The child-killing thing always seemed WAY over the top to me. It was just too extreme to happen so abruptly. I mean, I agree Vader was always theoretically irredeemable after Alderaan. But we all know that human nature makes it a lot easier to stomach the idea of millions of nameless children dying in a nuclear blast than a dozen or so children being stabbed by someone they trusted. Plus, the child-killing scene ruined any hope of some kind of “slow descent towards evil”. Why was Obi Wan even trying to talk Anakin out of being evil after this?

Also, for a decade before the Prequels, I heard these tantalizing rumors about Anakin Skywalker as this bad-ass Jedi-killer assassin. So when I finally saw him depicted as such in ROTS, only to see him killing a room full of defenseless kids, it just seemed… I don’t know… kind of pathetic. (Cue Prequel defense team: “that’s the point you idiot, didn’t you even watch the Prequels? Stop idolizing Darth Vader, etc. etc. etc.”)