gffa:The key thing is that it can’t take away from the storyline we do see and the import
gffa:The key thing is that it can’t take away from the storyline we do see and the importance of what does/doesn’t happen. They almost assuredly cannot have a major conversation without it diverting what we do/don’t see in Return of the Jedi, because they would have mentioned it!But also thematically and character-wise, I don’t think they could have connected again at that point. Vader absolutely wasn’t ready to hear Obi-Wan, he wasn’t ready to let go of his hate and his anger enough to get out of his own way to hear Obi-Wan calling to him. He fell into that deeper loneliness that Yoda felt from all the way across the galaxy, he missed Obi-Wan, but he couldn’t admit it. He couldn’t get that noise out of his head enough to hear what the Force was trying to tell him.But also that Obi-Wan wouldn’t have reached out at that point. He didn’t believe there was a spark in Vader that he could reach (and he’s not wrong about that, not at that point in time). He still believes there’s nothing good left in Vader, not after he killed children and attacked Padme. If he could do that to Padme of all people, Obi-Wan had no reason to believe that Vader would want to hear from him or that he wasn’t a danger to Luke.And he’s also not entirely wrong about that, it’s just that Luke represents this blank slate of potential to Vader, he doesn’t have to admit to the really horrible things he’s done or the intimately personal betrayals he did, because Luke wasn’t part of that.It’s not until Vader’s willing to let go of everything and have this last incredibly selfless act of caring about Luke’s future instead of the one he was trying to force onto the galaxy, that he could finally hear Obi-Wan again and that Obi-Wan would be reaching for him again.Obi-Wan, previous to that, cannot even think of Vader as “Anakin”, it would threaten to undo him (because, for all that Obi-Wan has a strength of character and soul that see him through things that would be crushed others, while he rises above them, this one person is the one he cannot untangle in his heart, not Anakin, even as he can speak of Anakin himself to Qui-Gon), so there’s no way he’d be in the right mindset to reach out to Vader while watching over him. And he wouldn’t visit often, because there’s nothing of the man he loved left.But once or twice? Just to remind himself of why he must protect Luke, why he must help Luke, to remind himself that Darth Vader must be stopped? To remind himself not to mistake the two again, because he did that once (when he couldn’t bring himself to kill Anakin, because he loved him too much, this is the one thing he couldn’t do) and it was the worst mistake he ever made.I headcanon that absolutely Obi-Wan visited Vader once or twice and it was like visiting Anakin’s grave for him. Looking upon that black armor was like looking on a tombstone for his dearest friend. It was a chance to mourn and make peace with the circumstances as they were, rather than what he wished they were, just as much as it’s about keeping an eye on what he’s up to. -- source link
#star wars#anakin skywalker#luke skywalker