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The Ryder Windham novelization of Anakin's / Vader's life aimed at a younger audience (The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader) implies that Obi-Wan was taunting Vader aboard the Death Star by not calling him either "Anakin" or "Vader" during their battle. Vader's thoughts during the course of the fight are that his former Master was trying to irritate and confuse him by not properly using his Sith title.

The real world explanation is most likely that, as far back as 1977, George Lucas had yet to settle on whether or not "Darth" would be a first name or a title given to Vader. Lucas can say all he wants about having a fully fleshed out backstory written that early in the history of the Saga, but we all know quite a few of the early names were different from what they ended up being on screen (Deak Starkiller, for instance).
 
I've always felt it wasn't entirely a coincidence that the protagonist is "Luke" and the creator's last name is "Lucas".
 
As Jar Jar proved, Lucas can be about as subtle as a baseball bat to the kneecaps. I wouldn't be surprised if that were indeed the true origin of the Luke name.
 
tighr said:
I've always felt it wasn't entirely a coincidence that the protagonist is "Luke" and the creator's last name is "Lucas".
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Possible, but you have to remember in very original draft of SW, Luke Skywalker wasn't the the hero protagonist, but rather the Obi-Wan figure.

cooleddie74 said:
As Jar Jar proved, Lucas can be about as subtle as a baseball bat to the kneecaps. I wouldn't be surprised if that were indeed the true origin of the Luke name.
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But Jar Jar was originally more like Chewbacca in that he wasn't a comedic slapstick character and more of a helpful alien sidekick for the heroes. I think it was only in the final draft that he was transformed into a caricature.

cooleddie74 said:
The Ryder Windham novelization of Anakin's / Vader's life aimed at a younger audience (The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader) implies that Obi-Wan was taunting Vader aboard the Death Star by not calling him either "Anakin" or "Vader" during their battle. Vader's thoughts during the course of the fight are that his former Master was trying to irritate and confuse him by not properly using his Sith title.
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That line of reasoning I think came from the Death Star novel by Michael Reaves.
 
CorporalCaptain said:
Additionally, Ben's powers were fading on the material plane. IIRC, it was David Gerrold who wrote in Starlog that he thought that Ben foresaw his own death, as evidenced by these lines [according to http://www.blueharvest.net/scoops/anh-script.shtml]:
LUKE: I think my uncle knew him. He said he was dead.

BEN: Oh, he's not dead, not...not yet.
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There's something to be said for that interpretation, and additionally, there's this:

BEN: They must be delivered safely or other star systems will suffer the same fate as Alderaan. Your destiny lies along a different path than mine. The Force will be with you...always!
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Of course, there's also this:
VADER: Your powers are weak, old man.

BEN: You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
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If it was Ben's fate, then the Force would deny him the strength to alter his destiny, should he try to do so.

In the PT, in ROTS, Yoda sets him up to ascend and guide Luke from beyond, which further reinforces the idea that dying on the Death Star was Obi-Wan's destiny.
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And Vader also tells Tarkin that "Escape is not his plan" in regards to Obi-wan, so clearly he already knew that Obi-wan was planning to sacrifice himself.
 
tighr said:
CorporalCaptain said:
Of course, there's also this:
VADER: Your powers are weak, old man.

BEN: You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
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Another thing that sounds weird in retrospect. In all other movies, "Darth" is treated as a title, not as a name. Ben appears to be using "Darth" as a personal name, and not a title. As if he knows this guy Darth personally. Everyone else just calls him Vader, or Lord Vader.
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Weird, maybe, but it's really no different than calling somebody "Captain."
 
Yeah, Vader had the Force/psychic impression that Obi-Wan didn't intend to leave the Death Star. He just wasn't prepared for his transformation into the Force and disappearance, as evidenced by Vader's boot jabbing into his former Master's empty robes as if to say "WTF just happened here?!?"

Obi-Wan vanishing from this mortal realm really took Vader by complete surprise and likely made him wonder if he hadn't indeed just become "more powerful than [he] could possibly imagine."
 
These days it reads to me as Obi-Wan calling Anakin a master of evil and then re-enforcing that by calling him Darth, a title that pretty much means master of evil.
 
I always thought he knew that was going to happen, and he was just making sure he was dead.
 
JD said:
I always thought he knew that was going to happen, and he was just making sure he was dead.
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Oh, you mean poking his boot into Obi-Wan's empty robes as if stunned at his disappearance? The books I've read that spell out what Vader was supposedly thinking at that moment lean in the direction of genuine wonderment....that Vader expected his lightsaber strike to cut through his former Master and physically kill him, and the sight of seeing his body completely vanish and his robes crumple to the deckplates was a big surprise.

Vader and Obi-Wan hadn't had contact with one another in 20 years so the former had no idea what the latter had learned during all that time in hiding. I'm sure Vader realized it was some sort of fantastic Force power he was unfamiliar with and the Emperor might have explained the disappearance to him at a later point (and that's making the assumption that even the Sith Master understood the event).
 
Well, I figured that Vader knew that Obi-Wan was going to die, but not that he would vanish, much less ascend.

In the context of the PT, this makes even more sense. The Sith were obsessed with material immortality, rather than spiritual immortality. Apparently, the possibility of spiritual immortality was unknown to either the Sith or the Jedi, until Qui-Gon secretly contacted Yoda.

That in and of itself is interesting. Luke starts off knowing only what little Ben showed him. But by the end of ANH, Luke's in on a big and profound secret—spiritual immortality—unknown to the Sith or the Jedi Order. That's probably why Obi-Wan refused to help Luke fight Vader, to keep that secret from the Sith.
 
cooleddie74 said:
JD said:
I always thought he knew that was going to happen, and he was just making sure he was dead.
Click to expand...

Oh, you mean poking his boot into Obi-Wan's empty robes as if stunned at his disappearance? The books I've read that spell out what Vader was supposedly thinking at that moment lean in the direction of genuine wonderment....that Vader expected his lightsaber strike to cut through his former Master and physically kill him, and the sight of seeing his body completely vanish and his robes crumple to the deckplates was a big surprise.
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I had assumed that he was just checking to make sure that he was dead.:shrug:
 
What I really wouldn't mind seeing would be a bit more delving into the TPM/ANH gap with either Obi-Wan or some of the other "rise of the Empire" stories - I mean it seems like the Republic goes from "Yay Aliens!" to "Sapiens only" in a very short amount of time.

I read some article that Ewan MacGregor is supposedly down to doing an Obi-Wan Kenobi movie - it WOULD be nice to see a bit more of him in live action as a younger Obi-Wan, while he's still young and fit enough to do it
 
He also seems to be up for reprising Obi-Wan in the new Trilogy. It'd give us a chance to see Obi-Wan's Force ghost as a younger man (and possibly even one that can morph into Alec Guinness using modern CGI) and have Ewan interact with Mark Hamill the way the late, great Sir Alec once did.

Unless Lucas, Kathleen Kennedy, Abrams and/or others have different ideas the new Trilogy would be the perfect excuse for both Ewan and Hayden to return as Force ghosts along with a CGI spirit Yoda to give advice and moral support to Luke and other leaders of the New Republic and revived Jedi Order.

Anybody who thinks they've seen the last of Hayden as Anakin Skywalker is probably deluding themselves whether they liked his performances or not.
 
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