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Padmé
Amidala, the young queen of Naboo, is forced to flee her blockaded
world in a desperate attempt to plea to the Republic Senate for aid. An
attack during the escape damages her ship and forces her and her
entourage, which includes the Jedi Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice
Obi-Wan Kenobi, to seek repairs on the barren world of Tatooine.
In disguise as a handmaiden, she accompanies Qui-Gon to search for
parts, and in the first shop they enter, a young slave boy sees Padmé
and is instantly convinced she must be an angel,
one of the most beautiful creatures in the universe. It is love
at first sight for Anakin, though of course at the moment he is far too
young to be anything but a friend to Padmé. |
Anakin volunteers to enter
a dangerous Podrace to win the money Padmé and her friends
need to repair the ship - no doubt largely to be able to see
and help this beautiful angel again. Anakin and Padmé
become fast friends in the following days, and by
the time it comes for Anakin to race, she is genuinely
worried for his safety, angry enough about the risk that she
lashes out at Qui-Gon for allowing it to begin with.
As he is a source of
comfort for her, she is also one for him as he is forced to
deal with leaving behind his mother and his home to pursue a
life as a Jedi. He gives her a handmade pendant,
carved by him from a japor snippet, in the hopes that no
matter what happens, she won't forget him. She assures
him that is not a problem, and that despite the changes all
around them, her caring for him will remain. |
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After a fruitless trip to
Coruscant, Anakin returns to Naboo with the Queen and her
entourage, and is awhirl when he discovers the Queen and the
girl he's come to adore are one and the same. Once
again he plays champion to his lady, piloting a starfighter
into the core of the battleship still blockading her world,
destroying the ship and freeing Naboo. Afterwards, the
two are parted when Anakin leaves to become a Jedi, but a
shared smile at the victory parade is a tiny foreshadowing
of things to come... |
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Ten
years later, that lovestruck boy has grown up into an
accomplished - if headstrong - Jedi student and a striking young man. A
threat to Padmé, now a Senator, deems her the recipient of
Jedi protection, in the form of two old friends she has not
seen in ten years. Anakin still feels as strongly as
ever for her, perhaps even more so, and the combination of
this as well as the additional surprise at just how
much her old friend has grown begins to stir new feelings
in Padmé,. Though she refuses to acknowledge them, as Anakin's status as a Jedi makes him forbidden to pursue attachments. |
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The Jedi Council, in perhaps a questionable moment of judgment, send Anakin and Padmé in hiding to her extremely beautiful and
romantic home planet. Padmé finds it increasingly difficult to ignore
her growing feelings. She even allows
herself to share a passionate kiss with him. When one
night Anakin confesses just how deep his feelings for her
run, it's a jolt back to reality for Padmé, who cuts things
off between them: pursuing a relationship with one another
would destroy his future and is therefore impractical.
Anakin is highly frustrated, but concedes to her request. |
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Anakin's nightmares of his
mother beckon him to return to Tatooine, and Padmé
willingly accompanies him. It is clear they still feel
strongly for one another, but all that is secondary
when Anakin discovers his mother has been held captive by
Tusken Raiders for over a month. When he goes to find
her, only to have her die bloodied and beaten in his arms,
he goes on a rampage, destroying the Tusken camp.
Horrified and angry, he later confesses the act to Padmé,
who remains with him and comforts him, much as she did ten
years before. |
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When they go to
rescue the captured Obi-Wan on Geonosis, the two are
themselves captured and sentenced to death. Realizing
how trivial duty is at such a time, Padmé confesses her
love to Anakin. After a battle in which Anakin loses
his right arm, he is sent to escort Padmé home to Naboo
before he himself joins the newly-begun Clone Wars.
There, in defiance of thousands of years of Jedi tradition,
Padmé and Anakin secretly wed. It will be the first
of all too few brief moments they manage to steal together
with one another over the next few years.
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Near the end of the Wars,
Padmé greets Anakin after a long separation with the news that she's pregnant. It's the happiest moment of his life, and the two
contemplate raising their child back in Naboo's lake
country, where they fell in love. However, Anakin soon becomes tormented by visions
of Padmé dying in childbirth. She tries to assure him
this won't happen, but he's not convinced. Chancellor
Palpatine lures Anakin with the idea that the Sith have the
ability to stop death. Anakin resists at first,
especially on learning Palpatine is a Sith. But his desire to keep Padmé
alive is too desperate and, in the end, Anakin turns his
back on the Jedi (who he's already disgruntled with) to join
Palpatine as his apprentice, Darth Vader. In his tasks to prove his allegiance - killing the Jedi at the Temple, then the last of
the Separatists - Anakin slips quickly to the dark
side. When Padmé learns what's happening to
Anakin she tries to save him, following him to Mustafar,
where he killed the Separatists. Her heart breaks as
she realizes just how far he's gone, on a path she can't follow. Anakin won't accept this,
and when Obi-Wan arrives, the confused and angry Anakin
rages that Padmé led Obi-Wan there to kill him, that Obi-Wan turned her against him - he lashes out
and Force-chokes her until she passes out. |
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After this, Obi-Wan and
Anakin duel. Obi-Wan leaves Anakin maimed on the edge
of a lava river, where Palpatine recovers him, and Obi-Wan takes Padmé to a medical facility in a distant outpost. At the
same time Padmé suffers in labor, Anakin is in his own agony as droids rebuild him
in a cybernetic suit - their pain seems to be as one.
Padmé dies as their twins are born - and as the Vader mask
is sealed on Anakin's face - her final words that she
believes there's still good in Anakin. When Vader
awakens after his reconstruction, he immediately asks where
Padmé is, and if she's all right. Sidious lies that
Vader's anger killed her, causing Vader to rage in disbelief
and anguish. At her funeral, Padmé is laid to rest
forever holding in her hands the japor snippet Anakin once
gave her. With her death goes the last remaining good in his life - or so he believes. |
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The closest we get to a
happy ending for these two is through their twin children.
When they are grown, they will become key figures in the
Rebel Alliance that will overthrow the Empire. Luke
himself will be the one who brings Anakin back, as his son
and the reminder of the life and love he had before (and
definitely of Padmé), being able to appeal to the part of
Anakin Skywalker that does still exist in Darth Vader.
If all beings end up in the same place in the Force, and in
his redemption Anakin was restored to his youth, perhaps
it's not naive to assume he was also reunited with his
beloved.
Naive or not - that's the story I'm sticking to! No way did Anakin become hot again as a ghost just to spend eternity with Jedi geezers. ;)
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