Is Anakin the bringer of balance or the imbalance itself?

A thought just occurred to me.

As George Lucas has said before, Anakin Skywalker is The Chosen One, destined to destroy the Sith and bring balance to the Force. But in the ROTS DVD featurette The Chosen One, Lucas also says that doing this means destroying himself in addition to Palpatine.

Much has been made of the fact that Darth Plageuis, in his attempts to discover the secret of immortality, may have been responsible for influencing the midichlorians to create Anakin. Others have speculated that after killing Plageuis, Sidious may have picked up where his master left off and had a hand in Anakin's conception.

The implications of all this are quite provocative. What if Anakin was never ever meant to be in the first place, but was in fact an aberration, and it was only through his destruction (and that of Sidious) that balance could ever be restored to the Force?

Although it's been firmly established that Anakin is indeed The Chosen One, some people might offer an alternate interpretation of the prophecy. Suppose Luke was the one that was meant to bring the balance, by encouraging Anakin (as Vader) to turn against Palpatine, resulting in Anakin's death?

I'm just engaging in idle speculation here. I would certainly like to read other people's thoughts on the subject...

 

anakin had to destroy sidious and himself because he joined the sith.
watching luke get tortued made him turn back to the light side. but if he didn't turn back and killed sidous like a good sith apprentice (pun intended ) then he wouldv'e got himself a new apprentice and the sith tradion would live on.

yoda: destroy the sith we must!

anakin brought balance by killing the two sith: sidous and vader

 

The irony in all of this is that Anakin becomes even more like a Christ figure. Christ died to save humanity and restore the universe to glory and perfection. Anakin (as a Sith) had to "destroy" himself to bring balance to the Force and restore the natural order of the universe.

 

What is meant by "balance" anyway? In order to be balanced, shouldn't there be at least 1 Sith out there somewhere?

For years, the way I had heard it was that Luke was the Chosen One. Then someone pointed out that Anakin actually destroyed Palpatine, making him the Chosen One.

However, to answer your question. For the Chosen One to bring balance back, it has to become unbalanced. I don't think the Force was unbalanced until after Anakin and the clone troopers killed the Jedi. After that, there weren't enough Jedi to keep the Sith in check. Obi-Wan misquotes the prophecy by saying Anakin was "supposed to destroy the Sith not join them." It says that the Chosen One will bring balance back to the Force. It doesn't say when or how. In other words, it doesn't say that the Chosen One must unbalance it first, only that there is an imbalance that the Chosen One will balance again.

You know, when you really think about it, (and if I have the story straight) the Jedi have kept the Sith in line for about 1,000 years or more, and then the Sith rose, ruled over an empire of all of 24 years. So, the Force wasn't unbalanced for very long.

 

Yoda suggests that its a misread prophecy and thats exactly what it is. Anakin is a physical manifestation of the force. What Obi-Wan says about plunging the force into darkness is a actually a necessary step to the whole thing, IMO. And I dont really think there is a " darkside " of the force, anyway. Thats what eludes everyone, including Palpatine, until the very end of RotJ. People are only capable of being evil. The energy source, binding matter, higher power, or however you want to describe the force, is intrinsically neutral. I think alot of it has to do with Lucas becoming a much different person between making the two triliogies. The immense political aspect to the PT gives evidence that the entire citizenery of an expansion ( geographically ) of an old democracy are always in the dangerous position of becoming imperical. If Lucas would have made the Saga in order of 1-6, it probably would have had a much more tragic ending because he does use up to date allegory in the PT thats almost totally different ideologically to the OT - that alludes to seperatism, terrorism, nihilism, globalization, and ( the only thing that really stays the same allegorically ) spirituality, and even that becomes much tighter in the PT - with Lucas showing how dangerous proselyetation really is, which is allegory in the OT also, but no where near so the level as it is in just RotS alone.

 

I look at Anakin as the bringer of both the imbalance and the balance. Of course the Force is already imbalanced because the Sith exist, but Anakin is a major contributor to it. When he decides to help Palpatine in RotS, he joins the Dark Side, contributing to the already existing unbalance in the Force. We all know why he?s the bringer of balance - because he ends up killing the Emperor in RotJ and himself in the process. That eliminates the Sith from the Galaxy and restores balance back to the Force.

 

Call me silly, but I never got the notion that Anakin HAD to join Sidious as a Sith to ultimately bring balance to the Force. Seems to me if he had killed Sidious when he found out he was the Sith (and without ever turning into a Sith himself), the problem would have been solved 20 years earlier than it was. It all seems like a silly and contrived story line to me. Like GL had to come up with some reason why poor Anakin HAD to go bad and become Vader. Couldn't he have just been a bad guy? Geesh. I have to say that the whole Chosen One slant is easily one of my least favorite things in the PT. I liked it more when Vader was just a bad guy who learned the errors of his ways before he died.

 

You're right. Anakin didn't have to turn to the Dark Side in order to bring balance. If he would've put his lightsaber through Palpatine's back in RotS balance would've been brought to the Force right then and there. The problem is that he couldn't do it; he needed Palpatine to save Padmè.

No, he couldn't have been just a bad guy; George never wanted people to think that. Vader is a tragic character. The Darth Vader we see in the OT isn't just a bad guy, he's a good man overcome with evil. The good in him is berried deep down inside waiting for someone (Luke) to bring it back out. Vader knew that what he did in the past was wrong, he lives with the grief of all those bad things he's ever done for the rest of his life.

 

Vader wasn't really a "tragic" character until the PT. Before that, he was just the bad guy trying to destroy the rebels but who redeemed himself by saving his son at the end. The character wasn't all that deep in the OT. Certainly not deep enough to be some great tragic character. He was the heavy breathing bad guy at the time. And I highly doubt that GL meant Vader to be more than the bad guy when he made him. But in typical GL fashion, he changed the story when it came time to make the PT. He went from the bad guy to the Chosen One! And now the saga is Anakin's story! Hogwash. It's like people are trying to re-write history. At the time of the OT, Vader was just the bad guy. He wasn't the tragic hero. He wasn't the Chosen One. He wasn't the one to bring balance to the Force. The OT was not HIS story. HE WAS THE BAD GUY.

 

I don?t have the exact quote, but George said in either the audio commentary or the ?Chosen One? featurette on the RotS DVD that people got the wrong idea about Vader in the OT. He was seen by most as a stone-cold villain when really he wasn?t. I?m sure someone around here has the quote.

 

GL likes to change his story when it suits him. Where was all this talk about Vader being more back when Star Wars originally came out? Where was all the Chosen One talk back then? Come on. Why do fans constantly quote GL like he's telling the truth all the time? The guy is full of it. He says whatever he wants to justify the inconsistencies, loopholes and obvious changes he's made between the OT and PT. Heck, look at the changes he made during the making of the OT. Luke and Leia weren't supposed to be siblings (unless you think GL wanted the squick factor of Luke crushing on his own sister), Vader wasn't originally Luke's father etc etc. But if you listen to GL, he planned those things all along! Heck, he had all 6 movies (or 9 depending on when he was talking) planned out all along! Hogwash.

 

Giving it a messianic angle may have been solely an idea for the PT but the story really doesnt have the same kind of power without Vader as once a good man and thats established early on in the OT and whether Lucas decided it while he was making ANH or ESB really has nothing to do with us at all.

 

Here's the quote. Though by you're last post, you don't seem to want to see it as the truth.

"Darth Vader became such an icon in Episode 4 that that icon of evil sort of took over everything much more than it originally intended. If it would've been one movie, that wouldn't have happened, he would've been reveled as this pathetic character at the end of the movie. But now by adding Episodes 1, 2, and 3, people get to see the tragedy of Darth Vader as it was originally intended to be. I liked the idea that the person you thought was the villain, was really the victim and that the story is all about the victim trying to regain his humanity."

- GL, "The Chosen One" featurette.

 

Sorry, but quotes years after the fact don't hold much weight to me. Especially when it comes to GL. I grew up with the OT. My memories of the movies and the characters can't be changed because GL decided years later that he meant something else than what he showed us on film. I hope you can understand my point of view.

 

George knows more about the movies than anyone, I just go by what he says. Don?t worry, Fat_Bird, you?re view is yours and yours alone. There?s nothing I or anyone can do to change it.

 

Any number of fans around here know the films as well as GL but only GL can tell us what his intentions were in making them (even though he likes to change those to suit his needs ). As I've said before in other discussions, what GL claims doesn't always match with what comes across on the screen. Especially when he makes those claims years after the fact. I just don't see the OT or Vader as he's trying to portray them now. I can't help that. I'm not big on re-writing my memories of the favorite movies from my childhood. I can't re-write history!

 

It's always the same, a fan starts a topic to talk about Star Wars and a basher has to come in and say the same thing that we've had to hear over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over. The Basher Standard: Lucas is a liar, Vader was not and never was the hero, Luke was the hero and Leia was not his sister.
Yeah we've all heard it 12,283,908 times and counting. We have a basher sanctuary here on theforce.net over in the Star Wars community. It's a fictional story not human history. Lucas is not a historian, he's a fictional story teller. Lucas is not rewriting human history. You cannot equate changing Star Wars with changing human history. Human history is real. Star Wars is fake.

 

How about you quit trying to label people "bashers" just because they don't see things as you do. The level of intolerance that some fans around here show to people who don't view the saga as perfect or GL as a God is very humorous (in a scarily fanatical sort of way). People can like the movies without agreeing to everything or thinking GL is a God. People can give their opinions without quoting GL and agreeing with everything he says (I swear if I see one more "Well GL said" as a defense I will scream!). Now that that is out of my system, how about we stick to talking about the movies and/or GL?

 

I think the answer is both in a way. In the novelization, Anakin says at one point "I am a disturbance in the Force." I think this answers the question.

 

Well he was the one that brought balance.... how could he have created it?


I think the imbalance was already there, since the prophecy was so old.

Anakin brought balance, whether this means through killing or Jedi or only the Sith. It really depends on your point of view.

 

it has been said several times in several places that the sith are the imbalace because they only take from the force while the jedi take and give back. anakin is the chosen one because he destroyed them, conveniently at the same time.

 

"You will find that a great many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our point of view" Obi Wan Kenobi ROTJ

Balance

Does this refer to the Users of the force (Jedi Vs Sith) or the USE OF THE FORCE?


At the end of ROTS the Users of the force are in balance (2 Jedi, 2 uninitiated, 2 Sith). Or to put it another way we have left, center, and right. SO clearly this cannot be the definition per Lucas because by destroying the Sith the force would once again be unbalanced (1 Jedi, 1 uninitiated, 0 Sith)

It must be USE of the Force. It turns out that the ability to become one with the force is dependant on LOVE as an ingredient. I think that this is meant to show that the Jedi had crippled themselves by walling off sections of their emotions that they felt were "dark". A feeling or emotion denied will inevitably cause resentment and hate. The Key here would be not to feed that. How do you do that? well you allow the subject to feel the feeling, aknowledge it but dont dwell on it.

Example: Mace Windu - VAPID fighting style.
Now I think we can all agree that Mace Windu is a Jedi with exemplary character and until the last moment of his life, he acted in that manner. When he abandonded the jedi way and tried to kill Sidious he paid for it. But look at AOTC, there is a great regret for killing Jango Fett. Yet VAPID channels the Dark side of the force to Mace's Advantage. He becomes a conduit for it, but retains none of the Darkside energy.

In many ways what Sidious said was true: "If you want to understand the great mystery that is the force you must study ALL it's aspects not just the narrow dogmatic view of the Jedi."

And way to go Fat_Bird You tell em.....

I find it amazing that with the number of people quoting GL that the've never HEARD the inconsistancy in his interviews. Oh well there is none so deaf as those who refuse to hear.

And maybe if the Godfather was a teddy bear salesman he would have been a nicer guy.