Anakin and Darth Vader -- one in the same?

According to Star Wars, are Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader the same person, or two seperate beings in the body of one man? Was it Anakin who killed both Vader and the Emperor on Death Star II in ROTJ, or did Anakin/Vader decided he had made mistakes and decided to have the courage to do what is right and suffer the punishment for all the evil he brought to the galaxy? It seems there are two different perspectives -- one that Anakin was once a good man but chose to become evil, while the other believes Anakin was always the good man Obi-Wan and Padme loved, but became briefly lost for twenty years when the demonic presence of Darth Vader possessed Anakin's body until Anakin, through Luke's love, found the strength to destroy Vader ...

I personally believe Anakin and Vader are, to a degree, two seperate beings ... while Anakin did chose to become evil (attack Mace, Jedi Temple, kill the Seperatists) and is responsible for those actions, there did come a point where Anakin simply lost control of himself and his actions and the dark side he let in simply overwhelmed him, and he did things Anakin regreted, like hurting Padme ... when he's first in the suit, it is Anakin who cries "Nooooo!"

Yoda warns Luke in ROTJ, "Once you START down the Dark path, FOREVER will it DOMINATE your destiny" .... basically if Luke just used the Dark side, for even a sort period of time and struck down an unarmed, defenseless Vader and Emperor in anger, the Dark side would consume Luke like it did to his father ...

 

It depends on point of view.
Even if they are two separate beings, Anakin still created Vader. The boy is still at fault for the evil creature which consumes him. If trhey are different, then it is a case of self-destruction.

I see them as the same person.
personally.

"Yoda warns Luke in ROTJ, "Once you START down the Dark path, FOREVER will it DOMINATE your destiny" .... basically if Luke just used the Dark side, for even a sort period of time and struck down an unarmed, defenseless Vader and Emperor in anger, the Dark side would consume Luke like it did to his father ..."

I see that in a slighly different light.
Yoda said it will forever dominate the destiny, not that it will consume you. Luke does indulge in the darkside during the DeathStarII duel, that doesn't mean he will be consumed by it. It just means his destiny will in some way be shaped by that decision.

-Seldon

 

Anakin sold his soul to the devil when he turned to the dark side. So in a way, Darth Vader is another person, because he is Anakin Skywalker without Anakin Skywalker's soul.
He is still Anakin Skywalker, though.

That's how I look at it.



Darth Vader is cruel
/LM

 

I tend to look at it as Anakin truly is gone, and it is all Vader. There are small moments where Anakin does come out for a second. The tear in his eye after murdering the seperatist, the wail of pain when he realizes he had a hand in Padme's daeth, and even when he did't kill his Admiral after they failed to capture the MIllenium Falcon on cloud city after assurance the rebels couldn't fix the Warp Drive. Anakin gains slight control for seconds, but needed Luke to become fully Akakin again.

 

Right, I agree with both Users.

I've said this in other threads, Vader is the sum of the remainder of evil and hatred left in Anakin. Metaphorically speaking, when Anakin was burned, he lost the goodness in himself too. Once Vader was truly born he buried the good in Anakin, buried Anakin's memories, feelings, happiness ... all of it. It was buried, but not gone. Then comes along a kid named Luke and you know the rest.

 

for me vader and anakin are one person. i think you'd have to buy that in order to believe that he can come back. yoda and obi-wan are harsh in their judgement that it's impossible for him to come back.

it's just that as vader all the love that he had has been turned to hate. but the intensity is still there.

 

They are one and the same. If you look at the chapter titles on the ROTJ dvd when Vader throws the Emperor down the shaft, saving Luke, the title is Vaders redemption. I bring this up because if they were two different entities, why not call it Anakins awakening or Anakins redemption?

Anakin dies a metaphorical death when turning to the darkside.

 

Anakin is Vader, and the starwars saga, was compleatly changed when desided to make the prequels. Before that one could say that Vader and Anakin were two different beings, and Starwars was the story of Luke Skywalker, but once the prequels were created the story changed to that of Anakin, the fall and redemption. If you look at what drives Anakin turn to the dark side and what drives Vader to kill the emporer it is the same thing, his love for a family member, first his wife and then his son, had it been some other jedi that wasnt his son do you think he would have allowed him to live in Bespin, or save him on the Deathstar II, I do not believe so. Anakin/Vader act only for what is self serving. The link in character is clear if you look at it in the correct point of view.

Shadow
~Fear not your waking enemies, trust not your sleeping allies.

 

Vader is Anakin's anger and ambition fully released, without the conscience to hold him back. But they are still the same person.

I look at the dark side like a drug, heroine or something. The use of the drug will change the person who uses it. Suddenly they will be capable of stealing, lying, even killing just to get a fix. The drug changes them, but it's still the same person.

 

Like most older SW fans,I saw the OT 1st and the whole "Anakin Skywalker the once-good Jedi is inside the suit" aspect didn't fully impact till ROTJ and even after that,still had mental images of what this former Jedi was like before the Suit.

But with only my own imagination as to how and why exactly he got into the suit to fill the gaps.

So for me,Vader was Vader more due to the suit and the evil deeds and then this alter-ego of vader was broken with the redemption factor.

The OT didn't give too much away as to the whole story on Anakin Skywalker and all we knew was that he had been a good Jedi and powerful too i.e. "Father,mmm... Powerful Jedi was he,powerful Jedi" - Yoda in ESB.

Then the PT details started to filter through and Anakin Skywalker was becoming more prominent in terms of character.

Now,after seeing the entire saga Anakin is pretty much entirely fleshed out as to his life and history and so I see that my original childhood views of the ROTJ Anakin/vader on the DSII was someone much different than I thought.

Of course the events of ROTS tell it completely and my imagination no longer fills questions like:

Why did he become a Sith?

What kind of Jedi was Anakin?

Who was his wife?

Why and how does the Emperor have such control of a powerful Sith like Vader?


All in all now,I see Anakin and Vader as one and the same person,just that one is his good persona and the other his evil one.

Many fans have said on TFN that they can see ROTS dialogue or tones used by Anakin that are so similiar to how Vader talks in the OT.

This is of course done on purpose by GL to connect the viewers to PT Anakin and OT vader.

Though I do feel that for a long time the suit and mask Vader wore made him easier to see as a separate persona.

 

Yes they are the same. Sidious would have Anakin and everyone else believe differently, but his son that loves him knows different - that he has only forgotten his true self.

 

Obi-wan shares my opinion:

"He betrayed and murdered your father (Anakin)"

IMO, Anakin and Vader are two separate characters, and in RotS Anakin's inner hatred killed him and he became Darth Vader. In RotJ, Anakin comes back to life and kills Vader. It's all emotional warfare.

 

I think Luke summmed up my opinion on it very well "It is the name of your true self, you've only forgotten." I used to subscribe to the belief that as Obi-Wan said "The Good Man who was your father was destroyed" but after seeing ROTS my thoughts changed. I still think that from a certain point of view Obi-Wan was right however. Anakin was dead as far as anyone else in the galaxy was concerned. However Luke being his son and a Jedi like his father before him slowly rekindled the embers of Anakin that were left inside of Vader and over time Anakin was metaphorically ressurected though, from a far more literal stand point it was that Anakin began to remember his life before Darth.

 

I beg your pardon but the line IS:

Yoda: Once you you start down the dark path forever will it dominate your destiny. Consume you it will, as it did Obi Wan's apprentice......

 

to me they are the same person. If Vader is seperate then it's not very interesting because all he has is rage ect. When i watch the OT it's Anakin gone bad.

 

^^^ I agree, it becomes disinteresting and too 'cut and dry' if you make Anakin and Vader out to be two completely different entities.

Anakin is conscious even when he is going by the name of "Darth Vader," and even when he's in the suit. All his memories are intact, and there isn't an internal battle between two different people inside of that body. Vader isn't some outside entity that entered Anakin's body with the Dark Side... He's not possessed by some foreign being called Vader. Vader is Anakin, just with his very own darker inclinations strengthened and brought to the forefront by the Dark Side. When Anakin breaks loose from the Dark Side, he basically succeeds in de-emphasizing his darker inclinations so that they don't dominate his actions as much, and so that his good inclinations are able to have more say in what he does.

In this way, Vader's actions are Anakin's actions. He's making conscious personal decisions, just aided by the Dark Side... and Anakin is still conscious of himself and has to live with the loathesome being that he has become, and with all the inhuman things he's doing/done. This way it's more tragic, as opposed to having Anakin "awaken" in ROTJ and he's like "What? What happened? Man, I'm glad I was able to throw that evil guy out of my body! Phew, I'm a good guy and always have been!" (I'm overplaying this bit, of course)
That's just what I think.

 

Physically they are the same person, mentally though it's two different personalities.

Anakin was buried by the hate and anger that we call Vader. Vader was buried by the good and pureness that we call Anakin.

 

Everyone has both good and bad in them. Vader is simply all of Anakin's bad sides, with his good sides being supressed. Anakin had all of what Vader has: rage, belief in dictatorship, lust for power. The difference is that Anakin had a coinscience that held those emotions in check. The dark side tore that down. Vader and Anakin is the same person, only empathizing different sides of the same man.

 

I know that everyone has good and bad in them. But in Anakin's case, these emotions dictate the character.

It's not like Anakin/Vader is good sometimes, and bad other times. When Anakin's Vader, it's pure evil staring at you, with no sign what-so-ever of any good. When it's Anakin, it's kindness and pureness staring at you. Yeah, there are some hints of anger in him, I'll give you that. But for the most part each emotion suppresses the other. That is why they are two completely different personalities.

 

The Force has two sides, the Light and Dark Side. But it?s still one Force. Everyone has an evil and good side to them. But it?s still the same person. Vader is nothing but Anakin?s inability to let go, his fear, his greed and his hatred. But it?s still Anakin.

 

Anakin the chosen and Darth the Machine!

 

I agree, besides what was OWK supposed to say to Luke at this point? Was he supposed to tell him that his father was the evil Sith Lord Darth Vader and shake the foundations of his world? This is another one of OWK's POV statements.

I like this analogy. The fire still burns within. It makes me smile when I hear Tarkin's comment to Vader in A New Hope, as Anakin's fire is being re-lit right under his nose as the Force bring his children into play.

TARKIN: The Jedi are extinct, their fire has gone out of the universe.
You, my friend, are all that's left of their religion.

 

They are the same person. However, Vader of the OT bares no resemblence whatsoever to Anakin. Not physically, emotionally, mentally. Everything about him is a different, he has a completely different personality by all means of the word. Between the PT and the OT, Anakin changed so much that he was no longer recognizable. Not even his flaws are the same.

Even though Anakin was far from perfect, he was also far from Vader. Vader no longer has Anakin's fear of loss and attachment. He also no longer has Anakin's anger and love. Vader is angry a lot, but his anger is dark and really in control. Anakin's anger was spurred by grief, and would consume to do things he knew was wrong.

So, in metaphysical terms, they were two different people. The very things that drove Anakin to become Vader were no longer a part of Vader in the OT.

When Vader/Anakin redeemed himself, he was still different from Anakin, at least as he had been in AOTC and ROTS. He regained a childlike compassion that he had in TPM. For the first time in a long time, he was not thinking of himself at all. When this happened, he not only redeemed himself from all of the horrible things he did as Vader, but also all of the mistakes he made as Anakin, all of his flaws as Anakin.

I hope that makes sense.