Originally posted by: xhonzi
So... in pondering how poorly and unconvincingly the Prequel Trilogy handled Anakin's "Fall to the Dark Side," it got me thinking: What stories have convincing depictions of a character's fall to a dark side of sorts? I quickly thought of 2:
1) Luke in RotJ (for all of 5 minutes) as he destroys Vader with the Dark Side
2) Lex Luthor in Smallville. Others may not agree, but he's been our favourite character on the show (early seasons, at least) and we really enjoyed seeing the seeds of his future dark side being sown. At some point it seems that he became the typical villain, but up until then he was really interesting.
Who/What else?
xhonzi
So... in pondering how poorly and unconvincingly the Prequel Trilogy handled Anakin's "Fall to the Dark Side," it got me thinking: What stories have convincing depictions of a character's fall to a dark side of sorts? I quickly thought of 2:
1) Luke in RotJ (for all of 5 minutes) as he destroys Vader with the Dark Side
2) Lex Luthor in Smallville. Others may not agree, but he's been our favourite character on the show (early seasons, at least) and we really enjoyed seeing the seeds of his future dark side being sown. At some point it seems that he became the typical villain, but up until then he was really interesting.
Who/What else?
xhonzi
I'd say Luke's "dance with the Dark Side" really came about when he took his weapons into the cave, so it was even before he left Dagobah. Yoda was an ancient Jedi Master and he still wouldn't listen to him. I wouldn't even call his "turn" in ROTJ a real turn. More like a dance on the Dark Side.
As for Lex, he definitely exhibited a slow turn. Again, that comes from the direction the actor was given. They told him to ignore everything he knew about Lex Luthor and just play him like a normal guy. He comes off as being the perfect friend in the beginning and by Season 5, you're really starting to hate the guy.
Now with Anakin's turn, I remember thinking that it was going to happen when Palpatine revealed himself to be the Sith to Anakin. I kept thinking 'He's going to turn and offer to protect him' or something along those lines. When he didn't turn in that scene but later did in another scene, I was one of those going "WTF?!" Then to hear the commentary on the ROTS DVD where Lucas says "I was going to have Anakin turn in this scene where Palpatine reveals himself, but I decided that it just wasn't going to work" Again, "WTF?!" Wasn't going work?! How was it not going to work? It was the perfect moment! The actual turn scene is like a tacked on bit that makes no sense at all!