A collection of comments, thoughts and images, some highly spoilerish and not all of them canon.

1. I framed through the end of the Vader vs. Obi-Wan battle in A New Hope after being a bit confused by it last night. Watch closely, and you’ll notice two things. First, Vader’s lightsaber appears to go through Obi-Wan’s, about an inch above the hilt. This I can pin on imperfect special effects and then get on with my life. However, the second thing is that Obi-Wan’s robes start collapsing before the lightsaber even touches him. Kelson, watching it, said, “Does Vader even connect with a body?” I don’t think he does. Which looks like a very plausible solution to the disappearing-Jedi conundrum: if Obi-Wan wasn’t actually killed in action, then all evidence points to non-violent death being the only way to disappear.

2. This time through A New Hope, I had the strange experience of mentally hearing a parallel voice track for Vader, with Hayden Christensen speaking many of his lines. I don’t know how much of this is my own overactive brain (fueled by coffee and Honey Smacks, no less) and how much is a reflection on the acting/directing/writing, but it’s very cool.

3. Toward the beginning of RoTS, Palpatine calls Anakin “son.” It’s a joking, avuncular thing, but in light of later revelations about learning to influence the midichlorians to produce life, he may be effectively telling the truth.

4. I’ve heard it hypothesized that General Grievous is powered by a remnant of Darth Maul. Personally, I think he’s a remnant of a Dug— probably not Sebulba, though the Wikipedia entry doesn’t completely rule it out. Dugs are small enough for a sufficient portion of one to fit in the organic space inside the Grievous exoskeleton; and in Clone Wars, Grievous proved himself adept at fighting with both hands and feet, something that would come naturally to a Dug nervous system. It would also extend the foreshadowing/parallel relationship between Grievous and Vader in a way that seems almost too deep for a Star Wars movie.

5. The thematic triumph of Ep III, so far as I’m concerned, is the complete lack of any outright lines to the effect of “Always there are two.” That the movie could accomplish that visually without having to say it almost makes up for the fireplace scene in AotC.

6. The pose of the charred skeleton outside the Lars homestead evoked an image of mostly-dead Anakin crawling away from lava.

7. Something Farscape would have considered, but wouldn’t happen in the SW universe: Anakin does learn how to manipulate life, and this is how Padmé ends up with twins. Would also have been intriguing (and somewhat Ender-esque) for there to have been only one actual baby (Luke), and for Leia to have been created directly from a dying Padmé in a twisted effort to keep her alive. But then there would have been a need for some event to keep Vader from finding (or trying to find) the kids, which is very neatly handled by the emotional evisceration of believing Padmé dead at his hands.

8. Perfect, perfect payoff with Padmé’s pendant at the end.