Andrew K. or how to make Anakin's turn a better one

OK, this is meant as an antidote for certain recent stupid posts...

I was reading a historical novel recently (don't ask, you don't know it anyway, albeit it's written by Nobel prize winner) and I thought that the problems the main hero faces could be neatly used in script for Anakin's turn to dark side. (because most of us agree this was one of the weakest thing executed in Ep.III).

Meet Andrew K., a young, brave man full of vigor. It is the time of war - his country faces multiple threats, including internal ones.

Even though he served his duty and that all odds are against him (his country's forces are in retreat), he gathers a team of soldiers who know no fear to make a series of "hit & run" raids on the enemy.

His skills can't go unnoticed. A powerful aristocrat asks for his support and wants him under his wings. The young man sees this as an opportunity (I'll skip all the legal problems which all would be instantly solved by this alliance ;) ), and the old nobleman wants a man with such bravado on his side...

In the meantime a new, powerful enemy attacks the country and makes unprecedented and unexpected progress. Province after another fall into its prey.

The old nobleman ask the young hero to swear, that even in the worst of times he won't leave him. Our patriotic hero zealously agrees, as he fears no enemy and will fight even a lost battle for his country. The old man is very pleased...

During a great party with other commanders and nobles, the old aristocrat announces that... he joins his forces with the invading enemy!

Our hero is shocked... just as are some other commanders, who refuse the oath of obedience to the new masters.

...to make things worse, our hero is given the task of... subduing the "rebelling" troops.

His conscience is soothed, as the old aristocrat explains him his complex plan: he doesn't really join with the enemy, he just want to save his province/troops/resources from the pillage, wait for the moment when the enemy is exhausted by the victorious, yet long campaing - and then to strike to liberate the whole country.

So with the new energy he quells all "nay sayers" who are in fact faithful to the country. But he is convinced that the country is doomed with its current leadership, and that only the plan of his old master may be the only chance to defeat the stronger enemy.

As he was always zealous, he's fulfilling his task with great energy... and ruthlessness. In his eyes - and according to his master - those patriots are traitors!

====================================================

Of course he later finds out that the old aristocrat does this only to gain power - at any cost. He changes sides again, trying to repair all the damage he had done to his country. But that's another story...

What I wanted to say, I didn't want Vader to be a whiny youngster full of angst and fear, killing bunch of children when his mood changes. I wanted him to fall in the trap many countries do: the government doesn't want to negotiate with the rebels/rioters, no matter how good are their reasons, because "there must be order" - and sends troops to quell the uprising. People get beaten or killed. In revenge, the rebels/rioters strike at the government, blowing up sth, then they are called terrorists and treated as traitors, even though they may be true patriots and it is the government who went too far.

Vader should be ultra rightie :D At first he looks like a good guy: patriotic, church going, full of zeal. But his good zeal turns into hatred towards anything that his leaders say may be against things he believe. Even if he - at some point - realizes that things went too far, he only reinforces himself in his resolve, unable to admit "they have lied to me and used me as a tool for their evil schemes, because they saw my unbroken faith".

Threads like this are depressing. They really show how crappy the prequels really are. Something like the above would have been great, as would have any number of other stories. But we got what we got, and it honestly couldn't be much worse than it is. Blah.

I was hoping for something more... verbose from you, C3PX. If there can be like 50 answers to a damn troll thread... I wasted some time typing this stuff for you, guys. Make it worthwhile.

Good post.

I'm sorry I don't want to anger you but I don't really have much more else to say. It was a real interesting read and I'm glad you spent the time typing it.

If the Anakin/ Emperor story was something like that it would have been phenomenal and spanned all three movies. But I feel I've spent enough of my life on the should have, would have, could have of the Star Wars prequels.

I think the fact that Anaking goes to the Dark side becuase he doesnt want to loose his love, his wife is pretty epic.

My two cents...

I think Vaderisnothayden is pretty spot on. I know Lucas didn't intend for his story to come off that way, but as presented it most certainly did.

What was wrong with the presentation of the PT story?

1) Child Anakin served no purpose and, in fact, inhibited Anakin's character development. If Anakin had been 17-20 years old in episode I, we would most certainly have felt a greater familiarity with him in the alternate episode II. At the start of the actual AOTC, we in the audience needed some time to get used to the adult character Anakin Skywalker - time that could have been used more effectively.

2) Anakin is whiny and cocky in AOTC. "The good man that was your father was destroyed". What good man? Anakin was an utter idiot in AOTC and impossible to root for! I know you don't have to like every character in a given story, but the main character of the movie - hell, the main character of the six-part saga, according to GL - needs. To. Be. Sympathetic. Unless you're a whiny, cocky, insurrect jerk, there's no way you can relate to Anakin Skywalker in AOTC.

3) Realism has its limits. OK, you might tell me, yes Anakin was a jerk who slaughtered an entire Tusken village, but in real life good girls fall for bad boys. And if the SW saga was a 1970's Martin Scorsese film or something like that, then fine. But it's not. This is space opera; in the OT, Lucas understood how space opera works. His good characters were heroic and virtuous, his bad characters were evil through and through. Luke and Leia and Obi-Wan and Yoda and Tarkin and Jabba and the Emperor were either perfectly good or perfectly evil. The only characters with any gray areas were Han in SW, Lando in ESB, and Vader at the end of ESB and throughout Jedi. In AOTC and ROTS (before the turn) Anakin is one of those blasted anti-heroes, distractingly so.

And if realism is so desirable, would not a scene involving Mace Windu preparing a tax return be defensible on the grounds that it's realistic? After all, taxes are a part of real life!

4) Anakin's fall from grace really and truly begins halfway through the third movie? Is this really enough time to be plausible? Anakin's pure goodness should peak sometime in the middle of the second movie - and it would have gone that way had Anakin been an adult in episode I.

5) Anakin is going to turn to the dark side because of nightmares? How about in episode II Padme obtains some kind of terminal condition that Palpatine says can only be fixed through Sith techniques? See, in that way Palpatine dangles a real carrot in front of Anakin to fix a real problem.

See, I didn't propose any radical changes here. These suggestions didn't require any new characters or locales. There are other problems that need to be addressed - for instance, I should care that the Jedi are slaughtered in ROTS, but I didn't - but this little list is just a way to repair the problems in the Prequel Trilogy's "A" story.