"Revenge served HOT"
by John Keenan
Omaha World-Herald (Nebraska) May 15, 2005, Sunday

  At first, he was merely scary and cool: tall, shrouded in black, with a deep, forbidding mechanized voice.  Darth Vader, dark lord of the Sith -- torturer, murderer, fiend.  But Vader, who returns to screens this week in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, isn't simply evil, which may add to his appeal.  While the first three released Star Wars films tracked Vader's redemption -- introducing him as the embodiment of evil, then revealing he was Luke Skywalker's father, then allowing him to redeem himself -- the prequel trilogy has chronicled his descent, from sunny-faced slave boy to Sith lord.

   Many movies have good and bad guys, said William Blizek, editor of the University of Nebraska at Omaha's Journal of Religion and Film. "In this one, they're all part of the same force.  That's why Darth has more clout, because we could be Darth Vader. We could have gone, or maybe have gone on occasions, to the dark side."  Thursday, that's where flawed hero Anakin Skywalker finally goes, crossing over to the dark side and donning Vader's distinctive mask and cape. It has taken 22 years and two weak prequels.  For fans, it can't happen fast enough.  "Growing up, Darth Vader was my idea of the iconic bad guy, so it's interesting to think of where he came from and how he got there," said Barry Dunne, 28, of Omaha.

   Vader has loomed large on the pop culture landscape since the first Star Wars was released in 1977.  He finished third -- behind Hannibal Lecter and Norman Bates -- in the American Film Institute's list of the 50 greatest film villains, ahead of heavyweights such as the Wicked Witch of the West, the demon in The Exorcist and the alien of Alien.  "I think Darth Vader is one of the most compelling villains because of the more-machine-than man qualities he possesses," said longtime Star Wars fan Jillian Boston.  "Mask, cape, boots, movement, voice -- he has it all," Blizek said.  "He's fabulous for representing evil.  If he's also the dark side of everything that's good, that really does say something about us.  If we're sensing that as we watch this movie, it will have a lot more impact that most movies wouldn't."

   Philosophy professor William Stephens, head of Creighton's Department of Classical and Near Eastern Studies and a contributor to the book Star Wars and Philosophy, argues that Anakin/Vader can be seen as a classic tragic hero.  "He certainly has tragic flaws, anger and rage," Stephens said.  "In terms of Aristotle's theory of tragedy, a tragic hero cannot be someone who is just plain evil because anyone who's just plain evil is not going to move us emotionally.  "It has to be someone we identify with, someone who is neither extremely evil nor brilliantly virtuous in every respect and saintly, because we don't identify with those characters, either."  Anakin/Vader fills that prescription, Stephens said.  As a young orphan slave boy, he commands an audience's sympathy, as does the death of his mother, though that triggers a murderous rage.  "His plight as an orphan is what leads Qui-Gon Jinn to take him under his wing," Stephens said.  "Unfortunately, Qui-Gon gets killed before he can complete that training."  The prequel trilogy has allowed Lucas to deepen Vader's character, making him more interesting.  "Even the most imposing, strong figures, whether they're heroes or antiheroes, are more interesting when you have dashes of inconsistency and complexity," Stephens said.  "There's a reason he became that way because no one's born with that kind of unswerving monolithic evil.  He's a horribly scarred guy; he's had all sorts of accidents, he's emotionally damaged, and he hasn't had the father figure, the friendship and the emotional support."

   For Dean Phillips, owner of Krypton Comics in Omaha, Vader's appeal is even more elemental -- he looks cool.  "He's such an imposing figure," Phillips said. "Seven feet tall, gleaming black helmet. A scary-looking guy. And that voice . . . ."   But whatever the reason -- back story or black cape, or the mechanized tones of James Earl Jones, who provided Vader's voice in the first three films -- fans are pumped as Vader's onscreen return nears.  "With the first two films of the prequel trilogy, we were able to see what he was like before he becomes this horrifying monstrosity," Boston said.  "Now it is going to be awesome to actually see him make the ultimate dark transition.  It's like a horror film; people know it's going to be terrifying, but they want to see it anyway."  Fans were buying tickets to theaters just to see the trailer, with a shot of the famous costume and the emperor's voice saying, "Rise, Lord Vader."   Dunne is expecting fan reaction to the first sight of the helmeted Darth Vader in "Revenge of the Sith" to be boisterous.  "I know I'll probably let out a whoop or a yell," he said.  Phillips agrees.  "The fans are going to go crazy."