Vader/Gollum, Bilbo/Obi-Wan, Mustafar/Mt. Doom, the end of the duel

I saw something along the lines of the following posted on another board and thought it was an interesting comparison.

Obi-Wan is dueling to kill Anakin on Mustafar. Spoilers now indicate that he cuts off all of Anakin's limbs and Anakin falls on the sand. But then, strangely, Obi-Wan refuses to finish the job and kill him. Which was what he set out to do in the firdst place, but instead, he leaves. I am sure in the long years on Tatooine, he regretted the fact that he did not finish the job since he helped create the suited Vader, a scourge upon the galaxy. And yet, because Vader was NOT dead, he killed the Emperor when the latter was distracted by lighting up the obstinate Luke.

This has an interesting parallel to "The Hobbit" and LotR. In The Hobbit, Bilbo, out of pity, spares Gollum's life. And this has enormous consequences. At the very end of LotR, Frodo is not powerful enough to do the job and has to have help from Gollum who bites his ring finger and thus ends the Ring. In fact, Galndalf tells Frodo at one point that it's a good thing that "pity stayed Bilbo's hand."

Do others see this parallel? Is this a small homage from GL to Tolkien which made him end the DUEL as he did?

Please discuss ONLY this potential parallel but don't start LotR vs. SW wars.

 

People who star LOTR vs. SWs must be idiots. They are two different types of films that should be left alone. Not to compete against one another.

Anyways, that is a very interesting parallel. They are very different things happening, but they do compare quite nicely.

 

Hm, I hadn't though of that. I suppose you could also draw a parallee between Frodo's inability to destroy the Ring and Obi-wan's seeming inability to put Anakin out of his misery. Very interesting. Meditate on this I will,

 

Interesting thought, but Bilbo doesn't kill Gollum out of pity. Obi-Wan Kenobi leaves Vader to die. Two different things.

 

GL has many sources from which he creates his story arc...i need not go into those here. I don't think it is so much an homage to Tolkien as much as it is that both authors have/had done much research into the same topic areas, etc...

Both are great story tellers though.

 

Yeah, but he doesn't actually kill Vader though, does he? It's kind of like Frodo and Gollum. Frodo though that he could save Gollum, which turned out to be impossible. Maybe Obi-wan thinks that even after all he's been through, Anakin can still be redeemed and he is.

 

Ewok, that's what I started to think when I first read this comparison. Does the seed of the thought that perhaps Anakin COULD be redeemed someday, be planted right there, at the very end of the duel? Obi-Wan was apparently sitting around, waiting for Luke to grow up and redeem Anakin.

Otherwise, why doesn't Obi-Wan jump down and put his saber through Anakin at that point?

 

He's pretty much going to die anyways. I don't see why he should make him hurt anymore.

 

Mordor had one massive Volcano

Mustafar is full of them.

And dont say GL wrote it because of LOTR,Mustafar/how Vader came to be was in the orignal draft of SW I believe

 

I don't know if it was in the original draft of Star Wars, buts The Duel has been kicking around George's mind since the beginning, yes.

 

GL keeps paying little homages to tons of other people in his SW movies. I am sure that the DUEL idea is completely GL's own and has been in his head since 1973, but what's to prevent him from paying a little homage to Tolkien's "The Hobbit" with the Bilbo/Gollum angle?

Otherwise why not end the duel with Anakin disappearing from Obi-Wan's sight and Obi-Wan thinking he really did die? If it had been Yoda or Mace instead of Obi-Wan, would they have made sure that they killed Anakin before departing?

 

The Duel was wrtten ever since 77

 

The Duel was wrtten ever since 77


And when did Tolkien write his classics. I'm pretty sure is was a quite bit of time before '77.

I think both are using common themes throughout the history of literature, which is descending into hell for the final battle versus evil. Hell,(no pun) even the movie version of Spawn ended like that.

 

see thru wat peter jackson says bout OT on bonus disc of star wars OT dvd

 

The only thing the two scenes have in common is that they both take place at the location of a volcano and lava. The dramatic dynamics of the scene and the characters involved are completely different. But I knew this discussion was coming because people love to make mountains out of molehills, or in this case, mountains out of lava.

 

I think people continue to compare these two franchises, because I believe they're trying to figure out which one is going to be their darling. But JohnWesleyDowney, you're right. the only similarity is the volcanoes, and lava. The characters, and situations are alot different.

 

It's possible Lucas read The Lord of the Rings books when he was young and derived some part of this dynamic and incorporated it in an original fashion for Star Wars. After all the books by Tolkien came first.

It's more likely though that it's just coincidence that some aspects of the series have seemingly parallel events. The original Star Wars was based loosely on The Hidden Fortress; a film by Akira Kurasawa.

At any rate, and at a very minimum, both George Lucas and Tolkien are well aware of literary themes; these themes are universal and that's probably all that is in common with what you're talking about.

 

forever_jedi = "Otherwise, why doesn't Obi-Wan jump down and put his saber through Anakin at that point? "

Bacon164 = "He's pretty much going to die anyways. I don't see why he should make him hurt anymore."

Because it would be less painful to finish Anakin off then to just like him burn to death. Reason why he doesn?t I think is because if Anakin is burning down there so will Obi-Wan if he goes down.

 

There both stories about the danger of power with some aesthetic similarities - nothing more. We've known that Obi-Wan and Anakin were going to duel on a planet of lava for about twenty years now, so its definetly not a homage to the RotK movie and if youve read the book there isnt a duel at all in Mt. Doom - just a slip and fall.

 

I think people continue to compare these two franchises, because I believe they're trying to figure out which one is going to be their darling.

Do you have the same feeling when people compare aspects of SW to Herbert's Dune? It's fine if the only similarity someone sees is a lot of orange fire and lava.

Anyway, I was thinking that if Obi-Wan had been fighting Maul in the same situation, he would not have simply left Maul to die or whatever. He would have made sure that Maul was truly dead. It's just in character for Obi-Wan. And yet here is Anakin still quite alive, screaming his hatred, and yet Obi-Wan does not finish him off.

Anything can happen - the Will of the Force. It really seems that instead of killing him, Obi-Wan lets the Force decide Anakin's fate. It's quite curious that he should feel this way about a Sith apprentice who has done worse things than Maul and Dooku. It's clear that even at the end, his feelings for Anakin get in the way of his finishing the job. And this has positive consequences 20+ years later! Just like the horrible creature Gollum being so vitally important!

 

I like this comparison. Had Bilbo finished the job, Gollum wouldn't have been around to take the Ring from Frodo, and all of Middle Earth would've been covered in darkness for an eternity. Had Obi-Wan finished the job, Vader wouldn't have been around to destroy the Sith...and the Emperor would've ruled with an iron fist for much longer than he did. Nicely played.

 

Never saw the comparison either. Only connection is the volcanos and such. Since learning that Obi-Wan leaves Anakin to die, I've wondered, did Obi-Wan feel guilty at all?

It sounds as thought Anakin is asking for help at the end, but is refused....

 

HERE

This is where you can find virtually every star wars reference to another movie, or visa versa.
But this is a STAR WARS forum, and I would hate to have bob come here and start to lecture about parallels and mirrors.
Please, no more, and please...









Don't compare SW to LOTR. Trust me.

 

"Vader came to be was in the orignal draft of SW I believe"

Not even remotely close.

The current incarnation of Vadar did not even begin to take form until after McQuerrie designed the suit in order to solve the problem of how Vader survived the vacuum of space in the original version of the boarding of Lea's ship.

Before that Vader was simply a fearsome military commander and henchman of the Emperor. Not a cyborg or a Jedi/Sith.

 

I am the chosen one precious.