Lucasfilm Addresses Popular Fan Theory About Anakin

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A long-standing theory about how Emperor Palpatine orchestrated three generations of the Skywalker line has seemingly been put to rest right along with him. 

The Rise of Skywalker set out to answer many lingering questions around the sequel trilogy and the larger Star Wars canon as possible. In the process, the film happened to kick up quite a few long-simmering fan theories. Among them was the belief that evil galactic overlord Palpatine created Anakin Skywalker, who would eventually become the dark lord of the Sith best known as Darth Vader. Fans argued that Palpatine achieved this through his mastery of the dark side energy, which he then used to manifest Anakin in his mother Shmi Skywalker's womb. 

However, Lucasfilm Story Group Creative Executive Matt Martin recently addressed this idea head-on. In a recent Twitter thread, he clarified that a comic panel that fueled this theory about Palpatine's long-game in the fight for control of the Force was... downright wrong. 

"I can tell you definitively, as someone who worked on the comic, that is 100% not the intended implication," Martin wrote. "I'm not saying there isn't a logical misinterpretation that they're coming to. I'm just telling you definitively that it's not correct."

The tweet was in response to Twitter user @softboykylo, who just a day before the wide U.S. release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker messaged Martin about a famous panel in the 2018 release Darth Vader #25. The scene is a vision sequence of the past from the mind of Vader that features his mother Shmi still pregnant and standing with her hands, cradling her stomach. Palpatine hovers behind her, his fingers crooked and his face spread into a frighteningly dark and menacing smile. In the next panel, an ominous swirl forms at the center of Schmi's pregnant belly, seemingly in response to Palpatine's Sith sorcery.

Since the issue's release, fans have speculated that the scene implies Palpatine played a significant role in Anakin's birth – making Anakin's eventual turn to the dark side not an act of choice but of destiny. The theory was exacerbated after Matt Martin took to Twitter in December 2018 to say that "a very subtle thing from one panel" in Darth Vader #25 had yet to been discussed amongst fans. But following a tweet from @softboykylo asking for clarification on whether the panel implied Palpatine had created Anakin, Martin made it clear that the Emperor had no role in Anakin's birth. The scene, Martin argues, is actually a manifestation of Palpatine's manipulations and Vader's fears mixing. 

"This is all in Anakin's head," Martin tweeted in response to a fan who pushed back against his complete dismissal of the fan theory. "Wouldn't that idea, a concept that Palps hinted at to Anakin himself, be something likely to freak Anakin out? Something that would linger in his mind? 'Oh crap, what if he made me!' Doesn't make it true. It's all through Anakin's lens."

It looks like with just a little obsession, a dash of aggressive corruption, and a pinch of luck, Palpatine was able to turn Anakin to the dark side and nearly unsettle the balance of the Force without having to conjure up a "chosen one."