We all remember the heartbreaking ending of the Star Wars prequels, be it the obliteration of the Jedi or the replacement of Republic with the brutal authoritarian regime of Palpatine, the soul-wrenching moments lived up to expectations, and served as a solid foundation for the original trilogy.

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Of many events, the transformation of the naïve Anakin Skywalker into the vicious Darth Vader is still disturbing and heartbreaking for millions. In Revenge of the Sith, we are introduced to Anakin’s family background, his companionship with Obi-Wan Kenobi, and his love for his wife Padme. Later, these are used as viable reasons for sympathizing with the character’s choice to embrace the dark side, barring people from completely demonizing Darth Vader.

The argument is that Vader is a layered character, and Anakin’s transition into Vader is the consequence of Palpatin’s keen manipulation, a lack of trust on the part of the Jedi council to elect him as master, and most importantly, his attempts to save Padme’s life.

While a focus on this character arc is open to diverse interpretations, many are against the idea of humanizing Anakin because of his objectively evil actions, which according to them, can’t be overlooked or dismissed as a result of either love or personal trauma. Recently, Reddit was replete with opinions on this character transformation as well as debates around Anakin’s innocence.

User suprememccream objected Vader’s humanization and deems the arguments doing the same as too simple lacking depth.

“I think while his portrayal in the clone wars is cool af, I think having the deliberately angsty, almost annoying Anakin that you get in the Prequel trilogy was deliberate to make his switch to Vader more understandable. the Vader comics spend a lot of time trying to find the “Anakin” in the Vader but I don’t think it’s fair to give him that chance. A lot of the atrocities that Vader commits are the will and actions of Anakin Skywalker and that tends to be forgiven because he had a bad childhood or because he still loves and misses the wife that he murdered (even if you don’t believe he killed her, he assaulted his pregnant wife). This is an incredibly simplified breakdown but I would love to hear your thoughts as this has been a topic i’ve been interested in for a long while.”

Of course, the argument received some support, as Ikn240 vilified Anakin.

“Of course he doesn’t. Anakin turned evil because he’s a gullible idiot with a room temperature IQ. In fact he was already a mass murderer long before he decided to become Palpatine’s errand boy. The OT was always about LUKE’S CHOICES, not Anakin’s and how Luke redeemed his father whether Anakin deserved it or not. We all kind of ignore that it’s pretty questionable for Anakin to get to be a force ghost in jedi heaven at the end because the the climactic scene is so good the rest of the movie kind of gets a pass. If say Himmler killed Hitler in 1945 people wouldn’t have been throwing him parades.

Meanwhile, there are some staunch disagreements as many users have come up with the opinion that Anakin’s background was a significant addition to the story. One, HauntedReader responded in kind.

 “I disagree, I think it benefited the story to humanize him and the events that lead him on the path of becoming Vader. The best villains aren’t people who are just born evil, they’re villains who are made. Good villains have an origin story and some humanity because that heightens the impact of them making the choice to take the path of evil.”

Another, RhythmicBleating also commented in disagreement.

“Very much disagree. He doesn’t deserve forgiveness because of his childhood or because he misses his wife, that’s just silly. That only exists as a plot point to remind us he’s human and to build empathy. He deserves forgiveness because he made a decision to change and act by killing the emperor. That’s a big and important difference.”

Darth Vader continues to remain the most-discussed and debatable Star Wars antagonist, with Anakin’s transformation easily one of the most iconic storylines of the franchise.