brash_stryker said:I think saving Padme's life being Anakin's rationale for turning to the dark side needs to be cut completely.
Either cut the dream, or replace it with a more symbolic dream sequence, and don't have Anakin mention the dream to her or promise that he can save her (Luke never talked about his vision in the cave; we just saw it, and that worked just fine)Also get rid of all Palpatine's promises about saving her. Just keep the parts of him seducing Anakin with promises of power.
After Anakin tells Windu about palpatine being a sith, and he's in the Jedi council chamber, and you hear the echoing voice of palpatine saying "any chance of saving her will be lost" etc. Replace that with sound bytes of his senior jedi masters being critical/holding him back/saying things that hint at dishonesty, interspersed with palpatine's promises of power.
When he then rushes to stop Windu, it is clear then that it is his distrust of the Jedi, along with the promise of power that's seducing him. It's not perfect, but it's better than "I'm making a conscious decision to turn to the dark side to save my girlfriend"
I'm sorry, but I disagree with that, brash_stryker. I actually think Anakin's issues with attachment is one of the few things that works very well in the PT. It's a thread that runs through all the three movies: he leaves his mother in TPM, is too late to save her in AOTC, and in ROTS, his one attachment has become such an obsession he turns to the Dark Side over it. It's actually pretty character defining.
Anakin's whole turn in ROTS hinges on him wanting to save Padme. If we cut out all of the references to saving Padme, pretty much nothing of the turn remains. The scene in the opera house would be gone, we'd have to cut pretty much half of the scene where Palpatine reveals himself to be Sidious and the "ruminations" scene, and cut Palpatine's plea to Anakin "I have the power to save the one you love, you must choose". Also, the very moment Anakin actually decides to turn still hinges on Padme: "I will do whatever you ask, just help me save Padme's life". I think removing the "saving Padme" aspect from the turn, there would leave nothing left of the turn.
Also, where is Palpatine promising Anakin power? It's only in one scene, and that's the scene where he reveals himself to be Sidious, that's hardly a seduction.
When Anakin turns, cut Palpatine telling Anakin that he doesn't have the power to stop death. It makes no sense for Anakin to turn of Palpatine can't actually help him. Later, when Anakin has become Darth Vader, and asks about Padme, we could dub in a line of Sidious saying something like "It is too late..." followed by the original dialogue of "in your anger, you killed her". Again, Anakin realises he was too late to stop (and even had a hand in) a loved one's death, hence the agonized scream (the NoooOOOooooOO must go though). This would also keep vague whether or not Palpatine actually did have the power to stop death, which adds to his character of being a manipulator.
After Anakin has turned though, he should be evil. Cut him crying on Mustafar, make it more of a brooding scene, as if he is already plotting to overthrow Palpatine, as he later says to Padme. I don't think Anakin needs to be killing kids though, that's taking it too far, and makes him irredeemable. My suggestion is: have Mace Windu face Sidious alone. We can make that logical by adding some empty chairs in the council chamber. The Jedi are spread across the Galaxy, and there is no backup. The deaths of the other three Jedi could be reworked with footage from the Separatist slaughter, with a blue lightsaber rotoscoped in, making it look like Anakin is killing some Jedi during the raid on the temple.