“My mom died of lung cancer on my sixteenth birthday. My birthday is actually coming up—this Saturday. Before she passed away, I was a good student and everything. I was probably going to get a scholarship for singing. But I stopped caring after that. My mom was my biggest fan. Even when she was really sick, she came to my singing recital in a wheelchair, with her hair falling out of her head, and she sat on the front row. I quit singing after she died. There was nobody to sing for anymore. My Dad raised us. And he was wonderful. You want to know how awesome my Dad is? He went to court and tried to legally change my birthday. Just so I wouldn’t have to go through it every year. It turns out you’re not allowed to do that. But he tried.”
Can we talk about how this one panel tears down the idea that Vader hated Obi-Wan beyond all others? Yes, that is certainly a statement that could be taken as scornful, though I read it as at least somewhat wistful. No matter what tone he says it in, and surely it would be with relish and anger, he had to think it first. He does not call Obi-Wan an old fool, nor does he call him a dangerous renegade. He levies no insults at Obi-Wan at all. He’s an old man who thought he could help gifted children.
He recognizes that Obi-Wan wanted to help him. And rather than blaming Obi-Wan for fucking him up, he essentially shoulders the blame as that gifted child for being impossible to help. He actually blames Obi-Wan only for optimism. His destiny, after all, was predetermined. Obi-Wan thought otherwise, but that is not a crime worthy of hatred.
And I kind of get on about this because I think there is literally no canon evidence that Vader directed hatred or energy toward killing Obi-Wan between their duels. Rewind from their pitiful duel on the Death Star, and what do you have? Twenty years of Obi-Wan living in peaceful exile. The EU conjures up reasons for why Vader personally did not hunt down all the Jedi, both creating Inquisitors for us and at times having Palpatine personally counsel against it as a detriment to Vader’s growth as a Sith. But the point remains that Vader did not focus pursuit on Obi-Wan. Rewind further to the duel on Mustafar. Amid Anakin’s ranting, he tells Obi-Wan “Don’t make me kill you.” He waits for a solid declaration of intent from Obi-Wan that a fight must commence. That is not obsession and it is not drive to see Obi-Wan’s death. While they both prepare for the duel they know is inevitable, on both sides, they require that last push to make them fight. It is not an uneven assault where only Anakin pursues combat because he specifically wishes for Obi-Wan to die.
Back to their final, pitiful duel. I know that people like to characterize it as murder since, well, murder and heavy breathing are pretty much what Vader does best. It only barely fits the criteria, since Obi-Wan not only lowers his weapon, but outright declares that when Vader strikes him down, he will become more powerful. He intends for it to happen. Vader is the instrument of his suicide.
How does Vader react? With fury that Obi-Wan denies him even his vengeance? No. Obi-Wan is an old man who thought he could help gifted children. He was mistaken. Now, Vader is well and truly abandoned for Obi-Wan has given up on him and living in a world that has him in it.
This is, in many ways, a sadder interpretation than the more prevalent idea that Vader obsessed over vengeance every hour of the day.
