ST Hayden Christensen (Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader) in IX

They should probably consult GL, Zahn, etc about how they'd approach Anakin's conversations with those three and work that $%#@ out because it clearly should happen. I'm thinking it isn't done because no one wants to be blamed for messing it up.

 

That means it’ll happen.

 

Anakin's death and FG have more than one unique attribute. It's not just that he manages to appear as his younger self at the end of ROTJ- but there's also the fact that his body didn't disappear like Yoda or Obi-wan. I mean, I doubt Luke dragged his empty suit down to Endor so he could burn it. Between that fact and the fact that he was conceived of the force I don't think it is a stretch to have the character appear again in fill bodily form in IX. Personally, I think he should be the first Force user to actually come completely back to life- post death. We've heard talk about Sith cheating death, and keeping ones they love from dying, and even manipulating mediclorians to create life, but that doesn't necessarily mean returning from death.
Anakin was prophesied to destroy the Sith and bring balance to the Force, but that doesn't mean he was supposed to do both at the same time. Perhaps he was always meant to destroy the Sith by turning back to the light and killing Palps- but the balancing of the Force was meant to happen later on. The last two films have set up Kylo and Rey as on opposite sides of the force, yet still unable to overpower the other. As if no matter how strong one gets, the other will be granted an equal measure by the opposite side of the Force. It could be that their powers will continue to grow to dangerous levels without them being able to stop each other- creating more and more collateral damage in the GFFA as well as in the Force itself. Perhaps even leading to FG Luke fading away before he can fully guide Rey- maybe even leading to the premature deaths of other FS characters like Leia. All this could keep getting worse and only Anakin will be able to bring them both in-line- mirroring the destiny he was told to have by The Father in TCW's Mortis Arc. Anakin becomes the new Father, while Kylo becomes the new Son and Rey becomes the new Daughter. Not that the film has to explain all that Mortis backstory, they just have to show that only Anakin can save the galaxy by pulling the other two into the Beyond with him, to contain them there moving forward. Or maybe he just brings balance by getting them to stop fighting each other and start working together somehow.

 

But what did actually burn? Was there still a body within the suit on the funeral pyre, did Anakin's spirit just need a little longer to ascend before his body vanished?

 

I'm pretty sure it is the case he just ceremonially burned the suit.

 

Lucas did confirm that Anakin disappeared following his death. If not Lucas, then someone in an official capacity did. Luke burned the suit.

 

Yeah, makes the most sense. He's a ghost, he disappeared like Obi & Yoda.

 

Which was why when Kylo retrieved the helmet he didn't need to remove a skull.

 

Agreed. Cos honestly. No one can say it wouldn't be possible to fit him into Episode IX. Anyone who reads posts on here could see that there are several scenarios where having Anakin appear especially to Kylo Ren would work seamlessly, almost to the point of being an obvious opportunity. So if he's not in there, then what else would the reason be?!

That.

Agreed. You know, I also had this (albeit headcanon) theory that even if Anakin's body did not disappear, it still makes sense he could be a ghost-because of Luke burning him on the "Jedi funeral pyre." Just as it was with Qui-Gon, and he was able to retain his consciousness as well.

 

So according to Vader no 25

Spoiler: Mystery Box Unboxing

Sheev is Anakin's father

. A lot of people speculated this, but I wonder if they should have left that to imagination unless there was some functional purpose to a story line.

 

Is it confirmed?

Spoiler

I only saw that "immortal" pics on reddit.

Do you have a source.

 

Wait, what? Like officially, without a shadow of a doubt?

I really hate that, if it's Palpatine literally manipulating the Force to have birthed him. They've better have damn-well consulted with George on that, if they're going to make it that explicit. That wasn't the impression I got at all from the prequels, more just that the Force had birthed him on its own as a true "chosen one", and Sheev just sort of sensed the immaculate destiny stuff upon meeting him. Like he started the gears moving on manipulating Anakin at the end of EpI and not beforehand.

If this is legit, why the hell would Palps have been cool with the notion of replacing Anakin with Luke in the first place? What, Vader's a cripple? Some sort of Darwinian "the strong survive, Luke beats Vader hypothetically, that's enough for me?" Seemed to me Maul & Dooku were always kind of stop-gaps, or Dooku anyway (he hadn't met Anakin when Maul was still around), just seems weird if Sheev literally conceived Anakin through Force-mojo that he'd do away with that Plan A, especially given how uber-successful Vader's been for him for, oh, 20+ years.

Haven't read the comic so might be jumping the gun context-wise, but that smells like a major bullcrap idea to me personally.

 

Sheev this is Shmi. Shmi meet Sheev.

 

Spoiler: Link

https://www.fatherly.com/news/star-wars-finally-reveals-darth-vaders-real-father/

There were some captions from the comic in the article last night that I don't see now. But this was the article I read.

 

Plagueis confirmed.

 

It's been well hinted ever since Episode 3 that this was the case. I believe it was George's intention to do this originally, but he didn't make it explicit for some reason. I can't remember specifics, but I thought there was direct documentation of this.

I don't see it having any problem with Luke replacement, though. Vader became handicapped, and a new member of the insanely powerful bloodline appears? Palpatine was always the ultimate opportunist. And it could certainly be that they lost sight of Shmi at some point, so Anakin was a surprise rediscovery. Or maybe a large swath of women were experimented on, appeared to have negative results, and were thus forgotten about; only later did Shmi become suddenly pregnant. There are any number of ways this could be made to work in context.

That all said, I don't know how I feel about it suddenly being put out in the open. It feels like something better left to interpretation and rumor...unless there's a specific reason to bring it to the fore now. Which could imply things and revelations to come, likely about Rey and Kylo. The Aftermath trilogy puts alot of weird force experimentation going on at Jakku under distant (and occasionally personal) control of the Emperor; the Church of the Force has a sect on the planet for some reason. These could mean something. Unfortunately, they likely will not, and just be red herrings for us all to gawk at. That's my particular problem with this new tidbit: it's a world-shattering revelation that will not be used to shatter any worlds.

 

I don't think Palps is the Father.
Episode 6: Dad and son try to kill each other in front of cheerleading grandpa. After some time dad decides to throw grandpa into a reactor shaft while son says "Good job dad ." This totally destroys the depth of the father son conflict
If that is really the path the storygroup is going then please give me now Reylo on top so I can be sure that this is the new Disney SW path I cannot follow.

 

Preferably just GL and not Zahn. I couldn't finish reading Thrawn Alliances because of the way he wanted Anakin to look inferior and unintelligent compared to Thrawn.

 

I don't know the EpIII thing's exactly a substantial hint at it. I mean, it's the word of a liar & schemer in a scene where he's explicitly coloring the truth & manipulating the naive vulnerable borderline-wacko. Could be euphemized truth leaving out the specific identity of the student, sure, could also be full-on fairytale. If we're looking at it purely with what's in the movie.

I don't know, if this were coming from George, or it's been sanctioned by George, it's something I can wrap my head around. If he had no say in it though, it sure as hell conflicts with my personal take on that scene - which is fine, that's okay - but it's a little annoying getting this made clear-as-day in a mere comic of all things. Yeah, it's all canon now under the story group, fine, but just seems a little too big a thing to relegate to some comic 5% of Star Wars viewers are ever going to read.

There's something kind of arty & beautiful about the way it was, vague as EpIII left it. Where it's a total possibility, but there's also a good chance Palps is talking out of his ass and taking advantage of a young troubled guy who's going to eat up said stories. Personally I just prefer the notion that Anakin's a purely natural phenomenon, literally born of the Force without any mumbo jumbo from Palpatine, but that Palpatine's that attuned to things that he senses how important Anakin is upon first meeting him, when even guys like Yoda & Mace don't. Then over 10 years he's putting that plan in place, feeding the boy's ego, painting the truth with manipulative coloring, weakening allegiances, fueling suspicion. At that point when Anakin's convinced he's going to lose Padme, he's probably going to believe any bullcrap story Sheev wants to spin, so long as it's involving a promise of saving his wife.

At that point there are a few ways it could go: Plagueis was a real guy but Sheev was never the student that killed him, Plagueis was a real guy and Sheev was indeed the Brutus, or Plagueis is a boogeyman Sheev concocted up a couple of hours ago while sitting on the toilet and he's been giggling ever since about how dummy Ani's going to buy it hook-line-and-sinker and he's soon to be beheading 6 year olds. And we never have to know which.

I dunno. Just feel like this may have been the type of thing ol' Georgey-boy wanted left inconclusive. If it's to be clarified one way or the other specifically, cool, but just seems the sort of thing that's up-and-above a comic, canon as said comic legitimately is now. Like if Abrams or Johnson or Filoni or whoever had done it in a movie or Rebels or whatever, after sitting down to lunch with George and picking his brain about it and getting his blessing, that's something else. Just bugs me the way this has been done though.

 

According to the makers of Revenge of the Sith, this was exactly the intention.
The earlier cut of Revenge of the Sith had Palpatine flat-out tell Anakin he created him, then Anakin pledges to the dark side partially because of this revelation.
But when they changed the final film they left the implication unstated and vague, basically so it is up to the individual viewer if they want to interpret it as a fact.

Personally, it makes a lot of sense that Palpatine probably created him, but I can appreciate they ultimately kept it mysterious.

If Plagueis or Palpatine created Anakin as a potential "super-Sith" it makes the fact Palpatine turned him from the Jedi, then it backfired in the end when Palpatine is killed by his own apprentice Vader (and a returned Anakin himself), all the more ironic. And the Jedi prophecy becomes pretty paradoxical, really. Like Anakin is thought of by the Sith as their "chosen one" but the force in the end teaches them a lesson about the Sith imposing their will on it.

But the irony is still there either way I suppose. That The Emperor's own machinations, that served him so well for decades, are what essentially do him in.

A theory I have thought about that is interesting to me, is the perspective shift if you look at Anakin's potential origin when watching The Phantom Menace relative to Revenge of the Sith.
In TPM Qui-Gon seems to think Anakin was created by the midichlorians, and even briefly becomes a kind of surrogate father-figure to Anakin himself.
If you were just to watch Ep1, then the implication is pretty clearly that the force created Anakin as a chosen one to the Jedi. And Qui-Gon is the ideal mentor that symbolises what Anakin should strive to be, and perhaps could have been.
But watching ROTS (which supersticiously takes place 13 years later), Palpatine's revelations subvert this and totally turn it on it's head. With the idea that the Sith were responsible and Anakin turning was more pre-destined (perhaps one reason they took this out - it removes some of the free-will in Anakin's galaxy-shaping choices).
If Palpatine created Anakin it puts more of a mark on Anakin, like he was unluckily cursed and had less chance to resist his fall.
But watching TPM in a vacuum, the emphasis is on his Jedi destiny. I just think that is significant.

 

More too it than that. Dad and son fight, dad threatens daughter, son lashes out and beats up dad, grandpa is a rotten old creep that molests grandson with lightning fingers, dad kills rotten grandpa. Good riddance.
This time grandpa is dead, so they clearly won't take that route. This time it is the grandson that is the rotten creep that will be killed.

 

That's depressing...

 

I really hope that Palpatine is not Anakin's father.

On one hand, it explains why the "Skywalkers" are wonderfully troubled characters - where due to the fact that people are the product of their genetical ancestry and the environment in which they grow up in, the "bad genetics" of Palpatine occasionally creep in to affect the emotional state of the "Skywalker" and subsequently corrupt the "good" character traits of the Skywalker.

But on the other hand and in respect to the greater overall Star Wars story, this idea is taking a few steps backward. In the last few years, the LFL story group has done a wonderful job in expanding the Star Wars universe. It has seemingly made the galaxy even bigger and more diverse through its wonderful world building. Yet IMO, having Sheev as the father counteracts alot of this good work and makes the galaxy feel a bit smaller again.

I feel Anakin's ancestry should remain as it is where Shmi's pregnancy is unexplained. The mythical aspect needs to remain a key component of Star Wars where the Force should always have a sense of mystery about it and cannot be fully explained. You can have Jedi and Sith and "whoever else" Masters able to do some really amazing and cool things and have a deep knowledge of the Force, but ultimately have only scratched the surface in understanding the Force.

I prefer the "Chosen One" path in respect of Anakin's origins because to me it portrays the Force as some sort of living entity that has a "will" of its own in determining the fate of something or someone. The Force chose to create Anakin to balance what the Force felt was an imbalance in the Force.

Papa Palpatine should only remain as an idea within Robot Chicken.

 

Spoiler

It's not at all confirmed, considering how the whole thing was just a vision sequence including a lot of Vader's own thoughts and memories. Just because he thinks Sheev may be his father doesn't make it so.

 

He's not Sheev. Come on you guys it's so obvious that his name is The Senate. In TPM, he didn't like this name and begged Padme to be referred to as Frank (let ME be FRANK your majesty) but she disregarded him which put him on the dark path. In ROTS, he accepted his true identity when speaking with Master Windu (I am The Senate).