TheoOdo said:
This is something I've really thought about a lot. There are so many plot holes in the PT, some less obvious than others that I've never actually seen addressed by even the most probing of fans.
First of all, Anakin Skywalker's upbringing. Owen Lars states knowingly to Beru that he is afraid of Luke having "too much of his father in him", which infers that he actually had some experience with Anakin and certainly not that he was a mere step-brother who came into his life much later on and only momentarily.
I find the most interesting thing about this scene is that when saying "there's too much of his father in him" Beru smiles and it is clear she remembers Anakin fondly, so I wonder could Beru be Anakin's sister?
I know it seems far fethched as Owen would be Ben's brother (or at least half-brother/step-bother as they have different surnames) and Beru would be Anakins sister, but if Ben first met Anakin (and Beru) when visiting his Brother it wouldn't be much of a stretch, and this would mean they are still luke's real Aunt and Unkle.
Also, during the scene in Obi-Wan's hut it is revealed that Owen Lars thought Anakin should have "stayed here" (Tatooine) and not gotten involved in the Clone Wars. This suggests two things; first of all that Owen knew Anakin while he was living on Tatooine, because it would otherwise be nonsensical for him to make judgements about his leaving Tatooine (particularly when according to GL's PT staying would have meant remaining a slave, something even the gruff figure of Owen Lars couldn't have supported). Secondly it suggests that Anakin left Tatooine with the specific purpose of "getting involved" with the Clone Wars in a "damn, fool-idealistic crusade" with Obi-Wan. This scene does not suggest at all that Anakin left Tatooine before the Clone Wars. He left in order to become a Jedi Knight during the Clone Wars, if my reading of this scene is accurate.
Another hint as to the relationship between Anakin, Owen and Obi-Wan is given when Owen states that he believes Obi-Wan to have died around the same time as Luke's father. As both Anakin and Obi-Wan are, in fact, alive this could be taken to mean that Owen was aware of Obi-Wan's metaphorical perception of the "death" of Anakin Skywalker and applied the same judgement to Obi-Wan himself, perhaps believing him to have surrendered himself to the new persona of "Ben Kenobi".
I agree that Anakin leaving Tatooine specifically because of the clone wars does make sense, but there is nothing said which rules out him leaving before the clone wars for some other idealistic cause.
I think it is clear that Owen is aware to some degree that Ben is responsible for Anakins death, even if it's just because he led him to the war and he has never forgiven him which is why he is so keen to prevent Ben having any interation with Luke, I don't think he considers him dead on even a metaphorical level he just wants to keep Luke away from him.
Another interesting problem is why has Ben not gone by the name of Obi-wan since before the twins were born, the biggest critisism of this plot point is that it's not a very good way to hide, but if Luke is going by his real name and living with relatives, and Leia is actively involved in galactic politics then it's clear nobody is really in hiding it's just that no one is looking, which is backed up by the ROTJ novel which says that Anakin didn't know the Twins' mother was pregnant and if he didn't find out about his son until after the battle of Yavin then there is no need to hide, so maybe the reason Obi-wan is using the name Ben is because that is his real name! To me it would make a lot more sence than having one brother with a fairly standard name (Owen) and one with an exotic name (Obi-wan), maybe Obi-wan is a name given to him by the Jedi and he stoped using it after they lost the war.
Another thing that's very up in the air is the nature of the Clone Wars. In "Dark Empire" Luke finds himself on board a "dungeon ship", which he says is the same kind they used to transport Jedi during the Clone Wars. It's possible to speculate, then, that the Clone Wars may have been a war against the Jedi, involving mass execution and imprisonment of the Jedi. Anakin may have switched sides in this war in order to enjoy the greater power of the Dark Side having been corrupted. At which he point he "helped" hunt down and destroy the Jedi Knights. "Before the Dark Times, before the Empire..."
Well, that's all I can think of off the top of my head...
we'll that's EU so I tend to ignore it, all we know about the clone wars is that Ben and Anakin served Senator Organa and were pilots for the Old Republic, and that the Jedi defeated a race of Warriors who wore armour the same as Boba Fett's (ESB novel), I don't even think it specifically stated wether the formation of the Empire was the cause or the result of the war (or neither), the descriptions of the formation of the empire and Palpatine's rise to power in the ANH and ROTJ novels contradict each other but both suggest that it happened through political corruption rather than as the result of a war, but the two could obviously be related.