#this is not super coherent but just. anakin is so shaped by shmi and i cant get over it

[sheepfulsheepyardinspace]

anakin skywalker's relationship with the jedi order begins and ends with his mother.

the first time he meets a jedi, he's slave, and his first reaction is him saying, “no one can kill a jedi." and that means so much! because he is a slave, and even at age nine, he very explicitly knows that he nor his mother have no control over their own life or their own death. in the next breath, he asks, "have you come to free us [the slaves]?" for nine-year-old anakin, who lives and dies by his master's will and whim (and knows that very, very well), a jedi's power is intrinsically intertwined with a mastery over life and death which he has never had.

and qui-gon says no. and anakin asks him, "why else would you be here?" and that's never, ever answered to anakin's satisfaction. there must be a higher power and a higher goal, here, because up until qui-gon dispels this notion, the jedi have been the highest power anakin can conceive of. ultimately, anakin's freedom does not come from the jedi––he wins his freedom after having it gambled as valuable property—and his entrance into the jedi order comes with leaving his mother behind, his mother behind in slavery, in real and present and explicit danger. but the jedi did have the power to free his mother: anakin knows this, anakin asks this, and anakin is never answered—why didn't the jedi free the slaves?

anakin's most pivotal, most consequential meeting with the jedi order is his first meeting, and he's very much completely rejected by them, for things he can't control: his mother, his age. he is nine years old, has been freed from a lifetime of slavery maybe forty-eight hours before, and taken half-way across the galaxy with people he barely knows to meet an order he thought was myth with powers and rules he does not understand and have not been explained to him. when he is told he is afraid––of course he is.

"afraid to lose her?" yoda asks of shmi, and that line right there echoes off the great chasm that stands between anakin and the jedi order for his entire life. anakin, at such a tender age, is intimately aware that shmi is in clear and present immediate physical danger at all times. yoda is speaking hypothetically, existentially. anakin is not. anakin's fears are grounded deep in reality, of lifelong slavery, and yoda is one of the many standing before him who have the power to help and free his mother. so why not?

anakin's entire career as a jedi is founded on shmi, who told him, "don't look back," who anakin left behind as a slave, so in turn anakin tells his mother, "i'll come back and free you." but ten years later and shmi is still not free—as far as anakin knows.

it hangs over the narrative of aotc until anakin is holding his dead mother's body in his arms. by then, anakin is too late to free his mother, and it morphs: “I will learn to stop people from dying.”

it’s not a rational plan, or a reasonable goal, but it’s an understandable reaction that traces its origin directly back to anakin always having been very acutely aware that he has no control over life or death, especially since he was born as a slave. and no doubt! anakin’s skills drastically increase in the three years between aotc and rots. he goes from unceremoniously having an arm cut off by dooku to being able to relatively easily best him in a duel.

but from shmi’s death onward, every potential death of a loved one is now, in anakin’s mind, the same death played over and over. if he is running through every potential situation as a chance to re-do shmi’s death, he is the only unknown variable. as much as padmé’s death is complicated by their child’s fate hanging in the balance, it is, once again, shmi’s death.

there’s no wonder that anakin turns towards palpatine—who has manipulated and groomed him since age nine, from right when he left his mother—because yoda unknowingly recites the same lines in the script anakin has been feverishly relieving for years. yoda says: the jedi cannot help. his response was the same to padmé that is was to shmi: make peace with this, there is nothing to be done. but why? why not? why didn’t the jedi free the slaves, all those years ago? why can’t they save padmé?

the irony, of course, being that for all of the hellfire and fury anakin brings down on the order, he’s left with exactly the same as where he started. there are slaves. there is death—pointless, pointless death. shmi’s dead, padmé’s dead, his child’s dead. the republic rots away into the empire, because the empire had long before calcified in the bones of what had been a republic.

later, much later, palpatine demands the same thing from vader: i will torture your son, you will watch, and you cannot do anything—make your peace. and finally, finally, anakin shatters the cycle he and the galaxy are trapped in. he saves luke, leia lives, as anakin’s greatest triumphs, because it is the end of the old and beginning of something new. no more slaves. no more death.

[fictionsthings]

Anakin for the character meme?

First of all: *insert incoherent screeching*

Second: This is a lot and I apologize (especially if it doesn't make sense.)

How I feel about this character: Ok, I have a lot of feelings about Ani and they're not all coherent so bear with me. I love him so much but he makes me so sad. Anakin is such a tragic character. So much shit happens to him.

Age 9: Freed from slavery (which is good) and taken from his mother, who is still enslaved (not good AT ALL). He is thrust into a new environment with a bunch of strangers, the majority of whom are hostile towards him. (*coughTheJediCouncilcough*)(HE'S NINE, YOU ASSHOLES! OF COURSE HE'S GOING TO BE SCARED!)

Little Ani is so brave. I never would have been able to leave everything and everyone I cared about, even if my mom wanted me to, even if it meant a better future for me. Not to mention that he literally goes in to battle THE NEXT DAY and NO ONE SAYS ANYTHING!

Age 19: Has nightmares about his mother's death which eventually come true when she dies in his arms, and then kills every Tusken Raider he deems responsible for her death (and not just the men. But the women- and the children too.) He then loses his hand to Count Dooku the next day.

Since my grandfather died this year, I find myself tearing up when Shmi dies. Sure, my grandpa and I weren't super close, but I still loved him very much and for weeks after his death, I could hardly bring myself to do anything. I can only imagine what it must have been like to lose a mother and then have to hide the fact that you were even grieving from the majority of the people in your life.

Age 22-23: Has nightmares of Padme dying in childbirth and becomes reasonably terrified of losing her and their child(ren). He goes to Yoda for advice, but unfortunately, Yoda's advice is shit and doesn't help him at all in any way, shape or form. Palpatine uses Anakin's fear to manipulate him and make him come over to the Dark Side, making Anakin think that it's the only way to save Padme, only for Ani to lose everything he ever loved instead. When Anakin first woke up in the Darth Vader suit, one of the first things he asks is "Where is Padme? Is she safe?" When Palpatine said that Padme was dead, Anakin literally destroys almost every thing in the Medcenter in his grief. Palpatine then relied on Anakin's attachments to ensure that he would remain Palpatine's slave apprentice because Palpatine was the only thing Anakin had left. Not only that, but Anakin felt that he was too far gone to redeem himself. (Note that it was Luke's belief in what goodness Anakin had left that helped him return to the Light. More on that later.)(I fucking hate Palpatine. He has literally been manipulating Anakin since he met the kid on Naboo.)

I would like to say that the majority of people I've seen/talked too agree that it was Palpatine who killed Padme. Anakin was supposed to die on that beach on Mustafar. Palpatine wanted Anakin's power leashed to him, so Palpatine saved him by using Padme's life force. It makes sense. Palpatine has known Padme for years. He mentored her in politics. He knows her, and so it would be easy to identify her in the Force and then steal her life, even easier if she is already weakened from emotional (Anakin's fall and use of the Force on her) and physical stress (her pregnancy and labor). The parallels between Anakin's "repairs" and revival and Padme's childbirth and death make it subtle but obvious all at once. (I also want to punch Palpatine's damn teeth in for smiling at Anakin's pain.)

I'm also half convinced that Palpatine planted those nightmares of Padme in Anakin's mind to draw him closer to the Dark Side.

Age 41-42: Finally kills Obi-wan Kenobi and feels so lonely (and maybe sad, I'm not sure) that Yoda can feel his pain all the way from Dagobah and Yoda feels sorry for him. (I would also like to note that Anakin knew to be off the Death Star in ANH because he had a Force Vision and decided not to tell anyone else because everyone else sucked and you can't change my mind.)

If you- a Dark Lord of the Sith- can make Yoda- Grandmaster of the Jedi Order- feel bad for you, then goddamn you must feel awful. (I'm feeling even more sad, wtf? I didn't realize it was possible)

Age 44-45: Finds out that he has a son and that Palpatine lied to him for literally half his life. Think about that. He has spent approximately 22 to 23 years as Darth Vader and he had a son out there. Literally, nothing is more important to Anakin than Family. He is angry that Luke was kept from him and he is vengeful. (In the Darth Vader comics, he goes to the Lars Homestead to punish the people who "stole" Luke, only to find out that they're already dead.) He singlemindedly searches for Luke for years, and then he finally gets to him on Bespin (after he hurt his son's close good friends.) There's the fight, then he literally cuts off his son's hand and THEN he tells Luke that he is his father. (Anakin, I love you, but you have pretty bad timing.) Then Luke literally chooses to fall, choosing the possibility of death over taking his father's hand.

Even if you're a Sith Lord, that has to hurt. Note that Anakin only made the offer to take down the Emporer and rule the galaxy as father and son once. Luke rejected him (which, I'll admit- perfectly reasonable) and I'm not sure why Ani rejected Luke when Luke pretty much offered the same thing in ROTJ, but something happened and I need to find out what. I may tear my heart out in the process, but it's whatever.

Age 46: Emperor Raisin Face keeps on saying that Luke will either join them or die (which granted, Anakin said in ESB, but still) and so Anakin is reasonably desperate to get Luke over to the Dark Side so he doesn't die. Anakin senses Luke going to the Forest Moon of Endor and decides to pop down for a visit when the Emperor says that Luke will go to him. Luke does indeed go to Anakin, and immediately tries to appeal to Anakin's goodness, to his paternal side. Anakin tries to deny him, says that the name Anakin Skywalker "no longer has any meaning" to him and that "I must obey my master" and continues to deliver his own son to the Emperor. During their fight in the throne room, Anakin finds out that he not only has ONE child, but TWO. He then makes the happy mistake of trying to provoke Luke into fighting him. It works and Anakin loses his hand again. And just when he thinks that Luke might kill him, with the Emperor egging him on, Luke tosses his saber away, rejecting the Emperor and saying, "I am a Jedi, like my father before me." When the Emperor attacks Luke with the Force Lightning and Anakin literally crawls back to the Emporer's side, Anakin eventually answers Luke's calls for help and tosses the Emporer down a chasm. Anakin dies just before Luke can get him off the Death Star and after telling telling that he (Luke) was right about him (Anakin) and that Luke already saved him.

Can I just say that the "I must obey my master" line breaks my heart? Because it absolutely shatters it. As I've gotten older and understood more as I've watched these movies, I have cried at this scene and I will cry when I watch it again. That is not just a threat, it is a promise. It breaks my heart. He sounds so defeated. And I always feel so relieved and happy when he comes back to the light.

Moral of the story is: I want to give him a hug and officially adopt him as my son. (Real talk though, if I met him in real life, I would just do my best to not piss him off.)

All the people I ship romantically with this character:

- Padme

That's it.

My non-romantic OTP for this character: I have many.

- Obi-wan and Anakin

- Ashoka and Anakin (I have yet to see Clone Wars but I've seen a lot of fan content)

- Captain Rex and Anakin (I have yet to see Clone Wars but I've seen a lot of fan content)

- Luke and Anakin

My unpopular opinion about this character:

I'm not sure if this counts as an unpopular opinion, but if you didn't notice, I don't call Anakin by Darth Vader in this and that is because he was always Anakin Skywalker, he was just in denial. Also, it doesn't feel right for me to call him Darth Vader. I used to clarify if I meant Vader or Anakin, but at this point it's just... Why seperate the two? They are the same person. I call the suit "Darth Vader", yes, but honestly it's just to clarify when I'm talking about in ROTS because Anakin is "Darth Vader" both in and out of the suit in that movie.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that Anakin can't go back to being the man he was, but he never stopped being Anakin. He changed, yes, drastically even. He went by a different name, yes. But he was still Anakin Skywalker. It just took him awhile to figure that out. (Hence why he wasn't in the Darth Vader suit as a Force Ghost)

One thing I wish would happened / had happened with this character in canon:

I wish that he and Leia had been able to make some sort of peace. Leia doesn't have to forgive him, Force knows she has every right not to, but it would've been nice if she could have made peace with her parentage in canon.

I actually read a fic like that here on tumblr recently. I'll have to see if I can find it for y'all.

Found it! -> x <-