympathetically. And it's a particularly unsympathetic way of describing what happened anyway. So I don't say it. Because I find it super unhelpful to say it when it doesn't accurately get across what the story is. The Jedi didn't failed. The Jedi WERE failed, by everyone else, everyone around them, everyone they should've been able to trust. The galaxy failed. The Jedi just... lost.

When it comes to Jedi discourse I think a lot depends on the amount of sympathy behind a statement there is. For example, "The Jedi have been corrupted by this war." is something Lucas has said, but it's in the context of how they were drawn into a trap, they were forced into roles that they were never meant to be, there's sympathy there for how the only choices here are shitty ones. "Do they compromise their morals (to fight in this war) or does everyone die and it's pointless anyway?" is basically what he said. I agree with that! But I have seen many people say, "The Jedi became corrupted by the war." and they mean it as the Jedi no longer cared about people, only themselves, they were only looking out for themselves, they were making selfish choices. There's no sympathy for the rock-and-a-hard-place situation the Jedi were in, and I disagree with that and I think that's what a lot of people are arguing back against. "They allied themselves with a corrupt government!" is another one--like, yeah, the Republic government wasn't great! But, when I say that the Separatists were worse, it's not because I'm refusing to admit the Republic had any fault, I'm saying it because that's basically the choice laid out in front of them--either you help the Republic or you let the Separatists take over, who were committing war crimes on screen. I do think the Jedi were hamstrung by their connection to the Republic! I just also think the alternative was worse, that the whole structure of Star Wars as a story was designed to hem them into this impossible choice (in as much as Star Wars is about the Jedi, when they're very much not the core of the story), that they couldn't find better options because the story wasn't set up to allow that. Could the Jedi have handled Anakin better? Ehhh, I think that's hard to say because the story itself doesn't present that, so making hard proclamations about what they did/didn't do wrong is reading into something the story didn't address. The story is about Anakin refusing to emotionally accept Jedi teachings--can we read beyond that and say there were ways the Jedi failed him? I think you can and some of them are fair (and some of them aren't), that it's a fun conversation to have, but that it's not what the narrative intention is, if we're talking about actual narrative intention. The narrative intention is that Anakin, though very human in his failings and Lucas clearly has so much affection for his Blorbo, failed to learn what he needed to learn. But there, too, I think a lot depends so much on how much sympathy comes across for the choices being made. I don't think we're meant to see Anakin as someone we can't relate to, Lucas even says that Anakin is a victim in TPM (of the Hutts and Watto, to be clear), I don't think criticism of Anakin can come without that he was trying, that he did genuinely love people. The ending of ROTJ doesn't work without us wanting for Anakin to find the good in himself! That we knew had to be there all along. So much comes down to how much sympathy there is in the criticism, how much sympathy there is for the reasons why any given character chooses the paths they do, and that's where a lot of disconnect comes from. So much Jedi criticism is done in the vein of saying, "They failed." and meaning it as an accusation of how a better choice was super obvious. But if you say, "They failed." in the sense that there was no way out of the trap that they could have possibly forseen, given the circumstances, that they did their best and they shouldn't have to be perfect to be good, then I'm all the way onboard! It's about how much sympathy there is for the context around a given character's choices and what the story allowed for them. I have no issue with saying the Jedi failed in the war, that they became corrupted by it, that their connection to the Republic led to their genocide, because I don't think the Jedi were bad for it, I think they made the best choices they could in the worst situation.

[skywalkr-nberrie]

Friendly reminder that Padmé isn’t supposed to be considered ‘unreasonable’ for falling in love with Anakin nor choosing him because she’s “messy and traumatized” (I mean she is traumatized, but that’s a whole other in dept nuance in her character, worthy of analysis.) and that she only wanted to live out her “fairytale fantasy” and that’s why she chose to marry Anakin. No, she chose him because she saw the goodness and beauty of him. She loved him for his soul, his sincerity, for his passion, etc. It’s actually reasonable why she chose him and married him. It’s just a misconception that she had to be as insane as Anakin for her to ever choose him, because a good hearted and morally righteous woman could never want someone like him.

Padmé is traumatized, her story parallels Anakin in many ways, she has the sort of nuance that pars even Anakin’s character, she had to put up with running a whole planet at the age of 14, and she had her whole life stolen from her at a very young age. She feels like she’s made to live in servitude and her duty rather than dream of her own life. She had multiple handmaidens that upheld the system of pretending to be her for the sake of taking her spot in case someone puts her in grave danger, robbing Padmé of her self identity, and burdening her with the guilt of someone else dying for her. Her only real friends are all people from her work, aka her colleagues.

So yes, indeed Anakin is her safe spot, her breath of fresh air, her happiness, her everything. He’s her perfect ‘fairytale ending’ that she always deserved, but that’s not why she fell in love with him. Padmé’s love for Anakin and decision to be with him isn’t in anyway associated to her trauma (in the way most people think, I mean.) or that it means she’s insane. It’s a reflection of how passionate, sincere, romantic, hopeful, domestic, emotional, and spiritual she is as a person. She is like Anakin in that way too, and that’s why they connected so deeply. Padmé was aware of all of Anakin’s flaws, and darkness and she still loved him because she was capable of seeing that the greatness in him was more.

“But though she loves her husband without reservation, love does not blind her to his faults. She is older than he, and wise enough to understand him better than he does himself. He is not a perfect man: he is prideful, and moody, and quick to anger—but these faults only make her love him the more, for his every flaw is more than balanced by the greatness within him”

- Revenge of the Sith novelization written by Matthew Stover.

[tumblingxelian]

Can I ask what deep seated flaws they had?

Because every time I see this brought up it always ends up being either not a flaw at all, something some other faction did, or 'human' error type stuff, which is unreasonable to expect any group to lack.

Before answering, and only do so if you wish to, I wish to note my stance on the following traditional answers:

The Republic being corrupt is not their fault.

Anakain being a fascist speciest is not their fault.

Anakin wanting to both be a Jedi & get married is not their fault.

The Sith wanting to kill them & corrupting people is not their fault.

They had no means of magically liberating slaves everywhere & had people working to undermine slavery across the Galaxy.

The Jedi's advice of not letting despair & fear consume you when worried or grieving is not bad advice. It is actually quite typical for most religions & especially when one is being given no details.

The Order stood for thousands of years. They mixed species & cultures, former slaves and traumatized victims with those who were basically born into the Order. They gave a multitude of life skills from diplomacy to mechanics, to piloting & allowed people to freely leave or return if they so wished.

Despite there only being ten thousand in a massive densely populate galaxy. They still labored to stop wars, oppression, corruption, slavery and genocide to the best of their abilities in the places they could reach.

Every other Jedi for thousands of years did not become a genocidal Sith because they couldn't be an obsessive possessive and a Jedi at the same time.

So barring 'human' error, what deep seated flaws did they have?

Don't understand why so many SW fans seem to struggle w the fact that 'the jedi order had developed a lot of deep-seated flaws and problems that contributed to their downfall' and 'the jedi order was a force for good and their destruction was a major loss' are two concepts that fully co-exist u know

[cosmicmordecai]

“ Why do people hate things being Jedi critical? It’s okay if they’re flawed.”

There’s flawed and then there’s presenting the idea the in universe religious minority who essentially have to fucking do everything as narratively ‘flawed’ bc they don’t appease everybody essentially. Be it Anakin, be it their philosophy, etc and correlate to the idea of how that leads to their fall. Most ‘Jedi critical’ points just assigns a unusual level of onus on them for simply existing. Jedi are human/human-like so we know they’re flawed to a point but when they’re accessory to slavery, accuse them of child taking, or whatever points and ignore context, it’s not being critical. Y’all just wanna slander.

Whats actually annoying is how this fandom & this franchise can look at this religious minority group (composing a lot of PoCs & allusions to other cultures) who get literally persecuted by a politician who created a entire army called Stormtroopers, which is right on the nose for Nazi allegories, and go “lets craft ideas & stories that suggest they’re at fault for really existing & not being perfect paragons of good.” This is the same fandom to say the Sith made some good “points” despite being a part of the problem, ignore the Mandalorian’s weird ass system of government, and find ways to sympathize with characters who participate in murder & genocide because they’re hot (Anakin, Kallus, Maul).

And to top it all off, the story had them killed via mind control to shoot them in the back by people they bonded with for maximum hurt & efficiency after fabricating a war using OTHERS.