Catching up on everything StarWars

In that case why does Obi-Wan blame himself for the failed training of Anakin? Why does he leave him writhing in agony? Why does he teach him to do what I say, not what I do?

Anakin's decent to the Darkside is also pretty laughable when you really think about it. It's just jarring when you watch it, but when you try to subject the words to paper it gets even worse. You say "He was not going to let history repeat itself as with the death of his mother which he blamed on himself." but where in the movie do we see any justification of why he blames himself? Because no-one thought to bring his mother to the city? Because he never writes and never answers his phone? Because we'd seen so much affection between the two?

Yes, he wanted to save Padme, heck, who wouldn't. You say he was on the verge of being a master? But then expect the audience to believe the only person for whom Anakin could turn to in this time of trouble was an obvious Sithlord that has no connection to his community? Does the Jedi training not include a few lessons on the subject of coping with death? Heck, they deal enough out. Does no-one 'sense' his anger? Take him to one side? Does no-one in the Jedi council get even slightly narked by the sudden death of it's entire young-ling collection? Does the young-ling school only teach one age group? Where are all the other school grades, those aged 0-7 and 9-18 or whatever? Don't you think he'd be quite the marked man after such an act?

The entire character arc is nonsense thrown at you without rhyme nor reason. One minute he's a Jedi trying to be a Jedi, the next he's Charles Manson. You really think someone with force powers wouldn't have a completely arrogant nature towards the opposite sex? "You will go down on me now" - "I will go down on you now". I just don't buy it, and neither did the audience. Even if the one you loved was in dire straights, the whole "you could always try my backroom down this alleyway" routine would result in at least some research, it's not like trying to save people from death is illegal. Wouldn't there be some nutty Shamen on planet bonkazoid be worth a shot as well? You know, before the whole slaughter everyone option? Nope, just mother dies, well that's what you get for leaving her in the wastelands, Padme dies, I'm a Sith now.

The movies are very long, there's three of them, the whole point of the movies is to watch Anakin become Darth Vader (and how Obi-Wan failed him), and all we get is his mother dies and Padme dies towards the end? What were the foreshadowing clues as to his gradual submission to the darkside? When he whines at Padme? Give me a break. The guy doesn't even snap a pencil for 6 hours.

lackblogger said:

In that case why does Obi-Wan blame himself for the failed training of Anakin?

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Well, who wouldn't? Wouldn't you ask yourself what you could have done differently? How you could have prevented it? Should you have taken early signs more seriously?
If anything, Obi should maybe blame himself for not realizing Anakin's deep love for Padme sooner. Did he look the other way too much? Should he have forced Anakin to abide by the Jedi code? Could he have seen how the visions of Padme's death affected Anakin?

Why does he leave him writhing in agony?

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So episodes IV to VI wouldn't be nullified . But seriously? No idea... we'd have to ask GL.

Why does he teach him to do what I say, not what I do?

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Maybe Obi can control himself better? Maybe he sensed that Anakin's control of the force was more "wobbly" so to speak?

Anakin's decent to the Darkside is also pretty laughable when you really think about it. It's just jarring when you watch it, but when you try to subject the words to paper it gets even worse. You say "He was not going to let history repeat itself as with the death of his mother which he blamed on himself." but where in the movie do we see any justification of why he blames himself? Because no-one thought to bring his mother to the city? Because he never writes and never answers his phone? Because we'd seen so much affection between the two?

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Well, I watched the PT back to back last week and it really became clear to me this time how much it nagged at him. He had those visions about his mother for quite some time but could not tell if they were just bad dreams, nightmares or visions. When it became clear to him that they were visions he went to save her but came too late.

He then says repeatedly in AotC that he was very upset about not having the power to save his mother. Not being able to save his mother was like an ultimate failure to him that really left a very deep impact on him.
He swore to himself to become the most powerful Jedi and defeat death (he tells it like that to Padme after killing the tuskens).

Well, it turned out he had to become a Sith to defeat death (or that's what Sidious had him believe anyway).

Yes, he wanted to save Padme, heck, who wouldn't. You say he was on the verge of being a master? But then expect the audience to believe the only person for whom Anakin could turn to in this time of trouble was an obvious Sithlord that has no connection to his community? Does the Jedi training not include a few lessons on the subject of coping with death?

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Anakin definitely failed his training in not being able to control his fear. He was absolutely terrified to lose Padme because he knew that his visions were real.
He shouldn't have been in a relationship at all so he had to deal with this all on his own and he failed...

Does no-one 'sense' his anger? Take him to one side? Does no-one in the Jedi council get even slightly narked by the sudden death of it's entire young-ling collection? Does the young-ling school only teach one age group? Where are all the other school grades, those aged 0-7 and 9-18 or whatever? Don't you think he'd be quite the marked man after such an act?

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I think it was already too late at that point. Anakin fell to the dark side when he killed Windu. That was his dark/light RPG choice . Save Sidious (and Padme as he thought) but fall to the dark side OR stay light side, let Windu kill/arrest Sidious but squander his only chance to save Padme.

The entire character arc is nonsense thrown at you without rhyme nor reason.

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Sounds a little harsh to me but it's not totally wrong. That's what happens when you waste a full movie (episode I) on Anakin being a little child.
If the first episode would have started with Anakin at his AotC age with maybe a short prologue on his slaver Tatooine past there would have been much more opportunity to flesh out Anakin's character arc properly. Also: Less Gungans, more Ani .
As for RotS as it is, yes, GL should have maybe cut down on the rather uninteresting scenes with Grievous and Yoda on Kashyyyk. That time would have been much better spent focusing on Anakin, Palpatine/Sidious, the council and so on.

The movies are very long, there's three of them, the whole point of the movies is to watch Anakin become Darth Vader (and how Obi-Wan failed him), and all we get is his mother dies and Padme dies towards the end? What were the foreshadowing clues as to his gradual submission to the darkside? When he whines at Padme? Give me a break. The guy doesn't even snap a pencil for 6 hours.

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Yep. It could have all been done much better. The movies are full of wasted opportunity to answer some pressing questions. Instead we get a long drawn out swoop race and retarded gungans etc. *sigh*

And another thing...

Once Palpatine has said that he can save Padme, why doesn't Anakin's spirit now suddenly lift back to normal? Why doesn't he mention this to anyone else? You'd think he would be jubilant. Even if Palpatine had sworn him to secrecy, you'd think he'd at least still rush to Padme and tell her the good news, then Padme would be on the communicators all day telling everyone. What's Palpatine going to do? Refuse to save her because...? How would that effect his election credentials and press standing?

Oh and Padme is dying because "She's perfectly healthy but seems to want to die", well, you'd think if this whole Jedi order had any use beyond Pith then a room full of them barging into Padme's free will would solve the problem. Is she another one of those people for who "your Jedi mind tricks don't work on me", even if there was room full of Jedis? The best Jedis in the universe? You'd think they would at least try that, right?

I say it again - TCW did a *lot* to explain Anakin's behavior in RotS, but you would have to watch six seasons of the show.

I've no doubt, many people find The Clone Wars far more watchable than the prequels. The point being discussed was not necessarily the plot-holes of the prequels being the reason for their shittiness, but the incompetent, rather facepalmy, method of delivery. Take the Terminator franchise for example, more plot-holes than anything Star Wars could ever dream-up, but the first two movies are fine despite this, when the quality of the series declines then the plot-holes become more of an issue, because it's the presentation of the plot-holes that's more important than having plot-holes.

I watched the first two seasons of The Clone Wars and they were ok, fairly standard children's show. Some episodes were horrible, some were great, with a lot inbetween. I wasn't motivated to seek out any more series though and only watched them because they were gifted to me.

Moriendor said:

There was a bit of an inner struggle after he killed Count Dooku and also when Palpatine revealed himself but generally you have to consider his ulterior motive which was to save Padme.
From his point of view there was only one way to save her and that was to acquire the dark life-saving powers of Darth Plagueis via Darth Sidious.
That is why he eventually turned over so easily. He felt he had no choice and he was also still traumatized by his mother's death which he could not prevent.
Having these visions and nightmares of a dying Padme left him with very little resistance when Sidious offered him a chance to save her.

Then add to this that he felt the Jedi council was not taking him seriously, did not promote him as expected and that he generally felt let down even by Obi-Wan at times. If you consider all of these things then it is quite understandable why Anakin was seduced so easily.

For me, the main weakness of RotS -which I consider to be the best of the PT by far- was the duel at the end. Anakin was supposed to be the strongest Jedi/Sith ever and ended up with his legs chopped off after trying to pull off a really dumb attack on Obi-Wan.
I wish they would have portrayed his defeat more like an accident. He should have had Obi-Wan on the verge of defeat, ready to deal the final, fatal blow and then should have somehow fallen into the lava by accident (or from a nearby explosion shaking the ground or something).

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Well those are good points and I quess Anakin's shift to Dark side works alright in general sense. It was actually better than I remembed now that I've rewatched the prequels (again) and refreshed my memories. The motivation is present there. I just thought it happened quite sudden. The lenghts he was willing to go and how much he was willing to sacrifice for a personal goal… Then again Anakin was quite an emotional and impatient young man. And he was indeed very afraid of losing her. (Like Yoda's line famous line goes:“Fear is the path to the dark side”)

So betraying jedis and even his friend, Obi Wan makes sense, but killing children goes pretty far for someone who just swore an oath to his dark master. But maybe when you fall into dark side and start using it, the raw power consumes you fast or something like that. I quess I'm saying that falling into dark side made sense alright, but he fell really far quite fast.

As for the duel… If you think about how Anakin behaves: this is not the first time he does something before thinking. Dooku for instance chopped his hand in AotC. Besides Obiwan was more experienced even if Anakin had more raw power. Experience has to count for something.

As for Obiwan leaving Anakin to die… I figured that Obiwan was so hurt that he could not bring himself to kill his former friend. I quess jedis are supposed to be above such feelings, but situation was hardly usual. Anakin turning into dark side was not only a failure of him being a teacher, but Obiwan likely thought he had failed his former master's last wish.

Jaz said:

I say it again - TCW did a *lot* to explain Anakin's behavior in RotS, but you would have to watch six seasons of the show.

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Hey thanks for the tip. I better watch it then

Dez said:

As for Obiwan leaving Anakin to die… I figured that Obiwan was so hurt that he could not bring himself to kill his former friend. I quess jedis are supposed to be above such feelings, but situation was hardly usual. Anakin turning into dark side was not only a failure of him being a teacher, but Obiwan likely thought he had failed his former master's last wish.

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Leaving your former friend to writhe in agony is worse than either killing them or attempting to comfort them. The choice to leave him writhing in agony is only justifiable if he was... consumed by hate...

Maybe that's why he exiles himself ?