Saga Is Vader sincere with Luke in Empire Strikes Back?

Near the end of Empire Strikes Back, Darth Vader has a big proposal for Luke:

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Is Vader really intentioned to destroy the Emperor with the help of his son, or is he just trying to lure Luke into the dark side using a proposal that might sound light-side oriented to him (destroy evil, bring back peace...)?

Of course I don't mean he is already a good guy at this point, but does he really have a personal plan against his master, to take his place and have Luke as his apprentice? Is he even showing a little bit of fatherly love? Or is it all a lie?

 

YES!!

This is the Sith way.

Darth Plagueis was killed by his apprentice.

Dooku wanted Obi-Wan to help him to destroy Sidious.
Vader wanted Luke to help him to destroy Palpatine.

Palpatine asked Anakin to kill Dooku. And Anakin took Dooku's place as the Sith apprendice.
Palpatine asked Luke to kill Vader, and take his father's place.

The Sith master and the Sith apprendice are allies, but the apprendice eventually will want to become the master, and the master always wants a greater warrior to be corrupted.

 

Yes. He wanted to kill him for the last 20 years but didn't think it possible in his diminished state until he found out about Luke.

 

One of the things I liked about Dark Lord (I think it was also touched upon in the ROTS novelization) was that Vader didn't really care about Sith traditions, rather he wanted to kill Palpatine and rule the galaxy with Padme. Obviously that didn't work out and Padme died, but this gives us Vader's motivation in wanting Luke as an apprentice. When Padme died, he basically fell into a kind of despair, and by the end of Dark Lord he decides has to resign himself to the typical Sith tradition of finding an apprentice and killing his master. Fast forward twenty years though, and not only has Vader found a suitable apprentice, but it's his and Padme's child...and well ruling the galaxy with him would be easily the next best thing, if not just as good.

 

"At this point, Vader’s plan really, now that he knows he’s his son, is to convince him to come with him. Join the dark side and together they’re going to overthrow the Emperor, which is the thematic devices used through the whole movies in terms of the Sith, which is Sith Lords are usually no more than two because if there are three, then two of them will gang up on one to try to become the dominate Sith. Anakin would have been able to do it if he hadn’t been debilitated and now he’s half machine and half man, so he’s lost a lot of the power of the Force, and he’s lost a lot of his ability to be more powerful then the Emperor. But Luke hasn’t. Luke is Vader’s hope. His motives at this point are purely evil. He simply wants to continue on what he was doing before which is get rid of the Emperor and make himself Emperor. He only sees his son as a mechanism for the ambition. His mad lust of power."

--George Lucas, TESB DVD Commentary.

"And when he finds out Luke is his son, his first impulse is to figure out a way of getting him to join him to kill the Emperor. That's what Siths do! He tries it with anybody he thinks might be more powerful, which is what the Emperor was looking for in the first place: somebody who would be more powerful than he was and could help him rule the universe. But Obi-Wan screwed that up by cutting off his arms and legs and burning him up. From then on, he wasn't as strong as the Emperor -- he was like Darth Maul or Count Dooku. He wasn't what he was supposed to become. But the son could become that."

--George Lucas, Rolling Stones Interview, 2005.

"One of the themes throughout the films is that the Sith Lords, when they started out thousands of years ago, embraced the dark side. They were greedy and self-centered and they all wanted to take over, so they killed each other. Eventually there was only one left, and that one took on an apprentice. And for thousands of years, the master would teach the apprentice, the master would die, the apprentice would then teach another apprentice, the master, and so on. But there could never be any more than two of them, because if there were, they would try to get rid of the leader, which is exactly what Vader was trying to do, and that's exactly what the Emperor was trying to do. The Emperor was trying to get rid of Vader, and Vader was trying to get rid of the Emperor. And that is the antithesis of a symbiotic relationship, in which if you do that, you become cancer, and you eventually kill the host, and everything dies."

--George Lucas, Bill Moyers Time Magazine Interview; 1999.

 

Yes, I believe both Vader and Tyranus were sincere in their offers. It bothers me nil that few agree. I believe both understood that the old ways of Sith and Jedi were both corrupted.

 

Vader truly did want to rule the galaxy with Luke

I don't think he would intentionally be a cruel, iron-fisted despot; I believe he wanted to become emperor himself so that he could change the laws to keep the peace the best way he sees possible, to protect his loved ones and help others stay safe
He wants to create "peace, freedom, justice, and security" in the best ways he sees fit, and he wants to do it with his family by his side

 

Morover, he is repeating the same thing he said to Padme: we can get rid of the Emperor and make things the way we want and bring peace to the galaxy. So yes, he is sincere, in a greedy way. In a way, he hates the Emperor, he hates being trapped by the Dark Side. And at the same time, he needs the Dark Side: the only reason why he is powerful is because he is feared as the Emperor's right hand man and a powerful Sith Lord. He needs to hide behind the mask.

 

As with George's quotes above, I can understand why his motivations are purely evil at first. However, Luke does sense at some point that there is good in him, and you have to wonder when exactly that happens. It would have to be when he communes with Luke and Luke is aboard the Falcon. I mean, there has to be some level of sincerity in him that isn't pure evil by then and is becoming more in the lines of the man trying to get himself out of the trap of evil.

 

Yes, he is sincere about everything in Empire, whether it be the offer to join or the threat to kill Luke.

 

The Sith are like the Jedi in many ways. They both want peace throughout the galaxy, but believe in different methods to get there. The Jedi believe that peace can only be achieved through negotiation and understanding of other peoples. Whereas the Sith believe that they need to force everyone to bend to their will, or else they'll kill them all. So when Vader says that he wants to bring peace, he's referring to what he said to Padme in AOTC.

ANAKIN: "We need a system where the politicians sit down and discuss the problem, agree what's in the best interests of all the people, and then do it."

PADMÉ: "That is exactly what we do. The trouble is that people don't always agree. In fact, they hardly ever do."

ANAKIN: "Then they should be made to."

PADMÉ: "By whom? Who's going to make them?"

ANAKIN: "I don't know. Someone."

PADMÉ: "You?"

ANAKIN: "Of course not me."

PADMÉ: "But someone."

ANAKIN: "Someone wise."

PADMÉ: "That sounds an awful lot like a dictatorship to me."

ANAKIN: "Well, if it works..."

 

Good question. Strong thread.

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"one should not make light of villains like Darth Vader or Thulsa Doom." James Earl Jones

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Yes, Vader plans to make Luke his apprentice and together overthrow The Emperor.

 

Vader is still tainted by the dark side at that point. He may have feelings for Luke, but mainly sees him as a tool to gain more power. That way he can both save his son from the Emperor and rule the galaxy as he's always wanted.

 

Except... Jedi=Good, Sith=Evil

 

It's a mix of truth and lies.

Foremost, like Dooku, I think Vader's words are a ploy meant to manipulate, regardless.

I do think Vader definitely wants Luke to join him, that more than anything. I don't know if it's fatherly love at this point, but he definitely likes the idea of father and son, this kid named Skywalker has awoken something he hasn't felt in many years.

In no way does Vader have anything close to good or light side intentions here. Despite "we can end this destructive conflict", I don't think he cares one bit about the well-being of the galaxy. I think it's entirely selfish motivation here.

I seriously doubt the sincerity of any plans Vader has against the Emperor. I think it's more likely it's something he just thought of recently, rather than something he's been waiting for for years, and I seriously question his courage to actually go through with any plan against the Emperor.

 

This is a gift that he got from his mother. Somehow Luke was able to see the same thing Padme did.

 

That's the only exception. But Palpatine was making a point which Anakin believed, that the Jedi were fighting Palpatine because they didn't want to lose their power. This was elaborated more in the script and novelization.

 

It's an enormous exception, among dozens of other enormous exceptions. Judicially the Jedi had no power. The Senate had the power, and Palpatine was the Senate. The Jedi were fighting Palpatine because they wanted power returned to the Senate.

 

This is so true.

 

Not that kind of power. The Jedi Council had its own powers that was granted to it by the Senate and the Chancellor's office long ago. Just prior and following the Battle of Coruscant, Palpatine begins pushing for more executive powers so that he can make more decisions without relying on debates on the Senate. One of the things Palpatine chooses to do is take power from the Jedi Order, which the Council objects to. This in turn is what leads the Council to want Anakin to spy on Palpatine. Palpatine plants the notion in Anakin's head that their reasons are just as selfish as that of the Sith and the Confederacy. That in truth, the Jedi were the biggest bunch of hypocrites in the galaxy. By doing so, Palpatine is able to make his case for Anakin to switch sides more palpable.

 

The Jedi only had military power over the clones. They had no power over the Senate. Palptine was the ultimate political and military power in the galaxy. It was quite obvious how seflish and power-hungry we has in his rise from Senator to Emperor.

 

The Jedi had other powers before the war. These powers allowed them to function as they have for as long they've been around. Nor did I say that they had power over the Senate. But they were willing to and capable of taking the power from the Chancellor and either returning it to the Senate, or holding on to it. The thing is that the Council wants things back to the way it was and Anakin sees that as a problem, because it was broken in the first place. The war started because of the petty squabbling in the Senate. Because of the corruption from the corporations that had too much sway over the government. Because of an apathy that had set in regarding the state of the affairs of the Republic. Anakin believes that the Jedi want that to continue to the detriment of the Republic and the galaxy as a whole. The Jedi even start breaking their own rules to achieve their goals which is the opposite of what he was trained to believe in.

As to Palpatine, he didn't come across as selfish and power hungry. He carefully manipulated everyone into giving him what he wanted and making it look like he was doing so reluctantly. And when Anakin learns that he is Sidious, he's still not certain where to go. What to do. And when he sees Mace trying to kill Palpatine, it is because Mace wants to take control of the Senate for himself. That is the picture that is painted for Anakin and what he starts to believe. Thus when Mace goes to kill Palpatine, a helpless man, Anakin finds it hypocritical. Do as I say, not do as I do.

 

I think he is.
It's implied in various sources (ROTS, TFU...) that Vader wanted to kill Palpatine .
He was never strong enough to do so, though.
So he needed someone extremely powerful to conquer the Emperor.