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Darth Vader is born
Star Wars: Episode III—Revenge of the Sith
Writer: George Lucas
Director: George Lucas
“But, like, did Darth Vader always have that mask on?”
It was the summer of 1983, I was about eight and my mother did not have that information. In an era long before Wookieepedia, podcasts, and tweeting Lucasfilm story group members until they block you, my mother had the burden of answering these important questions for me. The only problem was that she didn’t know the answers.
“I think so. He needed it to breathe, or something, so he had to wear it,” she answered, probably, or something like that. I can recall the moment with some clarity, but most of my mind was focused on that mask and the feeble man that had looked out at all of us when his son helped him to remove it on the floor of the second Death Star. I wanted to know. This was important. I just watched the Rebels win and celebrate. The Emperor was gone. Darth Vader was Luke’s father, that I understood, but that can’t just happen. Right? This all seemed so sad.
“How did that happen?” I asked one last time. My mother was loading groceries into the back of our blue Subaru station wagon because when you grow up in the 1980s, you have to embrace it. She was searching for the one answer that would satiate my quest for truth in the galaxy. She knew I wouldn’t stop until I heard something final. With a shrug of both love and annoyance only a parent could give, she finally answered.
“He fell to the dark side.”
That, it turns out, was very right. Anakin Skywalker fell to the dark side. He didn’t ascend to the position of Lord of the Sith. This wasn’t an intergalactic promotion. He didn’t strive for it like reaching his quarterly business sales goals. Anakin was ensnared by Palpatine’s plan and gave into his deepest fears. He was targeted, tricked, coerced and even carried the burden of being prophesied, but at the end of all those excuses, you find one of Star Wars’ most powerful lessons. The choices you make define you. You either do good or are trapped by the bad choices you make. Once you start down that dark path, as that Yoda guy said, “forever will it dominate your destiny.”
Anakin Skywalker fell and was now a prisoner.
Star Wars is a fast and intense journey through the belief in hope, the search for yourself, and navigating the waters of morality that stretch out in front of you. It’s loud, it’s vibrant, and, above all, inspirational. Yet, to highlight this point, this one powerful warning about what you do and how that affects you, George Lucas went quiet.
In the closing moments of Revenge of the Sith, what was left of Anakin Skywalker lies wrenching and screaming on a cold slab in one of Palpatine’s lairs. Medical droids whir and click about him as they transform into the very image of terror and evil the galaxy would soon fear. Anakin may have already been called Darth Vader by this point, but this is when he is truly born. It’s mesmerizing, claustrophobic, and haunting. It’s George Lucas the artist crafting a perfect sonnet. An ode to Vader’s pain.
Every piece of this sequence works in perfect concert, from John Williams’ always stellar score to the intercutting of the birth of Luke and Leia and death of Padmé. Each stanza builds until we reach the crescendo: the mask, that iconic visage of evil that stretched out beyond Star Wars itself to become known worldwide. It haunts that galaxy, and ours. As it lowers onto Anakin, we see through the mask. This will be his world now.
Everything he sees will be now be filtered, altered, and sterilized. Even the light from the medical bay is dimmed, turned into the red hue that will dominate his vision. Nothing will be seen through his own eyes. Vader is now part of this machine. As it lowers down, Anakin’s eyes go wide with fear. Though there will be times the mask comes off, by his choice or in battle, that will always be what happens to Darth Vader. What we’re watching now are the final moments of Anakin Skywalker. These are the last seconds he will see for himself until years later when his son saves him in that moment in Return of the Jedi that created all these questions. 5
Here, now, though, George Lucas focuses all of our attention on that mask. Strains of “The Imperial March” are heard as smoke rises off of the suit now keeping this man alive. All sounds fade away, except for those of the mask sealing shut. The path he chose to walk down has led him to here. Darth Vader has been locked in his tomb.
We had many questions about Darth Vader. Did he always have that mask? How did this happen? Who was Darth Vader? As the mask covered the burned face of a man once called Anakin, we finally learned that Darth Vader was a man who was afraid and very aware in those final moments that he had made the wrong choice. Star Wars’s most tragic lesson.