PT Were Obi-Wan and Anakin ever friends?

Isn't that jacked up? Just because they weren't 'friends', he can kill scores of children with impunity and it doesn't reflect negatively on how people see him? Honestly if my one best friend killed a bunch of kids, I'd prolly try to kill him too. Even if he wasn't himself when he did it.

 

So what? Luke saw the super bad Vader and fought him as well, and lost his arm, did he think of the same thing when he only heard Vader(never saw him do any good) was his father? I don't think people's view can't change, but you must see a person well enough on both sides.

Obi Wan failed to see Anakin's darkness as a Jedi and again, failed to see the good in Vader again as well. So he almost made the same mistake on Lukel. He was trying to convince Luke to kill his own father, we can see how much anger and rage did it take for Luke to almost do it, and what would have become of Luke if he really did it Should a sane person push a son to kill his father, when the son clearly showed that he didn't want to? People all have darkness and soft spots inside them, you can't just ask them to suppress it. Palpatine knew the old Jedi too well, he failed because Luke wasn't like those old Jedi, and he also ignored the light in Anakin.

 

Luke didn't know Vader BEFORE he was bad, it doesn't have the same impact on him it must have had on Obi-Wan. Nor did was ever Vader's master like Obi-Wan, so lacked the same guilt that perhaps he does have some responsibility in Vader becoming such a monster. Luke also lacked the personal friendship with many of Vader's victims, he didn't have the emotional connection on BOTH sides, merely to his father. Luke knew the Empire blew up Alderaan - but a million deaths is just a statistic to some extent, he couldn't truly grasp the enormity of it, no-one could. Obi-Wan knew and was friends with many of the Jedi Vader had a big part in executing, he knew and taught a lot of those children that Vader hacked down in person. Padme was his friend too, seeing Anakin coldly throttle her of all people would have been a pretty convincing argument he's gone right off the deep end.

Was he wrong to think Anakin had no good left? Yes. Can he really be blamed for that mistake? Not really. Everything he knew pointed to Vader being evil to the core. Luke had a perspective Obi-Wan just couldn't have.

 

This is one of the flaws of the prequels, Obi-Wan should have been the one eager to train Anakin rather than just being annoyed with him all the time. We the audience should have seen their friendship unfold on screen rather than just them referring to things we don't see in the movies.

 

I quoted you because I was responding to you. Don't like it, don't respond.

Right. Obi-wan and Qui-gon discussed this in "Overlords".

QUI-GON: "Obi-Wan, have you done as I asked? Have you trained the boy?"

OBI-WAN: "Master Qui-gon. How are you here?"

QUI-GON: "I am here because you are here."

OBI-WAN: "No, I don't understand. What is this place?"

QUI-GON: "Unlike any other, a conduit through which the entire Force of the universe flows."

OBI-WAN: "Are we in danger?"

QUI-GON: "This planet is both an amplifier and a magnet. Three are here who seek Skywalker. They, like me, believe him to be the Chosen One."

OBI-WAN: "You were right. The Force within him is stronger than any known Jedi. I have trained him as well as I could, but he is still willful and balance eludes him."

QUI-GON: "If he is the Chosen One, he will discover it here."

OBI-WAN: "And if not?"

QUI-GON: "Then you must realize with his power, this is a very dangerous place for him to be."

Yet, Obi-wan didn't want to kill him. He said it to Yoda who told him to accept that his friend was gone and do what needed to be done. He was too attached to Anakin to do what needed to be done, but he was also too bound up in duty. That is why Obi-wan leaves Anakin to burn. Luke was able to see the good in Anakin because of the simple fact that he had a clean slate that Obi-wan didn't have. When Luke and Vader had connected through the Force, Luke had sensed that the good was in there waiting to come back out. It took Luke a while to realize it, but it was there. And Vader had no reason to hate his own son. As to Obi-wan and Yoda, they wanted Luke to accept that his father has to die and in the end, he does. But he does so in a way that is unexpected, but just as effective.

Obi-wan was only annoyed with Anakin in AOTC and that's because the boy has been trying his patience. He was eager to train him as we saw at the end of TPM.

 

Understand your point of view I do Darth Sinister, but I still wish we would have seen more of their friendship on screen. Imagine how much more drama would have been felt during their duel in ROTS if we saw them as good friends more. I also always wished there was more dialogue in their duel on Mustafar during their fight, it would have added a lot more to the scene. I always thought Obi-wan more trained Anakin out of respect for his master Qui-Gon's request.

 

There was plenty of material in AOTC and ROTS that painted them as friends. Not happy go lucky friends, but friends. Lucas didn't have much dialogue during the duel even before filming began. There was only one passage during the conference room portion of the duel which Lucas omitted.

200 INT. MUSTAFAR-MAIN CONTROL CENTER-DAY View screens EXPLODE around ANAKIN and OBI-WAN as they work their way into the Control Room. The fighting is intense. OBI-WAN is on the defensive as he jumps up on the table view screen in the center of the room.

ANAKIN: "Don’t make me destroy you, Master. You’re no match for the dark side."

OBI-WAN "I’ve heard that before, Anakin . . . but I never thought I’d hear it from you."

But in terms of training Anakin, he could have easily gone against Qui-gon's wishes and let someone else handle it. However, there was something about how Anakin conducted himself that lead to his decision to go through with it.

 

I've been thinking about the 'clean slate' which Luke had and Obi-Wan didn't. That really fits I think.

In the first instance I suspect that having seen what happened to Anakin when he turned, Obi-Wan must have been asking himself if he had perhaps ignored or rationalised away the growing darkness in his former padawan, allowing his love for the young man to blind him. I suspect he may have felt bad and guilty about that. I think this would have made Obi-Wan very cautious indeed about thinking too well of Anakin/Vader at any time after that point.

Secondly, Obi-Wan wiould have heard about many of the terrible things Vader did during the time Luke was growing up, convincing him even more clearly that Anakin/Vader was evil and perhaps making him wish he had had the strength to kill him on Mustafar. The love he had had for his 'brother' had got in the way of him completing his mission and years of significant evil resulted from that action (or lack of). He may have felt guilty about that too. Again this would cause him to be very guarded about any glimmer of positive feelings towards Anakin/Vader.
So for both of these reasons I think Obi-Wan would not be able to see the good left in his former ally.

Luke, on the other hand, had no reason to be cautious or guarded in these ways because he had no history with the man and so could see more clearly.

 

jakobitis89 I agree! We could chalk this too up to a flaw in the prequels, but there's a lot missing from this relationship that would add up to what is suggested in the OT. Even in the the CW series, I don't see the type of affection you see between Obi-Wan Anakin that we see between Qui-Gon in TPM.

 

He refused to see the good that Vader never let show BECAUSE HE FAILED TO SEE HIS DARKNESS AS A JEDI. Luke could forgive Vader because, besides losing his hand he never really suffered from him, nowhere near as much as Obi-Wan or even Leia did (and Leia did not forgive him). Luke never saw the true extent of Vader's crimes, and Luke was always an idealist whereas Obi-Wan was a cynic. Not to mention, Luke was far stronger in the Force and could possibly sense his inner turmoil (not to mention they likely shared a force bond due to their relationship). All in all, it makes perfect sense that Luke would see the good in Vader and Obi-Wan would not. And, you keep missing the crucial fact that Obi-Wan had absolutely no reason to see Vader as anything but a monster. Remember the end of the Last Airbender? While Aang spared Ozai, if he had no other option, wouldn't the sane choice have been to kill him? What about the Emperor, should he have lived? Everyone can be redeemed if they want to be, however, often times people don't care for redemption or are even aware that they're wrong, and often become too dangerous to live, just as Ozai and the Emperor and Vader for a time.

 

No, Obi Wan just couldn't judge a person on both sides, like all the other Jedi.

Let's see
Luke
saw Vader killed Obi Wan
almost got killed by Vader in EP IV
knew that Vader captured his friends and gave Han to Boba
cut off his arm
threatened to corrupt Leia

Shall I continue? Unlike Obi Wan, he never ever saw anything about the good Anakin.

Because of the Emperor, it would be a super stupid idea to ask Luke to kill Vader because that's exactly what the Emperor wanted Luke to. Hadn't the Jedi learned their lessons? Anakin killed Dooku in EP II and what happened?

 

Except, he didn't suffer, is my point. Sure, those things suck, but most people can forgive them. Anakin personally killed most of the people Obi-Wan knew and cared for, also, betrayal is far harder to forgive. Obi-Wan saw the good in Anakin at one point, and saw how depraved and evil he became, making him seem even more irredeemable.

 

It isn't that Obi-wan couldn't see the good in Anakin anymore, it's that all of his anger and frustration from thirteen years had come boiling to the surface. Anakin had let all of the negative feelings that had been festering about how Obi-wan was training him, how he criticized him, how he had been disappointed in him and let that fuel his anger and hatred. All Obi-wan could sense was the dark side in him. Luke is confronted by a Vader who is not furious at his own flesh and blood. He is dealing with a man burdened by his personal failures and his own misery for doing what he had done. This was on top of sensing all the darker things that Obi-wan had felt, which drove Vader during the years since Mustafar. That's why there's the struggle that Luke feels on Endor and aboard the Death Star.

 

Luke was never PERSONALLY betrayed by Vader like Obi-Wan was, that's the real difference I think. They had been fighting before either of them knew their true relationship, it was just (sort of) Jedi vs Sith, Rebel vs Imperial, until Vader realised that Luke was actually his son - after revealing which he immediately altered his tactics to try and turn Luke instead of kill him.

Obi-Wan had the exact opposite experience, he was close enough to Anakin that they were brothers in all but blood, they were family. And then he sees Anakin (the best friend he's ever had) killing mutual friends, he sees him murdering innocent children they've both taught, he sees him choking his own wife (and Obi-Wan's friend also) and that isn't just 'He's gone bad!' that is a personal betrayal.

Luke sees the good buried deep down in a fundamentally bad person, Obi-Wan sees a good person turn evil. They are coming at it from opposite directions and draw appropriately different conclusions. As I said, Obi-Wan was WRONG in his conclusion that Vader was evil to the core... but from what he knew it was a perfectly logical conclusion to reach.