SilverWook said:

Yeah, Hamlet being haunted by his dad was soooo lame. ;)

I presume what was left of Anakin vanished between Luke dragging him onto the shuttle and escaping the Death Star. Lucas said somewhere the armor was empty when Luke burns it. Had we seen the body vanish in the movie, that would have spoiled the ending a tad...

If it's the usual retcon by George, one can presume Ben and Yoda helped him cross over. Qui Gon didn't vanish either.

Hadn't thought about Vader not appearing to disapear, if you pardon the expression. The armour does look empty on the pyre now you mention it. If any FX savy editors are listening, I'd love to see a mockup version of the hanger bay scene where Vader's face disapears leaving just the armour. Just to see how it would play emotionaly.

I just assumed that the real reason Jedi's don't vanish in the PT was because George realised that they all needed to die and having hundreds of Jedi's all vanishing would look silly. It would've been like a bad FPS when all the corpses vanish 3 seconds after you shoot them. But then he never really explained it by the end of the PT. Just some throw away nonsense about Qui-Gon.

I don't think any force ghosts are needed in the ST as all the character arcs were all wrapped up in ROTJ. I always felt that when Luke gives them a contended smile in that last scene in the Ewok village, that it would be the last time they'd apear to him or anybody. Yoda, Ben and Anakin probably went to whatever the Jedi equivelant of the undying lands is ;-)