ROTS really changed the way I perceive the Dark Side. I am wondering if it had the same effect for others. In the OT, it's pretty simple. Aggression, anger, fear, hatred = Dark Side. In a way, it's too simple. The Dark Side is a temper.

I really think that through the PT, Lucas has turned the Dark Side into something as applicable as Tolkien's ring metaphor, something about power and control, and how when we look for things to achive control, as Anakin does, we become controlled by those things. It's more metaphorical, I'd say the Dark Side is the power to achieve your desires. It's like positive and negative freedom. Light Side = Freedom from want. Darkside = Freedom to get what you want (and the resulting enslavement to the devices used to achieve that freedom).

And I think GL has done us a great service by creating stories with such broad, metaphorical, applicable, allegorical motifs. Yet, I don't see much discussion about the Dark Side in regards to ROTS. Thoughts?

Good call, I hadn't thought of that. All power corrupts seems to be the basic premise, whether the intentions or good or not. And in Lucas' mind, same applies in government. Anakin himself is very Robespierre-esque in Episode III. In that, he abandons his ideals for the achievement of a society which values his ideals. And the killing of Jedi Younglings is seen as a necessary evil (whether you view his goal as being preserving the Republic or as trying to save Padme, I think the latter most heavily weighs in his mind, but both are part of his larger desire to "make things the way [he] wants them to be."



I agree wholeheartedly. One of my friends has a real problem with the "what have I done?" line b/c he thinks Anakin should be cold and calculating at that point. I like that the duality exists up the point where the power consumes him completely. Yoda and Obi were wrong in a sense, Anakin could've been redeemed, or at least forced to acknowledge his own evil doings.

Yeah, the Darkside isn't just an "attitude" anymore, like you put. It's a false promise in a sense, and there's really categories of those who are affected by it:

1. Those that blindly follow it to their own destruction (The Apprentice, in this case Vader)

2. The one that uses the promise to cause the others to fall (the devil, or in this case the Emperor).

In a way, hopefully it gives Luke's near turn in Jedi a little more weight. My problem with his turn was it really seemed like Sidious was just trying to piss him off to the extent he'd kill Vader, not actually joining the ranks of the Sith.
Now that it's established that the Darkside is in a way a promise for "unlimited power", there's a little more credibility in there.

I own every single issue of the Tales of the Jedi comics. Haven't been able to get through any of the miniseries yet. Holy CRAP does Kevin Anderson suck.

Yes, Krispies. He does suck.

Throw rocks at him.

Interesting topic - mind if I hop in?

While I agree that the PT has given a bit of breadth and depth to the nature of the Force (and particularly the dark side), I think the seeds were planted in the OT.

An example: When Vader and Luke meet on the Sanctuary Moon of Endor, Vader admits that it is too late for. Luke doesn't understand the power of the dark side; he MUST obey. Yoda hints at this too in ESB when he explains to Luke the whole, once-you-begin-forever-will-it-dominate-your-destiny bit (I don't remember the exact line).

Tolkien was mentioned by many here. I think you can go even farther back. We all pretty much agree that SW is a glorious union of multiple myths. Wagner's Ring cycle is another one of those.

(Pardon me while I get my nerd on...ahem)

Wotan, king of the gods, wants power, much like Anakin. The story (in the beginning) is how he sought that power and the price he had to pay for it. He increased his power by making "treaties", or pacts, which he inscribed on a seemingly invincible Spear made from a branch taken from the World Ash Tree.

This tree was the source of all wisdom and power, and as a sacrifice, Wotan gives up an eye, just as Anakin, in his quest for power, has his flesh taken from him.

The thing about these treaties that are inscribed on the Spear - there is no way to reverse them. So, once the deals are struck, once the sacrifice is made, once Wotan starts down the path, forever does it dominate his destiny.

Neat, huh?

I think perhaps GL had in his mind the ideas of the Force long ago - particularly the nature of the dark side (which is the only interesting side, isn't it?) - but because the story he was telling with the OT didn't NEED the definition fleshed out, he couldn't do anything to give it more depth...until now.

excellent thread and your right the darkside has taken on a completely new "life" so to speak. It's actually blurred the lines some for me between the light and the dark. Or perhaps the lines have been blurred between the Jedi and the Sith. It seems they both are searching to bring peace to the galaxy and althoguh the sith would eventually turn it into a peace forced through fear the jedi were also willing to lie and break their own codes to do what they believed was right. Without the force to forsee events the jedi were basically left to use treachery, well that may be a harsh word, to achieve their ends. They had to ask anakin to lie and spy on the chancellor, they were even ready to take over the entire senate after arresting palpatine until they could choose another chancellor. I just really found it ineteresting to see such a noble order driven to such extremes

Thanks to ROTS, I now like the whole "plan" for making Luke turn in ROTJ. Since Palpatine doesn´t have the same connection to Luke as he had with Anakin, he really needs Vader to help convince the boy why he should join them.

In ROTS, Palpatine represented both a father figure and a means to make things better. In ROTJ, Vader provides the father figure while Palpatine only has the promise of power. Combined, they could tempt Luke the same way Anakin was tempted.

To be honest, most of the "temptation scenes" in the OT fell abit flat for me back in the day, that´s why I think the PT now adds a new layer of understanding to the process of joining evil and makes the saga as a whole better for it.

Yes, exactly.

Back when you first saw ROTJ, it seemed so simple. How could Luke even fall for what seemed like such a clear black and white situation?

The prequels give it a lot more depth.

On top of all that's been mentioned, I like how you suddenly don't see the Sith as people of "pure" evil as they seemed in the OT. Part of you actually believes that Palpatine really wants to stop the Republic from destroying itself. I do believe his motivations are to form the perfect union where there are no wars and everyone follows a neat, albeit strict, path that he lays before them.

I don't think Palpatine so much wants to destroy anything, moreso than necessary to attain his power. He just wants all of that power an control laid at his feet, the ultimate megalomaniac. It's just about having the power at any cost, not so much purposefully destroying things to get it.

He finds Anakin and he sees he would have the ultimate ally and enforcer in this young pupil and he very carefully manipualtes and persuades him to his point of view. We of course know that Anakin is not inherently evil, he's just never gotten a grip on his emotions and detached himself from the physical. His wants, his needs are all that matters and he projects that into a delusional state where he thinks all of those things are for the good of the galaxy. Also, some people do tend to forget that even though a Sith is not a muderous psychopath by GL's definition, the darkside does twist and pervert the mind the moment it starts working ("forever will it dominate your destiny").

I mean, from the moment Anakin slaughters the Tuskens, he starts looking for the quick and easy way to do everything, which is why he lost to Dooku at their first meeting.

When you think about the Jedi philosophy, and I know many of us jokingly see Yoda as a spiritual mentor of sorts, it makes a lot of sense. If you remove your desires and attachments, you will make better decisions in your life. You won't succomb to anger as quickly, you won't be greedy, you won't harm others because all you care about is your self. By freeing your mind from the constraints of the material things around you, including your own physical form, you can begin to live a perfect life.

Anakin of course never learns this, forming attachments to Padme, his mother and Obi-Wan. He becomes jealous of the other jedi's status. Think about it, their status--not their power, because he knows and is constantly told by others that he is/will be more powerful than the others.

I definitely love this new view of the darkside. It makes the movies deeper on so many levels and ultimately makes them more weighty than many other sci-fi movies.

Sith77 you are very right about using that philosophy of letting go of things in our own lives, i'ts a very buddhist view and one I think would benefit alot of people to try to adhere to.

I pretty much agree with everything you said except that palpatine doesn't wanrt to destroy anything. He definitely wants to destroy the jedi, even if he thought he could lie peaceably beside them which he did for a while, he wanted them completely wiped out and all memory of them

Yeah, you're right about that...I forgot to qualify that statement

Of course he wants the jedi dead, but I think he would prefer to preserve as much of the infrastructure and people of the rest of the galaxy that he can. Thanks for calling me out on that.

I knew exactly what you meant it's cool. I agree though and I think it mirrors what anakin said in AOTC, " then they should be made to agree". I think thats the exact line palpatine took, I will make everyone agree or destroy them

Was Palpatine ever good? Was he ever like Anakin? Confused? With good intentions? Interesting question. I'm actually glad they don't answer it in the movies. You need to leave someone who is simply pure evil.

I think that since these movies are so largely dealing with metaphors, sometimes GL makes certain decisions to prove a point, such as leaving Palpatine as pure evil. Like you said, many fans erroneously thought that Anakin would be predisposed to evil. And in real life, yes, maybe evil people have an evil disposition from a very young age. But since GL is dealing with larger, broader themes and metaphors, that's not what he is trying to do with Anakin. Likewise, Palpatine I think is made to remain as the pure embodiment of evil.

Dooku of course isn't as black and white as Palpy, and I bet his turn would have some similarities to Anakin's. His seduction might make an interesting spin off book, cartoon, something, not sure if its been touched upon yet.

No one ever said that Palpatine and Dooku couldn't be redeemed, they just chose not to be. Palpatine was a man who didn't even believe in good and evil, he only cared about gaining personal power, and so the whole concept of redemption would have been meaningless to him. Dooku, on the other hand, is a more tragic case. Judging especially by his portrayls in the EU, it seems that Dooku was originally tricked into believing that he was on the right side, and while he eventually realized that what he was doing was evil, he had too much pride to admit that he had been wrong, and thus refused to change sides even though he knew at heart that he was making a mistake.

Wait a minute!
Isn't it all about love and therefore compassion for other people and therefore attachments? I got the impression the Jedi failed because of their strict "buddist" views and lack of compassion. Would Anakin have fallen to the dark side with a less strict view on the force by the Jedi order? After all the Jedi order lost their touch with the force and Yoda had to do some repetitive lessons on Dagobah...

Hello all. First time poster. To quote some wisdom from Dr. Joel Fleischman: "Love is selfless, not possesive. If you truly love someone, you have no desire to possess them. You don't keep them." Love and compassion in their purity never lead to attachment. Yeah Yeah?

Good point, but much like Yoda, I bet Joel Fleischman is really, really ugly. It's sure easy to say love is selfless, you have no desire to possess them, etc. etc. when you're an ugly asexual monk like Yoda. But it's another thing in real life. I think this line of thinking is unrealistic, and agree with an above poster that the Jedi's line of thinking is part of the problem that led to Anakin's downfall. But I'm not sure if that's what Lucas means. Lucas probably would agree with you more, that attachment is bad, and that love should be unconditional. Again, ties to Joe Campbell, the idea that we are all one and the same and we should not treat ourselves any better than we would others, therefore strip ourselves of any selfish desires.

But I think Lucas has led a life which would lead him to a bitterness towards romantic love...I'm pretty sure he's attached to his children...so, it's hard to know what GL is trying to say at the end of it all.

I guess things like that are all up to interpretation, but I regard his redemption as being the moment he chooses freedom for himself, starts thinking for himself, making his own decisions, etc. Literally throwing off the chains of slavery (first Watto, then the Jedi, then the Sith) to choose freedom for himself, life for his son, death for the Emperor and destruction for the Sith Order.

I think the Jedi's being failure is their inability to give Anakin the kind of emotional support he needed. They admitted that he'd led an atypical life for a would-be Jedi, yet trained him anyway and expected him to just magically drop his emotional attachments to his mother and to Padme. They treated him like just another Jedi when he wasn't psychologically capable of processing the standard Jedi directives.

Also, you mentioned Mace's would-be confession. Yes, the Jedi were becoming weaker in AOTC as the Dark Side of the Force became stronger. That is (arguably) not the Jedi's fault. Their reaction though (deciet and more lies) *is* their fault. How can they be the good guys on the one hand, but lie to the very people they claim to serve on the other?

And yes, the Jedi Order in general did lack compassion. A compassionate Jedi wouldn't care about jurisdiction, he would make it his business to bring peace and justice to the *entire* galaxy, not just the Republic. In TPM, the Jedi clearly had no interest in freeing the slaves on Tatooine or in protecting the Queen when she went back to Naboo (they were more concerned with the appearance of Darth Maul than Queen Amidala's plight). Qui-Gon did have moments of compassion, sure, but even he crossed some ethical lines by claiming he'd won Anakin's pod while gambling, putting Anakin in physical danger for replacement space ship parts, etc.

Yoda said himself he failed, and I guess it was more int he book he said he didn't allow the order to change. He failed to see how the newer jedi had needs that the order couldn't fufill, he was too strict. Hence training the sole source of discipline is not line. He understood too late that he wasn't compassionate enough with anakin and couldn't even sense how inlove anakin was with this woman who he was having a child with. I would say that came from a lack of compassion or ability to have compassion. They knew this kid already had formed attatchments in his life and would need more than normal jedi, or they should have known it.

What's your basis for that? And why do you think Watto knows what he's talking about?