Episodes Wun and Too were quite effective at immunizing me against trying to think about Episode Three. I only had one half-hearted expectation, and it was this:

Padme would survive the birth of her children, and live in Alderaan disguised as the royal nursemaid. This was set up so well in the first two episodes: Padme exchanges identities with her handmaidens all the time. It would have been "like poetry, it repeats." It would also demonstrate the theme of falling, as she falls from Senator to servant, albeit for selfless reasons rather than Vader's selfish fall. By her fall, she protects the girl she loves; Vader only used this as an excuse for his fall. Imagine: There is a closed-casket funeral on Naboo, then one final shot on Alderaan. Bail and Brea present their adopted daughter to a cheering crowd, the camera slowly pans around the room and we see Brea's attendants, all of whom are ecstatic, except for one who is "very beautiful, but very sad."

RotJ told us everything else we needed to know. Eventually Leia would learn that her nanny was her mother, and Padme would die. The implied story, the clever girl finding out that she is adopted but her real mother hadn't abandoned her, adds a sort of hidden depth beneath the surface. It's also a clever inversion of the usual fairytale commoner-turns-out-to-be-a-princess story, in that the princess discovers she is the child of the servant. The EU would eventually chronicle the "Young Leia Adventures," but for the movie-only types the relationship between Padme and Leia would be a nice mystery.

Of course, that "hidden depth" adds narrative complexity that George didn't need. Episode III had to end exactly where Episode IV started. There was no Padme in Episode IV, so out the airlock she went.