If you could save a loved one from death but had to turn to the darkside like Anakin...

Would you do it?

 

How hot is this person I am trying to save?

 

Won't I just end up force-choking the person to death anyway?

 

Not if my turning to the Dark Side ends up doing more collateral damage to that person's life. Anakin becoming a Sith went against everything Padme struggled for.

 

Is there a third option for indecisive wimps? I'm asking for my friend...

 

Ah, there he is now.

 

Only if I get to kill 8-12 defensless children.


What?

 

Yes, I would. But then I would use flow-walking to retcon the whole thing out of continuity.

 

Sod the loved one. I'll turn to the dark side anyway!

 

Hanging out at the opera with Ian McDiarmid and making babies with Natalie Portman

vs.

Meditating with a bunch of monks who separated you from your Mommy



That's a hard one.

 

Maybe before trusting a completely untrustworthy chickenhawk like Palpatine, I'd take her to you know, a DOCTOR.

 

But the bizarre thing is - Anakin joins up with the darkside even tho Palpy has admitted that he doesn't know how to save padme .

for me the question is : would anyone be as dumb as anakin ?

 

But don't forget, despite all the electronics PT-era medicine is about on par with Europe's Dark Age. Padme's diagnosis was "She's lost the will to live," remember?

 

I don't think it's valid see the dilemma through that lens.

First, Anakin's a spirit man with a direct line to God. Three years prior, he received visions of his mother's torture, and lo and behold, they turned out to be accurate. Someone like that ain't gonna make an appointment to see the nearest OB-GYN; they're hauling tail to Nostradamus.

Second, Anakin had closer ties to Palpatine than his Jedi instructors, who advised him to either dismiss the dreams (WRONG!) or to rejoice in the face of death (HUH?).

 

I still say none of that is nearly a good enough reason to trust the sith lord that ordered the death of Qui Gon Jinn, but anyway.

 

What was the alternative? In his reality, Padme is going to die, as surely as his mother. Now if Anakin possessed some degree of ideological/spiritual purity, he'd of been more rational in dealing with the dilemma. But he's a broken headcase, ensnared in a cult of personality. He can't live without his wife, period. And if her sole savior happens to dabble in the Dark Arts, well then so be it. Qui-Gon Shmi-Gon.

 

Sold! I'l do it!

 

BTW, that doesn't mean I was keen on that Dark Side vampirism malarkey that culminated in child slaughter. There were less jarring approaches to the Temple siege, and I consider those scant few scenes blemishes on an otherwise sound character arc.

 

drg4....so 'understanding' of the beginning of Anakin's arc, but so 'ambivalent' (to say the least ) about the end of that arc*.



*see drg4's views on ROTJ

 

I bet you enjoyed typing that, Toschi. Taking a cue from Ian McDiarmid himself.

?My dear conflicted gusher, I'm afraid the deflect-ah shield will be quite operational, when your friends arrive.?

 

But he's a broken headcase, ensnared in a cult of personality. He can't live without his wife, period.


You would be surprised at how many people are like that . . . either in regard to a loved one, a place to live or an object. People tend to find it very hard to let go of their attachments. Anakin is not some special case.

 

No, because it isn't morally sound. Though fear, dread, and helplessness can be very powerful forces.