By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
The Star Wars prequels were full of dumb moments, from that clunky “I hate sand” speech to pretty much every second that Jar-Jar Binks was on screen. Generally, though, most fans agree that the absolutely stupidest moment was Padme Amidala dying of a broken heart. Even in a galaxy far, far away, it’s difficult to accept that a take-charge former Queen and mother to the galaxy’s biggest hero would simply die of sadness. However, some fans have tried to redeem this idiotic Padme death plot development with a simple theory: that Anakin Skywalker unconsciously drained the life force from her to survive.
The Padme Death Theory
Credit where credit is due: Revenge of the Sith had some clever editing moments, including interspersing scenes of Padme giving birth to Luke and Leia and scenes of Anakin Skywalker’s robotic rebirth as Darth Vader. Part of what made that rebirth so creepy is that we already saw Anakin dismembered and then left to catch fire and die by former mentor Obi-Wan Kenobi. It didn’t look like something that even a powerful Force user could survive, and according to this Padme death theory, the only way Anakin managed to live was by sucking all of the life out of his wife (husbands, right?).
An interesting side effect of the Padme death theory is that it also redeems another stupid prequel moment. Darth Vader’s cartoonishly stupid “NOOOOOOO” scream when he’s told that his wife is dead. Palpatine had just told his new pupil that “in your anger, you killed her,” and Vader’s scream was cringeworthy because it seemed like he was very easily duped by the galaxy’s most obvious liar. According to this theory, though, Palpatine was actually telling the truth and Vader, blinded by anger, subconsciously drained Padme’s life force in a way that couldn’t be detected via medical scanners.
More Than One Padme Death Theory
While this Padme death theory is compelling, there are variants and other theories that are just as interesting. For example, the primary theory assumes that Anakin did all of this unconsciously, which is why he is so surprised and grief-stricken when he learns that his wife is dead. Others think he sucked out her life force intentionally (perhaps starting with that Mustafar Force choke or even earlier), and he only felt bad when he discovered he went too far and killed her (talk about post-bot clarity!).
Of course, the most popular variant of this Padme death theory is that it was actually Palpatine who sucked out her life force rather than Anakin. This would fit with an enduring theory that it was Palpatine who sent Anakin visions of his wife dying, essentially implanting the idea of her death so that he could then offer the false carrot of giving her eternal life. By deliberately sucking the life out of her body after all this manipulation, the newly-crowned Emperor could ensure that his strong right hand had nothing to live for but the Empire.
Obviously, your mileage may vary as to whether this Padme death theory truly redeems the Prequel Trilogy. Even if George Lucas came out tomorrow and gave us his best Han Solo (“it’s true…all of it”), we’d still be left with awful dialogue and shoddy plotting. Plus, it’s a tad embarrassing that fans have spent nearly two decades trying to fix all the mistakes in a movie whose plot has more holes than the hull of the Millennium Falcon. Then again, given how much Disney is currently running this franchise into the ground, fans and their theories may be our only hope for good Star Wars storytelling for the foreseeable future.