Cause And Effect: Anakin's Fall to Darkness.

This is an essay I wrote in my english class last semester. I wrote it in about an hour right before it was due, but it ended up being one of the best essays I've ever written!

Anakin Skywalker?s slide to the dark side is an effect of many different causes. On the surface, it may seem as if it is simple, yet in reality it is one of the most complex transitions that any one person may go through. He is both light and dark, conflicted with doubt, and clouded with uncertainty. Cause and effect is crucial to his story, because there are so many long term effects and short term effects. Anakin Skywalker is plagued by greed, is unable to allow the natural order of life to take its course, and is unable to control his temper, all which lead to his path towards darkness.

Anakin?s own greed and lust for power is at the centerfold of his fall to the dark side. He longs for this power in order to keep things, in order to control people?s fate so that they are the way he wants them to be. He wants to make things right, a longing that he has had ever since childhood when he vowed to return and free all of the slaves. It is an innocent childhood want, to make the world as it should be and to show it what it can be. When Anakin grows, he has the realization that in all reality, he can attain this power and it is not in the realm of impossibility. As it is said, power corrupts, and Anakin is corrupted by this power and is unable to let it go, to lay it down. This innocent childhood want transforms into greed, the longing for this power to not only control the fates of the ones he loves and to seek immortality, but to control everything. This greed causes him to go to the dark side because it offers what Anakin wants the most: power.

Anakin has always had a knack for not being able to accept things. When he left his mother and went to train in order to become a Jedi Knight, Anakin didn?t want to accept the change, accept the fact that he was leaving his mother. Afterwards, when he goes in search to rescue her, he is unable to accept her death and the fact that he was not powerful enough to save her. Anakin is unwilling to allow the sun to set, to allow life to go on in its natural process as it should, to allow one day to end and another one to begin. It is this that causes Anakin to seek this power to stop people from dying and to protect his family and the ones he holds dearest to him. This, in effect, leads Anakin even further towards the dark side because the things that he seeks are not of the ways of the Jedi.

Anakin is brave to the point of being reckless, impulsive to the point of being careless. He has always had a temper, ever since childhood. When being accused of cheating in the pod race which he had finished first, Anakin impulsively starts a fight with a young alien child named Greedo. It is shown even in his youth that Anakin does allow his emotions to get the best of him at times, and is unable to control his temper. This truly accumulates to his fall because Anakin gets too emotionally attached to things, which is why he longs for this power to protect his family. Anakin, out of hatred and rage, slaughtered the tusken raiders in order to avenge his mother?s death, because of his knack for being impulsive and his inability to control his temper. Because of this, he is unable to allow life to go through it?s natural cycle, therefore he lusts for power to make things right, which transforms into greed and the realization that he could have the power to control everything, which is when Anakin chooses to go over to the dark side of the force.

Anakin Skywalker?s progression towards the dark side of the force is a complex process that has many different causes. Anakin?s unwillingness to let things go, his inability to control his temper, and his greed and lust for power all lead him down this path and cause him to make his fatal choice to go to the dark side. All of these causes are effects within themselves for the different causes towards Anakin?s downfall. His fall is so car

 

I think this was brilliant. It is exactly my vision of Anakins slide to the dark side. Great job!

 

Its good and its part of the equation but there are other contributing factors - an evil and ambitious entity bent on the domination of the Galaxy who recognizes immediately how to flower and perpetuate the very weaknesses in Skywalker that you speak of, solely for his own gain and not that of Skywalker. That's key also to his fall. Lucas clearly displays the internal AND external circumstances of corruption, especially in the PT with Anakin, whose journey is MUCH different then Luke's in the OT, but essentially they are very similar people. Luke IS his fathers' son, without having ever met him and sans the knowledge of his place in the order of the Galaxy for a much longer period of time than Anakin. The manifest destiny of the GFFA is also a factor in Anakins' fall as well as the fall of the Republic. Both corruptions happen at the same time, speed, and pound for pound have the same ramification - the Galaxy sleek and mechanized under bondage with a small fraction of rebellious persons at its heart and Anakin the same with a small fraction of rebellion in his own heart. What your saying IS correct but does not represent the entire picture. Anakin IS redeemed and despite what people will argue and for the sake of the piece of art that we watch, IS redeemable. Above all else, SW is a story about the triumph of love over any of the various evils in the world that we must face.

 

Anakin IS redeemed and despite what people will argue and for the sake of the piece of art that we watch, IS redeemable. Above all else, SW is a story about the triumph of love over any of the various evils in the world that we must face.


I agree.

I didn't include things like Palpatine's manipulation because I wanted to keep it focused on Anakin and his character; it flowed well as an essay with the things I used.

Palpatine's manipulation is key, because without that, Anakin would not have turned in the first place. He turned because Palpatine played on his weaknesses.

 

Your right. As a character essay you need to show that Anakin is a person that despite his immense talent and potential for good has an equally large flaw that would allow him to commit atrocities. There definetly is a ying and a yang going on with Skywalker Sr..

 

I think we must also bear in mind that the flaws Anakin has are things we all have to face in our lives. Letting go of things and people we love is not an easy thing to do at all. The difference with Anakin is that he makes the choice to become a Jedi - and a Jedi, given the power that he has, must be able to move above the normal human tragedy, since the stakes are a lot higher. If a normal person falls victim to Anakin's flaws, it's a problem - but for someone who has so much power, it's an absolute disaster. Anakin's problem is that, although he chooses to join the Order, he is not fully committed to it - part of his heart is with his mother, and part of his heart is with Padme. As Yoda says in ESB, "A Jedi must have the deepest commitment ... the most serious mind ..." Anakin, though he is committed to being a Jedi, has other commitments on his mind, and he becomes confused about what he really wants. Does he train as a Jedi and fulfil his destiny as the chosen one, or does he continue with his feelings for Padme and leave the Order? He tries to do both, and he fails. So Anakin goes through very human things - but because he is more powerful than anyone else, his capacity to do evil is stronger than anyone else.

 

" Anakin, though he is committed to being a Jedi, has other commitments on his mind, and he becomes confused about what he really wants "

Thats really where the Jedi Orders' failure comes into play and Lucas' obvious metaphor to the Catholic priesthood and its unraveling due to its adherence to committments that arent practical in a rapidly growing world. In the case of a GFFA, its a Galaxy. So you can add a Jedi Order up to its eye balls in unprecedented sociological changes and they adamently playing the game the way they always have as another cause in Anakins fall, him being the most gifted in their order, and the effect being losing the chosen one to their greatest foe. This topic, by the way, is awesome.

 

Thats really where the Jedi Orders' failure comes into play and Lucas' obvious metaphor to the Catholic priesthood and its unraveling due to its adherence to committments that arent practical in a rapidly growing world

I thought it was a riff on the Knights Templar and other monastic/military orders, their journey into decadence and eventual collapse.

 

Your right and its funny how all these monastic orders suffer tragic fates.

 

Anakin Skywalker?s progression towards the dark side of the force is a complex process that has many different causes. Anakin?s unwillingness to let things go, his inability to control his temper, and his greed and lust for power all lead him down this path and cause him to make his fatal choice to go to the dark side. All of these causes are effects within themselves for the different causes towards Anakin?s downfall. His fall is so carefully designed which shows how this once innocent boy, this aspiring good young man, falls to evil because of his own ambitions, becoming caught up with his own personal greed.

When you think about all the complexities of Anakin Skywalker?s fall to the Dark Side, you (inevitably - seemingly, predictably) get to thinking about all the 'father figures' Young Skywalker had during his 'formative years'.

Of course, you have the obvious TPM and post TPM figures: Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, but most people never mention the OBVIOUS: Watto!

As we all know from watching TPM, Watto is greedy, selfish, and very easliy manipulated by "someone wise" (i.e. Qui-Gon Jinn); all throughout that movie he really looks like some kind of jack-ball, don?t you think? Although he showed kindness in letting the boy Skywalker go home early after he cleaned the ?racks?, Watto wanted to win his bets, with Master Jinn, and others, so badly that it appeared as if he would probably laugh his blue butt off if his most valuable slave actually tasted his untimely, young death in Beggar?s Canyon.

But by the time we see him again in AOTC, we see that he can actually 'let go'; allegedly, a ?Jedi trait?, and perhaps, his one 'redeeming quality; though, obviously, Watto wasn?t freeing Shmi to ease his own burdened conscience of his immoral relationship with his former slave Shmi Skywalker, but, still, simply to gain the ever-precious credits ('Business is business, eh?'),

This is truly a conflicted character. Anakin is a conflicted character.. Are ya savvy?

I honestly thought that Anakin WAS using the "Old Jedi Mind Trick" on his former Master, despite Watto's claim in TPM, "Mind tricks don't work on me.. only money", and that mind tricks WILL work on you if you are weak minded (i.e. have an 'attachment' i.e. "Little Annie...?") to the one who is Jedi Mind Tricking you...

Anakin had no money to offer, just his vaunted status as "a Jedi", which Watto instantly recognized, and Anakin took FULL ADVANTAGE of...

I suppose that stating that Qui-Gon "waved off" using the Mind Trick (or any of his "Jedi Powers"), once he failed with it in the back of Watto's junk shop, and "seemingly" reconsidered his situation in terms of the Jedi Code (at least until before/during the Pod Race), while Anakin apparently thought of *nothing* of the Jedi Code, because it stood in the way of saving his mother, is completely superfluous, and no one has ever thought about this but me?

Ever?

LOL

 

I theorize that the force also reflects the populace as a whole and since sidious is stirring up evil this is why the jedi are faltering since they are losing their connection. But looking at his post i wonder if the galaxy turning bad is also having an effect on Anakin since he is so attuned, if the energy source is contaminated then that should have an effect on anakin also

 

you guys are awesome!
hardcore star wars professors philosiphers!
that's what i'm training to do.
but i think things would've been different if in ep1 Anakin followed Qui-Gonn and Obi wan to fight Maul secretly. when he saw they were no match for him, Anakin would whip out some force lightning and kill Maul. that's how strong he is with the force. He has more midi-chloreans than Palp and Yoda combined!

 

I also wonder if the force turning to the darkside also helps because he is so tuned to the force that it influence his decision making