Saga How did you imagine Anakin to be like before the prequels?

Personality wise I imagined him exactly as he was described in PT, but I imagined him a bit older... I was convinced that he had dark hair and dark eyes, similar to Leia's... and I imagined him with a beard... Still I loved the guy in PT, no disappoinment at all.

 

This. Ben describes Anakin as a skilled warrior and pilot, a good and honourable man/Jedi. I expected some of the inner, emotional conflict like portrayed in AOTC, and assumed he would turn regarding some aspect of forbidden love (seeing as Luke and Leia would need a mother,) but thought most of his fall would be attributed to wanting unlimited power...which I suppose in a way it was.

 

I honestly don't recall, but I probably didn't put much thought into it. I just accepted that he was a Jedi that filled out the application for the darkside and was approved. Somewhere along the way I heard the rumor of the Kenobi/Anakin lava duel before TPM came out. Before that, I imagined his scarred appearance had to do with *many* battles. A build up of war wounds even prior to the turn.

The reality is any thoughts I had were probably pretty one dimensional as I didn't spend time writing Star Wars stories in my head or on paper. The closest I came to that was when I was a kid playing with my figures and I'd imagine what I came up back then was pretty shallow. There wasn't a young Anakin Skywalker action figure, so I never played out that scenario.

 

I imagined him to be physically bigger. Hayden is tall, but rather spare. It's just his build.

I thought he would be older when we first see him. I got worried when I saw they were going to have this 9-year-old kid version of him. And I'm sorry to say those fears were realized for me. I thought we'd meet him as a older teen or young man.

I did not think his fall would be so self-oriented. I get what Lucas was going for, but for me, Anakin's motivations in his fall seemed incredibly parochial and selfish. It's hard for me to believe the other Jedi, especially Obi-Wan, would not have sensed that in him. I expected him to be a more "means justifies the ends" kind of guy.

Lastly I expected a more mature character. Hayden's Anakin was essentially an adolescent the entire time, even when he was supposed to be a man in his 20's. His concerns and attitudes, even through Ep III, remain fairly adolescent in their nature. I'm not sure why Lucas chose to go that route. There is nothing inherently wrong with that approach for a character, but it did not match up well with the Vader we come to know in the OT.

 

Just because he isn't who you expected him to be should not ruin the character, IMO.

 

i guess i thought obi-wan met anakin in his early 20s (obi-wan would have been a bit older, perhaps late 20s or early 30s). "when i first knew your father he was already a great pilot but i was amazed at how strongly the force flowed through him." (ps. relating to how i see rey as a kenobi, i feel like the skywalkers and kenobis are often impressed by each other's force abilities).

i saw anakin as a good person (very much like luke) who became misguided thinking he had to employ darker methods. i expected anakin to be faced with complex circumstances in which i might be able to see myself following his choices. the anakin we met in eps. 1-3 was not who i imagined. he was... an idiot. lol

but strangely i've adapted.

 

I saw him before the prequels as similar to what later was Peter Jackson's version of Boromir in LOTR. Approximately the same age, noble, a strong character but seduced to the longing for power by the desperation and violence of the Clone Wars. Loyal and a true friend of Obi Wan.

 

From what Obi Wan told Luke in ANH, I thought of him as a Jedi Knight, the best star pilot in the Galaxy, a cunning warrior and a good friend. I was disappointed when Obi Wan told he had been killed by a young Jedi named Vader- and really thought "Bummer. I would've loved to see this Anakin guy! He sounds amazing!" Then it was revealed that Vader is Luke's father in ESB, and when I got over the shock, I was now even more intrigued by Anakin. In ROTJ Luke removed Vaders mask, and I finally saw his face (instead of the back of his head from ESB)- and thought "Is this really Anakin?"
Time went by and a few years later TPM came, then AOTC and finally ROTS- and here I was thinking to myself "Anakin Skywalker looks amazing on paper and when people talk about him, but the execution in those films didn't match my vision of him" Now, TCW came by and I really loved his character. This is the Anakin character Obi Wan told Luke about in ANH, and I for one was thrilled!
So I imagined Anakin before the PT like he is in TCW.

 

I pictured him as a weak Force user who went to the dark side to become stronger.

 

Waaay back watching Star Wars as a little kid...
Luke's father as described by Obi Wan was distant lost father figure. A idealised vision a kid might have of that father they had never seen.

Strong jawed and handsome and brave and honourable. Poe Dameron perhaps in a way. Never to be seen, so never disapointing the dream.

Rather sad actually.

And then you find out who your dad actually is...

 

You know...

I guess I tried not to "imagine" Anakin too much before the prequels.

I'm a bit bothered by the fact he didn't turn out to be Jar Jar.

Though, symbolically, that's what he is.

 

How did you imagine Anakin to be like before the prequels?

Well, basically like this (along with young Obi-Wan).



Less like a whiny teenager, probably more like a deeply frustated Jedi knight in his early 30s with some psychopathic tendencies.

 

There is something rather classically surreal but intriguing about that photo above. It's Star Wars, Ealing Studios style. I kind of want to see it.

Before the prequels, my personal imagining of Anakin Skywalker was that he would be a tall, well-built and generally well-liked regular member of a brotherhood of knights similar to King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table, and who just went rogue. I didn't envisage him as a whiny and petulant individual with a messianic "chosen one" angle.

 

Didn’t think about it too much before the PT. Although I can say I definitely didn’t expect a Han Solo type driven by cool quips, nor did I expect another Luke but with a dark ending.

 

Am I the only one who thought Anakin would be mostly a bad guy? Someone who was good when Obi-Wan met him but was seduced by the dark side quickly due to his youth or inexperience and desire for power. Obi-Wan said he "betrayed and murdered" Luke's father so it kind of sounded like he pretended to be a good Jedi for a while and then betrayed the Jedi for Palpatine and then Obi-Wan found out and dueled him. Yes, Obi-Wan said Luke's father was a good friend but I figured this was retconned into a lie in the subsequent movies. I did expect him to be a great pilot and a powerful warrior since it matched Vader's persona. I kind of expected Obi-Wan to be the protagonist of the prequels (in some ways, he is).

So, unlike a lot of OT purists, I was actually happy to see an optimistic kid in TPM and a struggling, but still mostly good young man later on. Even the fact that love and attachment were the primary catalyst for his fall actually makes him more sympathetic and it's more believable he'd sacrifice himself to save his son whom he'd only met once before. His frustration with the political situation in the Republic is still there but not in the forefront.

 

i imagined him to have a beard like obi wan and look a bit like uncle Owen

 

I imagined him as more of an ordinary guy who went astray due to some extraordinary circumstances. Or as ordinary as you can be when you're a Jedi. The combination of the prophecy and the fact that the Jedi didn't really wan to train him initially I guess put paid to that. He was always going to be fairly complex.

 

Yes, this is how I imagined him to be. A rather unremarkable and anonymous Jedi Knight, just one of many.

 

I imagined him probably in much the way Luke did, a powerful Jedi, amazing pilot, great warrior. A man who at some point made the wrong choice or choices and was manipulated by the Emperor into becoming Darth Vader. That's what made Luke's journey so meaningful to me, it was Luke choosing to be better than Anakin, to make the right choices his father never did. I never really imagined particular character traits for Anakin as I don't feel like we really had much information in the OT to support anything, other than he followed Obi-Wan on a crusade and he seemed to follow adventure.

 

Yoda does say Luke's father was powerful. Both Jedi and the dark lords want Luke so clearly Skywalkers are above average even without the prophecies and midichlorians.

 

What I meant by that is that I never really envisaged Anakin being as predominant has he was from being a child and treated as specially as he was. I think I kind of imagined a group of Jedi Knights with Anakin showing exceptional promise but really just "one of the gang" until he drifts away from them and gets pulled in by the Dark Side. Does that make sense?

The closest analogy I can think of is the knights in the movie First Knight, in terms of the idea that they would all dress the same and be a kind of brotherhood, with Anakin as the Lancelot figure, the highly skilled one who starts off being well-meaning but is ultimately the reason it all goes wrong.

 

@Lobot's Wig I see your point. I certainly didn't expect him to be a child of prophecy (nor did anyone I'm sure). However, the OT hints at his power as an adult knight. Otherwise, how could he kills other Jedi?

 

I would have been cool with that, his power kind of becoming more noticeable as an adult.

 

Obi-Wan mentions meeting him and feeling how strong the Force was in him and Yoda specifically tells Luke that he was a powerful Jedi, no faint praise coming from Yoda. The OT obviously wasn't made with the Chosen One prophecy in place yet, but Luke states that the Force is strong in his family, so even without the prophecy, the Skywalkers were always clearly a gifted lineage. Palpatine tells Vader that if Luke is fully trained he'll have the power to destroy both Sith Lords.