generalfrevious said:
Well then, Lucas couldn't even realize that Anakin was the lynchpin of his vision and not be some emo kid that nobody likes.

I think when Lucas came back to Star Wars in 94 (or maybe even as early as 90, judging by a quote), he had a thoroughly revised interpretation of the story and the characters and he totally changed the sort of person Anakin was supposed to be. Hayden's performance makes it worse, but if you look at the writing for Anakin it's not good either. Whiney megalomaniac who goes "I hate you!" and all that. Hayden's performance may actually be what Lucas was looking for, what he envisioned Anakin as. In other words, his vision of Anakin got totally screwed and became entirely incompatible with the OT. I mean, no way is Sebastian Shaw playing an older version of the guy we saw in the prequels and no way is the OT's Vader the same guy as Hayden's Anakin, or as Mr "Nooooooo!" either.