Sebastian Shaw is older then Alec Guinness, while Vader is described as a Young Jedi and mocks Obi-Wan calling him “Old Man”. So my question is, regardless the reasons George had Shaw as Anakin’s Ghost, do you think he ever imagined Anakin as someone in line with Shaw and that Anakin was supposed to be like Shaw? Or you think that he was always meant to be someone similiar to Hayden’s Anakin?
In 1977, when Anakin and Vader were separate characters, I believe Anakin and Ben were peers of roughly the same age while Darth was much younger. When Lucas fused the two, it seems to me he initially leaned towards keeping the character around the same age as Ben. If Lucas hadn’t had a falling out with David Prowse, we maybe would’ve gotten Prowse in the unmasking scene, but though he was in his late forties during the filming of ROTJ, he might’ve been aged up with makeup. But when he started making TPM, he wanted Anakin as a young kid — a 12/13-year-old at first, then aged down to 9 to make his separation from Shmi more emotionally impactful.
Gods for some, miniature libertarian socialist flags for others.
I heard that Sebastian Shaw was cast as a favor for Alec Guinness because they were friends and he was out of work. As for why he cast Hayden Christensen later, he either didn’t care about the age discrepancy or he changed his mind. Either one’s possible considering what we know about George Lucas.
All his life has he looked away… to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing. Hmph!
I think Sebastian Shaw did a very good job in the one scene he had, considering how little dialogue he was given and still being required to project real emotion with it. From my childhood in the '80s to now, I still love that scene. It shows that Anakin feels so much remorse, but at the same time he finally has peace.