In the third part of the saga Star Wars – Revenge of the Sith – George Lucas decided to remove some dialogue during editing. The information revealed in these dialogues would have greatly changed the scope of an epic scene in the film: the death of Count Dooku.
Anakin turns to the dark side to defeat Dooku
Anakin Skywalker’s Trajectoryfirst chaperoned by the Jedi Knights before switching to the dark side of the Force, is one of the main plots of the prequel trilogy Star Wars. His rivalry with Count Dooku, also called Darth Tyranus, grows stronger over the course of the trilogy through several fights. In episode 2 – Attack of the Clones – Dooku manages to rip an arm off padawan Anakin Skywalker, despite the help of Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi. In the last section preceding A New Hope, it is Anakin, mad with rage, who will manage to defeat the protege of Lord Darth Sidious before his eyes, tipping irremediably towards the dark side.
Before embracing the dark side to become a Sith Lord himself, the young boy from Tatooine experienced other events that disrupted his Jedi apprenticeship. One, in particular, will be the cornerstone of his doom. The death of his mother in his armsShmi Skywalker, tortured by Tusken warriors, will see the teenager Anakin explode with rage and decimate the entire Tusken camp, causing great disruption to the Force in the process. These disturbances will therefore have repercussions years later, when Count Dooku himself advises Anakin Skywalker to use his dark side to defeat him. It will be done, after long hesitations on the part of the padawan, without Darth Sidious coming to the aid of his current protege.
Dooku responsible for his mother’s death?
The Making Of Revenge of the Sith reveals dialogues where we learn that Count Dooku orchestrated the kidnapping and torture of Anakin’s mother, presumably acting under the orders of his master Supreme Chancellor Palpatine. If the manipulation of Tusken warriors is not the most plausible, the responsibility of the Dooku-Palpatine duo in this traumatic episode in the life of Anakin Skywalker would have doubly harmed the screenplay tension of the film.
First, the discovery of the Count’s responsibility would have drastically limited the scope of the scene of his final fight against the padawan.. The latter would then not have hesitated for a second to decapitate him: the way of the Light would have had only a distant echo to oppose to the howls of anger of a child holding the head of his mother’s murderer after his sword.
Secondly, Palpatine has manipulated young Anakin Skywalker since his introduction to the Jedi Order. Systematically causing doubt in the padawan as to the emotions he can feel, he always presents himself as reliable and good advice in his eyes. Discovering it linked to the suffering and assassination of his mother would, on the contrary, have distanced the future Jedi from Darth Sidious, thus depriving the latter of his most powerful protege. Darth Vader would surely never have put on his maskrobbing us of one of pop culture’s most iconic villains.
