Characters / Star Wars – Anakin Skywalker

All spoilers regarding the Skywalker Saga and The Clone Wars are unmarked. Examples relating to Disney's films and EU can be spoiler-tagged if deemed necessary.

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Anakin Skywalker (Darth Vader)

"I will be the most powerful Jedi ever."

^{Click here to see his The Clone Wars appearance} 

Species: Human (Cyborg)

Homeworld: Tatooine

Portrayed by: Sebastian Shaw (Return of the Jedi), Jake Lloyd (The Phantom Menace), Hayden Christensen (Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith, Return of the Jedi^note as a Force spirit since the 2004 George Lucas Altered Version, The Rise of Skywalker^note voice only, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Ahsoka)

Voiced by: Matt Lanter, Hayden Christensen^note Archived audio only ^{Foreign VAs} Latin American Spanish dub: Isidro Olace (Return of the Jedi, original dub), Federico Romano (Return of the Jedi, remastered dub), Héctor Emmanuel Gómez (The Phantom Menace), Irwin Daayán (Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith, and The Clone Wars), Carlo Vásquez (Rebels), European Spanish dub): Constantino Romero (Return of the Jedi), Masami Musuda (The Phantom Menace), Óscar Muñoz (Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith, The Clone Wars), Japanese dub: Tōru Ōhira (Return of the Jedi), Akiko Yajima (The Phantom Menace), Daisuke Namikawa (Prequel Trilogy), European French dub: Julien Bouanich (The Phantom Menace), Emmanuel Garijo (Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, Revenge of the Sith, Rebels, Obi-Wan Kenobi), Matthieu Sampeur (Seasons 5-6 of The Clone Wars), Roland Ménard (Return of the Jedi), Canadian French dub: Alexis del Vecchio (The Phantom Menace), Martin Watier (Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, Revenge of the Sith, Obi-Wan Kenobi), Brazilian dub: Rafael Rodrigo (The Phantom Menace), Arthur Salerno (The Phantom Menace, second dub), Peterson Adriano (Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, Revenge of the Sith), José Leonardo (ever since The Clone Wars, including a redub of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith), Silvio Navas (Return of the Jedi, first dub), Pádua Moreira (Return of the Jedi, second dub), Sérgio Fortuna (Return of the Jedi, third dub), German dub: Constantin von Jascheroff (The Phantom Menace), Wanja Gerick (Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith, Clone Wars, The Clone Wars, Rebels), Horst Schön (Return of the Jedi)

Appearances: The Phantom Menace | Age of Republic | Obi-Wan & Anakin | Marvel's Star Wars | Attack of the Clones | Queen's Hope | Brotherhood | Tales of the Jedi | The Clone Wars | Forces of Destiny | Ahsoka | Dark Disciple | Kanan^note cameo only | The Bad Batch | Revenge of the Sith | Thrawn^note mentioned only | Thrawn: Alliances | Obi-Wan Kenobi | Rebels^note appears in hologram and visions only | Return of the Jedi | Brotherhood | Ahsoka | Shadow of the Sith | The Rise of Skywalker^note voice only

"When I finished constructing my lightsaber, Obi-Wan said to me, 'Anakin, this weapon is your life.' This weapon is my life."

The Chosen One. The Hero With No Fear. The strongest member of the Jedi Order.

The Fallen Hero.

Anakin Skywalker was a Force-sensitive Jedi Knight during the final years of the Galactic Republic in addition to being the former Padawan learner of Obi-Wan Kenobi, the husband of Padmé Amidala, the master of Ahsoka Tano, the father of Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa, and the grandfather of Ben Solo (who later became known as Kylo Ren).

Anakin was strongly believed to be the Chosen One of the Force by the Jedi Order and developed from a lowly slave on Tatooine to the Jedi apprentice of Obi-Wan Kenobi and a hero of the Clone Wars. His promising career was tragically cut short when his personal demons lured him into turning to the Dark Side and becoming known as Darth Vader — the Dark Lord of the Sith and apprentice to Emperor Palpatine/Darth Sidious. Following a disastrous duel with Obi-Wan which left him horrifically scarred, was transformed into a cyborg bound to a suit of armor.

Vader would devote much of the rest of his life to hunting down the remaining Jedi alongside the Inquisitorius and stamping out rebellions to the Empire. Vader eventually learned of that his son, who he once believed died with his wife, was still alive. While Vader sought to recruit Luke to the Empire — first in a bid to overthrow the Emperor, and later to serve as allies to both — his son's continued faith in his ability to do good was proven when he willingly sacrificed his life to kill the Emperor.

Anakin died seeing his son one last time, but his sacrifice was deemed redemptive in the eyes of the Force, allowing him to live on as a Force Spirit to watch over a generation who would not have to suffer under the reign of the Empire. Later, he would be among the many Jedi advising Rey during her final trial — a duel against a resurrected Darth Sidious.

For information about Darth Vader, see his personal page.

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#-A

• 0% Approval Rating: Prior to the Bloodline novel the galaxy was unaware that Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader were the same person, meaning he was remembered as one of the Republic's greatest heroes. However after the truth was revealed all people saw was that he was Vader and only acknowledged him by that name, leaving Luke as the only person in the galaxy who remembers him as anything more than a figure of fear and tyranny.
• Accidental Hero: Anakin manages to end an invasion by the Trade Federation against Naboo by inadvertently powering on a starfighter, getting dragged into a vicious battle on the Federation's droid control freighter, and unintentionally firing proton torpedoes into the ship's reactor core, blowing the whole ship up and causing the droids on the planet surface to power down. All of this happened when he was just nine years old.
• Ace Pilot: Anakin is a fantastic Podracer pilot at the age of nine years old and becomes the best starfighter pilot in the galaxy by the time he is nineteen years old. Although, he does have some issues with landing properly.
• Act of True Love: He saves Luke's life at the cost of his own in Return of the Jedi.
• Action Dad: He becomes a father in Revenge of the Sith and is still a heroic Jedi Knight before turning to the Dark Side.
• Action Hero: Deconstructed. Jedi are supposed to search for peace in all things, but Anakin feels more comfortable in combat and is always eager to be at the frontlines during battles. Obi-Wan tends to remind him that such an attitude could get him killed. It gets even worse as this passion for combat is just one more thing that leaves him vulnerable to turning to the dark side.
• Adaptational Wimp: Downplayed. The de-canonization of Legends takes out several of his most impressive war feats, especially in regards to Asajj Ventress. In Legends, Anakin defeated her with authority in their very first duel in Yavin IV, and at the end of the war he again gave her such a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown that she had to be rebuilt as a cyborg. In canon, the only duels between Anakin and Ventress are the ones presented in The Clone Wars, where Ventress (despite partially being an Adaptational Wimp herself in said continuity) could fight him and Obi-Wan simultaneously and look comfortable with it. The canonical Anakin does have an instance of overpowering Ventress later on, when he is infuriated at her on the belief she might have framed Ahsoka, but it happens after Ventress had been knocked out and stripped of her lightsabers.
• Adaptation Origin Connection:
  • Inverted and possibly subverted. Legends databooks published around the Prequel Trilogy and Vader: The Ultimate Guide stated that Anakin's origin might be tied to Darth Plagueis, who would have caused his conception while trying to summon a "living embodiment of the Force" in order to have the perfect Sith candidate (one of the sources also speculates that it was Sidious who did it after killing Plagueis). The 2012 novel Darth Plagueis altered this backstory, implying that Plagueis had failed in his experiment and that Anakin was actually the Force striking back by giving Plagueis the opposite of what he wanted. However, with the separation between Legends and Canon, this second origin was erased too, and it is now suggested that the first one is closer to the truth, with Vader suspecting that it was Sidious himself who created him through the techniques of his old master. Nothing about this is confirmed, though, it having been officially stated that those are just Vader's own thoughts on the matter.
  • Inverted with his Jedi Knight rank. In Legends, Anakin was knighted for his military victories in Praesitlyn and Vjun, where he frustrated two Separatist operations led by Asajj Ventress. In canon, according to an official visual guide, Anakin was knighted before the Clone Wars in order for him to be eligible to serve as a Jedi General in the Republic, as shown in The Clone Wars (which starts in the year 22 BBY, the same year as Attack of the Clones).
  • Inverted again with his facial scar. In Legends, it was given by Ventress during the Battle of Rendili. In The Clone Wars, and by extension the canon, Anakin is portrayed as already having the scar two whole years before said battle, which rules out this backstory for the wound.
• Adorably Precocious Child: Anakin is this in The Phantom Menace. During his subsequent appearances in the canon, Anakin is obviously older.
• Aesop Amnesia: A key plot point in Obi-Wan Kenobi is that the young Skywalker was once taught never to allow himself to become so obsessed with victory that he leaves himself open to harm in the process. He ignored that advice throughout The Clone Wars and other works set in the Prequel Trilogy, most notably being so obsessed with trying to capture Count Dooku that he winds up being the one captured, with the Republic being forced to trade the recently captured General Grievous for him to get him back. And that's not even getting into how badly he forgot this lesson when he became Vader.
• Affectionate Nickname:
  • Shmi, Padmé, Jar Jar, and Watto sometimes address Anakin as "Ani".
  • Ahsoka occasionally calls Anakin "Skyguy", but he doesn't appreciate this nickname for him that much and she rarely calls him it for the rest of the time that she's his Padawan.
• Age-Gap Romance: Downplayed with Padmé as there is a five year age difference between them; he is 19 while she is 24 when they get married.
• All for Nothing:
  • After having a vision of Padmé dying in childbirth, Anakin succumbs to the temptations of the dark side as a result of believing that the Sith had the power to save Padmé's life. After killing his fellow Jedi, slaughtering the Separatist leaders, and ending the Clone Wars, he ended up strangling Padmé in anger, which eventually led to her death just as he'd seen in his visions.
  • After sacrificing himself to destroy the Emperor, Word of God states that he'd finally fulfilled the prophecy of restoring balance to the Force. Years later, it was revealed that the Emperor cheated death and hid in the shadows, where he manipulated Anakin's grandson into restoring the Sith Order before getting killed again. And since the Emperor was able to survive being thrown into the Death Star's core right before it was blasted from within, it's entirely possible he could keep coming back through other means that Ben and Rey hadn't foreseen. Anakin gave it all up for a fleeting victory that actually worked to the enemy's advantage.
• All of the Other Reindeer: The Jedi Council often viewed Anakin as an outsider ever since he was brought to them at nine years old, with Obi-Wan as the sole exception. By the time of Revenge of the Sith, this only makes it easier for Palpatine, who is invariably nicer to him than the Jedi Council is, to manipulate him. Mace Windu, in particular, makes no attempt to hide his dislike for Anakin, and after Anakin tells him that Palpatine is the Sith Lord, his condescending comment is that Anakin will have earned his trust if it proves to be true.
• Always Save the Girl:
  • This occurred in a non-romantic sense in The Clone Wars when the Son kidnapped Ahsoka. Anakin went to confront him, shrugging off Obi-Wan's warnings about how something like that could have devastating effects on the universe at large.
  • Deconstructed in Revenge of the Sith. His quest to save Padmé from dying in childbirth not only dooms the galaxy and puts him in a life support suit, but it ironically kills her.
  • This could, in fact, be considered his Fatal Flaw. Anakin will always save those he cares about, even at great cost to himself and others. What use is there in being the Chosen One if he can't save those he loves, be that his padawan, his beloved wife... or the kindly old man who was always there for him.
• Always Second Best: He'd never admit it out loud but Anakin tends to feel this way about Obi-Wan. As much as he respects and trusts Obi-Wan, Anakin gets frustrated at the seeming ease with which Obi-Wan does everything and how he's praised by the Jedi Council as the greatest of the Order. Especially when Anakin himself isn't particularly well liked in spite of his own heroic actions.
• Amazon Chaser: Downplayed. Anakin is already smitten with Padmé when they meet at nine and fourteen, respectively. But, Hayden Christiansen notes in the Star Wars II: Love Featurette that one of the qualities about Padmé Anakin is attracted to is her strength of character.
  "Padmé is a very strong-willed person, you know. [Anakin]’s not so much attracted to the power that she holds in her political arenas, but rather the power and strength that she holds within herself."
• Ambiguous Situation: Thanks to deliberate vagueness in the prequel trilogy and conflicting accounts in canon and Legends sources, Anakin is stuck with a few of these.
  • His birth. His mother says there is no father, suggesting that he's a virgin birth. Qui-Gon muses that he might have been created by the Force itself. However, Palpatine hints that he may have been created by Darth Plagueis, or even himself. Other sources have stated that he was created by the Force to counteract Plagueis and Palpatine, others that he was created by the Dark Side.
  • His fall. We know that Palpatine manipulated him for more than a decade, but how much of that was just Palpatine being a Manipulative Bastard? Was Palpatine also manipulating Anakin (and possibly Padmé) through the Force to push them into their Secret Relationship, accentuating Anakin's Crazy Jealous Guy tendencies and fear of loss? This is all less well grounded in canon, being more built on fan theories that try to resolve weakness in the writing, giving Anakin's and Padmé's rapid relationship in Attack of the Clones more justification.
• Ambition Is Evil: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin aspires to become the most powerful Jedi ever, which is a stark contrast to the sweet and innocent boy he was back in The Phantom Menace. When his mother dies during the course of the film, he apparently included "Learn to cheat death" to his list of ambitions, eventually pushing him into turning to the dark side when Padmé's death seems imminent in Revenge of the Sith.
• An Arm and a Leg: Loses his right arm in his first duel against Count Dooku in Attack of the Clones. He gets a metallic replacement during the Clone Wars. Later, he loses his remaining limbs in a duel against Obi Wan Kenobi during Revenge of the Sith.
• And I Must Scream: Losing all his limbs and sustaining crippling injuries in his early twenties. Being trapped in a robotic suit in constant pain for the rest of his life, haunted by memories of his dead wife, and aware of the fact that he made a terrible mistake in siding with Darth Sidious is simply a Fate Worse than Death.
• Anger Is Not Enough: At the climax of Revenge of the Sith, Anakin believes that his anger-fueled use of the Dark Side now makes him more powerful than anyone, including Emperor Palpatine and Anakin's former mentor Obi-Wan. However, it is not clear during his lightsaber duel with Obi-Wan that he actually possesses any new powers, as opposed to just fighting more aggressively than he had before. While Obi-Wan is largely on the defensive during the fight, Anakin loses the duel because Obi-Wan uses rational tactical planning to gain a solid defensive position on a slope, and when Anakin angrily tries to jump over him, he is able to sever three of Anakin's limbs.
• Angrish: After he gets maimed during a lightsaber duel with Obi-Wan that occurs on Mustafar, Anakin is reduced to screaming in agony and rage as he is consumed by flames and unable to take revenge on his former best friend.
• Anguished Declaration of Love: He gives a very angsty one to Padmé in Attack of the Clones. Although, he doesn't actually drop the 'L' word, but it's obvious what he's trying to tell her.
• Anti-Hero: Anakin is arrogant, aggressive, and self-righteous even at his most moral, but he is still a good man. Deconstructed through the fact that Anakin's less than heroic traits are exploited by Palpatine in order to cause him to turn to the dark side and become a Sith Lord.
• Anti-Villain: He becomes a cross between Types Woobie and Well-Intentioned in Revenge of the Sith, turning to the dark side because Love Makes You Evil and he thinks it's the only way to restore order to the galaxy.
• Appeal to Familial Wisdom: In The Phantom Menace, he quotes something Shmi told him back to her when she doesn't want him to go podracing, even though he could use the prize money to help Padmé and the Jedi reach Coruscant: "Mom, you say the biggest problem in this universe is nobody helps each other." This prompts Shmi to agree to let him race.
• The Apprentice: Part of Anakin's role in Attack of the Clones was being the Padawan learner of Obi-Wan. In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin becomes this to Chancellor Palpatine after turning to the dark side.
• Arch-Enemy:
  • During the Clone Wars, Anakin definitely perceives Count Dooku as this since he was responsible for putting Padmé in danger, killing hundreds of Jedi, the loss of his arm, and several other atrocities. They dueled multiple times throughout the war with Anakin's resentment at him only growing stronger after each encounter and it ends with Anakin finally executing the man despite the fact that he was an unarmed prisoner. This action of personal revenge is one of the most significant factors of Anakin ultimately turning to the dark side.
  • After turning to the Dark Side, he perceives Obi-Wan as this, especially when he later suspects that his former master is in a Love Triangle with him and Padmé.
• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin is incredibly full of himself and thinks he can take on Yoda in a lightsaber duel. Anakin gets significantly better about his arrogance by the time of The Clone Wars, but he becomes progressively worse about his arrogance by the time of Revenge of the Sith to the point of which that he loses all of his remaining limbs as a result of performing a miscalculated jump.
• Artificial Limbs: He receives a cybernetic replacement for his right arm after Count Dooku cuts it off during their lightsaber duel in Attack of the Clones and the rest of his organic limbs after getting maimed by Obi-Wan in Revenge of the Sith.
• Art-Shifted Sequel: Anakin infamously underwent this in Rebels, although slightly less so than Yoda. Taking into account for his redesign in Rebels is his appearance in The Clone Wars, Anakin lost all his rugged and chiseled features for a much more boyish appearance as well as losing his trademark scar and curly features of his hair.
• Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence: He ascends as a Force spirit after redeeming himself in Return of the Jedi.
• Attack! Attack! Attack!: As a direct opposite to Obi-Wan (who is a Stone Wall), Anakin has this as his signature fighting style. His style, Form V: Djem So, is amongst the more aggressive out of all lightsaber combat forms (the others being Form IV: Ataru and Form VII: Juyo/Vapaad), taking the initiative and unleashing a series of devastating offensive barrages that bash through an opponent's defenses.
• Ax-Crazy: He shows shades of this after he responds to his mother's death by brutally killing the Tusken Raiders who were responsible in a homicidal rampge, women and children included. He dives headfirst into violent insanity after he turns to the Dark Side, and becomes a highly unstable killer of mass destruction that lets his hatred and rage corrupt him into attacking whomever gets in his way.

B–C

• Babies Ever After: Revenge of the Sith presents how he and Padmé were expecting Luke and Leia. However, the two were unable to raise their children as the former became a Sith Lord and was led to believe his children died with their mother, while the latter died from childbirth and a broken heart. Luke was sent to be raised by Anakin's step-brother and step-sister-in-law on Tatooine while Leia was sent to Alderaan and raised by Bail and Breha Organa, friends of her mother's.
• Back for the Finale: Anakin makes a vocal cameo in The Rise of Skywalker as one of the many spirits of past Jedi that come together to give Rey encouragement in defeating Palpatine. He tells her that she is capable of restoring balance to the Force, as he once did decades before her.
• Badass Adorable: Anakin was a very adorable, young nine-year-old boy back in The Phantom Menace. He was also incredibly sensitive to the Force, a mechanical genius in his spare time, and one of the best Podracer pilots in the galaxy. In addition, there's his instant mastery of piloting a Naboo royal starfighter, which allowed for him destroy the Trade Federation's mothership and put an end to the conflict on Naboo in the process.
• Badass Unintentional: In The Phantom Menace, Anakin destroys the Trade Federation's Battle Droid control ship, effectively winning the Battle of Naboo simply because he climbed into a starfighter to hide from the action, accidentally activated its autopilot, and was looking for another safe place to avoid getting shot.
• Bash Brothers: With Obi-Wan (who even calls Anakin his brother) before Anakin turns to the Dark Side and pulls a Face–Heel Turn.
• Bastard Understudy: He becomes this to Palpatine in Revenge of the Sith and suggests to Padmé that he can overthrow him so they can rule the galaxy together.
• Battle Couple: With Padmé after they profess their love for each other in Attack of the Clones, especially when they fight back-to-back in the Geonosian arena.
• Beauty to Beast: Anakin starts out as being very handsome, but he is horrifically scarred after being burnt by lava on Mustafar and then encased in a menacing black robotic suit and mask that barely makes him look human anymore. When Luke removes his mask at the end of Return of the Jedi, as shown in one of the page images, he's still Covered in Scars and eerily pale, though he looks better than he did back when he was first injured.
• Became Their Own Antithesis: As Obi-Wan tells him before their lightsaber duel on Mustafar:
  Obi-Wan: You have allowed this dark lord to twist your mind until now you have become the very thing you swore to destroy.
• Be Careful What You Wish For:
  • As a child, Anakin dreamed of becoming a Jedi Knight. He does. But over time, he becomes disillusioned with the Jedi Order for many reasons.
  • He wished he could meet Padmé Amidala again after they parted ways following The Phantom Menace. He gets his wish in Attack of the Clones, but subsequently he faces the problem of falling in love with her even knowing they can't be together.
    Anakin: [to Padmé] From the moment I met you, all those years ago, not a day has gone by when I haven't thought of you. And now that I'm with you again... I'm in agony.
  • Tied into the above example, Anakin wished in Attack of the Clones to only dream about Padmé but has nightmare of her death in childbirth in Revenge of the Sith.
• Because You Were Nice to Me:
  • A big factor in Anakin's love and devotion to Padmé is that she is almost always supportive of him and listens to his problems without judging him or being overly critical, which is something he doesn't always get from Obi-Wan and the other Jedi. Sadly, after being twisted by the Dark Side, he assumes that she has betrayed him and repays her kindness by Force-choking her.
  • Unfortunately, the same applies to Palpatine, who intentionally exploits this to sway Anakin over to his side, while Padmé's kindness and empathy is genuine. Anakin doesn't realize this until it's far too late.
  • After decades of suffering and regret as a Tragic Villain, his son Luke is the only person who treats him with any sort of compassion and believes he could be a better person. He even spares his life during their lightsaber duel. As such, Anakin chooses to turn back to the Light Side and sacrifices himself to save Luke.
• Being Evil Sucks: Anakin's fall to the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith costs him everything and everyone that he loves as well as leaving him locked in a robotic life support system that he will use for the rest of his life.
• Believing Their Own Lies: Despite turning to the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith, at least part of him appears to genuinely believe that the Jedi have betrayed the Republic and that he is doing the right thing, even when Obi-Wan calls them out as Blatant Lies.
• Benevolent Boss: Anakin may be a somewhat reckless leader with his clone troopers, but he cares for them deeply and they rather be led under him in return. In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin insists on saving one of his men despite it making the mission more difficult.
• The Berserker: Anakin is naturally aggressive and reckless, but this side of him really shows up during the first time he taps into the Dark Side in order to kill the Tusken Raiders that abducted and killed his mother in Attack of the Clones. After the fact he starts to become more ruthless in his fighting style and prefers to unleash heavy attacks and using more of his anger to fuel his ability to fight.
• Beware the Nice Ones: In The Phantom Menace, he's an altruistic young boy that does whatever he can to help others, despite being a slave. Doesn't stop him from commandeering a Naboo starfighter to blow up the Trade Federation battleship, or giving Greedo a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown in deleted scenes when the latter accused him of cheating. Zigzagged throughout The Clone Wars, as while he's gotten friendlier than he was in Attack of the Clones, his struggles with his negative emotions get showcased as the series goes on, but he's a relatively Nice Guy who is A Father to His Men, a loving husband to Padmé, and the best of friends to Obi-Wan or Ahsoka. Still, say your prayers if you hurt those he cares about or manipulate him, because he'll either kill you or give you a severe What the Hell, Hero? speech.
• Big Brother Instinct: He's very protective of Ahsoka, his young Padawan learner with whom he has a sibling-like bond. However, like with many other close relationships Anakin has, this ends up being a negative influence on him, as whenever Ahsoka is in danger, Anakin tends to get corrupted as a result of tapping into the Dark Side in desperation to save her. Ahsoka's expulsion by the Jedi Council completely shatters his faith and respect for the Jedi Order. His brotherly love for her is one of the catalysts for his turn to the Dark Side.
• Big Brother Mentor: He really acts more like a big brother towards Ahsoka than a Jedi Master. It's not surprising given his attachment issues and the fact that they're only relatively a few years apart in age.
• Big Brother Worship: His relationship with his master Obi-Wan is a mix of a brotherly and a father-son relationship and it's clear to many, including Obi-Wan himself, that Anakin really idolizes his master.
• Big Ol' Eyebrows: In the original release of Return of the Jedi, the unmasked Anakin has rather thick eyebrows, which were digitally erased in the special editions to account for his horrific burns.
• Birds of a Feather: Anakin and Padmé both share a desire to do good and make the galaxy a better and more just place, even if that means bending the rules a bit. They just tend to have rather different ways of going about it.
  Anakin: We need a system where the politicians sit down and discuss the problems, agree what's in the best interests of all the people, and then do it."
  Padmé: That's exactly what we do. The trouble is that people don't always agree.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Increasingly, Anakin tends to see things in rather distinct terms (such as his beliefs around politics). He sums up the Clone Wars to Ahsoka as "The Separatists believe the Republic is corrupt, but they're wrong. And we have to restore order". After falling to the Dark Side, he straight up tells Obi-Wan "If you're not with me, then you're my enemy", which applies to everyone who disagrees with him at this point.
• Black Cloak: He starts wearing black-colored Jedi robes in The Clone Wars.
• Black Shirt: He doesn't support the Sith at first, but he is very much interested in the idea of the Republic's democracy being replaced by totalitarianism.
• Bloodbath Villain Origin: Anakin's first task after turning to the Dark Side and being christened Darth Vader by Palpatine is to lead an attack on the Jedi Temple.
• Blood Knight: Anakin rushes into combat lightsaber swinging and is very aggressive. He appears to enjoy fighting, even stating with a grin "This is where the fun begins" during the Battle of Coruscant.
• Blue Is Heroic: He wields a blue-bladed lightsaber as a Jedi. Subverted in Revenge of the Sith, where he continues using his blue-bladed lightsaber to commit various atrocities, such as murdering children, until he finally loses it after the lightsaber duel he had with Obi-Wan.
• Bodyguard Crush: He had one on Padmé in Attack of the Clones, where his childhood crush has become a full-fledged infatuation. He was tasked with being Padmé's bodyguard following several attempts on her life by Jango Fett and Zam Wesell, he accompanies her back to Naboo, where they become closer by the day and quickly falls in love (which is against the laws of the Jedi Order).
• Bodyguarding a Badass: He is assigned to protect Padmé, a senator who's more than capable with a blaster, in Attack of the Clones.
• Body Horror: Anakin's transformation into Darth Vader is very horrific through the fact that he loses all his organic limbs, has his whole body set on fire (along with his internal organs mangled), and is put into a mechanical suit that, according to Word of God, he wasn't given any anesthetic for and was awake the entire time.
• Born into Slavery: His mother was still a slave when she gave birth to him, so this trope is a given.
• Boy Meets Girl: This is Anakin's relationship with Padmé, who he first meets her back in The Phantom Menace.
• Brainy Brunette: Anakin's hair eventually turns from blond to brown by the time he is nineteen years old. While he has become more aggressive and prone to fighting instead of talking, Anakin is shown to be a brilliant tactician and mechanic.
• Break the Cutie: The incredibly sweet little boy of The Phantom Menace and the naïve, idealistic, and romantic teenager of Attack of the Clones are crushed by the events that occur in the latter due to the death of his mother. This is followed by a myriad of events that happen to Anakin in The Clone Wars, most prominently his mentor Obi-Wan faking his death and leaving Anakin Locked Out of the Loop and his Padawan learner Ahsoka being falsely accused of treason and leaving the Jedi Order as a result. Finally, Anakin's fear of losing Padmé the same way he lost his mother and the choices he makes in Revenge of the Sith to avoid that outcome finish smashing Anakin into tiny bits, which are then stomped on and finally set on fire. When Anakin kneels in front of Darth Sidious and receives his Sith title, you can see in his rag doll posture how completely and utterly broken he is. As Yoda tells Obi-Wan, "The boy you trained, gone he is".
• Break Them by Talking: Anakin accidentally does this to Padmé in Revenge of the Sith's climax. When he tries to convince her that all his atrocities are for the good of the galaxy (and to protect her) and they could just overthrow the Emperor and rule together, her spirit completely shatters and she is left sobbing and pleading him not to do this.
• Brilliant, but Lazy: Obi-Wan implies Anakin has this problem in Attack of the Clones; he is naturally very strong with the Force and outpaces many of his peers when he applies himself, but he isn't always the best student.
  Obi-Wan: If you spent as much time practicing your saber techniques as you did your wit, you'd rival Master Yoda as a swordsman.
  Anakin: I thought I already did.
  Obi-Wan: Only in your mind, my very young apprentice.
• Broken Ace: Anakin is stated all throughout the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars to be one of, if not the most powerful and skilled Jedi in the galaxy, even more so than already legendary Jedi such as Yoda and Mace Windu, in addition to being a Master Swordsman, an Ace Pilot, and a talented tactician and engineer. He also has some serious personal problems, including emotional issues, issues with attachment, relationship issues with those close to him, and conflicting feelings of guilt, fear, pain, and anger.
• Broken Pedestal:
  • Palpatine slowly becomes one to him over the course of Revenge of the Sith and by extension the Original Trilogy. He starts out viewing him as a "good man" and a Parental Substitute, but is clearly shocked when he learns he's a Sith Lord. In spite of this, Anakin sides with Palpatine in order to save Padmé from death by childbirth via turning to the Dark Side and seems to believe his lies to an extent. Eventually though, Anakin tells Padmé that he thinks he'd do a better job running the Empire, saying he could overthrow him and they could rule together. In the end, Anakin (or rather, Darth Vader) is loyal to Palpatine again, but only because he has no one else left and Palpatine is probably the only person in the galaxy at this point who understands and 'forgives' him for what he has done. The pedestal is fully shattered once and for all in Return of the Jedi when he realizes that Palpatine only ever manipulated and exploited him for own ends and kills him to save his son.
  • The Jedi become this to him over the course of the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars. Anakin starts out admiring them and aspires to become a Jedi Knight himself, but he struggles with their teachings and is frustrated that the Council don't seem to trust or respect him. Perhaps one of the largest pivotal moments was when Ahsoka was framed for treason and the Jedi Council casted her out. Even when the true culprit was discovered, Ahsoka refused to rejoin the Jedi Order because of her own broken faith in them. Seeing the student he grow so close to be let down like this definitely hurt his view of them. Anakin even admits to Palpatine that "my trust in them has been shaken" when they ask him to spy on the Chancellor and he starts to believe Palpatine's lies that they're plotting to take over. He eventually turns his back on the Jedi Order and becomes a Sith Lord in order to seize the power he thinks he deserves, even claiming to Obi-Wan during their battle that from his point of view "the Jedi are evil". It possibly becomes a Rebuilt Pedestal by the end of his life, as he turns on Palpatine and helps save his son, who has proudly proclaimed himself a Jedi. As a Force spirit, he appears alongside Obi-Wan and Yoda dressed in Jedi robes.
  • Some years after his death, Anakin being Darth Vader is finally exposed to the public, utterly decimating Anakin's reputation, not to mention that of his daughter, Leia. Up until that point, Anakin Skywalker was a beloved war hero that most assumed died during Order 66, with many believing that he died by Darth Vader's hand. Once it's revealed that the former Jedi hero had become a genocidal tyrant, any goodwill the public has about Anakin evaporates, as even his heroism as a Jedi, and his ultimate redemption isn't enough to excuse the millions of lives he ended.
• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: Anakin (the byronic, Jerk with a Heart of Gold Anti-Hero) is the Brooding Boy to Padmé's (idealistic, Nice Girl All-Loving Hero) Gentle Girl. Anakin even mentioned in Attack of the Clones that Padmé's presence is soothing to him.
• Byronic Hero: He is a handsome and brooding anti-hero with enough emotional issues (losing his mother, the fear of losing his wife, and his growing amorality, to name a few) to overfill the Death Star.
• Brought Down to Badass: While still an exceptionally powerful Sith lord by the end of Revenge of the Sith, his crippling injuries and the severely limited mobility of his life-sustaining suit reduced his potential power and combat ability. In the canon, there is a distinct difference from Legends about why and how he has been diminished.
  • In Legends, Anakin as Vader is a much more tormented figure which isn't helped by the fact that Palpatine rarely if ever engages with him as an actual teacher. In fact, in Legends, Palpatine actively tortures Vader and tries to keep Vader down as much as possible as he realized the source of Vader's reduction in power was almost purely psychological rather than physical. Anakin's loss of ability is due to him unconsciously limiting himself due to feelings of regret, guilt and self-loathing. It's implied that if Vader actually could have gotten over his issues, he'd regain his full power and be even stronger than the emperor. Also removed from canon is the statement from George Lucas that he lost much of his strength when he lost his limbs, thanks to losing all those delicious midichlorians.
  • In the canon, the reason for Anakin's reduction in power is purely physical. When he first dons his armor, he sends Palpatine flying in a fit of rage using the Force where he was unable to do that in Legends. Vader is far less tormented in the canon; while he still carries immense guilt and self-loathing, he buries it beneath his constant rage at his situation which actually makes him much more powerful in the dark side. His reason for not being as strong as he could be in the canon is that dark side power takes a toll on a healthy body over time. Vader's body is so injured and dependent on his life support armor that his own great power actually becomes a weakness in that he can no longer bear the weight of his extreme levels of Force potential and pushing his power to its limits would be too much for his body and kill him.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He's impulsive, frequently disobeys orders, is considered to be rather unorthodox and radical for a Jedi, and often uses unconventional plans and tactics on the fly with the 501st Legion during the Clone Wars, but he frequently gets results and is such a powerful Force user and skilled lightsaber duelist that his antics are often tolerated by the Council and sometimes even encouraged when they can benefit from it.
• Cain and Abel:
  • Although they are not biologically brothers, Anakin has this relationship with Obi-Wan. This is hammered home when Obi-Wan addresses Anakin as his brother and that he loved him at the end of their epic lightsaber duel on Mustafar after Anakin turns to the Dark Side.
  • Downplayed with his stepbrother on Tatooine, Owen Lars. They met once (Attack of the Clones) and this trope is more emphasized on between Anakin and Obi-Wan, but still applies. While Anakin turned to the Dark Side and became the famous and ruthless second-in-command of the Empire, Owen remained a good, if flawed, man and humble moisture farmer.
  • A straight example with Ahsoka Tano, whom he has brother-sister relationship. He ends the Clone Wars turned to the Dark Side and becoming an infamous tyrant while Ahsoka remains on the light side who helps the Rebel Alliance take down the Empire. When they meet again 15 years later, he attempts to kill her, and is only prevented from it thanks to time-travel shenanigans in a Jedi Temple.
• Captain Crash: Lampshaded in The Clone Wars episode "Bounty Hunters".
  Ahsoka: How come every time you fly, we crash?
  Anakin: It's not my fault, it's the ship.
  Ahsoka: He always blames the ship.
• Career Versus Man: A rare gender-flipped example; Anakin's future with the Jedi Order is jeopardized by his relationship with Padmé, mainly because the Jedi Code forbids such personal attachments. One of the reasons Padmé gives for them not having a relationship is that Anakin would be "throw[ing] away [his] future". Anakin tries to Take a Third Option by keeping his marriage to Padmé a secret, but this doesn't turn out too well in the long-run. This is actually a factor in Anakin joining the Dark Side; as a Sith Lord, Anakin wouldn't have to choose between them and could be with Padmé openly. Unfortunately for him, genocidal dictatorships are a dealbreaker for Padmé.
• The Chain of Harm: Anakin eventually goes from a child slave to a dictator who brings terror and oppression upon the galaxy.
• The Champion: He professes himself as this for Padmé, who he says he will do anything she asks for, in Attack of the Clones.
• Character Development: Anakin undergoes quite a bit of this over the course of the Canon. He goes from a naive but brave boy who wants to help others to a deeply troubled and conflicted young man who tries to do what he thinks is right. He becomes increasingly paranoid, ruthless, and willing to go to extreme lengths to achieve his goals for the "greater good" before finally becoming...well, Darth Vader. Eventually, it is his son's unconditional love for him and belief that he can still be a good person that causes him to let go of his anger and hatred, face up to his actions, and sacrifice himself to save his son and by extension the galaxy, finally finding peace and redemption in his dying moments.
• Chick Magnet: He's considered to be attractive by several women; Carnelion IV native Kolara had a crush on him, a Twi'lek woman checks him out in a nightclub, his future wife Padmé is obviously attracted to him, and Queen Miraj of Zygerria is very attracted to him and intends to make him become her...'companion' in exchange for his friends' freedom.
• Childhood Friend Romance: With Padmé, whom he meets when he was just nine years old while she was fourteen years old. They meet each other again ten years later in Attack of the Clones when Anakin is nineteen and Padmé is twenty-four, during which their romantic feelings grow and they marry by the film's end. And by Revenge of the Sith, they are expecting a baby (babies).
• Child Prodigy: In The Phantom Menace, nine-year-old Anakin has already built his own working Protocol droid and Podracer, is the only known human in galactic history to win a podrace (it's considered almost impossible for a human to participate in a Podrace, due to their relatively feeble perception and reflexes), and manages to get enough of a handle on a Naboo starfighter to destroy the Trade Federation droid control ship (by accident). Much of these can be attributed to his exceptionally strong connection to the Force.
• The Chosen One:
  • Double subverted. Anakin is the Jedi's prophesied Chosen One and extremely lucky and unusually skilled at everything the whole time, which is consistent with a standard Chosen One package. Then, he turns to the Dark Side and becomes The Dragon for Palpatine, going against what he was foretold to do. However, he ends up fulfilling his destiny anyway when he destroys the Emperor to protect his son. And even if Darth Sidious was able to cheat death by unnatural means and disrupt the Balance of the Force that Anakin restored by corrupting Ben Solo and destroying Luke's Jedi, Anakin's final act ensured that no future Sith would be created through the Rule of Two; all of the Emperor's followers are Dark Siders with no true affiliation to the Sith, and his grandson would join the Emperor's granddaughter in ending their reign of terror for good.
  • Anakin Skywalker's arc as The Chosen One in the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars deconstructs Luke's arc in the Original Trilogy. Like Luke, Anakin is told at a young age that he has great powers, but he eventually becomes extremely arrogant and distrusting of everybody around him and loses his friends and loved ones in his attempts to assert that power. It makes sense since Luke in-universe is in many ways Anakin done right. He even ultimately helps get Anakin back on track.
  • Further deconstructed in Dark Lord of the Sith when Vader has dark side visions that the dark side may believe he is its Chosen One rather than bringing the Force in balance, and his conception or his growth in Shmi Skywalker's womb may have been influenced by Darth Sidious to create a Force-user of tremendous power. If true, this means Anakin did indeed live up to his destiny of helping the Sith take over, but he eventually ended up becoming the Anti Anti Christ when he turned on his former master to help his son. Word of God is the page in Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith interpreted as confirmation "Palpatine is Anakin's father" did not depict a direct connection between Palpatine and Anakin's birth and that "the Dark Side is not a reliable narrator." God Never Said That Palpatine definitively did not create Anakin (and not that he did, either).
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: In The Phantom Menace, he helps a group of complete strangers at great personal risk and asks for nothing in return. While he keeps an otherwise heroic attitude in Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith, he eventually starts to feel as if he's owed something.
• Clear Their Name: During the Fugitive arc, Anakin is Ahsoka's stanch defender when she's framed for bombing the Jedi Temple hangar.
• Cock Fight: He is openly hostile and passive-aggressive towards Clovis due to his blatant romantic interest in Padmé. This eventually escalates into physical violence. It's deconstructed, as Anakin seriously injures Clovis and could actually have killed him if he hadn't come back to his senses. He is quite disturbed afterwards while Padmé is utterly horrified by his actions and actually decides to keep some distance from him for a while.
• Cold Ham: When Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vader in Revenge of the Sith, Hayden Christensen maintains his stilted line delivery, but delivers certain lines in an over-the-top intimidating manner via often shouting at the top of his lungs.
• Combat Pragmatist: As an aggressive fighter, Anakin has no qualms resorting to fighting dirty like throwing cheap shots or using the Force. He viciously chokes Dooku with his cybernetic arm in their duel on Naboo and cuts his hands of in their final duel before decapitating him. During his fight with Obi-Wan in Mustafar, he frequently throws surprise kicks and punches when his attempts to chip away at his master's Stone Wall defense don't succeed.
• Coming of Age Story: Anakin's journey in The Phantom Menace is leaving his home planet and family in order to begin his training as a Jedi Knight.
• Conflicting Loyalty:
  • In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin is faced with remaining loyal to the Jedi Order and letting Mace Windu destroy Palpatine or saving Palpatine so he can save Padmé in turn. He chooses Padmé.
  • He's faced with a similar scenario in Return of the Jedi when Palpatine tortures Luke. He should save his son or remain by his master's side. During this decision making process, he picks the former.
• Contrasting Sequel Main Character: It's more like Contrasting Prequel Main Character. Anakin is very similar to his son Luke, but they differ in several essential areas.
  • Both are raised on Tatooine, but whereas Anakin is born into slavery with just his loving mother, Luke has a Happy Family Life on a Farm with loving parental figures.
  • Anakin had trouble over losing his mother and wife while Luke didn't really angst over the death of his loved ones (he was upset, but didn't allow himself the time to grieve) and never took a wife.
  • Their temperaments and methods of dealing with conflict also tend to differ. While Luke does have issues with anger and impatience, he ultimately copes with them far better than Anakin. Anakin tends to let his emotions get the better of him while Luke learns to be more cautious and levelheaded. Most notably, while Anakin is greatly tempted by the power he believes the Dark Side can offer him in Revenge of the Sith, Luke is briefly tempted by the Dark Side in Return of the Jedi and he is horrified at himself when he realizes what he's becoming and puts a complete stop to it. Anakin is at times dangerously overconfident and covers up his insecurities with bravado while Luke is usually quite humble and perhaps even a little insecure about his abilities.
  • We also see how different they are with Luke in the Sequel Trilogy. Whereas Anakin has a Never My Fault attitude and shifts the blame to others for everything that goes wrong in his life, Luke's response to the failure of his new Jedi Order (having been undermined by Snoke) is It's All My Fault. Where Anakin jumps to the Dark Side and helps establish a tyrannical government, Luke flees society to live in seclusion and wallow in guilt for his failure.
• Cool Car: The sporty, yellow XJ-6 airspeeder that he borrowed in Attack of the Clones in order to pursue Zam Wesell could qualify as a sci-fi variant.
• Cool Star Ship: He pilots sleek and visually appealing awesome starfighters in The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith.
• Cool Sword: His lightsaber, the Jedi's special weapon. His second one has achieved an almost legendary status via being passed down to his son Luke, the savior of the galaxy in the Original Trilogy, and wielded by Rey, The Hero of the Sequel Trilogy. Han uses it as a tool in The Empire Strikes Back, Finn wields it for a time in The Force Awakens, and his grandson, Ben Solo, utilizes it in the battle against the Knights of Ren.
• Corrupt the Cutie: Anakin starts off in The Phantom Menace as a young Wide-Eyed Idealist whose first thought is how he can help a group of strangers get off a planet. As he grows older, however, he becomes more and more ambitious in his desires for power and for love, partially egged on by Palpatine, who plays him against his Jedi brethren.
• The Corruptible:
  • When Anakin was faced with the Jedi Council back in The Phantom Menace, the Jedi find him to be fraught with fear of losing his mother, which makes him vulnerable to turning to the Dark Side. Palpatine capitalizes on this when his fears shift towards losing Padmé.
  • In The Clone Wars, Anakin's ever-present desire to do the right thing and bring peace to the galaxy also make him inherently vulnerable to turning to the Dark Side. In Revenge of the Sith, Palpatine managed to exploit this aspect of Anakin's personality to further seduce him to the ways of the Sith.
• Costume Evolution: He wore white clothes when he was a slave before switching to the standard Jedi youngling white garment — both represent his still present innocence and inherent kindness. As an adult, choice darker clothing highlights his growing experience and darkness.
• Covered in Scars: After his defeat on Mustafar, Anakin is left horribly burned and covered with hideous scars. By the time of his death, however, the marks are, while still very visible and quite brutal, less extensive.
• Cowboy Cop: He has a tendency to launch his own independent investigations when the Jedi Council stonewalls him.
• Crazy Jealous Guy: Anakin is less than thrilled whenever other men are attracted to Padmé.
  • Anakin shows signs of this, though in a very downplayed fashion in Attack of the Clones, becoming irritated and grumbling that he "gets the picture" when Padmé tells him about the cute boy she had her first kiss with (it's Played for Laughs).
  • Anakin is nothing but hostile and rude to Senator Rush Clovis whenever they are together in The Clone Wars because of the latter's romantic feelings for his wife.
    • When Padmé went undercover to investigate Clovis' possible Separatist ties, she was kissed by him on the cheek, which made Anakin (who was pretending to be a pilot to protect Padmé) quietly enraged. Also, when Clovis tried to kiss Padmé again, Anakin used his piloting skills to stop it.
    • This aspect in Anakin's personality gets deconstructed when the two men meet again during the Clovis arc: When Padmé informs Anakin that she was working with him, Anakin actually threatened to leave his wife in jail and remained quite antagonistic to Clovis during their escape. Anakin then attempted to "demand" Padmé to tell Chancellor Palpatine she wouldn't work with Clovis, which notably and rightfully angers Padmé. The final straw was when he saw Padmé being held in Rush Clovis's arms and about to be kissed by him (despite her resistance), he lost his cool, telekinetically threw Clovis, and beat him in a fistfight. However, both Padmé and himself are completely horrified at his actions with the former thinking the two need some space.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Gets both his legs and his remaining organic arm lobbed off at the cusp of his battle with Obi-Wan, leaving him crippled and unable to continue the battle. He then catches fire and burns to a crisp, all while screaming in agony. Subverted in that he isn't actually dead, though Obi-Wan considers this to be the moment when his friend and apprentice, "Anakin Skywalker", died.
• Curb Stomp Cushion: His first few duels with Dooku are this, as Anakin has the potential to be much more powerful than him but hasn't reached that level yet and is a few levels below him at that point.
  • During his duel with Dooku in Attack of the Clones, he actually manages to put up a more decent fight than Obi-Wan did and briefly puts him in the back foot at the start of the duel, making Dooku put a little more effort fighting him than he did with Obi-Wan. Despite this, Anakin is still no match for Dooku and he comes out of the fight in worse shape than Obi-Wan.
  • In The Clone Wars movie, Dooku once again overpowers him and counters his strikes without much trouble, but Anakin at least puts up a much better fight than last time as he manages to push Dooku back a few times and actually manages to land a kick to Dooku's face before fleeing the duel.
• Cutting the Knot: During the Clone Wars, he tends to win space battles for the Republic via using unorthodox tactics, which is evident when he had a group of AT-TEs hide on asteroids in order to ambush a Separatist fleet commanded by General Grievous from behind and when he combined I Surrender, Suckers with Ramming Always Works in order to destroy a Separatist Blockade that surrounded Ryloth.
• Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Anakin's descent into evil is paralleled by his cyborg conversion. Also, according to Word of God, a Jedi losing body parts makes them lose Midi-chlorians and thus weakens their connection to the Force.
• Cynicism Catalyst:
  • The death of Anakin's mother in Attack of the Clones shaped his destiny and started his descent.
  • In The Clone Wars, Anakin's trust in the Jedi Order is gradually eroded. He watched his former master Obi-Wan supposedly die, only to find out that this was a scheme to stop Count Dooku and a few bounty hunters, with Skywalker's reaction being what made it real, all without being informed of this. Then, he watched his Padawan learner Ahsoka get left to the Republic court system by the Jedi Order, only to then have her leave after being proven innocent. It didn't help that the Jedi Council gave Anakin a spot on the Council in Revenge of the Sith, but they refused to give him the rank of Master and were in fact just using him for his personal connections to Palpatine.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, the fear of the loss of his wife Padmé by childbirth is what drives Anakin into turning to the Dark Side. For extra irony, Padmé dies from childbirth because she loses her desire to live after seeing the monster Anakin has become in trying to prevent her death.

D–F

• Dark and Troubled Past: Though his life prior to The Phantom Menace has yet be given too much detail, what we do know implies his childhood was not a happy one. He was Born into Slavery on Tatooine, his only family being his mother, who he is eventually forced to leave in order to have a better life; shortly thereafter, his new Parental Substitute is murdered. His upbringing as a slave continues to affect him well into adulthood and his difficulties over leaving his mother (as well as subsequent traumatic events) give him serious abandonment issues, all of which contributes to his eventual turn to the Dark Side.
• Dark Is Not Evil: By the time of Attack of the Clones, Anakin's Jedi robe was much darker than most other Jedi's, but he was still heroic in The Clone Wars. However, once he turned to the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith, it became Dark Is Evil.
• The Dark Side Will Make You Forget: Anakin turns to the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith in order to save his wife from dying. By the end of the film, he has slaughtered younglings and Force choked his wife to near death.
• Deadpan Snarker: Anakin has quite a few moments of sarcasm throughout the canon, especially whenever he is interacting with Obi-Wan.
  Obi-Wan: [after the two Jedi are almost crushed by an avalanche of rocks] Anakin, when I tell you to run, run.
  Anakin: Master! You're alive.
  Obi-Wan: And where's your lightsaber?
  Anakin: It got knocked out of my hand.
  Obi-Wan: By a rock?
  Anakin: [turns back to Obi-Wan and begins searching for his lightsaber] Yeah, by a rock. It's got to be here somewhere.
  Obi-Wan: That is a feeble excuse.
  Anakin: You know what would be helpful? A little light.
  Obi-Wan: Certainly. [turns on his lightsaber but it sputters and goes out] Silly thing. It was just working a minute ago.
  Anakin: You don't suppose it was hit by a rock, do you?
• Deal with the Devil: He does this in Revenge of the Sith with Darth Sidious as the devil. Anakin turns to the Dark Side when the Sith Lord offers knowledge of how to save Padmé from death due to child birth. The scene where he submits to Palpatine is staged like a classical Faustian drama. Like all such deals, it ends up backfiring as his turn to the Dark Side is what drives Padmé away from him, causes her death, and eventually leads to him becoming a crippled cyborg paraplegic for the rest of his life.
• Death of Personality: The hearing of Padmé's death breaks whatever was left of Anakin's spirit and leads to his transformation into the brutal villain that we see in the Original Trilogy. Subverted, however, in that the old Anakin Skywalker did survive; it just took Luke's efforts to see him prevail.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of The Chosen One, showing how and why this character would cause more problems than they would fix. Anakin is indeed incredibly powerful with the Force, but it makes him a Smug Super who blames Obi-Wan and the Jedi for any personal failings or feelings of not being treated seriously. This makes him The Friend Nobody Likes, with the Jedi Council rarely trusting him fully which he picks up on and only creates a bigger distance between him and them, not to mention that his arrogance only worries those who do believe in the prophecy. All of this means he was easy for Palpatine to manipulate, and when he starts to dream about Padmé's death he doesn't even think to directly ask anyone for their help.
• Decoy Protagonist: During the Umbara arc in The Clone Wars, it initially looks like he is going to serve as a Deuteragonist to Captain Rex. However, halfway through "Darkness on Umbara" (the first episode in the story arc), he is called off to Coruscant.
• Despair Event Horizon: Padmé's death, particularly as Palpatine claims that Anakin himself killed her, and Anakin would naturally assume their child died with her. After that, The Empire and Anakin's service to his master are all he has left. He overcomes this after saving Luke from the Emperor, managing to die happy with the knowledge that his son had saved his soul.
• Desperately Craves Affection: One of Anakin's greatest flaws is his inability to let go of the people he loves. He can't bear to see them hurt or parted from him, constantly tries to gain others' affection or approval, and is eventually driven to extreme lengths to protect his wife. It's not helping that as a boy, he was separated from his mother and then found out that his father figure Qui-Gon Jinn died, leaving him as a ward to the Jedi. The separation from his mother and his time with the Jedi Order leaves him unable to save her from the Tusken raiders after he grows into a young adult. Upon marrying Padmé, who becomes the only family he has left, he grows paranoid about losing her.
• Destructive Romance: His relationship with Padmé eventually descends into this, which is particularly highlighted in "The Rise of Clovis". Although they love each other, having to keep their relationship secret puts a lot of pressure on them and causes trust issues. Anakin's ever-worsening emotional state and Crazy Jealous Guy tendencies don't help either and it clearly has negative effects on them. After Anakin turns to the Dark Side, the relationship becomes blatantly abusive – he twists the truth or just straight up lies to Padmé to cover up his crimes, starts treating her more like a possession than his wife and lashes out at her with the Force, ultimately causing her death.
• Determinator:
  • In The Clone Wars episode "The Citadel", Anakin takes back his lightsaber from an electromagnet while hanging from his own right hand (which is also stuck to the magnet) and being electrocuted.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, he manages to survive through The Power of Hate alone even after getting all but one of his limbs chopped off and his body immolated by a river of molten lava.
• Deus Angst Machina: By the time of A New Hope, Anakin has spent ten years of his life agonizing over leaving his mother in slavery, returned to her after all that time just for her to die in his arms, committed mass genocide, and killed his own beloved wife (and supposedly their unborn child) in a botched Deal with the Devil meant to save said wife and child from death, and spent another twenty-or-so years living with the guilt of his actions while trapped in a twisted mangle of burnt flesh and machinery.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: In "Overlords", Anakin manages to tame the Daughter and the Son, the god-like embodiments of the Light and Dark Sides of the Force, simultaneously.
• Died Happily Ever After: After performing a Heroic Sacrifice in order to save his son Luke, Anakin appears as a Force spirit alongside Obi-Wan and Yoda at the end of Return of the Jedi while being more peaceful than he's ever been in years.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: He dies in his son's arms after finding redemption.
• Disability Immunity: After being set alight by lava following a lightsaber duel he had with Obi-Wan on Mustafar, he manages to climb to safety because his prosthetic arm remains intact.
• Disabled Love Interest: Inverted. Anakin is the closest character to protagonist of the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars, has a robotic arm, and became the main love interest/husband of Padmé.
• Disappeared Dad: According to Word of God, Anakin was conceived by the Force itself, therefore he doesn't have a father.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Anakin massacres the village of Tusken Raiders, including the more or less innocent women and children in order to avenge his mother's death.
• Dogged Nice Guy: He is constantly trying to be kind, helpful, and charming towards Padmé and professes that he will do anything for her. He's not particularly interested in taking no for an answer from Padmé when she tells him they can't be together. However, he does tone it down after she spells out plainly the reasons their relationship wouldn't work... and then they end up together anyway.
• Domestic Abuse: As Anakin turns to the Dark Side, his treatment of Padmé steadily becomes this.
  • His controlling treatment of Padmé in The Clone Wars is an emotional abuse example, especially in regards to her relationship with Rush Clovis. When she was asked to spy on Clovis, Anakin blatantly stated he wouldn't let her do it. When Clovis returns to ask for Padmé's help, which she agrees to, Anakin is enraged upon learning it and threatened to leave her in jail. And when asked by Chancellor Palpatine to work with Clovis, Anakin actually told Padmé, he "demanded" her to tell the Chancellor she couldn't.
  • He falls headfirst into full-on physical abuse at the peak of his Face–Heel Turn in Revenge of the Sith, when he Force chokes a pregnant Padmé in a fit of paranoid rage, indirectly resulting in her death.
• Doomed by Canon: It was known what Anakin's destiny was going to be since The Phantom Menace despite the fact that he was originally a young and innocent boy.
• Dreaming of Things to Come: Anakin's recurring nightmare about Padmé's death during childbirth in Revenge of the Sith.
• Drives Like Crazy: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin nearly gives Obi-Wan a heart attack with his reckless speeder driving while chasing Zam Wesell on Coruscant, where driving is a three-dimensional affair. Justified, since his primary training in driving anything was his participating in the high-speed podraces on Tatooine.
• Drunk with Power: After turning to the Dark Side and becoming Darth Vader, Anakin declares his intention to overthrow the Emperor and become ruler of the Galaxy.
• Dual Wielding: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin fights Count Dooku with two lightsabers at one point. Unfortunately, it only lasts a short while before he's forced to switch back to one. He also does it again a few times in The Clone Wars.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Anakin becomes increasingly frustrated with the lack of respect and trust he feels he deserves from the Jedi Council, something that factors into his Face–Heel Turn in Revenge of the Sith.
• Dumb Blonde: An inversion. Anakin's hair was originally blond before it darkened over time. And despite his reckless and arrogant nature, he's a brilliant tactician and mechanic.
• Dying as Yourself: In the last moments of his life, he lets go of the Dark Side and dies as Anakin Skywalker, not Darth Vader. Reflecting this, Luke removes Vader's mask in his father's final moments alive.
• Dying Declaration of Hate: Anakin does this during his Villainous Breakdown after he's defeated by Obi-Wan on Mustafar, screaming out his hatred towards the Jedi Master, who responds by telling him he loved him like a brother. Subverted in that he doesn't die.
• Easily Forgiven: After his passing, Luke, Obi-Wan, and Yoda show no hard feelings towards the redeemed Anakin's spirit. Obi-Wan even shoots his former Padawan a fond smile.
• Embarrassing Nickname: Anakin does not like it when Ahsoka calls him "Skyguy".
• Emergency Transformation: After his duel with Obi-Wan on Mustafar, Anakin's body is injured so badly that Darth Sidious immediately brings him to Coruscant and creates Darth Vader as we know him in the Original Trilogy.
• Enmity with an Object: Anakin despises sand, likely as a result of trauma from growing up as a slave on the desert planet of Tatooine.
• Entitled Bastard: While he's justified in wanting respect for his many war accomplishments, he was probably overreacting to the Jedi Council not promoting him to Master at the age of 22. Him getting to be on the Council at all is already well into Improbable Age range, and was chiefly a political appointment.
• Entitled to Have You: Not at first, but his attitude towards Padmé starts to smack of this by the end of Revenge of the Sith; mostly Type B. As he succumbs deeper to the Dark Side, he starts to view her less as a person he loves and more as a possession who owes him loyalty and affection. He outright claims everything he's doing is for her, as if this is a valid excuse for her to not question or condemn his actions, disregarding her feelings on the matter. He completely flips out when she refuses to have anything to do with his plans and he believes that she has betrayed him. Anakin really only snaps out of it after waking up from his life-saving operation; one of the first things he asks is if Padmé is safe. Unfortunately, it's too late...
• Et Tu, Brute?: After his Face–Heel Turn in Revenge of the Sith, Anakin believes that Obi-Wan and Padmé are conspiring to kill him when they are merely trying to make him turn back from the Dark Side. However, it's the other way around since he was the one who betrayed them.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Not so much a villain as a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, but his massacre of the Sand people was provoked by their murder of his mother.
• Even the Guys Want Him: When he enters the club in Attack of the Clones one of the people who checks him out is a man.
• Everyone Has Standards: Given that he is a Jerk with a Heart of Gold until becoming Darth Vader, it's this trope instead of Even Evil Has Standards; while Anakin is one of the more ruthless heroes, he knows where to draw the line in several areas.
  • While he despised Clovis for being Padmé’s ex and putting her in danger, he was horrified at how he almost beat him to death for trying to put a Forceful Kiss on her.
  • He also shows utter contempt for slavery, which isn't surprising considering he was a slave for the first nine years of his life.
  • Despite his frustration with Windu and the Council over the years, he still makes it a point to report Palpatine as a Sith Lord to Mace not long after he finds out. And even though he ultimately cuts off Mace's hand to spare the Sith Lord, he's still devastated that his actions lead to Windu's death.
• Evil Costume Switch: Anakin puts his hood up a lot more after turning to the Dark Side and being christened Darth Vader. In the ultimate evil costume switch, he wears the infamous biomechanical suit of armor we are familiar with.
• Evil Is Hammy: In Revenge of the Sith, when Anakin turns to the Dark Side, he starts acting more bombastic when he speaks.
  Vader: You underestimate my POWER!
• Evil Makes You Ugly: Anakin starts to show signs of Dark Side overuse mere hours after his turn, mainly his sickly yellow eyes. His horrific disfigurement by lava soon follows. His final appearance as a Force Spirit also shows that, even without his burn wounds, he looks 30 years older than he is.
• Exiled to the Couch: After beating the crap out of Rush Clovis in "The Rise of Clovis", Padmé all but kicks him out of her apartment, saying she thinks they need time apart. To his credit, Anakin accepts this and leaves without much fuss.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin has short hair with a Padawan braid, the exact same hairstyle his mentor Obi-Wan had in his youth. By the time of The Clone Wars, the braid is gone and his hair is longer, giving him more of an Anti-Hero look.
• Extremely Protective Child:
  • Anakin is very protective of his mother, Shmi. As a nine year old boy, he promises Shmi he will come back and free her from slavery someday. Ten years later, he defies the Jedi Council and drops everything to go back to Tatooine when he has recurring dreams of her being in danger. Upon learning she was kidnapped by Tusken Raiders, he refuses to give up on her and doesn't rest until he finds her. Unfortunately, this trope is taken to the extreme when Shmi ends up dying, with Anakin massacring the entire camp of Tusken Raiders out of grief and rage.
  • He's also this to Obi-Wan, whom he regards as his adoptive father. Seeing Dooku about to execute Obi-Wan during their duel with him on Geonosis prompts Anakin to get back up from being electrocuted by Dooku's Force Lightning and stop Dooku from delivering the killing blow. During the Clone Wars, witnessing Obi-Wan seemingly get assassinated by an assassin drives Anakin into a vengeful rage and exact revenge on said assassin, unaware that Obi-Wan faked his own death and impersonated said assassin. Lastly, during their final duel with Count Dooku, seeing Dooku knock Obi-Wan out and crush him under a balcony pisses him off and he promptly curbstomps Dooku, cuts his hands off, and beheads him on Palpatine's request.
• Eye Color Change: Anakin's eye color changes from blue to yellow once he turns to the Dark Side and becomes a Sith Lord.
• Face–Heel Turn: In "Ghosts of Mortis", the Son convinces him to turn to the Dark Side a year early, ironically to prevent his actions as Darth Vader, though this is quickly undone by the Father. In Revenge of the Sith, he turns his back on the Jedi Order to become the ruthless Darth Vader.
• Fallen Hero: He could easily be the Trope Codifier. While he begins as a sweet, selfless child and becomes a heroic Jedi Knight, Anakin inevitably turns to the Dark Side and becomes one of the most famous villains in cinematic history.
• Family Man: Anakin loves his mother Shmi and wants to make a family with Padmé. The death of the former in Attack of the Clones and being unable to make a family with the latter in Revenge of the Sith marks his path to the Sith instead of the Jedi.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • He really hates Tusken Raiders for killing his mother, enough to kill a village of them. Although to be fair, Tusken Raiders have never been shown to be anything other than cruel, sadistic thieves and murderers, at least until The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett.
  • Anakin loathes Zygerrians, angrily referring to one as "Zygerrian scum". However, this is justified as Zygerrians are slave traders and Anakin was born into slavery.
  • He's not very fond of Hutts either, even straight up saying that he "hate[s] Hutts" in The Clone Wars' pilot movie. Again, this stems back to his upbringing as a slave; the Hutts are well-known perpetrators of slavery and Anakin and his mother were once owned by Gardulla the Hutt.
• Fashionable Asymmetry: His designs in The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith very subtly present his increasing darkness. He has a scar over one eye and the arm on the same side of his body has a tight sleeve and glove combo over his Artificial Limb, while he otherwise maintains his boyish looks and wears the same loose fitting uniform he had back in Attack of the Clones.
• Fatal Flaw:
  • Anakin has three: His first flaw is the fact that he arrogantly assumes that he can do anything if he puts enough effort into it, his second flaw is his inability to let go of things he cares about, and his third flaw is his refusal to accept anything he’s done as wrong or unjustified (although he gets this third flaw after he turns to the dark side). When combined, the result is that when faced with a situation in which he would lose something precious to him (Padmé's Death by Childbirth), he would go to any lengths to try and avert it, even if that means turning to the Dark Side and slaughtering those he called his friends, all while genuinely believing he's doing the right thing.
  • Obi-Wan Kenobi adds a fourth flaw he has that still persists even after he's become Darth Vader which the titular character exploits multiple times: an obsessive need for victory. He craves victory so much that it makes him incredibly reckless and impatient in trying to achieve it. It results in multiple force-sensitives managing to escape his grasp and him painfully losing a brutal rematch with Obi-Wan all because he wanted to prove that he's surpassed his former mentor.
• Fate Worse than Death: After the events of Revenge of the Sith, where he becomes Darth Vader, he is condemned to a life of constant emotional, psychological, and physical pain until he is redeemed at the very end of Return of the Jedi.
• A Father to His Men: He's pretty caring towards Ahsoka and Rex, but he usually comes up with reckless plans that send both of them into serious danger. Then again, given they are in the middle of a war, his plans could be argued as the lesser of two evils: he doesn't send his clone troopers into situations he knows they won't survive. He also leads from the front and seems unwilling to order his clone troopers to do anything he wouldn't do himself. In Revenge of the Sith's opening battle, he even wants to go help the clone troopers when they're overwhelmed by the enemy, but Obi-Wan says they need to concentrate on their own mission.
• Final Boss: He is the final antagonist of the main and prequel trilogies, fought by Obi-Wan in a climactic duel on Mustafar and then by Luke aboard the second Death Star.
• Flaw Exploitation:
  • Palpatine exploits Anakin's love for Padmé and fear of losing her to convince him that everything he does is for the good of the Galaxy.
  • Palpatine had also exploited Anakin's need for validation since day one via becoming a friend and mentor to Anakin since the inexperienced Obi-Wan occasionally struggled with his apprentice.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling:
  • He's the foolish to Obi-Wan's responsible. Even with his maturation, Anakin is still considerably more hot-headed and reckless than his more grounded older brother figure.
  • It's reversed with his own Padawan learner, Ahsoka. He gives her advice on how to handle herself in tense situations and help her grow.
• For Your Own Good: He delivers a very dark variation of this to Padmé in Revenge of the Sith, insisting all the horrible things he's done are for her own good.
  "I'm becoming more powerful than any Jedi has ever dreamed of. And I'm doing it for you. To protect you."
• Freudian Excuse:
  • Spending much of his childhood as a slave gave Anakin a seething hatred for slavers. In addition, losing his mother, first when he was taken to be a Jedi, and later when she died shortly before the Clone Wars, left him with an inability to let go of anyone he cares about, such as when his Padawan learner Ahsoka was put on trial and left the Jedi Order. It was this very inability applied to Padmé that allowed Palpatine, the sociopath who had been grooming him since age nine, to finally push him over the edge into villainy.
  • Anakin also has some serious issues with father figures. For starters, Anakin seemingly has no biological father (it's implied that he was conceived through the Force itself due to the manipulations of Palpatine). Growing up, his primary male role model was Watto, his slave master who cares mostly about money. He gains a new, much better father figure in Qui-Gon Jinn...only for him to be killed by Darth Maul. Obi-Wan tries his best to be a replacement, but their relationship is more reminiscent of an older brother being forced to step in as a parent, causing a fair bit of friction between them. Anakin blames Obi-Wan partly for "holding him back" and starts to suspect him of trying to steal his wife. His main father figure during the Clone Wars is Chancellor Sheev Palpatine aka Darth Sidious (who is the Dark Lord of the Sith and probably the worst person in the galaxy Anakin could look up to as a Parental Substitute).
• Friendly Ghost:
  • After his redemption and subsequent death at the end of Return of the Jedi, Anakin is seen smiling at his son and daughter as a Force Spirit. This is because Luke never gave up on him and Anakin’s love for his son turned him back to the light side.
  • In Ghosts Of Vaders Castle issue #5 on Mustafar at the end, when Lina’s crew is having trouble navigating through fog in Vader’s castle, a lightsaber guides them through. When they get back to their ship, they thought it was Lina leading them with the lightsaber but she wasn’t. Lina jokes that there’s no such thing as ghosts, where it’s revealed that the force ghost of Anakin was the one who helped them. With a smile on his face, Anakin laughs to himself after Lina’s claim of there not being ghosts.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: In the Canon, this is his status within the Jedi Order ever since he first met with them in The Phantom Menace. Qui-Gon Jinn is the only who wholeheartedly vouched for him and believed in him. While Obi-Wan loves Anakin like a brother, even he complains behind his back to the Council about his arrogance and bad temper (as shown in Attack of the Clones) in addition to never standing up for him, unlike Qui-Gon. The other Jedi have mixed feelings about him on account of his temperament, arrogance, willingness to take risks, tendency of bending the rules, issue with attachment, and inability to let his loved ones go. There is also the fact that, while Yoda at least has some compassion for Anakin, Mace Windu openly distrusts Anakin and occasionally softens on him during the Clone Wars and when he initially tells him about Palpatine's true identity. The bad blood between them likely had a factor in his eventual turn to the Dark Side.
• Friend-or-Idol Decision: Anakin believes he has to turn to the Dark Side or else Padmé will die. Also, Anakin's choice between letting Mace Windu kill Palpatine or saving the Sith Lord's life; he also seems torn between remaining loyal to the Jedi or the Chancellor and the Republic.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Anakin provides the page image for this trope. He starts out as a lowly slave boy born on an Outer Rim planet far away from the influence of the Galactic Republic, who eventually becomes the very instrument used to bring about the rise of the Galactic Empire and the decimation of the Jedi Order.
• Frontline General: While many Jedi Generals led their troops this way during the Clone Wars, Anakin had a particular knack and reputation for charging right into the thick of battle with his loyal 501st clone troopers at his back, or flying point in his Jedi starfighter during space battles throughout the war.

G–H

• Gadgeteer Genius: When he was a nine-year-old in The Phantom Menace, Anakin built his own protocol droid, C-3PO, when he was only a kid, as well as built his own podracer. In The Clone Wars, he is frequently in charge of making repairs to the ships, maintaining his own prosthetic arm (which came in handy when he eventually gained three more artificial limbs), and performing other mechanical duties.
• Generation Xerox: Although he becomes increasingly amoral, he initially shares his mother Shmi's compassion and altruism towards those in need as well as her Determinator attitude. Although it takes him a while, Anakin eventually proves to be as loving and protective towards his children as Shmi – she willingly remained a slave on Tatooine to let Anakin have a better life, while Anakin sacrifices himself to save Luke. Anakin's final fate is quite similar to his mother's - they both die in their arms of their sons after they had come to save them.
• Genius Bruiser: He is a brilliant engineer and tactician who leads his men from the frontline during the Clone Wars.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: Anakin's eyes glow a bright yellow when he goes off to kill a group of Jedi younglings.
• A God Am I: In Revenge of the Sith, after turning to the Dark Side, Anakin says that he is becoming the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy, so powerful that he can overthrow Emperor Palpatine and rule with Padmé by his side as his Empress.
• Good is Not Nice: Even before he turned to the Dark Side, Anakin was aggressive and a jerk at times.
• Good Is Not Soft: As a Jedi, Anakin is never afraid of more violent solutions. In The Clone Wars episode "Voyage of Temptation", he kills Tal Merrik when both Obi-Wan and Satine couldn't do so.
• Good Colors, Evil Colors: Anakin goes from wearing light colors in The Phantom Menace to progressively darker colors in Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith, which is a not-so-subtle indicator of Anakin's gradual openness to the Dark Side.
• Good Costume Switch: When Anakin appears as a Force spirit in Return of the Jedi, he has switched from the dark brown and black robes he wore as a young Anti-Hero and the iconic black armor he wore as Darth Vader to a light brown and white set of robes similar to Obi-Wan's own.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: He has a scar next to his right eye by the time of The Clone Wars before ending up covered in burn scars after his Face–Heel Turn and battle with Obi-Wan in Revenge of the Sith.
• Go Out with a Smile: This is Anakin's farewell to Luke. After being redeemed from the Dark Side, Anakin smiles warmly at his son after looking upon him with his own eyes for the first time in his life.
• Green-Eyed Monster:
  • Anakin's jealousy of Padmé's former relationship with Clovis is Played for Laughs for most of "Senate Spy". That is until the part where he abandons Clovis to the mercy of Lott Dod, Poggle the Lesser, and a battalion of Battle Droids.
  • The early scripts for Revenge of the Sith had Anakin suspect that Padmé and Obi-Wan were having an affair, with this being one of the contributing factors to his turn to the Dark Side. The finished film still has hints of this (Anakin asking if Obi-Wan had been to Padmé's apartment, and his emphasis on Obi-Wan during his conversation with Padmé on Mustafar), adding some extra depth to his hatred for Obi-Wan after becoming Darth Vader.
• Grin of Audacity: He often smiles and sometimes even laughs as he's doing or about to do something very dangerous.
• Guns Akimbo: During the Crystal Crisis arc, he resorts to using two X-8 Night Sniper blaster pistols he stole from an armory after the Sugi confiscate his and Obi-Wan's lightsabers.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: When he's a Battle Couple with Padmé — He charges in with his lightsaber while she uses her trusty blaster.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Young Anakin has blond hair in The Phantom Menace. When he meets the heroes and brings them to his home, he volunteers to race in the Boonta Eve Classic podrace so that they could get the prize money. When his mother objects, Anakin reminds Shmi of her belief that people need to help one another, convincing her to allow Anakin to race for Qui-Gon Jinn.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Anakin is very impulsive, hot-tempered, and easily angered, especially if someone he loves is in danger.
• Half-Human Hybrid: Qui-Gon theorizes that he might have been conceived by the midi-chlorians, based on his unprecedented midi-chlorian count, and Shmi's claim that he was the result of virgin birth.
• Handicapped Badass: In The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith, Anakin remains as much the skilled lightsaber duelist he was before losing his arm in Attack of the Clones.
• Happily Married: Zig-zagged. He and Padmé deeply love one another and, until his turn to the Dark Side, they were happy together. The nature of their marriage and other factors cause some problems. During the Clovis arc in The Clone Wars, Anakin displays some controlling behavior around Padmé out of jealousy of Rush Clovis and later nearly beats him to death in a violent rage when he nearly kisses his wife, greatly disturbing Padmé and leading to them temporarily separating. And in Revenge of the Sith, she implies that despite three years of marriage, they still keep things from each other; reading between the lines, it's also implied he believes Obi-Wan and Padmé may be having an affair. He eventually escalates into a full-on Domestic Abuser after turning to the Dark Side, Force choking Padmé when she rejects him and he believes she's betrayed him. He never stopped loving Padmé though and is emotionally destroyed when he realizes he caused her death.
• Hated Hometown: He despises Tatooine. It's not surprising, seeing as he lived in slavery there and it's also where his mother was killed; he doesn't much care for the terrain either. He only returns to Tatooine when he absolutely has to. This actually factors into Obi-Wan and Yoda's decision to take Luke to Tatooine after Anakin turns to the Dark Side; Obi-Wan knows that Vader is extremely unlikely to ever want to set foot on Tatooine again, so both he and Luke should be relatively well-hidden there.
  Anakin: The desert is merciless. It takes everything from you.
• Healthy in Heaven: As a Force Spirit, he lacks any of the burn wounds and severed limbs he sustained from Mustafar, looking exactly like he was before he turned to the Dark Side but with a flesh-and-bone right arm instead of a prosthetic one.
• Heartbroken Badass: His mother's death turns him into one and Ahsoka's departure from the Jedi only makes him feel even worse. When Padmé dies, Anakin's heart is broken so badly that his allegiance to the Dark Side becomes almost absolute.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: Anakin tries to redeem himself by telling Padmé that he can overthrow Palpatine so that they can rule in his place. Sadly, Padmé is far too terrified of what he's become to accept his offer.
• Heel Realization: His speech about killing the Tusken Raiders that caused his mother's death has elements of this in the sense that he feels like he's failing as a Jedi.
• He Is All Grown Up: In Attack of the Clones, Padmé is impressed by how much Anakin has grown in size and personality since their last encounter ten years earlier back in The Phantom Menace.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: He wears a black leather tabard as part of his Jedi outfit in Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith. In The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith, he wears a black leather glove to cover his prosthetic right arm.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: Anakin uses a lightsaber, as he is a Jedi and lightsabers are the Jedi's weapons. He himself associated lightsabers with Jedi since childhood, as he deduced Qui-Gon was a Jedi based on the fact he had a "laser sword".
• Heroic Bastard: His mother was not married and gave birth to him without a father, making Anakin this. And he's a loyal, if brutal, Jedi Knight. For a while.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Anakin has a huge one after his mother dies and he goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against her killers. He calms down after her funeral. Although, his impulsive rage in the First Battle of Geonosis (especially against Dooku) indicates it's still affecting him (seeing dozens of fellow Jedi killed and Padmé injured doesn't help). This gets him badly injured and nearly killed.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, he goes into one after informing Mace Windu that Palpatine is a Sith Lord and being told to wait at the Jedi Temple while Mace and some other Jedi Masters go to confront him. All of his inner turmoil comes to a head and he paces around the Council chamber, Palpatine's words echoing in his mind. He ends up staring out of the window and across the city towards Padmé's apartment (where she also happens to be gazing out the window, ruminating), silently crying as he seriously contemplates betraying the Jedi to save her and Palpatine.
• The Hero Dies: Well the Anti-Hero turned Villain Protagonist dies anyway. Anakin is the main protagonist of the Prequel Trilogy and he passes away in his son Luke's arms after his Heel–Face Turn at the end of Return of the Jedi.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Obi-Wan. After a somewhat difficult master-apprentice relationship, they became as close as brothers during the Clone Wars. Once Anakin turns to the Dark Side, however...
• He Who Fights Monsters: This is the reason why he becomes a Sith Lord, the very thing he sought to destroy. In one notable example before his Face–Heel Turn, he slew the Tusken Raiders responsible for Shmi's death. All of them. Including the tribe's women and children.
• His Own Worst Enemy: Although some of his suffering is through no fault of his own, Anakin does have a tendency to bring misfortune upon himself, especially in Revenge of the Sith. His insecurities, pride, short temper, attachment issues, and fear of loss directly leads to him turning to the Dark Side, getting horribly maimed, and losing almost everything he cares about.
  Obi-Wan: I believe Anakin may be in grave danger.
  Padmé: From the Sith?
  Obi-Wan: From himself.
• Historical Hero Upgrade: It's never made clear how widely known Anakin Skywalker's turn to the Dark Side is in the Canon by the time of the Original Trilogy. Anakin is still known as a great pilot among the rebels. When Obi-Wan and Yoda meet Luke, they call Anakin a great Jedi and great person, though Yoda is possibly being sarcastic. The things that Anakin did do, such as killing children, strangling his own wife and driving her to death, are never told to either Luke or Leia, even if both mentors knew what he did, nor the fact that for most of his time, Anakin was widely disliked within the Jedi community and his only promotion (being part of the Jedi Council) was a transparent political appointment which they countered by denying him many of the usual privileges. Or that when he became Sith, his grand plan for his kids was for them to become Overlord Jr., an ambition that still motivates him in The Empire Strikes Back. Then again, Darth Vader is apparently better known by the galaxy at large and is widely despised by anyone who isn't a First Order supporter to the point that Leia's political career is ended the moment people find out she's his daughter, redemption or no.
• Honey Trap: During the Zygerrian Slavers arc, Anakin's plan to rescue the enslaved Togrutan colonists is to charm Queen Miraj.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Especially by the time of Revenge of the Sith. To be fair to him, some of this is a result of manipulation on Palpatine's part and the Jedi Council inadvertently alienating him, leaving him uncertain of who he can trust:
  • He trusts freaking Palpatine above everyone else, outright defending him as a "good man". It takes him a while to realize he's a thoroughly evil and unscrupulous bastard who just wants to seize power for himself.
  • He thinks Padmé is plotting against him even though she makes it clear all she wants is to help him turn away from the Dark Side.
  • From his point of view, the Jedi are evil traitors. While the Jedi Council have issues with hubris and clinging to restrictive codes that do more harm than good, the Jedi as a whole stand for peace, justice and liberty, fighting to defend the Republic and only considering seizing control because they realized the corrupt government is being controlled by a Sith Lord.
• Hot-Blooded: Anakin is overly emotional, passionate, brash, impulsive, and hotheaded, which are traits that are attributed heavily to the Dark Side. However, both his children, in particular his daughter Leia, display similar traits at times, but are both very good people. The difference seems to be the way in which they apply these traits to situations. In Anakin's case, he often struggles to control his temper and lets himself be ruled by his emotions.
• Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Two examples:
  • A romantic example with Padmé, whom he towers over (he is 6'2" while she is 5'5").
  • A platonic example with Ahsoka. Justified, as she is a teenager while he is a full-grown adult.
• Humanoid Abomination: Anakin was somehow conceived through the Force without a father. This was thoroughly explored in the Legends novel Darth Plagueis, in which Anakin was conceived through the Force in retaliation against Darth Plagueis and Sidious' experiments. In canon, there are allusions to this with Sidious being implied to have played a part in conceiving Anakin through the Force.
• Humble Pie: It's hinted that getting his arm cut off by Count Dooku in Attack of the Clones, partly because of his impulsivity, caused him to tone down his arrogant or outright bratty behavior since he is a lot more levelheaded and mature in The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith. That is, until he turned to the Dark Side and became a Sith Lord in the latter.
• Hypocrite:
  • Let's just say he's the last person you'd expect to give Obi-Wan a What the Hell, Hero? speech for lying and deceiving others after the Jedi Council faked Obi-Wan's death briefly during the Clone Wars.
  • As a result of being Ahsoka's master, he often finds himself having to preach patience, humility, and detachment. All of which are things Anakin has struggled with constantly as a Jedi. This is most notable when he notices Ahsoka's affections for Lux and gently reminds her to set aside feelings. Considering the trouble this causes him, it's clear he simply wants her to avoid the hardships of his own life.
  • Anakin hates being controlled or manipulated, but can be controlling towards Padmé and Ahsoka for different reasons.
  • In "Senate Spy", when Anakin is called away by the Jedi Council, thus ruining his evening with Padmé, he attempts to comfort her by stating "duty comes first, especially in wartime". However, he always puts his duties second to his own personal feelings, as he did in this very episode.
  • In "The Wrong Jedi", Anakin doesn't control his rage when he calls out Barriss for betraying and framed her best friend Ahsoka when she orchestrated the bombing of the Jedi Temple. Sadly for Anakin, he eventually betrays the Jedi Order in order to save Padme's life.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, he urges for Mace not to kill Palpatine because killing an unarmed opponent is not the Jedi way. Not only did Anakin do just that earlier in the film, he's shown throughout Attack Of The Clones and The Clone Wars'' that he is far from someone who follows the Jedi way and often is commented on just how frequently he deviates and struggles with it. That said, this was mainly said to sway Mace's judgement, rather than a genuine belief.
• Hypocrite Has a Point: While Anakin definitely needs lessons in honesty, his anger towards Obi-Wan for faking his death and deliberately not telling him is justified. No matter what the reason, it was still a rather cold-hearted and manipulative act for Obi-Wan to do to someone he considered a brother, especially as he's well aware of Anakin's attachment issues.

I-K

• Icy Blue Eyes: Anakin starts off as the innocent variant but becomes this as he grows more ruthless and cold.
• Iconic Attribute Adoption Moment: After his first lightsaber was destroyed in the droid factory on Geonosis, Anakin spends the rest of the Clone Wars wielding the lightsaber that would later be passed down to his son.
• Identical Grandfather: To Kylo Ren. They are fairly similar to each other in terms of personality and they dress rather alike too (though Kylo's overall physical features more closely resemble that of his parents'). Kylo intentionally models himself after his grandpa, or rather, his evil persona Darth Vader. There are key differences, namely that Anakin was born poor and turned to the Dark Side out of love for his wife and fear for his children, while Kylo Ren chose the Dark Side over his family.
• I Did What I Had to Do: When he was trying to justify his actions to Padmé in Revenge of the Sith, he insists that he is bringing peace to the galaxy. The heinous nature of his crimes, however, make this ring hollow.
• If I Can't Have You…: He attempts to kill Padmé when he believes she is plotting with Obi-Wan to stop him in Revenge of the Sith.
• Ignorant of the Call: In The Phantom Menace, he just sees himself as an individual who's really good at podracing, in spite of how dangerous and difficult the sport is.
• I Got Bigger: Anakin started off as a small, wide-eyed child before becoming a tall, complex-filled adult.
• I Just Want to Be Free: As a child, Anakin was a slave and aspired to travel the galaxy.
• I Just Want to Be Special: As The Chosen One, Anakin already is special, but he still suffers from this, feeling he's not good enough or that he could be so much more. It doesn't help that he believes becoming more powerful would enable him to protect everyone he cares about (something which stems from his mother's tragic death). Palpatine exploits this by offering him greater power and a "life of significance" via the Dark Side.
• I Let Gwen Stacy Die: Shmi (Anakin's mother) and Padmé are Anakin's Gwen Stacys, as they both feed into his Face–Heel Turn. The former's death he believed he could have prevented if he had stayed at home while the latter he believed that he had accidentally killed after all the trouble he went through turning the Dark Side in order to save her.
• Imaginary Love Triangle: The subtext in Revenge of the Sith implies he thinks he's in one with Obi-Wan for Padmé. Nothing could be further from the truth, but by the end Anakin is so caught up in his delusions, he is convinced Padmé has betrayed him to help Obi-Wan kill him. It doesn't end well for anybody.
• Immortality Seeker: Not for himself, but the death of his mother and Qui-Gon as well as the many attempts on Padmé's life made him covet a way to make his remaining loved ones impervious to harm. In his quest to attain such power, he winds up outliving all of them and causing some of their demises himself.
• Improbable Age: Besides being a Child Prodigy when it comes to mechanics and piloting, Anakin eventually gets on the Jedi Council at the age of twenty-two years old, which Obi-Wan himself points out is extremely unprecedented. Due to being The Chosen One, Anakin is unusually skilled in the Force and capable of matching (or even outmatching) more senior Jedi in addition to being a Jedi General of the Republic by the time he is nineteen years old. Unfortunately, it's implied that the burden of these responsibilities and expectations at such a young age takes a toll on his well-being, only adding to his troubled emotional state.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: The Crystal Crisis arc shows that he's a crack shot with not just one, but two blasters. One must wonder if that's where Leia Organa and Ben Solo got it from.
• Improbable Piloting Skills: Justified by his connection to the Force, which aid his already impressive piloting skills and allow him to pull off stunts no ordinary human can do; even at the age of nine years old, he is purportedly the only human capable of piloting a Podracer, and takes down the Trade Federation blockade in a Naboo starfighter without prior experience flying one.
• Indy Ploy: He usually makes up the plans as they go.
  Rex: What's our plan of attack, sir?
  Anakin: Follow me.
• Improperly Paranoid: It's implied in Revenge of the Sith that he suspects that Obi-Wan and Padmé were having an affair. That couldn't be anymore false, as he knows what kind of person Obi-Wan is and how loyal he is to the Jedi Code.
• Inadequate Inheritor: Along the Master-Apprentice Chain, Dooku openly regards him as this. Dooku is very much proud of Qui-Gon, and similarly holds Obi-Wan in high regard and comes to consider him as a Worthy Opponent. However, he sees Anakin as little more than an unrefined brute unworthy of his and Qui-Gon's legacy. Ironic, given what Anakin inherits from Dooku in the end.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: It's implied he has one. He is very insecure about not being the best Jedi he can be and constantly thinks he can do better. Padmé outright tells him that he "expects too much of [himself]". He generally covers this up with arrogance or by avoiding responsibility for his actions, though sometimes his insecurities show through.
• Informed Ability:
  • His allegedly awesome power in the Force is mentioned many times throughout the Canon, but Anakin rarely demonstrates unusual Force power other than in piloting and lightsaber combat. For instance, during his duel with Obi-Wan on Mustafar, he tries to Force push Kenobi away, but he is unable to overpower Kenobi's own push. It is hinted that he has not yet reached his full potential in the Force; Sidious claims that when he does, he'll be more powerful than both himself and Yoda. However, his grievous injuries from his lightsaber duel with Obi-Wan hampers this.
  • His fighting ability is described by Nick Gillard to be on the same level as the likes of Yoda or Sidious, but considering that he lost to Obi-Wan, he never demonstrates that level of ability.
• Informed Kindness: Several people mention how kind he is, starting from the very first movie when Qui-Gon and his mother talk about how he's so selfless and does things without any thought of reward. While he may have these traits as a kid, once he grows into an insecure, arrogant young man, he loses those qualities. Obi-Wan, Padmé, and Ahsoka are the chief ones always mentioning this. The problem is that while Anakin may show kindness towards those specific three people, towards others, including his fellow Jedi and the galaxy as a whole, he's a bit of a selfish, uncaring jackass. He often treats people with contempt, a cold attitude, or outright ignores them unless they suddenly become interesting to him or have something he wants. Ahsoka says he was kind towards his friends in Rebels but the line left some viewers scoffing 'What friends?' given the attitude he keeps towards most people.
• Ink-Suit Actor: In The Clone Wars, he looks very similar to Matt Lanter.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: Anakin has blue eyes that represent his heroic qualities. They become the icier example the further he turns to the Dark Side.
• In the Back: This is how he kills Tal Merrick and the Son.
• In the Hood: After turning to the Dark Side, Anakin begins wearing hooded robes a lot more. Until he's encased in armor, that is.
• I Resemble That Remark!: To Anakin, the Jedi Council holds him back from being promoted (first to Jedi Knight and then to Master) due to the unfounded belief that he isn't ready for the position. He responds to this by sulking and insisting he deserves the promotion, which only reinforces his immaturity and lack of humility.
• Irony:
  • His idealistic nine year old self scoffs at Qui-Gon's suggestion that he stole his lightsaber off a fallen Jedi, and boldly proclaims that no one can kill a Jedi. Not only is this notion tragically proven wrong at the end of Anakin's first adventure, when Qui-Gon is killed by Darth Maul, but Anakin would rack up quite the Jedi kill count himself later in life.
  • During the Clone Wars, he temporarily turned to the Dark Side a year early to prevent himself from becoming Darth Vader. And his first decision? Telling Obi-Wan the Jedi have to be killed off because they stand in the way of peace... which is exactly how things went down in Revenge of the Sith.
  • He trained rebels on Onderon. Considering what his later career would be spent opposing... those very rebels end up opposing the Empire.
• I Shall Return: In The Phantom Menace, he promises his mother he will return someday and free her from slavery. This only makes it worse when he does return for her at long last, only to learn she's been abducted by Tusken Raiders in Attack of the Clones. He manages to track her down, but she dies in his arms from her injuries. Anakin does not take this well.
• I Should Have Been Better: He says this after his mother's death, believing that if he'd only been stronger or gotten there sooner, he could've saved her. Padmé tries to tell him that "Sometimes there are things no one can fix", but he still blames himself. It is his fixation on becoming better that eventually leads him into turning to the Dark Side.
• It Sucks to Be the Chosen One: Anakin is The Chosen One destined to bring balance to the Force. Unfortunately, the amount of pressure that's placed upon him makes him alternate from being insecure and being arrogant. He ends up turning to the Dark Side because of this.
• It's All About Me: He puts the Galaxy under the Empire's lash, largely out of a desire to "save" his wife. He also puts his own ambitions around ruling the galaxy above Padmé and their unborn child, completely ignoring her pleas to stop and think about what he's doing. When Padmé rejects his proposal to run the Empire together and expresses horror over his actions, he reacts as if she's being ungrateful and turns on her. This is subverted later, as the first thing he asks Palpatine when he gets out of surgery is if Padmé is safe. However, Palpatine then informs him that he killed Padmé in his anger and he realizes just what his selfishness cost him.
• It's Personal: Slaughtering most of the Confederacy leaders on Mustafar was just at the directive of his master, but it's mentioned that he had a particular axe to grind against Nute Gunray for ordering multiple assassination attempts on Padmé.
• Ironic Name: Clone War-propaganda took to calling Anakin the "Hero with no fear", quite ironic given how Anakin's whole life was dominated and destroyed by overwhelming fear.
• I've Come Too Far: The reason he swiftly sides with Palpatine after inadvertently helping him kill Mace Windu; he believes that there's no coming back from the Dark Side and sees it as his only chance to save Padmé. Later, when Padmé is trying to talk him into leaving the Dark Side, he insists that he has brought peace to the galaxy and refuses to listen to her, even proclaiming that everything he's done is to protect her, implying this trope.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Downplayed, but occasionally present. In Attack of the Clones, Anakin actually does back off and settles for being friends with Padmé when she explains to him why a relationship would never work between them. When Padmé gives him what she believes may be a Dying Declaration of Love, he initially says "I thought we decided not to fall in love. That it would destroy our lives" before she points out if they're dying it doesn't matter. In The Clone Wars episode "The Rise of Clovis", he also sadly accepts Padmé's request that they should temporarily separate after the incident with Clovis. Notably whenever Anakin stops considering what Padmé wants or feels, it's a sign he's succumbing further into the Dark Side.
• Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: When Ahsoka's life is threatened by Geonosian brain worms, Anakin goes to the cell where Poggle the Lesser is being held and Force chokes him until he reveals how the worms can be killed.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Anakin is an aggressive, hot-headed, and arrogant Jedi but does make good points throughout the canon.
  • In general, while Anakin can be something of an entitled, Spoiled Brat, he is right that the Jedi Council doesn't trust or respect him despite his years of loyal service and often puts him on restrictions.
  • A young Anakin hovers a lightsaber above a couple of Padawan's head to invoke fear in them for mockingly referring to him as a "slave". It was overkill but being mocked for being a former slave is not funny.
  • Anakin quickly orders Ahsoka to not dwell on what could've happened to Obi-Wan during the Second Battle of Geonosis. Anakin is worried too, but he explains that worrying about Obi-Wan wouldn't help them win the battle and she needs to stay focused.
  • His killing of Tal Merrik was brutal, a foreshadowing of him becoming Darth Vader, and resulted in Obi-Wan briefly chastising him. However, Anakin points out that Merrik was about to blow up the ship that they and other people were currently on, making his actions in self-defense.
  • Anakin didn't want to get involved in how the Duggs dealt with the Zillo Beast because of the fact they needed an alliance. Later on, Anakin is mostly unsympathetic towards the creature because he has seen firsthand how dangerous it is.
  • During the Citadel arc, after Anakin and his team rescued Tarkin and his group, Tarkin doesn't offer any gratitude only criticizing the Jedi's plan. As such, Anakin's response is to give the older man a subtle "The Reason You Suck" Speech at his ungratefulness.
  • When Anakin and Obi-Wan are attacked by the Nightbrothers, it seems like the latter is implying that the former provoked the group. However, Anakin points out he did nothing of the sort and they attacked first.
  • Anakin being unconcerned if Count Dooku killed Queen Miraj may be against the Jedi Code, but who could blame him, honestly? Not only does she pridefully rule over a planet that practices slavery daily, an issue that understandably pisses Anakin off, she also captured his friends (Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, and Captain Rex) and would only release them if Anakin became her Sex Slave. That said, he expressed shock and upset over her death, so he may have been lying to try and save her life.
  • Doubles as Hypocrite Has a Point. His reaction to learning Obi-Wan faking his death and being told it was the latter's call, not the Jedi Council, to keep Anakin in the dark? Anger and a What the Hell, Hero? rant. True, Anakin was being somewhat hypocritical since he's been keeping secrets from his former Master, but he's right in how Obi-Wan's actions were not only cold but he also abused Anakin's trust in him by manipulating their relationship just to fool their enemies. Even Obi-Wan comes to realize how dubious his actions were.
  • While it's mainly to due to a combination of jealousy and entitlement, Anakin's anger at Padmé for helping Clovis during the Clovis arc is valid to an extent as the latter senator did betray the Republic to the Senate, so trusting him is an issue. Plus, Anakin rightly points out that Clovis' previous misdeeds almost got Padmé killed.
  • For the unfinished "Crystal Crisis on Utapau" arc, he bluntly tells Obi-Wan that the Council gave Ahsoka no choice but to leave the Jedi Order, seeing as how quickly they threw her to Tarkin's non-existent mercy on flimsy evidence of guilt. While Obi-Wan counters that Ahsoka's choice to leave was still her own, Anakin raises up another point that he failed his Padawan as her Master, and couldn't live with himself for it.
  • Anakin puts it as gently as he can to Rex, but he's not wrong about the chances of Echo being alive are slim. And while he does stop the reunion between the Clones in a brusque manner, it's because they are in enemy territory and about to be attacked.
  • While his outburst only proved that he wasn't mature enough for the job, Anakin's complaining about being made a Council member and not getting a promotion to master were unfair considering he'd killed Count Dooku just a day beforehand and turned the tide of the war in the Republic's favor. Not only that, but the fact the Council, who lied about Obi-Wan Faking the Dead and throwing Ahsoka out of the Order when she was framed, want him to spy on Palpatine, proving they really don't trust him and see him as an asset they want to control.
  • He mentions that as dangerous as Palpatine is, he should be arrested to stand trial instead of being assassinated, which would at least vindicate the Jedi from being branded as traitors. A reasonable point even if it's a cover for his real reasons, i.e. needing Palpatine and his abilities to potentially avert death. Mace Windu doesn't listen, and attempts to kill Palpatine out of the stronger point that he already has control of the senate and too much power to discount any chance of a fair trial and could simply escape punishment. This results in Anakin cutting off Mace's arm, leading Palpatine to strike him with Force lightning (showing he was feigning his weakness). Anakin regrets doing this, but Palpatine immediately convinced him into turning to the Dark Side since he's burned his bridges with the Jedi.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Although he's impulsive, arrogant, and quick to anger, Anakin is at heart a loving person who will do anything for those he cares about. He even apologizes to Obi-Wan in Revenge of the Sith for his less than kind behavior. Then, he turns to the Dark Side and has a Face–Heel Turn.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope:
  • In The Clone Wars, whenever he starts Force choking people, it's a sign that he's slipping towards the Dark Side.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, he quickly goes from agonizing over his role in Mace Windu's death to killing younglings without a problem. He does seem to have a brief Heel Realization, but ultimately dismisses it as being necessary to save his wife and restore order to the Galaxy.
• Keeping Secrets Sucks: Particularly in Revenge of the Sith, Anakin is shown to be getting really tired with constantly having to lie about his marriage to Padmé. He even recklessly kisses her where people could see, saying "I'm tired of all this deception. I don't care if they know we're married". Subsequently, it means he also feels he can't properly get help from the Jedi when he starts having premonitions of her death. He also feels very conflicted about spying on Palpatine, whom he regards as a friend and father figure, for the Jedi Council, which Palpatine exploits to turn him against the Jedi.
• Kick the Morality Pet: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin Force chokes Padmé, his own pregnant wife, to near-death when she tries to convince him what he's doing is evil. Unfortunately, the incident doesn't prompt him to stop; instead he just blames Obi-Wan for turning her against him.
• Kid Hero: In The Phantom Menace, Anakin single-handedly (if accidentally) wins the Battle of Naboo at the age of nine years old.
• Kid Hero All Grown-Up: In Attack of Clones, The Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith. He's still a hero, but he's a lot more conflicted and troubled than he was as a child. And we all know what he eventually becomes...
• Kill It with Fire: He manages to survive, but Obi-Wan figures the best way to kill him is to just leave him to die while his body is set on fire.
• Kill the God: He killed the Son, who is the embodiment of the Dark Side of the Force.
• Kill the Ones You Love: He ends up Force choking Padmé, who later dies in despair. He believed he'd killed their unborn child too, though he learned much later this wasn't the case.
• Knight in Shining Armor: He wants to be the most powerful Jedi Knight, but his love for Padmé is his first priority.
• Knight in Sour Armor: Deconstructed, three years of fighting in the Clone Wars has left him jaded in general, not least in how the Council faked Obi-Wan's death or threw Ahsoka to the wolves to save face. No matter how hard he tries, his efforts to fight the good fight eventually break him.
• Knight, Knave, and Squire: Anakin is the Knave since he's more of a Combat Pragmatist than Obi-Wan with a few signs of Well-Intentioned Extremist thrown in. Ahsoka serves as the Squire in The Clone Wars, having less combat experience than the other two.
• Knight Templar: Anakin isn't quite as extreme as some examples of this trope (Tarkin, for example), but he still shows signs of it. If nothing else, he has no qualms with using torture and lethal force if he believes that he's in the right.
  • He fully embraces this trope upon his Face–Heel Turn, believing that destroying the Jedi (who are, in Anakin's twisted point of view, evil) is necessary to bring peace to the Empire.
  • Even as a Jedi, his solution to the inefficiencies of the Republic is that dissenting voices should be made to agree.
• Knight Templar Big Brother:
  • He once Force choked Poggle the Lesser in order to get the information he needed to save Ahsoka.
  • He also almost killed Ventress in a blind rage when he believed she framed Ahsoka for murder.
• Knight Templar Parent: He is heartbroken by the seemingly impending death of his wife Padmé and possibly of his children (whose future he cannot see in his visions). He goes on a savage killing spree after succumbing to the Dark Side of the Force in order to gain the power to save Padmé and, if need be, her unborn children.
• Kung-Fu Jesus: A tragic deconstruction and eventual reconstruction of this trope. His son plays it arrow-straight though.

L–N

• Lady and Knight: He is the Knight to Padmé's Lady.
• The Lancer: To Obi-Wan during the Clone Wars.
• Laser Blade: As a Jedi, Anakin had two lightsabers at separate points in the canon. While the first is destroyed in the Geonosis droid factory, Obi-Wan takes Anakin’s second lightsaber when he defeats him on Mustafar and later passes it on to Luke, which in turn winds up in Maz Kanata's hands before it passes on to Rey for a time.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: His memories of the vision of the future, as well as his brief Face–Heel Turn, were erased by the Father.
• Last Guy Wins: Padmé had other boyfriends before Anakin, in particular Rush Clovis, but Anakin is the one she marries. Although, this doesn't turn out so well in the end...
• Last Request: In Return of the Jedi, he asks Luke to remove his mask so he can "look on [him] with [his] own eyes". He also asks Luke to tell Leia that he was right about him not beyond redemption.
• Leeroy Jenkins: In Attack of the Clones, where against Obi-Wan's orders, he rushes in to attack Dooku and gets incapacitated by Force lightning, and Revenge of the Sith. As Darth Vader, this attitude costs him his limbs and most of his body and, after being outfitted with his iconic armor, he becomes a much more cautious and calculating fighter.
• The Leader: Type Headstrong. He's confident and bold to the point of recklessness, but it does wonders for the clone troopers' morale.
• Light Is Not Good: In Revenge of the Sith, he's still a heroic-looking character, even as he's having doubts about his allegiance to the Jedi Order and when he turns to the Dark Side.
• Lightning Bruiser: He has a strong, fast-paced fighting style. Because of his injuries on Mustafar and being put into the cumbersome Vader suit, he loses a lot of his speed and agility but becomes a Mighty Glacier.
• Like Brother and Sister: He and Ahsoka have a more of a brother/sister bond than master/apprentice. They also double as Platonic Life-Partners.
• Likes Older Women: Padmé (the woman he fell in love with) was five years older than him. It doubles as Precocious Crush.
• Living a Double Life: Hoo, boy. By the time of The Clone Wars, Anakin is a Jedi Knight and General of the Republic while secretly being married to a senator (and the father of her unborn children). Then, to complicate matters further, he has to secretly spy on Palpatine on the orders of the Jedi Council in Revenge of the Sith, but he starts confiding in him about his feelings of doubt and conflict in regards to the Jedi. Then, he turns to the Dark Side and becomes a Sith Lord, which he initially hides from Padmé...It all blows up in his face in the end as he understandably cannot keep maintaining all his lies and deceptions.
• Living Emotional Crutch: For Padmé. Padmé is so heartbroken and devastated by the loss of Anakin that she dies of a broken heart during childbirth. Though it seems to be less to do with losing Anakin and more the way she lost him. Realizing the man she loves has become a monster and doesn't even seem to believe his actions are wrong - even trying to justify it as protecting her - causes her to hit the Despair Event Horizon.
• Lonely Funeral: Anakin's son Luke gives him a Jedi's funeral by himself on Endor while the rest of the Rebels are celebrating their victory, since he's the only person who saw what happened in the Emperor's throne room and knows that Anakin died a good person. Anakin doesn't seem to mind.
• Long-Distance Relationship: He is in one with Padmé for most of their marriage. Padmé lives mostly on Coruscant or occasionally her home planet of Naboo whilst Anakin is off fighting in the Clone Wars. They sometimes go months apart without seeing each other.
• Long-Haired Pretty Boy: Anakin is very handsome and has fine facial features. By the time that he is twenty-two years old, his hair has grown to his shoulders.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • He practically runs off this trope to get around any restrictions. In "Rising Malevolence", he's ordered to keep his fleet on course to their rendezvous point, and not go searching for the missing Plo Koon. Instead, he takes the Twilight, Ahsoka, and R2 to the Abregado system to search for him, while keeping his fleet right where it should be. It annoys the Council to no end and they order him back right away, but it doesn't stop him from finding further loopholes on later assignments.
  Anakin Doing what the Council says, that's one thing. How we go about doing it, that's another.
  • The Jedi and the Republic can't help out the Onderonian resistance due to red tape. Anakin's solution? Hire Hondo's crew to deliver weapons in the Republic's place.
• Love at First Sight: The first thing he says to Padmé is to ask her if she's an angel.
• Love Cannot Overcome: Padmé's breakup with Anakin; she begs him to stop what he's doing while there's still a chance, professing that she loves him, and he actually seems to consider it — then Obi-Wan shows up, and it all goes to hell.
  Padmé: I don't believe what I'm hearing! Obi-Wan was right... you've changed! You have turned to the dark side! You're not Anakin anymore!
  Anakin: [with a growing angry look and voice] I don't want to hear any more about Obi-Wan. The Jedi turned against me. Don't you turn against me!
  Padmé: [crying] Anakin, you're breaking my heart! You're going down a path I can't follow!
  Anakin: Because of Obi-Wan?
  Padmé: Because of what you've done... what you plan to do! Stop! Stop now... come back... I love you!
• Loved I Not Honor More: Subverted. As a Jedi, Anakin is supposed to be a Celibate Hero as to avoid attachment and has tried to do this, but always fails because he is too afraid of losing those closest to him, especially Padmé.
• Love Hungry: He becomes this over the course of Revenge of the Sith for Padmé's love. This is most apparent when he encounters Obi-Wan on Mustafar, reacting angrily and violently towards any perceived threat to his relationship with Padmé.
• Love Makes You Evil: He and Padmé provide the trope image. Anakin's downfall seems like a living morality tale to explain why the Jedi believe that love is an inherently corrupt emotion that ultimately leads to the Dark Side as surely as hate and rage. Although, one could argue that it wasn't so much love that made him evil as his issues with abandonment. Anakin had to leave his mother at a very young age and that was a very serious thing. Further, she was killed when he wasn't there to protect her and so "left" him again. It was Anakin's Please, Don't Leave Me attitude along with his fear of losing his loved ones that helped Palpatine corrupt him. Regardless, his strongly loving nature makes him both more vulnerable to emotional wounds — as seen when Obi-Wan "betrays" him by faking his death along with when the Jedi Council ultimately drives Ahsoka away by falsely accusing her — and willing to go to extremes to protect them. With Darth Sidious secretly guiding him along, his visions of his wife's death in childbirth ultimately compel him into turning to the Dark Side. By contrast, while he was older and had a decent upbringing, Luke saw his aunt and uncle's charred corpses along with his home destroyed. Luke also didn't have lots of friends growing up either. After the attack on the Death Star, Luke was also praised and called a great hero. The big difference is that Luke didn't let his issues twist his heart, learned to make friends, and remained humble even in the face of his "greatness". So it was definitely more like Anakin's fear of being alone and abandoned that made him evil, not love itself, especially because...
• Love Redeems: It was by getting in touch with his more positive emotions and reconnecting with the part of himself he thought died when he became Vader that Anakin was able to pull a Heel–Face Turn. By meeting and interacting with his son, who not only accepted Anakin regardless of his crimes and sins, who saw past the shell of Vader and saw the wounded, broken man beneath, that Anakin rediscovered the capacity to love that he believed died within himself. It was by reawakening the love he had felt for his wife and the children he expected to have, that he was able to also reawaken the good man he once was to finally end Palpatine and the Sith while finally finding peace.
• MacGyvering: He built his own podracer from Watto's junkyard. He also won the Boonta Eve Classic with it.
• Machine Empathy: He was able to recognize R2-D2's voice through an emergency transmission on a radio.
• Manly Tears: If Anakin is crying, it generally means shit's going down. He completely breaks down after his mother dies and he confesses to Padmé that he slaughtered the Tusken Raiders responsible. In Revenge of the Sith, he is seen weeping as he contemplates siding with Palpatine to save his pregnant wife, briefly sheds tears after helping Palpatine kill Mace Windu, and also sheds a Single Tear after slaughtering the Separatist leaders as a result of being burdened by the many crimes he committed following the execution of Order 66, including killing the Younglings (which visibly tears him up before he does it).
• Man on Fire: He almost fell into a lava flow after having his limbs amputated lit him on fire, burning his skin off and necessitating his placement into his life-support suit and the birth of Darth Vader.
• Master Swordsman: Throughout his life Anakin has been formidable in lightsaber combat. He's one of the best swordsmen in the Jedi Order via defeating and killing Count Dooku (who defeated both him and Obi-Wan many times before) and killing countless other Jedi after turning to the Dark Side, but he loses only to his own master Obi-Wan because he wasn’t thinking straight.
  • In Star Wars Rebels, Anakin made adjustments to the classic Form IV: Ataru techniques and deflect several blaster bolts, something Yoda, a master of this form couldn’t do.
  • By the time of Revenge of the Sith, Anakin has fully mastered the Form V: Djem So style of lightsaber combat, which focuses on offense.
  • Word of God says that if he hadn't turned evil, he would have become skilled enough to defeat Palpatine in a duel.
• Meaningful Name:
  • His first name means "warrior", which is appropriate for him because he is an aggressive and powerful Jedi.
  • Anakin Skywalker is an Ace Pilot.
  • As noted by Janina Gavankar from starwars.com:
  "Jett (Lucas) recently told me a very interesting character tidbit about Anakin, and the origin of his name: Anakin is based off the Greek goddess of inevitability, Ananke. This made me stop in my tracks. That was what I was always feeling. The slow, burning throttle of inevitability. It was inevitable that Luke and Vader would meet like this. It was inevitable that good would triumph over evil, no matter how long chaos reigned, because it was inevitable that someone would come along."
• Meaningless Villain Victory: By the end of Revenge of the Sith, he's succeeded in wiping out the Jedi as per Palpatine's instructions and has survived his fight with Obi-Wan to kill him in the future, but he's stuck in an iron lung for the rest of his life, he's lost his wife, and he still doesn't get the secret to eternal life like Palpatine promised.
• Messianic Archetype: He was prophesied to defeat evil, was born in a desert to a virgin, and eventually died for the sake of others. All this serves to call Jesus to mind, which also makes Anakin's turn to the Dark Side all the more shocking.
• Metaphorically True: As it turns out, Anakin's almost as bad as Obi-Wan when it comes to this. In Revenge of the Sith, he tells Padmé the Jedi are trying to take over the Republic and that he saw Mace Windu try to assassinate the Chancellor. This is technically true...but he conveniently leaves out the part about Palpatine being a Sith Lord who has been plotting to take over the galaxy.
• Military Mage: Like many other Jedi, he becomes a Jedi General of the Republic after the Clone Wars began, often leading his clone troopers from the front lines or taking on the enemy single-handedly. He actually seems to prefer combat to other Jedi duties, seeing it as a more effective way of keeping the peace.
• Military Maverick: Anakin is very well-known for disregarding orders from higher authorities — whether it be the Jedi Council or the Supreme Chancellor — and still bringing in positive results.
• Mind over Matter: Whenever Anakin uses the Force, it really shows off how powerful he is. Amongst his most impressive feats are holding back an explosion with his mind for several seconds and his aforementioned victory over the Son and the Daughter.
• Mirror Character: His son, Luke. Both grew up on the same desolate desert planet before being taken away to train as Jedi Knights under Obi-Wan Kenobi. Both are tempted by the Dark Side to protect their loved ones, but Luke's horror at the realization he is becoming like this father, down to their mechanical right hands, narrowly saves him from falling as Anakin did. Luke's faith in his father manages to save Anakin as well.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: While mistreatment may be a bit harsh, it's pretty evident that a significant part of Anakin's descent to the Dark Side were the failures of the Jedi Order in terms of treating him. Because of his age and unique circumstances on being admitted, he already had a stigma attached and while he did grow to be respected, he seems to suspect they still hold him in suspicion or not as in good regard because of it. Mace Windu was pretty notable here in terms of cold treatment.
  • The mistreatment could be comparable to Parental Neglect, at least in the emotional sense. He had plenty of growing emotional problems that didn't go addressed because of how the Jedi Order operates and his own secrecy, but it was pretty clear he was in need of help and they were ill-equipped to handle it.
  • And in The Clone Wars, we see how the Council traumatized him with Obi-Wan's Faking the Dead to go undercover, and when they cast Ahsoka out of the Order in order to save face, it's actually quite impressive it took him this long to basically Rage Quit.
• Momma's Boy: Since he grew up as a slave without a father, he and his mother relied on each other quite a bit and he loved her very much, even being reluctant to leave Tatooine for a better life if it meant leaving her behind. His first big step towards the Dark Side (massacring a tribe of Tusken Raiders) is rooted in his attachment to her.
• Morality Chain Beyond the Grave: When arresting "Rako Hardeen", he tells him that he would've killed him if it was up to him, but that's not what Obi-Wan would have wanted. Unbeknownst to Anakin, the man he's arresting is actually his master impersonating his supposed killer after faking his death.
• The Mourning After: He never got over Padmé's death and it's implied he mourned her for the rest of his life.
• Mr. Fanservice: Anakin has a handful of Shirtless Scenes in the Prequel Trilogy, including one in Revenge of the Sith where it's shown he's in extremely good shape. Obviously, he's not so good-looking when he becomes scarred due to being set on fire after his Face–Heel Turn.
• Muggle–Mage Romance: With Padmé. While Anakin is a Jedi Knight skilled in the Force, his wife is a Badass Normal human.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Although he refuses to admit it via insisting he hates them, Anakin is clearly genuinely shaken up by his slaughter of the Tusken Raiders.
  • After attacking Clovis, Anakin suddenly stops mid-punch when Padmé pleads with him and is visibly stunned. He seems very shaken by what he did and later tells Padmé he doesn't know what came over him.
  • He looks visibly shaken after executing a beaten and unarmed Count Dooku on Palpatine's orders and even says that he shouldn't have done that because it wasn't the Jedi way.
  • Anakin says this (minus the "My God") after watching Palpatine kill Mace Windu, which he was only able to do because Skywalker had just cut off the Jedi Master's hand, causing him to lose the lightsaber he'd been using to deflect Palpatine's lightning.
  • He also briefly seems to be hit by this immediately after Force choking Padmé in a fit of rage, staring at her unconscious form with an expression akin to shock. However, he quickly goes to blaming Obi-Wan instead for "turning her against him".
  • When Anakin, newly turned into Darth Vader, gets out of surgery and is told that he killed Padmé;. And in this case doubles as a Big "NO!". Sidious lied to him, covering up that she died while delivering their son and daughter (not that Sidious was aware the twins survived).
• My Greatest Failure: His belief that he failed to save his mother from dying also has a big impact on his character, with him outright stating at her grave that he will "never fail again". He's also devastated when Ahsoka chooses to leave the Jedi Order.
• My Greatest Second Chance: Killing Emperor Palpatine to save his son. The last time he was in a similar situation over two decades ago, he stopped Mace Windu from killing Palpatine and sealed his fate and that of the galaxy. This time, he makes the right choice.
• My Own Private "I Do": He and Padmé get married on Naboo when he escorts her home after the First Battle of Geonosis. Due to the relationship being a secret one, only R2-D2 and C-3PO attend it. Despite this, Padmé still managed to find a lovely dress for the occasion; Anakin sticks with his Jedi robe, though he does have a shiny new robotic arm.
• Neck Lift: He frequently employs the Force choke as a means of interrogation.
• Necromantic: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin turns to the Dark Side so he can learn how to keep his wife from dying and if necessary bring her back from the dead before she's actually dead. Then, he kills her because he's evil now.
• Never Got to Say Goodbye: He was never able to say goodbye to his mentor and Parental Substitute Qui-Gon before his untimely death, likely contributing to his fear of loss and abandonment. To an even greater extent, the last time Anakin ever saw his beloved wife Padmé alive, he had just Force-choked her in a blind rage and (wrongly) accused her of betraying him. He later learns that she died, at least partly because of what he did to her. He couldn't even attend her funeral as he was in the middle of a days-long operation to fit him with a cybernetic life-support suit. Years later, Vader is shown to be haunted by his last memories of Padmé and deeply regrets what he did. The only solace he finds in any of it is when he finally discovers his child/children with Padmé didn't die with her as he was lead to believe.
• Never My Fault:
  • In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin blames Obi-Wan for turning Padmé against him. It couldn't have been your sharp descent into violent murder and villainy, no...but Obi-Wan is quick to call him out with a sharp "YOU HAVE DONE THAT YOURSELF!"
  • Later on, Anakin, waking on the slab, initially has this reaction to being told that he had killed Padmé. He thinks that he loves her, always will, and could never cause her death, even though his refusal to stop going down his path of evil and actually physically harming her is what led to her Death by Despair.
• New Child Left Behind: Downplayed, as Anakin finds out he's going to be a father before Luke and Leia are actually born. He accidentally gets Padmé pregnant while on leave from the Clone Wars before having to go fight in the Outer Rim. Padmé presumably didn't find out until after he'd left and had no way of contacting him, and she has to keep the pregnancy secret because Anakin's not supposed to be fathering kids with his wife. When he returns to Coruscant several months later in Revenge of the Sith, she informs him she's pregnant; although shocked, he's overjoyed by the news, insisting it's the "happiest moment of [his] life."
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Revenge of the Sith - which presents him becoming a Villain Protagonist by the end - could almost be considered Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Movie. Anakin's attempts to save Padmé and their unborn children, end the Clone Wars, and restore peace and order result in the Jedi being all but wiped out, a Sorcerous Overlord turning the Republic into a tyrannical Empire, his wife dying in childbirth, his children having their deaths faked for them, and being Separated at Birth in order to protect them, and Anakin ruining his own life. In the end, he's stuck in a life-support suit due to horrific injuries and everyone he loves is dead or has turned on him. As we see in both the Original Trilogy and the Sequel Trilogy, his actions continue to have severe consequences for decades to come.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Herod: He killed Tusken Raider children in a fit of rage. One of the acts that damns himself to a life of being a Sith is to kill Jedi younglings.
• Nice Mean And In Between: He's the Mean to Padmé's Nice and Obi-Wan's In Between via being a lot more aggressive and hotheaded.
• Noble Male, Roguish Male: With Obi-Wan. Anakin is the Roguish to Obi-Wan's Noble.
• Noodle Incident:
  • When his lightsaber is destroyed in Attack of the Clones, he mentions that it's not the first time.
  • Thrawn reveals that the title character learned about Palpatine because he met Anakin during the Clone Wars. The only known details are that it happened in the Thrugii asteroid belt and probably during the fifth season of The Clone Wars.
• Nom de Mom: Justified. Since his mother conceived and raised him without a father, Anakin took her last name.
• Not Good with Rejection:
  • Downplayed in Attack of the Clones. When Padmé says they can't be together after he confesses his love for her, he gets upset and tries pressing the matter, even suggesting a Secret Relationship. However, he backs off when Padmé plainly lays out all the issues that would come with it and they remain on good terms (and then they decide to pursue a relationship after all). To be fair to him, Anakin already has attachment issues and has no idea how to navigate romantic relationships, seeing how he was raised by the Jedi (who frown on such relationships).
  • Exaggerated in Revenge of the Sith after he turns to the Dark Side. He quickly becomes angry and accuses Padmé of turning against him when she turns down his offer to run the Empire together. Upon seeing Obi-Wan, he immediately assumes she's plotting with him and strangles her with the Force.
• Not Helping Your Case: Anakin's frustration at being distrusted by the Jedi Council is understandable, but he himself doesn't help matters at times by behaving in a very arrogant, rash, and insolent manner, which just reinforces their opinion of him. His reaction to them denying him the rank of Master in Revenge of the Sith is a prime example (though mitigated with the implication it was try and use him to spy on Palpatine.)
• N-Word Privileges: He gets upset when Padmé and group of Padawans call him a slave, but he talks about himself as a slave and continues to use the word at times as an adult.

O–R

• Official Couple: With Padmé as of Attack of the Clones.
• Oh, No... Not Again!: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin dives off a speeder in the middle of aerial traffic, and all Obi-Wan can come up with is a mildly disgruntled "I hate it when he does that." Anakin also commented that his lightsaber had been destroyed once before.
  Anakin: Awww, not again... [sighs] Obi-Wan is gonna kill me.
• One Head Taller: He is taller than Padmé via standing 6'2" (188 cm) as an adult. Had she survived Revenge of the Sith, she might have had trouble believing that the rebuilt Vader was Anakin since he became 6'8" (203 cm) with his cybernetic legs plus his helmet, boots, and armor.
• One-Man Army: In The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith, he's such a powerful Jedi that he can single-handedly turn the tide of battle with his appearance. Captain Rex lampshades this aspect of him in "The Unknown" when they're about to infiltrate a Separatist hangar to save Tup.
  Captain Rex: There must be a hundred droids in that hangar, not to mention the starfighters. This is stretching it even for you, sir.
  Anakin Skywalker: Rex, you're beginning to sound like Obi-Wan. You got a better idea?
  Captain Rex: Look, I don't doubt you could pull it off, but I'm just not sure Fives and I would be around to see it happen.
• Open Secret: His Secret Relationship with Padmé was becoming this by the end of the Clone Wars. Although not widely known, it was quite obvious to those close to the pair that something was going on between them: Palpatine knew, Obi-Wan and Ahsoka are all but stated to have figured it out, Bail and Yoda are unsurprised when they learn about it, Rush Clovis figures it out pretty quickly, Thrawn didn’t actually realize their relationship was supposed to be secret until Anakin denies there’s anything between them and decades later Mon Mothma tells Leia she’d suspected her true parentage for years but kept it quiet. In fairness, the two aren’t exactly subtle at times, particularly Anakin; they even act like a married couple (be it kissing or arguing) in public places where they could quite easily be spotted.
• Opposed Mentors: Anakin has to choose between his loyalty to Mace Windu or Palpatine's service. At that fateful moment, he chooses Palpatine and turns to the Dark Side.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Invoked. After donning the cybernetic suit, Anakin asks Darth Sidious what happened to Padmé and by extension the baby/babies. Palpatine tells him that not only did Anakin kill his wife, but his children also did not survive.
• Papa Wolf: To his children, Leia and Luke (more so the latter).
  • He spent most of Revenge of the Sith trying to find a way to prevent his unborn child(ren) from suffering a possible death. However, he takes it to Knight Templar Parent levels when he turns to the Dark Side in order to try and protect them. Following his attack on the Jedi Temple, the first thing he does before going to Mustafar is rush over to Padmé's apartment to "make sure [she] and the baby are safe". Even after losing it and Force-choking his pregnant wife, the first thing he asks Palpatine following his operation is if his family is safe, only to be told they died.
  • Seeing Palpatine torturing his son prompts his Heel–Face Turn, killing his master at the cost of his own life to protect Luke.
• The Paranoiac: Increasingly so over the course of Attack of the Clones and The Clone Wars, culminating in his Face–Heel Turn in Revenge of the Sith. He comes to believe that the Jedi are plotting to take over the Republic and that Padmé is planning to betray him (and may be cheating on him with Obi-Wan); neither of these is true. ^note  Well, technically, the Jedi were intending to take control of the Republic, but this was only going to be a temporary thing whilst they dealt with Darth Sidious; they aren't just out for power as Anakin thinks. The inciting incident of his turn is also his fear that his wife will die based on a hazy Force vision (it turns out, he is the one that kills her). By the end of the film, he meets all seven criteria for this trope (He tends to blame everyone but himself for things going wrong, exacts Disproportionate Retribution on those he feels has wronged him, is suspicious over his wife and the Jedi, takes several levels in Jerkass, turns into a Control Freak who thinks totalitarianism is the only way to achieve peace, has a huge ego, becomes increasingly self-absorbed, and thinks everyone is out to get him or is a traitor.)
• Passed-Over Promotion: Part of his resentment against his fellow Jedi stems from their not making him a Knight sooner, which he feels is long past due, and for not promoting him to the rank of Master when he's appointed to serve on the Jedi Council. Obi-Wan points out that being on the Council at all is an impressive achievement and unheard of at his age. Although, his anger is justified since the requirement to be a Jedi Master is to train a Padawan to Knighthood, which Ahsoka would have been had the Council not alienated her (and still would have been despite that if she had actually accepted their offer after proving her innocence instead of leaving). Not something he could have helped. To be fair to them, throwing a public temper tantrum was probably not the best way for him to disprove the Council's misgivings.
• Pay Evil unto Evil:
  • In Attack of the Clones, Anakin's killing the village of Tusken Raiders is clearly meant to be seen as the first step in his Jumping Off the Slippery Slope into the Dark Side. But seeing how those Tusken Raiders did kidnap his mother and tortured her to death, many viewers couldn't help but feel that his actions were pretty justified. The women and children on the other hand...
  • In The Clone Wars, he commits several morally dubious actions against individuals who had it coming; he had Force choked Poggle the Lesser in an interrogation to get information on the brain worms, the latter had been war profiteering off the sale of droid armies and was complicit in the brain worm plot himself; igniting his lightsaber In the Back of Tal Merrick, who sought to detonate the Coronet; his No-Holds-Barred Beatdown of Rush Clovis, who had not only been collaborating with Dooku to gain control of the Banking Clan (albeit for noble reasons), but had attempted to forcibly kiss Padmé against her will, though the last case leaves him horrified; and he threatened Admiral Trench before impaling him in defense, with Trench himself having taken advantage of Echo's tactical algorithm (which the Techno Union gained through horrific methods) and plotting to detonate Anaxes to guarantee a Separatist victory.
• Physical God: Word of God says that had he not been crippled at Mustafar, he would've eventually ended up as this. Palpatine outright states that he would've become more powerful than both himself and Yoda. His son realizes his potential in his place and becomes his equal if not greater.
• Plagued by Nightmares: Anakin has a recurring nightmare of his wife, Padmé, dying in childbirth, something that Anakin believes to be a prothetic dream. Sure enough, this ends up being the case. The film's Novelization goes more in depth with this, revealing that Anakin has this nightmare every time he sleeps, leading to him swearing off sleep entirely just to avoid it.
• Platonic Life-Partners: A master/student variant with Ahsoka. They form a deep, sibling-like bond throughout The Clone Wars, with Ahsoka acting as one of Anakin's Morality Chains and her having a great admiration for him. Enough that he still is fond of her decades later.
• Please, Don't Leave Me:
  • When he finds his battered mother clinging to life in the Tusken Raider camp, he tearfully says "Stay with me, Mom." She dies in his arms moments later.
  • When Ahsoka decides to leave the Jedi Order, he is left futilely begging her not to leave him.
  • When Padmé confronts him about turning to the Dark Side, he angrily states "The Jedi turned against me. Don't you turn against me!" It soon leads into If I Can't Have You….
• Politically Incorrect Hero:
  • See his Fantastic Racism towards the Tusken Raiders, Zygerrians, and the Hutts — admittedly, the first are from his personal experience an Always Chaotic Evil race whose sole interaction with all other species is to try and kill, rob and torture them, though his actions against them are presented as being evil (and later works that gave Tuskens more sympathetic portrayals make his actions seem less justified in hindsight); while the latter two are slave traders.
  • He also has authoritarian political views which are rapidly warped into totalitarian ones when he becomes Darth Vader. Even as a Jedi, he disliked the democratic process and believed that dictatorships were more efficient. When his girlfriend started looking worried during one of his pro-dictatorship rants, he backpedaled with a "Just Joking" Justification.
• Power Levels: The "Midi-chlorians" concept was introduced in order to establish that Anakin is an extremely powerful Force user, complete with his Midi-chlorians being obscenely high. George Lucas clarified that that Anakin is meant to be (potentially) the strongest Force-user in the Canon, equalled only by his son. See also Cybernetics Eat Your Soul.
• Pragmatic Hero: Particularly compared to other Jedi, Anakin will do whatever he feels he has to for the good of the galaxy or those he loves, sometimes resorting to more ruthless methods. He eventually develops into a full-blown Well-Intentioned Extremist and Knight Templar.
• Precocious Crush: Anakin and Padmé first met each other when they were nine and fourteen, respectively. He was instantly smitten with her.
• Pride: A major flaw of his. Anakin's determination to prove himself makes him dangerously overconfident at times and unable to handle criticism. His hubris further alienates him from the Jedi, who espouse humility and temperance. It gets so bad by Revenge of the Sith that he self-righteously proclaims that everything he's doing is for the greater good of "his" Empire and that anyone who disagrees is an enemy; even though he's clearly disturbed by some of his villainous acts, he cannot bear to admit to himself that he is wrong and tries to justify it all as being for a noble cause (restoring peace and order to the galaxy, saving his wife etc). During his duel with Obi-Wan, his pride ensures that he can't let Obi-Wan get away even though he has him at a clear disadvantage; the end result of this is Anakin needing a cybernetic suit and mask to stay alive due to severe injuries.
• Primary-Color Champion: In The Clone Wars, his main outfit in the first few seasons is a mix of red and blue.
• The Protagonist: Anakin is a main character in the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars as well as a central character in the Original Trilogy.
• Protagonist Journey to Villain: Anakin grows progressively darker over the course of the Canon, culminating in his story arc in Revenge of the Sith.
• Psychic Dreams for Everyone: Anakin suffers from nightmares of his mother suffering in Attack of the Clones; it turns out she was kidnapped by Tusken Raiders the whole time, and dies before he can do anything to save her. He tries to prevent this in Revenge of the Sith when he starts dreaming of Padmé's Death by Childbirth, but ends up being the one who kills her.
• Psychic Powers: As a highly Force-sensitive little boy, he was able to use them in some situations (podraces, for instance) without really knowing where it came from. He learned to master them during his Jedi training.
• Psychological Projection: During his Heroic BSoD in Attack of the Clones, he accuses Obi-Wan of being jealous of him and deliberately holding him back from progressing through the Jedi ranks. However, there's never any indication that Obi-Wan is jealous of Anakin and the reason he won't let him take the trials is because he feels he's not ready rather than out of malice. Anakin, on the other hand, is implied to be envious of Obi-Wan, particularly in Revenge of the Sith, as he has things he doesn't, such as the rank of Jedi Master and the trust and respect of the Jedi Council. It's also implied that some of Anakin's later accusations of the Jedi being evil traitors is him projecting his own guilt and self-loathing for his actions onto them.
• Psychopathic Manchild: He becomes one in Revenge of the Sith after his Face–Heel Turn. After he receives his armor and fully transforms into Darth Vader, he behaves in a more composed and stoic manner.
• Punch Catch: He pulls this on Ventress during their scuffle in The Clone Wars episode "The Wrong Jedi".
• Purple Is the New Black: Starting with the third season of the The Clone Wars, Anakin wears robes that have a dark purple shade.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Sure, Anakin ended the Clone Wars and his Face–Heel Turn to the Dark Side allowed Chancellor Palpatine to take over the galaxy. But he ends up losing Padmé (the pregnant wife he did it all for), isolated his few remaining friends, had his limbs chopped off by Obi-Wan at the end of their fight, and severely burned away by the magma, resulting in him being reconstructed with cybernetic limbs and black armor.
• Rage Against the Mentor: He calls Obi-Wan out on his rather questionable actions during the Deception arc in The Clone Wars. He also spends much of Attack of the Clones complaining about him behind his back.
  Anakin: He's overly critical, he never listens, he doesn't understand... it's all Obi Wan's fault!
• Rags to Riches: Downplayed. As a Jedi Knight, Anakin isn't rich, but is in a respected position of high social status (even becoming a general), and he has a far better life as one than he did as a slave.
• Red Baron: He is known as "The Hero With No Fear". It's ironic considering how much fear he carries. He was driven to the Dark Side in the first place because he was terrified of death, and more specifically, losing those he cared about.
• Redemption Equals Death: He dies as Anakin Skywalker, not Darth Vader. It is made more clear in the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi, where his Force spirit is portrayed by his younger self over his old, decrepit, and burnt body.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: He is the Red to both Obi-Wan's and Padmé's Blue.
• Reforged into a Minion: In Revenge of the Sith, Emperor Palpatine's conversion of Anakin into the infamous masked cyborg counts, although Anakin had already turned to the Dark Side and was significantly weaker afterwards.
• Relationship Upgrade: He and Padmé. They start off as friends when they first meet in The Phantom Menace; a young Anakin instantly fell in love with her while Padmé saw herself as a surrogate Cool Big Sis to him. By the end of the film, they part ways (Anakin taken in by the Jedi Order and Padmé continuing her reign as Queen of Naboo before entering politics) but remain in each other's thoughts during their ten year separation. When they meet again in Attack of the Clones, Anakin is still deeply and obviously in love with Padmé, but it takes her a little bit before she returns his feelings. However, Padmé thinks it would be best to remain friends because of the potential hurt they would be put through if they enter into a romance. Anakin begrudgingly but respectfully agrees to her wishes. This changes when they both are held prisoners and Padmé thinks they will die, leading her Anguished Declaration of Love to Anakin before sharing a kiss with him. By the end of Attack of the Clones, the two decide to marry in secret.
• Renowned Selective Mentor: Due to his unusual affinity with the Force, Anakin gets mentoring and attention from high-ranking Jedi beyond that given to other Padawans.
• Refused by the Call: Yoda and the rest of the Jedi Council initially refuses to let Anakin become a Padawan because he's too old and the emotions and attachments he had would damage him. He's only accepted after Qui-Gon's death as it was his last request.
• Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: Several works set in the Expanded Universe show that most of the galaxy's population is unaware that Anakin and Darth Vader are the same person. It's widely believed that Anakin was one of the victims of the Great Jedi Purge, with many even assuming Vader was the one who murdered him. Obi-Wan Kenobi even shows that Obi-Wan, Owen and Bail thought Anakin had died from his injuries on Mustafar, with Obi-Wan only finding out that he's alive and is really Vader from Reva ten years later.
• Resigned to the Call: It's rather interesting, though earlier material pictured Anakin as someone who Jumped at the Call of being The Chosen One, it's revealed during the Mortis arc in The Clone Wars that not only did he not think of himself as such, he didn't even believe in the prophecy. Then, when he proved it to himself as well as to the Father, he still refused to stay on Mortis to keep the Daughter and the Son in balance. It took the demise of all three Force-wielders for him to seemingly accept it.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: To an extent in Revenge of the Sith. He tries to argue that Mace should spare Palpatine to stand trial, saying killing unarmed prisoners is not the Jedi way, which can be interpreted as Jerkass Has a Point. However, his main reasons for arguing this is because he thinks he needs Palpatine to help save Padmé’s life.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Anakin performs one of these on a camp of Tusken Raiders after they kill his mother.
• Rogue Protagonist: Chronologically, Anakin is the protagonist of the Canon and eventually becomes one of the antagonists before redeeming himself by sacrificing his life in order to save someone.
• Rugged Scar: Between the events of Attack of the Clones and The Clone Wars, he received a noticeable scar over his right eye, symbolizing how much more experienced and badass he's become as a result of fighting during the Clone Wars.

S–T

• Sanity Slippage: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin's Trauma Conga Line finally catches up to him and begins taking a toll on his mental wellbeing. He becomes increasingly paranoid, unhinged and prone to violence, culminating in him getting completely Drunk on the Dark Side in the climax. Padmé is pretty freaked out by it, even declaring that she doesn't know who he is anymore. It gets to the point that Anakin assumes Padmé is plotting against him, chokes her with the Force and then accuses Obi-Wan of turning her against him, before viciously duelling him with little regard to his personal safety. It doesn't end well. By the end he seems to have regained his sanity, at least enough to realize the extent of what he's done.
• Saved by Canon: Because of his major role as Darth Vader in the Original Trilogy, Anakin cannot die no matter how much he suffers in the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars.
• Secret Relationship: He's secretly married to Padmé. Deconstructed in The Clone Wars episode "The Rise of Clovis", which comes to show that a marriage built on lies isn't a very healthy one, a fact that carries over into Revenge of the Sith.
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Anakin spends most of Revenge of the Sith fearing that his pregnant wife and possibly their unborn baby will die in childbirth. And despite his efforts to prevent it, this is exactly how they die (or at least as far as he knows in his child's case, as he was unaware of Luke and Leia's survival). Then there's the fact that Anakin is partly responsible for the death of his wife (and, he believes, their child); he had lashed out and seriously injured Padmé, all because he couldn't control his anger.
• Self-Proclaimed Knight: At the end of The Phantom Menace, Anakin is allowed to be trained as a Jedi even though he is too old. He vents his frustration to Padmé in Attack of the Clones that he's ready to be a Jedi Knight, but they won't let him move on.
• Serial Prostheses: Anakin loses a hand in Attack of the Clones and then loses all his remaining organic limbs in Revenge of the Sith. He re-loses some of those limbs and, in Return of the Jedi, Luke cuts off his arm again.
• Shadow Archetype: Although Anakin is most frequently compared and contrasted with Luke Skywalker, he's actually this to Leia Organa as well. At their core, Leia and Anakin have very similar personalities, both of them being quite opinionated, hot-tempered, and proactive; at one point in Bloodline, when Leia is enraged at being powerless to help a friend, she wonders if this how Anakin felt just before he turned to the Dark Side. Fortunately for Leia, she had a happy and stable upbringing, has very supportive family and friends, and strongly values liberty and democracy over control. Anakin, unfortunately, lacks these things; he had a very unstable upbringing first as a slave then as a Jedi, consistently loses or becomes alienated from his loved ones, and comes to desire power and control over everything else. Viewing father and daughter side by side, Anakin embraces or exacerbates many of the negative traits Leia is able to cope with better, and one can't help but wonder if Leia would've ended up like Anakin - or vice versa - if their lives hadn't been so different.
• Shipper on Deck: In "Voyage of Temptation", Anakin serves the role as this trope for Obi-Wan and Satine, as he smugly smiles when the two start bickering and calls Satine "Obi-Wan's girlfriend."
• Shirtless Scene: Anakin has this after waking up from his nightmare in Revenge of the Sith.
• Shout-Out: His fate in Revenge of the Sith, where he is defeated by Obi-Wan and cast into a fiery pit, is evocative of Lucifer's fall in Paradise Lost. Like Anakin, Lucifer was also a handsome, but prideful and arrogant paragon who ultimately sealed his own fate by rebelling against his former friends and allies.
• Sickeningly Sweethearts: He has a little bit of this with Padmé during the balcony scene in Revenge of the Sith. Half the stuff they say to each other doesn't even make much sense, though it could be justified in that they haven't seen each other in months and they're both giddy with happiness at Padmé being pregnant.
• Signature Move:
  • While Anakin was a master of most forms of lightsaber combat, the one trick that was distinctly his was catching an opponent's arm in his hand, sometimes using his mechanical grip to crush their wrist and cause them to drop their weapon from the pain. He uses this move on Barriss Offee for example.
  • Another move he uses frequently is raising his lightsaber above his head and bringing it down on an opponent in a two-handed power strike. Ironically, his son Luke uses this same attack to defeat him in Return of the Jedi.
• Significant Haircut: Throughout The Phantom Menace, he wears his hair in a bowl cut. At the end of the movie, he restyles it into a shorter cut with a braid, signifying his initiation into the Jedi order.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: Anakin's clothing becomes increasingly dark in color over the course of the canon, reflecting his growing amorality and inner conflict. In Attack of the Clones, he primarily wears black and brown outfits in contrast to the light-colored outfits he wore as a child back in The Phantom Menace. In The Clone Wars, he wears a blue and red outfit as a result of being more mature and grounded, but eventually starts to wear dark-colored outfits due to both the war and issues in his personal life taking a toll on his mental/emotional state. In Revenge of the Sith, he dresses in almost entirely black, culminating in him receiving his iconic suit and mask to complete his transformation into Darth Vader. Notably, following his Heel–Face Turn and death in Return of the Jedi, his Force spirit is depicted wearing brown and white Jedi robes, symbolizing that he has finally found inner peace and redemption.
• Single-Target Sexuality: Anakin was in love with Padmé since he was nine years old and his love never weakened even though they didn't meet each other again until Attack of the Clones (which is set ten years after The Phantom Menace).
• Single Tear: After murdering hundreds of Jedi and Separatist leaders, Anakin looks out into the hellscape that is Mustafar and silently sheds a tear of remorse.
• Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: Because he was Born into Slavery, Anakin has a seething hatred for slavers and becomes very tense and hostile at the sight of them. He furiously slaughters a bunch of Battle Droids after seeing them use Kudons as slaves in a factory and crushes a hologram of a Zygerrian who was talking to Obi-Wan in a fit of rage.
• Sleep Deprivation: In Attack of the Clones, he's been having trouble sleeping lately because he keeps having nightmares about his mother. It doesn't seem to be helping his emotional state. It's implied he has the same issue in Revenge of the Sith when he starts having nightmares about his wife dying in childbirth, although it's not explicitly commented on.
• Slowly Slipping Into Evil: Killing the Tusken Raiders in Attack of the Clones is Anakin's first openly evil act, specifically intended to foreshadow his eventual turn to Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith. The Clone Wars subsequently presents his slowly increasing aggression, self-righteousness, and tendency towards violence.
• Small Name, Big Ego: In Attack of the Clones, he regards himself as being on Yoda's level when it come to lightsaber combat and thinks that he's better than Obi-Wan in many ways despite only being a young and relatively inexperienced Padawan because of how talented he is. Because of his severe overconfidence, Obi-Wan has to frequently remind him of his place and he suffers a painful reality check when Count Dooku skillfully defeats him in a lightsaber duel and slices his right arm off.
• Smart People Build Robots: In The Phantom Menace, Anakin is shown to have a preternatural talent for all things mechanical, in particular robots. Used not so much to show smartness per se, but rather cleverness and precociousness. It also serves as foreshadowing what he'll become.
• So Happy Together: He and Padmé have quite a few of these moments in The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith, though one that stands out in the latter is their happy reunion after the Battle of Coruscant, where Padmé tells Anakin she's pregnant and then discusses her baby plans with him. In the very next scene, Anakin has a nightmare about her dying in childbirth, which is essentially the beginning of the end.
• So Proud of You: In his final moments, the unmasked Anakin's smile to Luke just beams with this sentiment.
  "At last Anakin sees Luke not as a Jedi or a warrior or a threat or a mistake, but as his son. And Anakin smiles. Not a crazed grin like the Emperor's. Not even a smirk like Anakin might've shown Ahsoka back in his Jedi days. A real smile. A smile only Padmé ever saw."
• Something Only They Would Say: Played With. When Anakin meets Watto again and asks where Shmi Skywalker is, Watto wonders if he is Anakin, but then decides he really is Anakin after he notices that his pit droid was fixed.
• Spanner in the Works: Anakin's destroying the Trade Federation's droid control station in The Phantom Menace was a massive stroke of luck, to the extent that not even he realized what was happening; he just hid in an unmanned Naboo fighter and stuff happened.
• Spirit Advisor: As a Force Ghost, he becomes this to his son Luke and former apprentice Ahsoka, with Yoda and Obi-Wan helping him with the former.
• Spoiled Brat: In Attack of the Clones, he thinks he is entitled to everything the Jedi would give him. He's better about this in The Clone Wars and Revenge of the Sith (at least before he turns to the Dark Side).
• Starcrossed Lovers: With Padmé. Due to their respective roles as Jedi and Senator requiring them to be on different planets, they were often literally star crossed. Even their romance theme was entitled "Across the Stars". As a result of being a Jedi, Anakin is forbidden to have romantic or familial attachments, forcing them to keep their relationship secret. By the time of Revenge of the Sith, this overlaps with Dating Catwoman to an extent since Anakin eventually sides with Palpatine and becomes a villain, while Padmé remains loyal to the Jedi and the ideals of the Republic (and helps found the future Rebel Alliance in some deleted scenes). It does not end well.
• The Starscream: He's this trope to the Jedi Order as a whole and tries to be this to Palpatine twice. In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin believes he can overthrow Palpatine and rule the galaxy with Padmé, likely foreshadowed in Attack of the Clones with his mistrust in Senatorial politics. Then, he tries it again with his son in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Special mention given because it does not involve the typical Sith MO of killing their masters over power, for it seems more like Anakin does not like how Palpatine rules, and wants to supplant him and perhaps do it better.
• Stern Teacher: With Ahsoka. Though Anakin genuinely cares for Ahsoka as her Master, he nonetheless makes her undergo rigorous training to protect herself and is very hard on her when he feels that she's substandard to her abilities. Even in Ahsoka's own series, Anakin's lesson in helping her understand the will to live is not without its challenging hurdles, including adopting his Vader persona to ensure she fights against him with all her might.
• Start of Darkness: The Prequel Trilogy was created to show Anakin Skywalker's progression from a noble young Jedi to the ultimate face of evil in the Canon.
• The Strategist: He's quite skilled at thinking outside the box.
• Student–Master Team:
  • With Obi-Wan in Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, and the first part of Revenge of the Sith.
  • He's also this with Ahsoka Tano during The Clone Wars.
• Stunned Silence: In "Old Friends Not Forgotten", Anakin is left practically speechless when he sees that the person contacting him is Ahsoka.
• Strict Parents Make Sneaky Kids: Obi-Wan's strict mentorship is a huge contributing factor to his disobedient and secretive behaviors, with Anakin frequently hiding things from him as a result. His relationship with Padmé is a the biggest example of this.
• Supernatural Gold Eyes: In The Clone Wars episode "Ghosts of Mortis", Anakin's irises turn yellow after he turns to the Dark Side as a result of the Son presenting to Anakin future images of him causing so much pain and death as Darth Vader. However, this is short-lived since the Father later confronts Anakin and erases his memory of the terrible vision the Son had shown him, which resulted in Anakin returning back to the Light Side of the Force and returning his eye color back to normal. In Revenge of the Sith after the newly minted Darth Vader kills the Separatist council, his eyes are shown with yellow irises with red rims. His eye color goes back to normal for his last meeting with Padmé and his fight with Obi-Wan, but after he's defeated and lands close to the lava flow, they are seen turning back to yellow and red. They stay that way until Anakin is unmasked at the end of Return of the Jedi, where he's no longer a Sith and dies with his original eye color.
• Superpowered Evil Side: According to Word of God, this is how Anakin defeats Count Dooku in Revenge of the Sith, but it has the cost of causing him to edge closer to the Dark Side.
• Supporting Protagonist: He is The Protagonist of the Prequel Trilogy in that his Protagonist Journey to Villain is the most important character arc, but he isn't the lead of any of the films. Qui-Gon is the main character of The Phantom Menace (where Anakin doesn't even appear for about 30 minutes), and Obi-Wan is The Hero of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, being the one who participates in the A-plot and has the most significant action scenes. Anakin's story in the latter two films mostly consists of character-driven scenes with Padmé and Palpatine.
• Sword and Fist: He incorporates punching, kicking, and choking into his already aggressive Djem So lightsaber form, which just emphasizes how vicious he is in combat. This is especially most prevalent during his duel with Obi-Wan on Mustafar where he frequently gives these to Obi-Wan as cheap shots because his lightsaber swings can't break through his master's defense.
• Sword and Gun: During the Crystal Crisis arc, he used one of the blasters along with his lightsaber before discovering the huge kyber crystal. Later, he used a battle droid blaster rifle when rescuing Obi-Wan.
• Symbolic Mutilation: In the climax of Revenge of the Sith, Anakin losing his remaining organic limbs and his body being horrifically burnt symbolizes how he has outwardly become as ugly, twisted, and inhuman as he is within. And there's the whole symbolism around a once proud and mighty Fallen Hero being cast into a pit of fire.
• Sympathy for the Devil:
  • Despite his hatred for slavers and telling Count Dooku he wouldn't care if he killed her, he genuinely looks upset when Miraj Scintel dies in his arms and realize that she was just another pawn of Dooku and a slave like him.
  • Despite hating Dooku as well, he felt remorse and it is implied as during his time as Darth Vader, he began to feel what his nemesis had felt his entire life.
• Sympathetic Murderer: Played with in Attack of the Clones when he kills the Tusken Raiders. Though the incident is still portrayed as shocking and disproportionate, Anakin is clearly deeply disturbed by what happened. He also only killed the Tusken Raiders because they had kidnapped and tortured to death his mother (and they're generally portrayed as Always Chaotic Evil), so they're not the most sympathetic of victims. It's averted after he turns to the Dark Side and starts killing Jedi, though – there, his actions are unambiguously presented as evil (though he is still slightly sympathetic, in that part of his motivation is succumbing to the Dark Side in order to save his pregnant wife and unborn kids).
• Talented, but Trained: Anakin is naturally very strong with the Force, but also receives a decade's worth of training from Obi-Wan, who himself is a highly adept Jedi, as well as other Jedi Masters. By the time Anakin is 19, he's on a similar level to Jedi far older and more experienced, though this has the downside of making him frustrated that he still has to advance through the ranks at the usual pace and isn't usually given any special treatment. Darth Sidious predicted that he would someday become more powerful than both himself and Yoda, although the devastating injuries he received on Mustafar hampered this. By his 40's though, he is still quite an exceptional Force-user.
• Talking to the Dead: At Shmi's funeral, he kneels in front of her grave and apologizes for failing to save her, promises never to fail again and finally tells her how much he misses her.
• Tantrum Throwing: In Attack of the Clones, Anakin does this while ranting about how Obi-Wan's "holding him back". To his credit, Anakin immediately feels shocked by this sudden outburst and Padmé attempts to calm him down, telling him that being angry is part of being human, but Anakin replies that a Jedi is supposed to keep his emotions under control; further highlighting Anakin's inner turmoil and inability to reconcile his emotional nature with his Jedi training. The fact his mother had just been murdered also contributed to his outburst.
• Tears of Remorse: Anakin as the newly-forged Darth Vader in Revenge of the Sith, while massacring a roomful of untrained kids in the Jedi Temple and after slaughtering a roomful of surrendering Trade Federation leaders and their bodyguards. Also, possibly one of the reasons he's weeping while he's telling Padmé about killing the Tusken Raiders.
• That Liar Lies: In the climax of Revenge of the Sith, he sees Obi-Wan emerge from Padmé's ship and proceeds to call her a "LIAR!" when she tells him she loves him. He believes that Padmé intentionally brought Obi-Wan to Mustafar to kill him; he's actually mistaken and Padmé had no idea Obi-Wan was there, but Anakin ignores her pleas and Force-chokes her.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: His turn to the Dark Side is at least partially due to this. While the main reason he turned was because he was promised by Palpatine that the Dark Side would grant him the ability to stop death (since Anakin lost his mother to sand people and he had visions of his wife Padmé dying in childbirth), it had been made clear to him since the get-go that no one on the Jedi Council wanted Anakin to be trained and that he has the potential to become very powerful and evil. When they do agree to train Anakin, only to grant the last request of the late Qui-Gon Jinn, they keep him on a very tight leash and leave him out of the loop. Anakin himself lost faith in the Jedi when Obi-Wan faked his death and Ahsoka was kicked out in an effort to save face. The straw that broke the camel's back was the Jedi accepting Anakin on the Council at Palpatine's request, but denying him the rank of Master and demanding off the record that he spy on Palpatine, whom, to Anakin, was a father figure. Arrogance and lust for power aside, Anakin's transformation into Darth Vader might not have happened had the Jedi not been so hard on him or mistreated him too much.
• There Are No Therapists: Sort of; while Anakin does seek help for his premonitions of Padmé's death, the fact that he does so from Yoda while also not being able to tell him the problem directly doesn't help him.
• These Hands Have Killed: While admitting that he killed the Tusken Raiders in Attack of the Clones, Anakin looks at his hands, implying this trope.
• They Died Because of You: In Revenge of the Sith, Palpatine tells him he killed his wife Padmé (and by extension, their unborn child as well). He doesn't take it well. Palpatine, on the other hand, is secretly thrilled at severing Anakin's last ties to the Light.
  Darth Vader: Where is Padmé? Is she safe? Is she alright?
  Palpatine: It seems in your anger, you killed her.
  Vader: I... I couldn't have. She was alive, I felt it!
  [cue everything telekinetically imploding]
• Third-Act Misunderstanding: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin comes to believe that Padmé and Obi-Wan are conspiring against him because they've been talking to each other about their concern over him.
• This Cannot Be!: Upon being told he killed his pregnant wife, he initially insists it can't be true, as he'd sensed she was still alive (he also can't accept that he would ever hurt her, even though he'd Force-choked her days earlier).
• Til Murder Do Us Part: Played with. Although he doesn't directly murder her, Anakin causes his wife Padmé's death at end of Revenge of the Sith after he snaps and Force-chokes her until she passes her out. The combination of her injuries, childbirth complications and her extreme emotional distress at her husband's actions results in Padmé dying shortly after she gives birth to Luke and Leia, just as Anakin had dreamt. Palpatine simply tells Anakin that "in [his] anger, [he] killed her" without giving any further details, leading Anakin to believe that his unborn child(ren) died with Padmé. Unlike some examples of this trope, Anakin didn't set out to harm his wife and was in fact trying to save her for most of the film, but he becomes so warped by his anger, paranoia and lust for power that he lashes out at her in a blind rage when he falsely believes she is plotting to betray and kill him. He deeply regrets losing control this way and is filled with self-loathing for killing the love of his life.
• Together in Death: He and Obi-Wan are finally reconciled following Anakin's Redemption Equals Death; their Force spirits are shown standing together during the celebrations on Endor, alongside Yoda.
• Too Dumb to Live: In Revenge of the Sith, he is nearly killed because he tries to jump towards Obi-Wan standing at the sloped shore of a lava river. He gets most of his arms chopped off and his whole body burnt to a crisp for his trouble, and would've died if Palpatine didn't arrive in time to rescue him. However, he's currently in the grips of extreme Sanity Slippage at this point.
• Took a Level in Badass: Between Attack of the Clones and The Clone Wars, Anakin became a full-fledged and very powerful Jedi Knight. While he became even more powerful by the time of Revenge of the Sith, this has flip-flopped by the time of the Original Trilogy, though, with him being more ruthless and physically stronger as a cyborg, but also horribly crippled and less powerful with the Force.
• Took a Level in Jerkass:
  • Between The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, Anakin grew from a wide-eyed, kindly child into an arrogant and angsty young man.
  • By the time of The Clone Wars, Anakin became a much more well-balanced, noble, and kind individual after training Ahsoka to be his Padawan. However, he starts to slip down the path of being a jerk once Ahsoka is framed for the bombing of the Jedi Temple hangar. After she is expelled from the Order, he is increasingly bitter with the Jedi Council and angrier almost to the point of leaning close to the Dark Side.
  • Anakin took this trope to a great extent in Revenge of the Sith. But this is kind of the whole point of the Prequel Trilogy.
• Took a Level in Kindness:
  • For much of the time in The Clone Wars, Anakin is more mature, friendly, likeable, heroic, and self-assured than he was back in Attack of the Clones. He is also nicer in the first part of Revenge of the Sith. Tragically, we know that this will not last.
  • This essentially happens when he chooses to to destroy Palpatine and save his son's life at the cost of his own, spending his final moments reassuring that Luke had already succeeded in saving him by proving there was still some good left in himself after all.
• A Tragedy of Impulsiveness: Anakin has a bad habit of rushing into decisions without properly thinking them through or without considering other people, and it's one of the reasons for his eventual turn to the Dark Side. His impatience and unwillingness to listen to Obi-Wan's advice turns him against the Jedi. Furthermore, he impulsively presses his attack against Obi-Wan during their lightsaber duel on Mustafar, resulting in Anakin being maimed, horribly burned and sealed into a life-support suit for the remainder of his life.
• Tragic Hero: Anakin was a Jedi who was a hero of the Republic, got the girl, helped win the war, and saved his master a number of times. His flaws were his issue of attachment and the fear of losing those he cared about, which fed a hunger for power to prevent it from ever happening and that eventually turned him into the ever-popular Sith Lord Darth Vader.
• Tragic Mistake: Anakin betrays the Jedi Order via unintentionally aiding Palpatine in killing Mace Windu.
• Trauma Conga Line:
  • In Attack of the Clones, in a rather short space of time, his mother dies in his arms after being brutally tortured for a month, he, his secret girlfriend, and his master are sentenced to death, he sees dozens of his fellow Jedi killed in battle, his girlfriend is almost killed and he's forced to leave her behind, he gets zapped by Force lightning, his master is badly injured and he gets his arm cut off.
  • He seems to have recovered by the time of The Clone Wars, but things get way worse for him. As a Jedi Knight and General, he more often than not sees clone troopers, many of whom he has grown close to, die. Then, his Padawan Ahsoka Tano gets corrupted by the Dark Side and dies (but she is brought back to life). He also sees visions of his future crimes as Darth Vader and is broken as a result, which leads to him temporarily turning to the Dark Side and the Father wiping his memory of the future. He sees his master get assassinated by a bounty hunter, only to find out the Jedi Council deceived him about the murder. Ahsoka is cast aside by the Council with the Senate's orders and Anakin is devastated by her leaving in the aftermath. One of his clone friends, Fives ends up dying as a madman and Anakin’s relationship with his wife is shaken by a Separatist traitor.
  • At the end of Revenge of the Sith, he is "betrayed" by his wife, maimed and horribly injured in a duel with his former best friend, left to die, sealed into a suit of life-supporting armour (which he would have to wear for the rest of his life), and learns that his beloved wife died as a result of his actions. After all of this, it's really no surprise that Vader crossed the Despair Event Horizon.
• Troubled, but Cute: Anakin is quite a handsome fellow, but he is riddled with emotional issues.
• Twirl of Love: He does this to Padmé in Revenge of the Sith after being reunited with her after several months apart.
• Two Roads Before You: Anakin struggles with being loyal to the Jedi and the Sith, eventually choosing the latter.
• Tyrannicide:
  • Anakin's killing of Count Dooku during the Battle of Coruscant is viewed as such, but most people are unaware at this time that he was actually The Dragon to Darth Sidious (a.k.a. Chancellor Palpatine) and it's all part of his plan to seduce Anakin into turning to the Dark Side and seize power. Anakin himself is conflicted over killing Dooku since killing unarmed prisoners is not the way of the Jedi.
  • Upon having a Heel Realization, Anakin sacrifices himself to kill Emperor Palpatine, severely cripplingly the Empire's powerbase – they were defeated about a year after the Battle of Endor. Everyone throws a galaxy-wide party upon hearing the news.

U–Y

• Undercover as Lovers: Invoked and subverted in "Hostage Crisis". Anakin was trying to convince Padmé to take a break from politics and go on a vacation with him where they could act as husband and wife instead of senator and Jedi because no one would've recognized them.
• Unexplained Recovery: How he comes back as a Force spirit immediately after his death has not yet been explained. The Yoda arc in The Clone Wars established that knowledge of how to become a Force spirit was something that only a select few could learn, and it took some time for both Yoda and Obi-Wan to understand how to accomplish this feat. Dave Filoni said that George Lucas had an explanation for this, but they aren't ready to reveal it just yet. It might be justified by the fact Anakin is strongly implied to have been conceived from the Force in the Prequel Trilogy. If anything would allow for a Jedi to become a Force spirit without receiving any training for doing so, that would probably be it.
• The Unfettered: Anakin, already less fettered than your average Jedi, edges closer and closer to this trope as the installments go on.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Anakin himself starts to show signs of this when he puts the blame on Obi-Wan for holding him back after he failed to save his mother at the Tusken Raider camp. In Revenge of the Sith, he even seems to recognize this and apologizes to Obi-Wan for not appreciating his training. Unfortunately, this is only temporary, as he goes headlong into a Face–Heel Turn not long after.
• Universal Driver's License: He can pilot anything from a Podracer in his youth to an old Corellian G9 Rigger-class light freighter as well as a Separatist flagship with ease.
• Unskilled, but Strong: His primary lightsaber fighting style, Form V: Djem So, is this compared to the other forms of lightsaber combat. It prioritizes brute force above all else, aggressively dishing out powerful strikes and parries followed by strong counterattacks but also at the expense of mobility. This is why he's able to demolish Count Dooku's precise and fluid bladework but is outlasted and outmaneuvered by Obi-Wan's unbreakable defense.
• Unstoppable Rage: Anakin has serious issues with anger, rage, and controlling his temper. He becomes better at outwardly restraining himself after this costs him the majority of his body.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Anakin is the instigator of his own doom. If he hadn't finished that protocol droid he had started back in The Phantom Menace, things could have been very different. One possible unfolding: R2-D2 would have never been sold to the Lars family without C-3PO's endorsement, and thus would have stayed with the Jawas and fallen into the hands of the Empire, and Leia's message never reaches Obi-Wan.
• Unwitting Pawn: For Palpatine, who manipulates him into turning to the Dark Side.
• Upbringing Makes the Hero: Played With. Although he had a loving mother and was freed and raised by the Jedi, his beginnings troubled him well into adulthood. The Jedi, unknowing of Palpatine's true nature, allowed Anakin to come under his toxic influence, muddying the waters further.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: He develops from an innocent, bright-eyed mother's boy who builds robot buddies into, well, Darth Vader.
• Villain Protagonist: He becomes this in the second half of Revenge of the Sith, which documents his ultimate turn to the Dark Side as he looks for a way to save his wife from death.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Of a sort and entirely unintentional on Anakin's part. It's generally assumed by most people that Anakin died heroically as a result of Order 66 with few knowing about his turn and many even believing Vader was the one who killed him. Many are shocked to find out that Anakin is actually Vader.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: Gender-inverted and deconstructed. Anakin is extremely protective towards his main love interest and wife, Padmé, often putting her safety and well-being ahead of his duties. However, Anakin's protectiveness over Padmé is the final step needed to turn him to the dark side.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Obi-Wan, but the vitriol is definitely of a deadpan variety.
• Vocal Evolution:
  • Matt Lanter's voice for Anakin in The Clone Wars was initially slightly adolescent and similar to that of Hayden Christensen. His voice changes over the course of the series through becoming significantly more mature and slightly resonant.
  • Hayden's own voice also matured between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. And at the end of The Rise of Skywalker when he's reaching out to Rey through the Force, his voice has lowered to a register similar to Matt Lanter's.
• Voice of the Legion: In "Overlords", when he controls the Son and the Daughter.
• War Hero: He fought in the Clone Wars and earned the rank of General. Everything after said conflict on the other hand...
• Wartime Wedding: He and Padmé get married in secret shortly after the outbreak of the Clone Wars.
• We Can Rebuild Him: When he truly became Darth Vader, it was required for him to wear a suit of armor equipped with life support as a result of getting maimed by Obi-Wan and set on fire.
• We Can Rule Together: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin tries to convince Padmé to become his Empress so they can rule the galaxy and "make things the way we want them to be!". Her horrified reaction is similar to their son Luke's when Anakin as Darth Vader eventually makes a similar offer to him in The Empire Strikes Back.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: His relationship with Obi-Wan is shaped by his desire to earn his master's approval, which is rarely forthcoming. Obi-Wan and Anakin share such a moment in Revenge of the Sith, where Anakin expresses his anger over being allowed on the Jedi Council while not being advanced to being a Jedi Master. Obi-Wan expresses that his skill and talent is what got him on the Council in the first place and he should not to be distraught over the disapproval of the other Jedi. Unfortunately, this doesn't help.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Anakin comes to believe that the Republic is corrupt (true) and that the Jedi are conspiring to take over the galaxy (not true).
  Ahsoka: [about Anakin] You might find some of his thoughts on the future eh... a bit radical.
  Barriss: Really? Why?
  Ahsoka: Let's just say my master will always do what needs to be done. I'm not even sure how peacetime will agree with him.
• We Used to Be Friends: With Obi-Wan after Anakin's Face–Heel Turn in Revenge of the Sith. It is taken further by Obi-Wan's feelings of betrayal since he considered Anakin as a brother instead of simply a friend.
• What You Are in the Dark:
  • Given that Anakin and Obi-Wan's friendship isn't the most stable (especially after what happened in the Deception and Fugitive arcs), he could have easily left his unconscious Master behind at Palpatine's urging. He chooses otherwise.
  • A slight example in Revenge of the Sith. Though he continues to do terrible things and tries to convince himself they're justifiable, on a few occasions when he's alone he's seen shedding Tears of Remorse.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: As a nine-year-old boy in The Phantom Menace, he kept an upbeat disposition of helping people with no want of personal gain. Once his eyes were opened to the true power he's capable of, however, it all starts to go to his head.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: The more powerful Anakin becomes as a Jedi, the more corrupt he becomes and the more he is pushed to turn to the Dark Side.
• Wonder Child: To Shmi Skywalker. Although she never explicitly mentions wanting a child, she clearly loves her son and regards him as a bright spot in her life. Nine years after his birth, she's still baffled as to how she even became pregnant because as far as she knows there wasn't a father, and though she isn't familiar with the term Force-sensitive she's aware that her son has unusual abilities such as precognition.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds:
  • He is briefly this in The Clone Wars episode "Ghosts of Mortis". After being shown his future as Darth Vader, he turns to the Dark Side and becomes willing to unleash the Son upon the galaxy in order to prevent that future from coming to pass.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin's final transformation into Darth Vader is shown to be caused by losing everything and everyone he cares for due to his own actions.
• World's Strongest Man: Played with. He is stated to have the highest midichlorian count in recorded history, so much so that Qui-Gon even suggested he might have been conceived by the midichlorians, and Word of God says had he reached his full potential, he would have been more than twice as powerful as Palpatine (and by extension than Yoda, who's roughly equal to Palpatine), who's stated to be the most powerful Sith ever. However, he never reaches this full potential, due to his personality flaws and the crippling injuries he suffers after becoming Darth Vader. However, we get a brief glimpse of what he could have become in "Overlords", when he simultaneously defeats the Son and the Daughter, embodiments of the Dark and Light sides respectively.
• Would Hit a Girl: He strangles his wife when she finds out that Obi-Wan stowed away on her ship and fought and killed several female Jedi during his attack on the Jedi Temple after the execution of Order 66.
• Would Hurt a Child: He slaughters the Tusken Raider's children after his mother dies in Attack of the Clones and Jedi younglings in Revenge of the Sith.
• Wrecked Weapon: Count Dooku destroys his new green lightsaber in Attack of the Clones during their duel to show how deadly of a swordsman he is.
• Wrestler in All of Us: At one point during their duel on Mustafar, he dropkicks Obi-Wan after his former master made him drop his lightsaber by kicking him in the back.
• Wrong Assumption: In Revenge of the Sith's climax, Padmé confronts Anakin on Mustafar and tries to turn him away from the Dark Side. However, when Anakin sees Obi-Wan emerge from her ship, he immediately assumes that she betrayed him and intentionally brought Obi-Wan here to kill him, prompting him to Force choke her until she passes out. This wasn't true at all; Padmé had in fact refused to tell Obi-Wan anything to protect Anakin and he stowed away on her ship without her knowledge, but by this point Anakin is too paranoid to listen to reason.
• Yandere: For Padmé. They develop from "old crush" to "husband and wife" over the course of The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. This results in Anakin nearly killing Rush Clovis when he saw him trying to kiss Padmé in The Clone Wars. Then, after Anakin foresaw through a dream that Padmé will die of childbirth in Revenge of the Sith, he turns to the Dark Side to prevent it and Force chokes her to near death because he got it into his head that she betrayed him for Obi-Wan.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: Anakin has "the happiest day of my life" when seeing Ahsoka again, defeating Dooku, and finding out Padmé is pregnant. Then, everything comes collapsing down.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are:
  • He is on the receiving end of this twice in Revenge of the Sith. When Anakin apologizes to Obi-Wan for neglecting his training, Obi-Wan reassures him that he's very proud of him and that he is both "strong and wise". Much later, when Padmé learns that he has turned to the Dark Side, she desperately tries to convince him to turn away from this path, insisting he is "a good person". Unfortunately, Anakin has convinced himself he's in the right and doesn't react well to Padmé's rejection of him.
  • In Return of the Jedi, he also gets a lot of this from his son Luke, who believes he can be redeemed and urges him to let go of his hate despite his belief it's "too late". This time, Anakin takes it to heart and does a Heel–Face Turn.
• You Are Worth Hell: An extremely tragic variation. Anakin/Vader thinks to himself that every terrible thing he's done and all the physical and emotional suffering he's gone through will be worth it if he can save Padmé and their unborn child. However, when he gets out of his operation, he learns that Padmé not only died, rendering it all pointless, but it was his fault. He promptly hits the Despair Event Horizon and sinks deeper into villainy...until he learns that his son with Padmé actually survived and still believes he could redeem himself.
• You Can't Fight Fate: In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin foresees his beloved Padmé's death and tries to find ways to prevent it, which leads him into turning to the Dark Side. Not only does he fail to prevent Padmé's death, he ends up being the direct cause of it.
• You Could Have Used Your Powers for Good!: Obi-Wan laments his turn to the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith, stating that he was supposed to destroy the Sith and bring balance to the Force.
• Younger Than They Look: Anakin was in his 40s at the time of his death, but he was portrayed by Sebastian Shaw, who was 77 years old at the time of filming Return of the Jedi. Just like Palpatine, this can most likely be attributed to the corruption of the Dark Side as well as his injuries on Mustafar.
• Your Tradition Is Not Mine: Anakin runs into conflicts with the traditions of the Jedi Order because the Jedi Code forces him to hide his relationship with Padmé. Much of what helps Palpatine convince him into turning to the dark side stems from offering things he knows the Jedi Order would never let him have.

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"There's hope for you yet."

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