Q & A's About 'Star Wars': Was it a mistake to depict Anakin Skywalker as a nine-year-old boy in The Phantom Menace?

Jake Lloyd as Anakin Skywalker. Photo Credit and © 1999 Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL)

I am not normally in the habit of second-guessing the storytelling abilities of writers or filmmakers whose work I admire. This is partly because I usually enjoy most of the books or movies that I consume, even though my many years of writing reviews have taught me that you can like, even love, a book, a musical work, a television series, or a film and yet be able to see imperfections in them.

For the most part, I enjoy Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace and the rest of the Prequel Trilogy. Not as much as I do the Original Trilogy that introduced my generation of fans to that great adventure that took place “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” but enough to sit through all three films and not feel like I could have spent my time something more worthwhile, such as working on a novel or a screenplay or playing Order of Battle: World War II. I am, after all, a Star Wars fan, and while I don’t think George Lucas is a genius who can do no wrong, I also don’t think he’s a talentless hack who ruined my adolescence retroactively with the Special Edition re-edits or the Prequel Trilogy.

However, I do have some issues with the Prequel Trilogy, the biggest of which is the depiction of Anakin Skywalker as a nine-year-old boy who, like his mother Shmi, is a slave on the desert world of Tatooine.

I understand perfectly well why Lucas wrote Episode I the way he did, both in storytelling terms as well as who the intended audience was. In the case of the former, he wanted to show Anakin as a naturally altruistic, loving, considerate, and empathetic youngster whose only flaws were a sometimes fiery temper and fear of losing loved ones. In the case of the latter, Lucas had an intended audience for the Prequels: preadolescents and teens who were born after the 1977 Generation who had “grown up” with Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. The older fans were, of course, included in the proverbial guest list, but just as the Original Trilogy was made for the young people of the 1970s and early 1980s, the Prequel Trilogy was aimed at the young people of the turn of the century and early 2000s.

The problem with those two considerations - the need to have a character who’s so nice and generous when we first meet him that his fall from grace (which we know is coming since this a prequel) will be seen as the Tragedy of Anakin Skywalker and have that character be relatable to the intended audience of pre-teens and teens - is this: It may look good on paper, but it doesn’t really work on screen.

First, while it is true that kids and young adults like protagonists/heroes that they can identify with, that does not mean that they want to see a pre-adolescent Anakin in a role that calls for him to be a skilled podracer, the GFFA equivalent of a NASCAR/Formula One racecar driver at the age of nine. Sure, Star Wars is a space-fantasy and not a science fiction film grounded on our experiences on Earth, but it’s easier by far to believe that a 19-year-old moisture farmer from Tatooine has inherited piloting skills and can fly a starfighter because his “skyhopper” was made by the same manufacturer.

Lucas probably figured that at nine, Anakin is immune from all of the basic instincts that come into sharp relief when kids grow into adolescence. As portrayed in Episode I, Anakin is depicted as:

1. Not being greedy
2. Wanting to help others without thinking of any reward
3. Having compassion even for the ever-annoying Jar-Jar Binks
4. Has feelings of loyalty and love for his mother and friends

Lucas may have looked back at his own adolescence, as well as his experiences as an observer of human nature and decided that even in a space fantasy, showing a teen so pure, so free of baser instincts such as lust, greed, or jealousy wouldn’t work on screen, especially in a character that we know in advance will fall from grace and become, literally, an agent of evil.

And, of course, because the Prequels have to address story points that were mentioned in movies set in the GFFA’s future history, certain specific items have to be checked off from a list when writing the introduction of the Boy Who Will Be Vader:

In this clip from Episode VI, you’ll see what I mean about items that have to be checked off a list of established “facts” mentioned in one “info dump” scene in Return of the Jedi,

Now, if Anakin Skywalker had been, say, 15 or 16 in The Phantom Menace, the movie’s depiction of Anakin as “a great pilot” at the time of his first meeting with Obi_Wan more believable. Not perfect, mind you, but less mind-bogglingly incredible than what we got in Episode I.

The other big problem with Anakin in Episode I that could have been avoided is the age difference between the slave boy from Tatooine and the teenaged Queen of Naboo, who is 14 at the time of the Trade Federation’s invasion and the ensuing crisis that followed.

To be sure, many boys have gotten over the “eww, girls!” phase at age nine. I had crushes on girls my own age before I was a teen, and I discovered that kissing them was nice, too. And I also liked the way teenaged girls looked; between the ages of 10 and 13, I looked forward to being a teen myself and date a teenaged girl!

But even though some kids have “puppy love” crushes on really pretty teachers and actresses they see on TV or the movies, the relationship between Anakin and Padme is a bit strange, if not quite creepy in the movie. (In the novelization by Terry Brooks, though, it does get weird when Anakin tells Padme that he will marry her someday because he had a vivid dream about it. Maybe that’s why she calls him “that funny little boy I knew on Tatooine.”)

If I had written the script for Episode I, there’s simply no way that I would have created the two characters who are fated to be Luke and Leia’s parents to have that much of an age difference, especially since she’s already a person of some importance in galactic affairs.