Why Did Anakin Kill Padmé In Star Wars: Revenge Of The Sith? The Dark Side Clouds Everything
"Star Wars" is a story for kids. There's no denying that. While the scripts written for the films are not the best or most nuanced ever written, they still offer something unique to audiences. Watching Anakin Skywalker's (Hayden Christensen) journey through the prequels may have been the first time many a kid experienced a character they liked turning to evil. The fallen Jedi redefined "Star Wars" as the prequel era turned the more simplistic good vs evil space fantasy story of the original trilogy into a complex (if not convoluted) tale with political intrigue and themes of corruption.
With the twin falls of Anakin and the Republic, "Star Wars" became a world where evil was not immediately recognizable or cartoonishly obvious, but one that hides in the shadows, in the hearts of good people who do nothing as institutions crumble away. Anakin showed the flaws of the Jedi, the flaws of humans, and the results of using child soldiers kidnapped as toddlers by cults.
And yet, what makes the story of Anakin so interesting, especially in retrospect and with the added context of "The Clone Wars," is that there is never one single factor that wholly explains why Anakin becomes a disciple of evil and a murderer of children. Sure, there are big moments and reveals that get him close, and one inciting incident that brings him over the edge, but it is the culmination of a lifetime of tragedies and injustices that make the story of Anakin so entertaining. What he perceives as injustices help him justify some bizarre and horrific decision-making, like when he betrayed everything and everyone he cared about to save his wife, Padmé (Natalie Portman), only to end up killing her anyway.
But why did this happen? How could Anakin kill the person he would sell his soul for? Let's find out.
Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering
A crucial thing to remember is that Anakin had a truly awful and stressful year. Not to excuse his behavior, but it's easy to see that Anakin was not thinking straight by the time he took on the role of a Sith.
In the same year he killed his wife, Anakin's padawan Ahsoka Tano lefts the Jedi Order, seriously damaging his relationship with the Order at large and turning his attention and obsession more focused on his wife. Shortly thereafter, Padmé was involved in a mission that also included Clovis, an old boyfriend. Anakin was stricken with anger and jealousy to the point that other Jedi noticed, and during the mission, he Force-choked Clovis upon seeing him try to kiss Padmé, subsequently beating the hell out of him.
A few months later, Anakin briefly reunited with Ahsoka, who pleaded with the Jedi to help in the Siege of Mandalore, but Anakin and Obi-wan were called back to Coruscant to rescue a kidnapped Palpatine. This prompted Ahsoka to share in her disappointment and mistrust of the Jedi and the order, which weighs heavily on a sympathetic Skywalker.
This is all to say that by the time "Revenge of the Sith" starts and Anakin turns a rescue mission into an execution for Dooku, the Jedi knight is extremely exhausted, both physically and mentally. He is barely thinking straight, and this is before adding his horrible nightmares about Padmé dying in childbirth. Of course, these visions could be just the stress talking. At this point, Anakin has already lost many people he cares about, and Padmé just told him she was pregnant with twins.
The tragedy of Darth Vader, the angry
Regardless, the mere thought of Padmé — Anakin's sole obsession — dying in childbirth is powerful enough to dominate his every thought. To make sure his wife stays alive, Anakin is even willing to betray his order and kill children.
As our own Sandy Schaefer once argued, the key to Anakin's fall is that he thought he could wield the dark side without being corrupted by it. Skywalker is a very controlling and possessive individual, as "Attack of the Clones" showed and "The Clone Wars" expanded upon — whether it crops up in his jealousy over Padmé's other relationships, his Padawan leaving him, or the Jedi Order not giving him a promotion.
By the time Anakin accepts Palpatine's proposal and rises as Darth Vader with the justification that it could save Padmé, it is already too late. By that point, he had made so many excuses and compartmentalized his actions so much he was blinded by his power. In a way, he had become a precursor to Reiner in "Attack on Titan," with his mind split into two roles — that of a warrior and that of a soldier — erasing his actions from his mind to avoid dealing with the pain he's caused.
Indeed, even if he was initially aware that the dark side was bad and his actions terrible, Anakin came to see a benefit in the Jedi being dead: not having to hide his marriage. The most telling line in the third act of "Revenge of the Sith" comes when Anakin tells Padmé:
"We don't have to run away anymore. I have brought peace to the Republic. I am more powerful than the Chancellor; I ... I can overthrow him. And together, you and I can rule the galaxy."
Blinded by the dark
Anakin may not have turned to the dark side for power, but he convinced himself that he needed all the power in the world to guarantee nothing could hurt his family. He thought he could use his newfound power without it affecting him, not realizing the dark was destroying him from within. In his warped worldview, anything that stands in the way of his ultimate goal of ruling everything needs to be crushed. It doesn't matter if that is Obi-Wan, who snuck on board Padmé's ship, or Padmé herself, who defends Obi-Wan.
Remember, this is the same guy who, not a year prior, tried to choke his wife's ex-boyfriend out of jealousy. How else would he react to Padmé seemingly saving Obi-Wan, the only person who could beat Anakin, from Order 66? How else does his twisted mind interpret Padmé bringing Obi-Wan to Mustafar, but as a sign of betrayal? Unsurprisingly, he snaps, and Padmé is the one who suffers the consequences.
It is telling that Anakin was so far gone, so blinded by the dark side, that he doesn't even internalize what he did to his wife. When he meets Palpatine after being burnt alive and getting a shiny robot body, he asks where Padmé is. The newly-minted Sith Lord is so utterly shocked to learn that he did damage to his beloved that he gives up on trying to overthrow Palpatine and on consolidating any sort of power. He lost control. He lost his obsession. He is now a slave to the dark, gone ... until his son eventually saves him.