It's all Obi-Wan's fault: is it?

Obi-wan played his part, made his mistakes, but if you ask me, he realized them early (enough) on. In AOTC, he seemed to know Anakin's weakness and limitations, but the Council did not. I think had OB1's concerns in AOTC been taken seriously by the Council, AS's fall might have been avoided. I say might, because we must remember, Palpatine played his part, too, and no matter what the Jedi did, Palpatine still might have corrupted him.

 

>>>>The lines were written with the intention of Obi-Wan discovering Anakin himself, not inheriting him from Qui-Gon. Hence, his motivations have changed. He doesn't do it because he thinks he's as good as Yoda. He does it because Qui-Gon tells him to.

He does it because he believes that Qui Gon is right that he should be trained, nobody else is going to do it, and he thinks he can do a good enough job of it.

For someone who is still wearing a padawan braid, that seems to be pretty arrogant to me...

 

Maybe Obi-Wan was a little arrogant, but he himself had just finished his training when Anakin was thrust upon him. If Qui-Gon had been more thoughtful, he would have asked Obi-Wan to send Anakin to Yoda to be trained. Obi-Wan was just not ready for such a responsibility. He handled it the best way that he could.

 

He does it because he believes that Qui Gon is right that he should be trained, nobody else is going to do it, and he thinks he can do a good enough job of it.

For someone who is still wearing a padawan braid, that seems to be pretty arrogant to me...

If you look at ROTJ, and also do the math on Dooku, you'd realize this is standard procedure. Luke was younger in Jedi than Obi-Wan in TPM, and Yoda told Luke to pass on what he had learned, and then recommended Leia as his first student.

Dooku is 80 in AOTC, and Qui-Gon was 60 in TPM. Do the math, and they are in fact only ten years apart. So Dooku was at the oldest in his early 20s when he trained Dooku.

And don't try to tell me experience counts. Dooku and Obi-Wan both have Luke beat in that respect, having been trained as Jedi all their lives.

 

First, I agree with the folks who have pointed out that Lucas revises certain story elements as he goes. Unfortunately, however, some revisions have been detrimental to the overall continuity of the mythology (an over-the-top example might include Anakin creating C3PO, for instance.)

Second, and related to that, I think the entire existence of the Qui-Gon character was Lucas's way of shifting some if not all of the blame away from Obi-Wan. Qui-Gon's deathbed plea to his grieving apprentice at least shows us where Obi-Wan's motivation was in wanting to train Anakin - it was not done out of arrogance, but out of a sense of duty and commitment. A sense of loyalty to his former master that was so strong, he would have defied the council (gee, I wonder where Obi-Wan could have learned THAT from?) in order to fulfill it.

Third, I seriously don't see much merit in debating whether another Jedi could have been a "better master" for Anakin. Didn't anybody else notice that Dooku was once Yoda's padawan? Hello, McFly!! Dooku is a Sith - they're the bad guys right? You think Yoda was a fairly competent Jedi, don't you? My point being that students can be flawed no matter how skilled the teacher.

Roger, dedicated sticker-upper for Obi-Wan

 

Hey Obiewn. How old was Luke in ep6?

 

I wouldnt blame Obiwan if he really didnt think it was right I doubt he would have trained Anakin. I think Obiwan felt he had to fill in where Qui Gon left off. Its really no ones fault. I mean if your dad or brother or close friend were to die in your hands would you try to forfill their request? i would. See ya

 

Obi-Wan is 25 in TPM. Some say he's 28, but that only makes my point better. Luke is 18 in ANH, 21 in ESB, and 22 in ROTJ.

 

>>>If you look at ROTJ, and also do the math on Dooku, you'd realize this is standard procedure.

"Standard Procedure" wasn't exactly going against Yoda's advice though...

>>>Luke was younger in Jedi than Obi-Wan in TPM, and Yoda told Luke to pass on what he had learned, and then recommended Leia as his first student.

The alternative being...? "Keep it secret, keep it safe?"

>>>Didn't anybody else notice that Dooku was once Yoda's padawan?

So were all the Jedi, weren't they? (Except Anakin.)

I don't think Lucas meant to give the impression that anyone trained by Yoda would be dark-side-proof. Just that Obi Wan thought he could do as good a job with Anakin as Yoda would have done.

 

At no point in TPM does Obi-Wan give an indication that he thinks he can do it as well as Yoda. His reasons as shown in TPM are different from the ones given in ROTJ.

Going against Yoda's advice may not be standard practice, but keep in mind it was Qui-Gon's idea.

Yoda never tells Luke "wait till you're older, then start training your sister." Luke wnats her to start developing her ability right away, and be the end of the film she has. Even without the Luke example, we see that most Jedi take on their first padawan in their mid-20s. To fault Obi-Wan for doing the same, we must be consistent and say that Dooku should never have trained Qui-Gon.

 

>>>At no point in TPM does Obi-Wan give an indication that he thinks he can do it as well as Yoda.

Not in TPM, no. But Yoda apparently trained every other Jedi; therefore, he's the benchmark. And in ROTJ, Obi Wan tells Luke that he thought he could do the job just as well as him.

>>>His reasons as shown in TPM are different from the ones given in ROTJ.

What were his reasons given in ROTJ? "I was amazed at how strong the Force was with him. I took it upon myself to train him."

In TPM, when it's clear that Anakin is something special and nobody else is going to do the job, he decides that Qui Gon is right and someone has to do it and he takes it upon himself to train him

>>>Even without the Luke example, we see that most Jedi take on their first padawan in their mid-20s.

Hang on- we've seen ONE master in his 20s take on a padawan, who had no previous training. We don't see Leia start her training (at a time when there was no other way for the only surviving Jedi to pass on the tradition and keep the Jedi teachings alive), we don't know how old Dooku was when he trained Qui Gon, or how old Qui Gon was when he started training with Dooku. Suggesting that this is "standard practice" is a hell of a leap...

 

"I seriously don't see much merit in debating whether another Jedi could have been a "better master" for Anakin. Didn't anybody else notice that Dooku was once Yoda's padawan? Hello, McFly!! Dooku is a Sith-they are the bad guys, right? You think Yoda was a fairly competant Jedi, don't you? My point being that students can be flawed no matter how skilled the teacher."

Uhh...Dooku was already a Jedi Master when he fell and is no longer under Yoda's tutelage so it isn't Yoda's fault that Dooku fell because he had many, many years to remember everything Yoda taught him and Dooku chose to ignore it and go Dark Side when the news on Qui-Gon's death went public.

 

Not in TPM, no. But Yoda apparently trained every other Jedi; therefore, he's the benchmark. And in ROTJ, Obi Wan tells Luke that he thought he could do the job just as well as him.


Those words are not the benchmark for the prequels. You don't seem to understand that. Ewan McGregor's performance does not project that motivation, no matter what Alec Guinness said. So The motivation SHOWN to us, not TOLD, is what applies. Those lines predate a fundemental change in the story, and are no longer valid.

We know the ages of Qui-Gon and Dooku. They are about ten years apart. (TPM: Qui-Gon is 60. AOTC: Dooku is 80.) For Dooku to have had the experience you seem to think all Jedi should, He'd have to be in his mid 30s, which means Qui-Gon was in his mid-20s when he began his apprenticeship. The film have established that apprenticeship begins earlier than that.

 

Just as Anakin chose to ignore what Obi-Wan was teaching him. Is this a galaxy of personal accountability, of of victims?

 

>>>Those words are not the benchmark for the prequels. You don't seem to understand that. Ewan McGregor's performance does not project that motivation, no matter what Alec Guinness said.

It's clear from TPM that Obi Wan believes that he can train Anakin. There is nothing in Ewan McGregors performace to indicate that he had any concerns about his own ability to train Anakin.

>>>So The motivation SHOWN to us, not TOLD, is what applies. Those lines predate a fundemental change in the story, and are no longer valid.

*blinks*

The OT is no longer valid?

So what were Obi Wan's motivations for training Anakin in TPM, exactly? (If it wasn't that he saw how strong the Force was with him, and decided to take on his training himself, which is what both ROTJ and TPM show and tell to me...)

>>>We know the ages of Qui-Gon and Dooku. They are about ten years apart. (TPM: Qui-Gon is 60. AOTC: Dooku is 80.)

From where?
E.U.?

>>>>For Dooku to have had the experience you seem to think all Jedi should, He'd have to be in his mid 30s, which means Qui-Gon was in his mid-20s when he began his apprenticeship. The film have established that apprenticeship begins earlier than that.

You're overlooking the fact that the only time we've seen a padawan being taken on by a master was Anakin, who hadn't had his Jedi-pre-school classes with Yoda, and is clearly not an example of the "usual" practice.

My point is that "standard procedure" may well be taking your first padawan in your mid 20s, but it is clearly NOT training a 9/10 year old who has had NO training before, when you've literally only just been "promoted" from being a padawan yourself moments before.

Obi Wan thinking that he could do that job properly is clearly arrogant, and consistent with his speech in ROTJ.

 

It's clear from TPM that Obi Wan believes that he can train Anakin. There is nothing in Ewan McGregors performace to indicate that he had any concerns about his own ability to train Anakin.

I think there is a point here that should be noted. SomeRandomNerd is right about Obi-Wan in TPM. He displays arrogance, questions Qui-Gon's decisions (including training Anakin), and defies Yoda at the end. That seems consistent with the idea of "I thought I could train him just as well as Yoda." As for the "the force was strong with him" line, it seems completely irrelevant to me. Yeah, the force was strong with him, but Obi-Wan doesn't specifically say that is why he trained him.

Now let's look at Obi-Wan's character in AOTC. He is clearly concerned and worried about Anakin's training. He acknowledges that he was wrong, and the boy was to old to be trained. He asks Mace and Yoda for advice on dealing with his arrogance.

It seems to me that this is a clear step towards the wise character that Obi-Wan becomes in the OT. It's just the natural progression of the character.

I don't see how the reasons given in the OT, and the reasons shown in the PT, contradict each other at all.

The Picnic

 

I think there is a point here that should be noted. SomeRandomNerd is right about Obi-Wan in TPM. He displays arrogance, questions Qui-Gon's decisions (including training Anakin), and defies Yoda at the end. That seems consistent with the idea of "I thought I could train him just as well as Yoda." As for the "the force was strong with him" line, it seems completely irrelevant to me. Yeah, the force was strong with him, but Obi-Wan doesn't specifically say that is why he trained him.

Wrong - it depends entirely on how you take it. Obi-Wan's certainly reckless, I would agree, and maybe even a little arrogant, but it didn't play too much into his decision to train Anakin. If he argued with Qui-Gon about decisions, then it's only because he disagreed with them. Isn't that what the whole apprenticeship program is supposed to be about - to learn through your Master; if an apprentice isn't comfortable enough with his Master to argue with him about an action that he didn't like, then that apprenticeship, IMHO, is doomed.

I saw him defying Yoda's decision in the end as the ultimate respect to his (dead) Master. Remember - Obi-Wan did NOT want to train Anakin; much less than that, he thought that Anakin was too old to be in the Jedi Order. Set aside the issues of equality, Anakin's forgoing almost eight years of training. Obi-Wan saw what Qui-Gon should have seen - namely, Anakin's emotions (especially the negative ones, considering his life as a slave for the nine years) are deeply set into him. He can't let go off his mother, he can't let go off his anger - why? Because he hadn't been trained to let them go, to not hold onto even powerful and ultimately "good" emotions such as love.

It is a statistically proven fact that you learn the most in the first decade or so of your life - there's a reason, IMO, why the Jedi take one-year-old children as opposed to thirteen-year-old children into their Order - the children will find it MUCH easier to grasp the issues, and are much more likely to follow the teachings.

So no, I don't think it's Obi-Wan's fault completely. Whatever blame rests on Obi-Wan's shoulder is insignificant compared to the one that lies on Anakin's and even Qui-Gon's shoulder. Qui-Gon knew that Obi-Wan was nowhere near ready to become a Knight, much less a Master. Still, to continue on his dream, he throws Obi-Wan into the loop and forces him into accepting Anakin as his apprentice. He knows that Obi-Wan won't NOT do his last wish, and he asks Obi-Wan to train Anakin with complete disregard to whether or not he could actually do it.

Aunecah

 

I've always looked at the realtionship between Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan/Anakin as that of the older brother (Obi-Wan) raising his younger brother (Anakin) at the request of their "father figure" (Qui-Gon). That's why I don't like that "he's like my father" line in AOTC. Qui-Gon took personal responsibility for Anakin's freedom and brought him to Coruscant to be trained. When the council decided to not allow Anakin to be train, Qui-Gon took it upon himself to "take Anakin as my padawan learner". You could the hurt on Obi-Wan's face, his master/father was "abandoning" him to train this kid. But when Qui-Gon died, Obi-Wan promised to train Anakin...and took on some of "Qui-Gon's defiance" with Yoda about taking Anakin as a padawan. And the tension between Anakin and Obi-Wan in AOTC was more of a "brothers" relationship...then that of "father and son."

Rather than taking the straight and narrow path, Anakin takes the scenic route to his destiny.
Having said that, I wouldn't place any "blame" with Obi-Wan in Anakin's fall to the dark side. It all depends on how you interpret "the prophecy." To bring balance to the Force don't you have to experience both sides...the light and the dark? What if for Anakin to play his part in "balancing" he had to experience both sides...train as a jedi, become Darth Vader...and choose to reject the evil of the SITH?

In that event, you can't blame Obi-Wan for not preventing Anakin's fall from grace...because it would've prevented Anakin from serving his higher purpose in life.

 

Aunecah Skywalker:

Wrong - it depends entirely on how you take it. Obi-Wan's certainly reckless, I would agree, and maybe even a little arrogant, but it didn't play too much into his decision to train Anakin. If he argued with Qui-Gon about decisions, then it's only because he disagreed with them. Isn't that what the whole apprenticeship program is supposed to be about - to learn through your Master; if an apprentice isn't comfortable enough with his Master to argue with him about an action that he didn't like, then that apprenticeship, IMHO, is doomed.

First of all, and no offense intended, I am not wrong. I'm not "taking it" anywhere. Obi-Wan clearly disagrees with some of Qui-Gon's decisions, including training Anakin at first. He does defy Yoda at the end of TPM.

Keep in mind that these are facts, no spin on them. Looking at those facts, and considering the line "I thought I could train him just as well as Yoda," it doesn't seem like the line is incorrect. The line fits in with the facts given above. Are there more facts to be considered? Yes, but none of them get in the way of this line being true. That is the point I am trying to make. I never said that ObiWan trained Anakin because he thought he was as good as Yoda. In fact, nowhere does he indicate that this is actually why he trained Anakin. That is why the line can stand on it's own, without getting in the way of the PT. I agree completely that he trained him because of Qui-Gon's dying wish. However, that does not negate the "better than Yoda" statement.

The Picnic

 

Qui-Gon knew that Obi-Wan was nowhere near ready to become a Knight, much less a Master. Still, to continue on his dream...
Qui-Gon had faith in Obi-Wan's abilities...
"he's headstrong, and has much to learn about the living Force; but he is capable"

While Obi-Wan disagreed with his master's persistance in having Anakin trained, he know "his place" and later apologized for questioning his master's judgment.

"I thought I could train him just as well as Yoda...I was wrong"
Everybody learns from their mistakes, even a jedi. For Obi-Wan to say that to Luke isn't a confession of guilt, but rather acceptance of his limitations. I'm sure Obi-Wan was a good mentor to Anakin (as any jedi could be) regardless of their arguments (which fits with my "brother" anaolgy). Obi-Wan realized that Yoda's experience has made him a better instructor then Obi-Wan (maybe even Yoda couldn't prevent anakin's fall to the dark side). And he was simply admitting some of that arogance he/Mace/Yoda were discussing?

The only people who think they have all the answers are people who post on the internet! (do the Ben Affleck "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back" look into the camera)

 

He does it because he believes that Qui Gon is right that he should be trained, nobody else is going to do it, and he thinks he can do a good enough job of it.

Maybe, but that makes me wonder -- it is possible that some Jedi go straight from student to teacher.

 

The OT is no longer valid?

So what were Obi Wan's motivations for training Anakin in TPM, exactly? (If it wasn't that he saw how strong the Force was with him, and decided to take on his training himself, which is what both ROTJ and TPM show and tell to me...)


The old trilogy is valid, but Obi-Wan's talks about the past should not be taken literally. His words in ROTJ don't reflect the details of TPM. Obi-Wan in TPM is training Anakin because of Qui-Gon. The Obi-Wan of ROTJ predates Qui-Gon. His dialogue was based on the assumption of an Episode I different from the one we saw: one in which Obi-Wan himself discovered Anakin.

 

Qui-Gon knew that Obi-Wan was nowhere near ready to become a Knight, much less a Master.

No, Qui-Gon felt Obi-Wan was ready for both. The Council doesn't give knighthoods prematurely. Regardless of your feelings about his abilities as a master, his days as an apprentice were numbered in TPM.

 

The lines about Anakin seeing Obi-Wan as a father figure are very accurate; they may not agree with your speculation between 1999 and 2002, but they do reflect the way lucas sees their relationship, and the way Anakin does. Qui-Gon was a father figure, but that doesn't automatically lead to a brotherly relationship.

Obi-Wan did often disagree with Qui-Gon, but he was also always right. He snesed something wrong with the mission before Qui-Gon did, he wasn't too fond of Jar Jar, and look what happened--Jar Jar handed the galaxy to Palpatine on a silver platter. Let me guess, that's Obi-Wan's fault too, isn't it? And he said Anakin was dangerous--which he is.

Obi-Wan doesn't take Anakin on out of a belief that he is as good as Yoda. He defies Yoda because he is following his master's last orders. He's not going into this thinking "I'll do this because I'm as good as Yoda." He;s thinking "I owe this to Qui-Gon." What happened to Anakin didn't happen because of poor training, but because of his own emotional baggage. What happened to him would have happened regardless of who trained him, even Qui-Gon.

 

Anakin was dangerous--which he is.
But if Anakin was destined to rise and fall from grace, only to redeem himself...Obi-Wan had to honor Qui-Gon's final request.

The Obi-Wan of ROTJ predates Qui-Gon.
Only from a film release "point of view"...regardless of the chronological order of the movie release, GL must have taken this into consideration when writing Qui-Gon (and even when he wrote ROTJ) Regardless of who discovered Anakin, Obi-Wan was commenting on his abilty to be Anakin's teacher. At the time of ESB, we knew Yoda had trained many jedi...we didn't know he was influential in the early development of all padawans (a stage Anakin skipped).

he wasn't too fond of Jar Jar, and look what happened
You mean when Jar Jar help unite the Naboo and Gungans to defeat the Trade Federation?