mrbenja0618 said:I see what you're saying; but I don't know how well that would play. I actually think we might be overcomplicating a Star Wars movie. But maybe I'm wrong. I'm up to seeing how it plays out.
Perhaps it's my grasp of the English language that is at fault (I've only been speaking and writing in it for 37 years or so).
There is a group being used by Palpatine to orchestrate his schemes, pirates basically.
Their leaders all go by the Nom de guerre of Darth Vader and when one dies the new leader wears the armour and the name but we don't know that at first as far as we know in the first few films there is one and only one Darth Vader and he is obviously not Anakin Skywalker (shades of "Kagemusha" here). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kagemusha
These leaders all wear the same armour and mask and nobody knows who under the mask they just know that these pirates are Darth Vader's men and the Jedi are trying to track them down but Obi-Wan has (through the force) discovered it's a former pupil of his (but he doesn't know which one).
At the end of Episode II Anakin is captured by the pirates and Obi-Wan fears he will be killed and naturally wants to save him but unlike Luke he listens to Yoda and doesn't go after him.
Vader and Obi-Wan meet and Obi-Wan learns the truth (though he doesn't fully reveal it) that all the time he was sensing the future, Anakin has become the new Darth Vader. They fight (with Anakin wearing the Vader armour) and he is injured causing him to have to wear the breath screen.
It shouldn't be too difficult to explain the concept over three films, the Padme/decoy thing came across as overly simplistic and that was in just one film. A similar idea appeared in "The Princess Bride" and that was just one book/movie : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dread_Pirate_Roberts
It's the only way I can think of keeping Vader a secret but still have the iconic duel.
It also plays into that element of Greek tragedy where the ability to see the future is a curse, which causes the very thing you are trying to avoid.
That way the burning of Vader's armour in ROTJ has a double meaning, on one hand he is freeing Anakin from the Vader persona but also he could inherit the name (because he was the cause of the previous Vader's death) but rejects it thus ending the title forever.