Star Wars: Rogue One is coming out on December 16th, and it will be the next big film for the Star Wars franchise. This will be a prequel to Episode IV: A New Hope, which will have Darth Vader making a film appearance. The last time he appeared on film was Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.
Having Darth Vader back on the big screen is great for Star Wars fanatics as he is one of the coolest movie villains of cinema.This will be a Darth Vader redemption moment due to horrible, cringe-worthy portrayal from two different actors of his previous identity as Anakin Skywalker.
In the prequels, the portrayal of Anakin Skywalker, young and old, were awful. Anakin was first introduced in Episode I as a young child, played by Jake Floyd. The introduction of Anakin showed him to be a slave who grew up on Tatooine. He was a gifted pilot and mechanic and was able to sense the future. Besides being force-sensitive, he built C-3PO and had his own pod racer all at nine-years-old.
Though it sounds great for Skywalker’s potential, the problem was that Anakin’s delivery of his lines was with the type of energy level that would’ve been suitable for a family sitcom. Giving him lines like “Yippee!!!” and “So this is pod-racing!” to show the innocence of a kid only to be cheesy doesn’t set up a compatible arrangement for the film.
Fans were aware that Anakin would eventually fall into the dark side. The issue was how the prequels gave a horrible interpretation of a character we loved so much as Darth Vader.
In the climax of Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Anakin was told to stay in a starfighter, leading to the ship being activated and taking him into a space battle and, later, inside a Separatists’ Trade Federation Station .Anakin’s attitude with the whole scenario in the crossfire of a battle, where others are getting killed, he can only share stale replies. Did I mention people were getting killed? It concluded with him blowing up the Trade Federation Station (by accident), deactivating the droids in Naboo and saving hundreds of Gungans. This brat will become a controlling, intimidating, war monger.
Hayden Christensen was the actor cast to play adult Anakin. Unfortunately, the actor could not transport the character and cannot reflect Anakin credibly, in relation what Alec Guinness' Obi-Wan Kenobi described to Luke in Episode IV.
Christensen couldn’t elevate his film scenes, and his personality dynamic was just not fitting. He was perfectly cast to have the appearance as a young Anakin, but his personality just did not mix with the audience. Some of the dire dialogue in the films came out ridiculous, and it couldn’t make the character to be likable.
Major key points reveal some of the Sith in Anakin early on, like killing the Tusken Raiders who kidnapped his mother, eventually killing everyone in the village, including children. His aftermath confession to Padme was unbearable. Not even Natalie Portman could lift that scene.
Others may argue it was the poor scripts that were given to the actors that could not enrich the quality of the prequels. The prequels did lack quality writers, but even with great actors like Samuel L. Jackson, Natalie Portman and Ewan McGregor, they could not lift the films' overall quality.
It’s so horrible it ruined Christensen's career, and it ruined what could’ve been one of the greatest characters in the Star Wars franchise. Having Darth Vader return in the Star Wars films is involves forgetting his past, aside from the memorable ending of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith:
