Kiki was watching Star Wars: Attack of the Clones today. 10 is an impressionable age and so I took a quiet moment to talk to her about good relationships and bad relationships using Anakin and Padme as an example. During the course of the conversation I mentioned how Anakin made lots of bad choices which led him down the path to becoming Darth Vader. Kiki’s jaw dropped “You mean Anakin is Darth Vader!?” she gasped. She has yet to see Revenge of the Sith and apparently is unfamiliar with the dramas that unfold in Episodes 4-6 because not only did she not know Anakin was doomed to become Darth Vader, she also didn’t know that Darth Vader was Luke’s father.
Apparently I’ve been appallingly lax in my children’s Star Wars indoctrination.
Shame on you.
At least you didn’t unleash Eps IV-VI on her, so she could learn to complain about Anakin being Hayden Christiansen like the older geeks are doing now… 😀
On the one hand, I’m horrified that she could be spoiled on such a thing. On the other hand, I’m horrified that you actually spoiled her rather than getting to see her reaction as she found out for the first time. Not many people get the shock of learning that Vader is Luke’s father anymore…
I forgot to put the smiley in that I meant to, so here: 🙂
GASP!
Because we won’t let LightningBoy watch #3 yet, we had a little sit down talk with about how loveable little Anakin becomes Darth Vader in SW3 (trailers on t.v. helped a bit too). We talked about how pride and anger can lead you down the wrong path.
On the other hand:
LightningBoy knew that Darth Vader was Luke’s father in utero! 🙂
When he was little my husband would use the Vader voice and tell him:
I AM YOUR FATHER!!!! and he would say, NOOOOOOooooooo!:)
Good times! Good times!
If I’d realized she didn’t know I wouldn’t have “spoiled” the movie for her I just began the conversation assuming that she did know.
Oh, and thanks for the added smiley. I’ll take all the smileys I can get. 🙂
The one thing Lucas did get really right about II and III is his depiction of a bad relationship that seems, on its surface, good. Sure, Anakin and Padme love one another, but it’s just kid love, lustful, fiery, exciting, dizzying, all those wonderful and terribly destructive things. Of course, there could have been a script that the actors could work within, or direction that they act, but that’s for another moment.
As a parent, it’s a convincing polemic about the dangers of marrying young, and the awful desolation that can result from young love, because its essence is not giving, as adult love is, but selfishness. To take the love from someone, to taketake self-love so far as to be vanity, arrogance, and crushing ambition.
If there’s any point to this fairy tale, it is that: love can destroy more terribly than anyone’s hate.
I don’t think that “marrying young” is as dangerous as “marrying stupid”. I got married at 20 which is fairly young in today’s society. Marrying Howard is one of the best life choices I have ever made.
I agree with you that Lucas did an excellent job portraying a relationship gone bad. Actually it started bad. What Anakin felt toward Padme was always selfish. Her feelings for him may have been nobler, but she allowed him to dictate all the terms of the relationship. It was extremely frustrating to me that Padme just rolled over and died because her husband made bad choices. I get angry with her for being so weak that she couldn’t go on with her life and raise her own children.
The good thing about Anakin & Padme is that they provide a very visual example that parents can use to start discussions about what makes relationships good and bad. The best defense against toxic relationships that I can give to my kids is to have conversations with them that allows them to clarify their own thoughts.