Dooku being too powerful partly responsible for Anakin's fall?

we all know that during the Obi-Wan/Anakin vs. Dooku duel, that once Anakin taps into the dark side, he simply overwhelms Dooku.

However, did Anakin really have a choice? We see Dooku handle the two easily in AOTC. So we give them three more years to develop their skills and knowledge of the Force. In the rematch, Dooku is once again having his way with them. Obi-Wan can't seem to keep up during this fight and the only hit Anakin (who keeps on Dooku on his toes like he did in AOTC) gets in on Dooku is that kick when Obi-Wan gets knocked out. He tries to keep up the momentum, but Dooku simply counters it and taunts him. Afterwards, Dooku finally convinces Anakin to give into hate.

Had Anakin not given into his hate, not tasted the power, would he have defeated Dooku? I mean, did he really have a choice at this moment? It seemed to me like AOTC all in replay (besides them attacking in unison) with Obi-Wan bowing out early and Dooku would once again best him had he not made that choice. I sort of felt Anakin's decision was out of his hands, that the training he received as a Jedi just would not have cut it here.

 

no, he might have still won.
Kenobi tapped into the darkside against Maul, Luke against Vader, they did not turn.

 

I think the Dooku duel was one of the steps for Anakin to turn the dark side.
Anakin wanted to win the duel but he needed the dark side for him to win, I think that was the point of the whole duel. It was supposed to be the beginning of Anakin?s fall to the dark side.

 

Yup. It was all planned. Had Dooku been weak then he wouldn't have knocked out OBW. Together they would have brought down Dooku, and Anakin wouldn't have tasted the dark-side, again...

I'm still one of those who thinks the way Dooku lost to Anakin is suspect though... that he actually seemed to be on top of things. He nearly smiled till suddenly his arms was chopped off... I'm thinking if there's a possibility of Sideous using stasis on him of some sort. Far fetched, I know

 

In the Novel, everything up to Dooku's head being cut off was in the plan. Sidious and Dooku wanted to test Skywalker to be some Sith Order General. Palpatine would stop the fight if Anakin got the upper...hands.

In any case, Dooku didn't know that Palpy wanted Anakin. So he was not shocked until Palpy said to "kill him."

 

i can not be the book or movie which makes you think Dooku got beat on purpose. In the movie he is just overpowered and then beaten by a superior Anakin, the book is the same but much more detailed, and Dooku was trying to win in both, he just could not, b/c Anakin was stronger....

 

Can't be much between them anyhow. Dooku was playing defensive - that much seems pretty clear. I just think it was strange that he so easily fought off both OBW and Anakin, then lost to Anakin later. I mean, he force choked OBW while fighting Anakin for crying out loud.

But, I think the intention was that Anakin had actually surpassed Dooku, or at least was quite equal to him. I just think it was suspect and strange...

 

When the duel begins, he's toying with both Anakin and Obi-wan. But he soon realizes that they're playing a trick on him. They're making him think that they haven't improved all that much. He soon realizes that both Jedi are, in fact, superior fighters now. Obi-wan has combined both Form III and Form IV to his arsenal, while Anakin has grown stronger. He starts to step up his game in order to avoid being overwhelmed. That's when he Force shoves Obi-wan and signals to the Super Battle Droids to open fire. And while fighting Anakin alone, he realizes that Anakin will get the better of him soon. So he tries to break Anakin's confidence. Which does work for a moment, but then after hurting Obi-wan and taunting him, Anakin unleashes his pent up fury. He stops holding back and gives into his anger and hate. He proves to be too good for Dooku, who starts to realize that he is going to lose this fight. Then Anakin cuts his hands off, which totally shocks him.

But to answer the question, yes, being strong as he was drove Anakin to try and top Dooku. Lucas even makes it a point in the AOTC commentary. That we hear Anakin wants to be all powerful, while Dooku boasts that he has become stronger that any Jedi. Palpatine used Dooku to turn Anakin, which is goes a long way towards getting Anakin to join him.

 

Thinking back to the book...and the movie...are we so sure that Anakin gave into the Darkside DURING the Dooku fight? As shown on film I consider it a toss up. Anakin does seem to go after him a little bit more, but it could be renewed determination knowing that his friend/mentor Obi-Wan was unconcious or dead and his other friend/mentor Palpatine would probably end up the same if he did not defeat Dooku. I think it is open enough to interpretation.

It's been awhile since I read the book, but I don't really recall it specifically stating or even implying that Anakin taps into the Dark Side during the fight. What I DO recall from the book is Dooku getting tired from fighting two foes in a "Fake" fight.

Is it possible that Anakin focusing and Dooku tiring lead to Anakin winning in a non-dark side turning fight? If Anakin was tapped into the darkside, would he really have hesitated to take Dooku's head?

I know I'm going against the commonly accepted view of how things went down, and it is a minor detail, but I really think it would be neater if we knew that light side Anakin Beat Dark Side Dooku. It establishes that Anakin is really starting to become strong in his own right and it also helps...

"Is the Dark Side Stronger?" - Luke
"No" - Yoda

Any views on this?

Carnage

 

There's nothing solid, but Palpatine says to Anakin much later in the novel "I know where you got the power to defeat Dooku from." I don't think Anakin says anything either way.
I think it makes sense that he used his anger. It would add to his his belief that the Sith are more powerful. He knows a Sith killed Qui-Gon, a man he had almost considered invincible up to that point. He saw himself (who he had heard referred to as "the chosen one") defeated pretty quickly by Dooku in AotC. And a higher ranking Jedi, Obi-Wan.
In ROTS he gets angry himself, and quickly takes Dooku's hands. It wouldn't be hard for him to figure out where the easy power comes from.

I don't think it works like this. He doesn't "turn on" the darkside to defeat Dooku. His anger gave him more speed, and made his tactics more aggressive. So he's technically using the darkside (which is really just an alternate way of using the 'same' force). But when he takes Dooku's head, I don't see that as technically using the darkside. It's more giving in to his fears, which further opens the "gate" for future darkside use. That's the way I've seen it.

I agree, I just don't think they went with this for the scene.

"Is the dark side stronger?"
"No... quicker, easier, more seductive."

A Jedi can be as strong as a Sith. But it would take a Jedi much more experience to achieve the same power as a Sith. The fact that the duel lasts about 10 seconds after Anakin gets angry supports the "quick power" idea too.

 

In the book, his 'turning on' is explicitly linked to the Dark Side, because Sidious steps in in the middle of the fight and tells Anakin what he needs to do to defeat Dooku.

Not a full quote, but exactly what Palpatine says to turn the tide of the fight is in the novelization, and it is pretty dark-side.

 

COUNT DOOKU: (continuing) "I sense great fear in you, Skywalker. You have hate, you have anger, but you don?t use them."

Anakin regains his composure and attacks COUNT DOOKU as the Dark Lord continues his spin to meet him head on. Their fighting becomes even more intense. Anakin attacks COUNT DOOKU with a new ferociousness.

39 INT. GENERAL'S QUARTERS-TRADE FEDERATION CRUISER

Anakin and Dooku continue their fight. It is intense! Finally, in one last energized charge, ANAKIN cuts off COUNT DOOKU's hands. The Jedi catches the lightsaber as it drops from the severed Sith Lord's hand. COUNT DOOKU stumbles to the floor as ANAKIN puts the two lightsabers to his neck. PALPATINE is grinning as he watches COUNT DOOKU's defeat.

Anakin used his aggressive feelings to win the fight, but he was torn when it came to killing him. He was enraged, but not enough to turn fully.

 

Fair enough. That's enough evidence to convince me. Maybe I just blocked those things out and it was wishful thinking that Anakin didn't need the darkside. He faught Dooku once and was impatient and failed. He stuck with the Jedi and helped them for 3 long years in the war, growing stronger even with that meaning he had to be apart from Padme. That was going against the easy path in my mind.

However, if he would have been killed by Dooku by not turning to the darkside, Palpatine certainly looks even more Masterminded. What a Catch-22. Either you, the supposed "Chosen One" kills your enemy by any means necessary, or you die along with your two friends. He has no choice at all.

Carnage

 

Yeah, that was sort of along the lines I was thinking. Either he dies to Dooku using the lightside (though not guaranteed, I think things were heading that way) or use the darkside.

 

Giving into Fears about what??

 

Well in his mind he is ending the war. So you could say his fear of an unsafe galaxy, and if you really want to go into it, a galaxy unsafe for his wife.

 

I just always thought Anakin was just that good to beat Dooku without having to use the darkside. I just feel that Anakin knew it was either Dooku or the galaxy.

 

Yes I agree, I think the Dooku duel was one of the steps for Anakin to turn the dark side. BUT it wasn't so much his winning that was the sign of him "tapping into" the darkside, it was more in the way he killed dooku that started his turn to the darkside. He says something like "but it's not the jedi way" (to kill Dooku) but Palpatine pushes him to do it, and then he beheads Dooku in a very un-jedi like way...

 

Indeed. This is a great thread and makes a case against the Chosen One having Free Will. Once Palpatine got this far with his plan, the bottom line is that Anakin's destiny was to join the dark side. I believe Lucas has said that Anakin fell because of his choices, but this scenario seems to indicate otherwise. The choices were Death or the Dark Side. The choice of Death would have meant that the prophecy could never be fulfilled. If we are to believe that "Once you start down the dark path, forever it will dominate your destiny." the beginnings of his turn in AoTC do not even matter. He was FORCED right here to start down the Dark Path. If Yoda's words are true, Anakin seeminly is void of Choice and is destined to become Darth Vader.

Carnage

 

Even if he refused to kill Dooku, Palpatine may well have killed him.

They did decide to 'spring the trap'

 

I just love Palpatine's line "You must run and get help. He's a sith-lord, you can't possibly beat him" (not accurate, but you know what I mean). Where the hell should they go and get help?

Do you think it stung when OBW said: "Sith-lords are our speciality" (killing Maul) , fantastic line by the way...

By the way, noticed how bad OBW's taunting is towards Dooku in AOTC? Before the fight he says to Anakin he can't take on Dooku alone. When Anakin is unconscious and Dooku shoots some lightning, and says he is much more powerful than OBW, OBW goes "I don't think so"... well, guess Dooku was shaking in his pants!! This was terribly off-topic. I'm over-tired, sorry

 

Palpatine probably wasn't too impressed with Obi-Wan's "Sith Lords are our speciality." He was probably thinking. "Wow Obi-Wan, I thought being a Dope was your speciiiiality."

Carnage

 

"Palpatine rather hoped that Anakin was going to leave Obi-Wan during the kidnapping, but Anakin is an honorable man and Obi-Wan is his greatest friend, so Anakin insists that he bring him along."

--Ian McDiarmid, Star Wars Insider #82.[/quote]

Though Palpatine thought that he had gotten enough of a hold on Anakin, he hadn't. Which is why Obi-wan survived and thus could put a hurtin' on Palpatine's long term goal for Anakin.

"After Darth Sidious' first apprentice is killed, he has to come up with a new apprentice, and rather than coming up with some baby that he trains from birth, which is what he should have done--well, he shouldn't have gotten himself in a position of getting his apprentice killed anyways--he's decided to make his move, so he needs somebody that was already trained. The point is to set up that he turned this one Jedi, so that he could turn another Jedi. It has to be set up that way."

--George Lucas, AOTC DVD Commentary.

This is what Dooku's purpose has lead to. Besides his functionality in the Clone Wars, Palpatine wants Dooku to be Anakin's nemesis giving him a reason to tap into the Dark Side. Palpatine had counted on a confrontation and was pleased that after the first one, Anakin redoubled his efforts to become the strongest Jedi alive. Hours before the battle, Anakin had put on an impressive display of Force power that had stunned Dooku. He realized that Anakin was powerful, but he still didn't think he'd be powerful enough to win a rematch. Thus when they did fight, even before tapping into the Dark Side, Anakin had proven to be a very formidable opponet. More so since Geonosis. Asajj Ventress and the Dooku clone had done their jobs adequately. In time, Anakin could've beaten him. But he didn't without the help of the Dark Side. Anakin could've backed away and let Dooku live. I doubt that Palpatine would've attacked them. Instead, he would play along with an alternate plan until he could kill Dooku.

Anakin didn't kill him so much out of fear, as it was anger and a tinge of hate for their previous battle. And for the last three years. A lot of people have died and it's taken it's toll on Anakin. More so following the Battle of Praestylin, where Anakin once again went beserek, but not all the way. Almost everytime Anakin found himself in a battle, he kept getting closer and closer to the Dark Side. He kept getting more and more emotional. He kept finding himself reaching into the Dark Side. So when he killed Dooku, the part of him that wanted to, did so out of revenge. But his conscious keeps nagging at him. Incidently, the initial fear has to do with the prolonging of the Clone Wars and the fact that Padme could be killed. So far, they had managed to avoid that, but it wouldn't last. Not so long as Dooku and Grievous still remained.