#Slave Anakin | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

aberrantcreature · 1 month

Text

Lost in the Moonlight 🩸🦇

Anakin shrieked as he fell to the dirt, sharp pulses of pain throbbing up his legs. Whatever he just stepped on cut right through his foot, but it didn’t matter. It couldn’t.

With a pained groan, he forced himself off the ground and hobbled to his feet. His face was slower now, but no less purposeful as he left bits of blood on the grass with every step. The few bits of chain that remained attached to his iron braces swung wildly, smacking Anakin with every pump of his arms.

All he could see in front of him were the hazy outlines of trees. He was hoping the dark would cover for him, but he had no way of knowing such a thick dog had settled in. His shoulders and cheeks stung from brittle branches scratching at him like a wild cat.

The voices behind him grew louder. He could hear the echo of horse hooves as they tore up the forest floor. His fate, one worse than death, catching up to him with every second.

No. Please.

Suddenly, the forest parted like the tales of the Dead Sea. Anakin was charging sluggishly through a mighty clearing where a large manor house sat in its center. The moonlight shone off its edges. The iron bars of the balconies and the shingles of the roof. The orange hue of candle light was no where to be found. It didn’t matter. Anakin had to keep going lest they catch him. Drag him back to be broken. To be kept and owned and mistreated over and over again.

His injured foot slammed into a rock, and Anakin hit the ground. The rushing pain, the exhaustion, the malnourishment, it all seemed to overcome the young man as he lay in the yard.

I hope they kill me. Anakin thinks. Better dead than to live a minute more as a slave.

A pair of legs step into his view. That doesn’t make sense, though, since he can hear the angry yelling of the house enforcers and slave keepers still approaching.

“It’s still practiced?” A posh voice calls from above him. “Even after all this time? Perhaps the world is progressing slower than I thought.”

The legs crouch, a cool palm cups his cheek, and then he is staring into the vibrant red eyes of the prettiest man he has ever seen.

No, not a man. Not quite.

“Don’t worry, dear one.” He coos, thumb making comforting swipes back and forth across his cheek. “Everything will be alright.”

The man moves, stepping around him, and Anakin succumbs to his exhaustion to the sounds of death.

#obikin #obikin au #Obikin snippet #writing snippet #star wars alternate universe #alternate universe #vampire au #vampire #slave Anakin #slavery #death #writing #one shot

56 notes · View notes

disastertriowriting · 5 months

Text

This is our fill for "Gladiator AU". :D

Sold from one owner to the next after his dragon abilities are discovered, Anakin finally ends up with Obi-Wan as his... handler. Except, Obi-Wan isn't a slaver like all the others, and he's also far nicer. And Anakin can do little to free the young Togruta Jedi, Ahsoka, who was recently sold into slavery, no matter how hard he tries. The most he can do is help her survive.

8 notes · View notes

fanfictasia · 4 months

Text

Star Wars One-Shots - Eyes of the Dragon (Part 2) - Wattpad

Eyes of the Dragon Chapter 2: Part 2, a star wars fanfic | FanFiction

3 notes · View notes

spiderbae2319 · 5 months

Text

We don’t talk about Leia killing Jabba enough. Her grandmother and father were born into slavery. Her blood was that of the desert sand and the shackles of bondage. Leia was never more a Skywalker than the day she strangled her slave master with the very chains he used to bind her. The daughter of Anakin Skywalker was the one who killed Tatooine’s most notorious slaver, and I find that really beautiful.

#tatooine #tatooine slave culture #Leyyah Skywalker #leia organa #princess leia #leia skywalker #anakin skywalker #star wars #star wars prequels #star wars original trilogy #shmi skywalker #jabba the hutt #return of the jedi

26K notes · View notes

merrysithmas · 7 months

Text

when ppl see this & this, directed by the same person, and think the narrative is "anakin is evil" not "anakin is a steward of the balance, a force demi god, as was foretold on Mortis" 😂

#anakin skywalker #ahsoka #not my gifs #if you havent seen TCW i really feel like stock in your anakin opinion is p low #you need to watch it to get a full picture of his journey and his purpose in the galaxy #he was good and evil #he is quite literally a demi god #he is always and will always be both #his ultimate struggle was wrestling with that and failing it in life bc he couldnt accept it #he was a slave to the destiny the force created him for #he was a slave to the sith #he was a servant of the jedi #he is quintessenially never truly free #he hated and loved the jedi in equal measure #he never loved the sith #he is balanced but OF THE FORCE #he was manipulated by the dark side but he is MADE OF THE FORCE #therefore he will always stand for the force the jedi way and the light #which is why he is a forceghost #star wars #u all know how i get when i put my stanakin shoes on #anyway the ogt and prequels are buddhist allegories and anakin isnt beholden to western concepts of morality in that sense as a character #in a mythic literary epic sense #also obviously he isnt human either #which is a big ring-a-ling

690 notes · View notes

fandumb-thoughts · 11 months

Text

I love the idea of Anakin sneaking people into his bedroom or whatever to surgically remove slave chips and everyone thinking he sleeps around (I have ZERO clue what fanfic that might’ve been from, but it 100% came from a fanfic that I read) because imagining a conversation about it is so funny.

Obi-Wan: So, you and Padmé. Anakin: Since when is this your business? Obi-Wan: Since you made me turn a blind eye at every goddamn opportunity you had to sneak someone into your room. Anakin: Okay, but—to be fair—I didn’t sleep with any of them. Obi-Wan, who has operated thus far as under the impression that his former padawan was a high-key slut: You never what.

#star wars #sw prequels #anakin skywalker #obi wan kenobi #tatooine slave culture #padme amidala #anidala

455 notes · View notes

ani-and-the-corries-au · 7 months

Text

There are some things that all troopers know Nat born's will never understand.

All the troopers grew up in a world where perfection was the standard and anything less resulted in death. Where individuality was a crime and being anything more than just another number was a danger, Where saying the wrong thing in front of the wrong person could get you killed.

All troopers know this, but post Kamino the Guards have had it drilled into them all over again. If they want to survive In the Senate they have to fall back on the lessons they learned on Kamino.

The Corries know that there are some things that nat born's will never understand. Things that Nat born's shouldn't understand.

So no one in the guard quite knows how to feel about the strange fallout of the Shiney squad's Jetti Cadets apparent discovery of the Guards position on Courcant.

It starts small, the guard notices that the boy stops being weird about the fact that most of the Corries don't use their names, when asked, the boys. "It's because I know that you have them now." raises more questions than answers, because apparently the boy just figured out that they used their designation numbers around the Senate because their names were a secret on his own. He also seemed to get an unreasonable amount of joy from the fact that all the clones chose their own names.

If it has stopped there then it probably wouldn't be so weird, but it didn't. From sneaking in extra medical supplies and food, (actual food, not just ration bars) when he discovered that 'depur' was cutting their budget for stuff that they needed to function, to the way he seemed to intrinsically understand their need for secrecy, and their reasoning for it. "secrets keep us safe." Without anyone seemingly telling him.

They all agreed that they weren't gonna ask about how the boy had managed to rangle several senators around to the truth of the situation and his point of view with only a few words to one of them. A point of view that not only had them working on trooper sentient rights bills, but also had them aiding in his more under the table helping.

At first it was weird and confusing, both because this kid was a nat born, and because how did a Jetti Cadet develop this kind of understanding, he was a child. It took them a while to connect the dots, Even as the boy started unconsciously dropping hints.

At first it was that weird little nickname he had for the Senate and Senators, in a language that even the most nerdy of Corries didn't seem to understand. They weren't sure what a Depur was, but apparently it applied to the Senate and was probably not a good thing.

The next clue was the stories, because as Anakin spent more time with the guard, becoming more of a Vod'ika than a Jetti Commander and subsequently beginning to learn more and more about the secrets that they kept from the rest of the Senate.

As the boy learnt about the lighter side of the inner workings of the guard, and how to speak the clones particular brand of Mando'a, the guards began to learn stories about Ekkreth, Leia and Ar Amu, stories about secret plots and tricking the The infamous Depur in ways that resulted in the freedom of those he enslaved.

About secret Languages, Tzai, Jappor snippets and secret rituals. About the ways one could steal back some control from the Masters in ways that they would never even notice. About things that the boy claimed that all Slaves should know, lessons that would help keep them safe from their Masters. A term that by now the guards suspended was not referring to the kind the Jedi had.

By the time the boy causally mentioned that he and his mother had been enslaved prior to him being taken to the temple, the Guards already had a pretty decent picture of the situation.

The fact that the boy had been adopting them into his own culture right under their noses had been vastly more surprising. He'd been a little awkward when he'd admitted it. Saying that he knew that they were sort of Mando'ade, but they could be Amavikka too if they wanted.

And sure, maybe it was a little dark that part of the reason the boy spent so much time in the barracks was because it felt familiar, but also this kid cared about every single one of them, to the point where he apparently sees them as family.

Well it really was no wonder that it was agreed that the entire guard would do just about anything for their Ad'ika. Including possibly stopping said Ad'ika from doing the same for them. (Bloody Skywalkers)

#ani and the corries au #padawan anakin #anakin skywalker #the courscant guard #child anakin skywalker #tatooine slave culture #of the fialleril veriaty #i had this thought in the middle of the night #its a long one but i had to write it anyway #Anakin is an Honorary Vode #and he also has several hundred siblings/new family members #they both adopted each other #tw slavery #mostly referenced but its there #the two way culture exchange is my favorite part of this au #mandalorian culture #Clone trooper culture #Corrie guard culture #the image of the Corries kind of mixing the clone brand of there mandalorian heratage with Anakin's Amavikan stories #The guards randomly weaving Amatakka in to there conversations and leaving there other siblings deeply confused #because Anakin never said they couldn't tell the other Troopers about what he told them #but he did say that they should use there own judgement #so they do

224 notes · View notes

lawsofchaos1 · 9 months

Text

Star Wars Promptlet

In one universe Obi-Wan Kenobi bows shallowly at the end of his formal report of the Battle of Naboo and requests the Council free the mother of his new Padawan from slavery on Tatooine. The Council makes agreeable noises and Obi-Wan tells himself that they will act on his request. However, wary of being accused of attachment, wary of his Padawan being taken away from him because he's too young, too inexperienced, too emotional, too much of a failure, Obi-Wan never checks and he never asks again.

In another universe, Obi-Wan Kenobi sees the dismissive body language of the Counselors during his report - it can't possibly be a Sith they whisper in the eddies of the Force - and he doesn't make a request before he leaves. Instead, he shows up at Quinlan's door in the middle of the Temple's night cycle and his creche mate takes one look at his face before putting on his Shadow blacks and sneaking them past the Temple guard.

Forty one cycles later, Obi-Wan picks Anakin up from where he'd been undergoing the crash course of So You Think You Want To Be A Jedi Knight in the Initiate's hall (which went shockingly well, Anakin making friends left and right and filling in some severe baseline knowledge gaps most of the Temple inhabitants took for granted). He hands his Padawan a small, carved bracelet - a broken chain - made from one of the few native plants of Tatooine, a gift from Shmi, and watches Anakin's eyes grow liquid-wet in joy and wonder.

Most people gloss over that Qui-Gon had bought Anakin and not Freed him, Anakin had noticed. Obi-Wan never needed to be told the difference. And Obi-Wan hadn't bought Shmi, he'd simply provided her what she needed to Free herself. And maybe a substantial portion of the Mos Epsa slave quarters along with her. (But that pesky little slave rebellion that started while Obi-Wan and Quinlan just so happened to be on planet absolutely definitely for sure couldn't be traced back to them. They'd made certain of that.)

The Temple still just shy of outright forbids Padawans contact with their birth parents, but every so often - although at least once a year - Obi-Wan sends Anakin on some strange errand that inevitably ends with him slipping into a booth and finding himself sitting next to his mother for a few precious hours of catching up. Their first meeting (after hearing all about how his mother Freed herself and so many others of course) is all about the new friends he made during his moon-cycle in the Initiate's dorms and how four of them have decided to claim him as a crechemate since apparently every Jedi needs crechemates and he came in too old to get them the normal way. Anakin thinks from watching Obi-Wan with Quinlan and Bant and Garen that this means he has siblings now.

(A few years later Anakin's definitely-siblings get sent with him on his weird errand that happens to be on Anakin's life-day and Shmi makes them all a cup of desert-scented tea and welcomes them into the family. Anakin doesn't cry, it's just the steam from the tea making his cheeks wet.)

When Palpatine starts showing a little too much interest in a young Padawan, Anakin listens when Obi-Wan warns him something might be wrong. After all, his Teacher is a Chain-Breaker- why would Anakin doubt him when his words suggest that Palpatine may be too close to a Depur to be trusted? His crechemates also don't like it and his mother says words he didn't know she knew in her own reaction.

The anonymous report Anakin submits to the Senate Guards that they might want to check in on Senator Palpatine and his creepy obsession with young kids stays anonymous, but it does get leaked and the ensuing media storm starts strong and ends stronger with the discovery of a Sith Master.

In short, Obi-Wan helps Shmi Free herself and a war that breaks a galaxy never starts.

#lawsofchaos rambles #star wars #obi wan kenobi #alternate universe #canon divergence #star wars prequels #anakin skywalker #obi wan and anakin #tatooine slave culture

272 notes · View notes

final-year-condition-available · 22 hours

Text

#jason todd x reader #funny #mountain]#faggot slave #cardinal copia #aly michalka #delicious #lakes #gay onlyfans #anakin skywalker x reader #the witcher #misa amane

120 notes · View notes

alea-says · 1 year

Text

On Tatooine, Skywalker isn't a name you inherit - it's a name you earn.

The Sky Walker. Ekkreth. The slave who makes free. Every one of Ar-Amu's children know that, if they find a skywalker, a skywalker will help them go free.

Because names on Tatooine have meanings. Slave names, depur call them. Slave names, the free men call them. But to Ar-Amu's children, they are promises.

A Skywalker will do all they can to release the children from their chains. A Darklighter will show them a path through the darkness, away from depur. A Whitesun will provide them with the papers needed to walk freely under the suns.

Depur do not care what names their slaves choose for themselves, so long as they are slave names. But Ar-Amu's children know the value of calling things by their names.

Ar-Amu's children know how to walk beneath the notice of depur. There is safety in secrets. And the best secrets are always the ones that do not appear to be secret.

Anakin, son of Shmi, earns his name when he is 3 years old.

Shmi is already a Sky Walker, has been so since before Anakin was born. Her skill with mechanics and electronics makes her a valuable slave and an even more esteemed Sky Walker.

So it is no surprise to Anakin to find a young female twi'lek ducking behind the small curtain that separated Shmi's alcove from the rest of the slave quarters (a level of privacy no slave would begrudge a Sky Walker).

There is a heavy, bulky collar fastened around the twi'lek's neck, and Anakin knows immediately why she is there. A new slave, not yet chipped, held only by the bomb collar around her neck - she seeks a Sky Walker to remove the collar and set her free.

But Shmi is not there. Gardulla had requested Shmi's presence as she entertained her guests. Almost all of Gardulla's slaves are up above, ensuring the hutt is able to impress.

The twi'lek's eyes are wide and scared. It will not be long before her depur discovers her missing. It is unlikely she will be able to sneak back to where she is meant to be.

So Anakin takes her hand. He sits her down on the barely-there pallet that serves as bed for both himself and his mother. He can feel his heartbeat racing in his fingertips, but he is also calm.

"The Sky Walker is not here," he tells her softly, "but if you are willing, I will try to free you."

The decision is hers. Any wrong move in disarming or removing the collar and it would blow them both to pieces. He is the son of a Sky Wakker but not yet a Sky Walker himself. She must decide what she is willing to risk for her freedom.

Anakin already knows what he is willing to risk. He already knows what name he wants to earn.

He is Anakin, son of Shmi Skywalker, and one day he will be able to call himself Anakin Skywalker.

The twi'lek nods.

Anakin's hands are steady as he reaches out, a thin piece of wire pulled from the hem of his ragged tunic. It takes five breathless minutes, but he is able to remove the collar.

It sits between them, heavy with threat, not yet disarmed, but open. Its circle of bondage broken.

"Sky Walker," the twi'lek breathes as she stares at him, and Anakin smiles back at her.

When Anakin joins the Jedi, he asks the council whether he should change his name. They stare back at him in confusion.

"Change your name, why would you?" Yoda asks. But Anakin doesn't know how to (or even if he should) explain. "Skywalker, your name is," Yoda continues. "Skywalker, it shall be, hmm."

Anakin hopes it means the Council understands. He is a Sky Walker, it is his privilege and his duty to free slaves.

But the Jedi are not there to free slaves.

And Anakin begins to hate his name.

He does what he can. Turning a blind eye here. Leaving supplies there. Accidentally unlocking chains. But it never seems to be enough.

He is a Sky Walker, it is meant to be the purpose of his life, but instead - he runs around obeying the senate and the Jedi council.

Until he begins to fear the council knew what they were doing when they told him to keep his name.

Because a Sky Walker is a slave who makes free.

When they make him a general, Anakin wants to throw his name as far away from himself as he possibly can.

How can he be a Sky Walker, a slave who makes free, when he is leading an army of slaves?

When Vader hears the pilot who destroyed the Death Star goes by Skywalker, he is not surprised. The Death Star was a chain the Emperor wielded to bind the galaxy to himself, and Sky Walkers are good at breaking chains. He thinks nothing more of it.

Until he learns the Sky Walker is force sensitive.

Sky Walker is a name that must be earnt, a title and a promise and a badge of honour. It is a slave name. The name of a slave who makes free.

Or, the name of one who could have been a slave, who comes from a family of slaves, and risks it all to make others free.

It is telling that this Luke Skywalker uses his name freely in the Rebellion - a declaration that he sees the empire, the emperor, as depur.

On its own it is not much, something someone not from Tatooine would not understand.

But Skywalker is force sensitive.

So Vader goes digging.

Luke Skywalker, raised by Beru Whitesun and Owen Lars. Best friends with Biggs Darklighter.

First known as Luke Lars, before his name was changed to Skywalker.

For someone else, anyone else, it would seem innocuous. It is easy enough to find out that Skywalker is a slave name on Tatooine. For the boy to have initially gone by Lars would have been a way for him to be protected from his parent's past. For him to claim the name would be a child deciding to claim their history despite the slavery in it.

But Vader knows better. He knows how names work on Tatooine.

The boy becomes a Sky Walker the first time he frees a slave.

The disjointed recording of the Princess's cell they recover has him boldly proclaiming, "My name is Luke Skywalker, I'm here to rescue you."

For one of Ar-Amu's children, such a declaration would have been a comfort. A promise. Vader sees how the Princess does not understand what she has been told.

The Imperials see the boy's behaviour as naivety, but Vader knows better.

It does not surprise him that the boy moves quickly up the ranks of the rebellion. It does not surprise him that the boy is fearless in the face of the empire's might, that he laughs each time he escapes the traps laid for him.

He is a true Sky Walker.

The boy might not have been a slave on Tatooine (and Vader checked, because if there was one thing he would not allow it would be that), but he was the son of a slave. Grandson of Shmi Skywalker.

And he earnt his name again and again and again.

There is another name the boy could lay claim to. Another name he has earnt, Vader finds.

A name the Princess earns, also, as she chokes Jabba with the very chain he sought to hold her with. Starkiller.

One who has killed depur.

It is a name the boy earnt long before he joined the rebellion. That he chooses to go by Skywalker instead is telling.

He would rather be known for making free than for killing.

Vader admires him, even as he despairs. For he knows the end result of being a Skywalker beneath the weight of the Emperor. He knows the power of the Dark Side. All he can hope is to keep the boy, his son, from being enslaved.

But the Sky Walker refuses to join him.

Refuses to acknowledge the power of the Dark Side.

Refuses to admit defeat.

And perhaps, Vader thinks, it is better that way. Dukra ba dukra. His son will not relinquish the name of Skywalker, he will not turn, so he will die free.

But Luke is a Sky Walker, and Sky Walkers are those who make free. Not content to just free themselves, they are those who will walk directly into the grasp of depur if it means freeing others.

On Tatooine, names can be earnt.

And so Darth Vader earns again a name he'd thought lost to him.

He is the son of Shmi the Sky Walker. Father of Luke the Sky Walker - who calls Vader by his earnt name. Who walks calmly into the grasp of the emperor in the hope it will save his father (it does).

Dukra ba dukra.

He is Anakin Skywalker, he is a person, and he dies free.

(Again, highly inspired by @fialleril's work, which if you haven't read, you absolutely must)

#star wars #tatooine slave culture #fanfic #anakin skywalker #luke skywalker #tatooine mythos #darth vader #the power of names

582 notes · View notes

bcitisthelight · 10 months

Note

hey remember when we were discussing how weird the whole cliegg thing is in AOTC. and you had thoughts, feelings and emotions. tell me about those XOXO

(Big TW for this post - I discuss human trafficking, sex trafficking, rape, child abuse, slavery, and PTSD in this post. It's about the realities of slavery and Tatooine and how it involves the Skywalkers.) Something that I almost never see in any discussion on the Lars family is how sharply the fanon headcanons and characterizations of diverge from the ones we get in the moves. Like, particularly Cliegg and the prequel trilogy. Like - I feel like there's this automatic assumption that the Lars loved Shmi and that they cared for Luke out of dedication to her and her family, and it's this huge found family vibe but like can I be real. Can I be super real right now. It’s something that I find kind of baffling, because when I watched Attack of the Clones, and on every rewatch since (and there have been many), it always seems kind of obvious to me that Cliegg bought Shmi as a slave, presumably as a house slave, if not outright as a part of sex trafficking. And I don't mean in one of those "He bought her to free her, he's a good guy, etc etc". I mean, he bought her as a slave with the original intention of keeping her as a slave. And what's really interesting, is you can get pretty much all the clues about that from the exchanges between Anakin has with Watto, his and Shmi's former master.

Again, I want to stress that, because I think it's crucial that we see this for what it is - not an exchange between a former employee and his boss, not an exchange between a kid and a member of his former community. His former slavemaster. The man who won him and his mother in a gambling game like so many fancy necklaces. The source and object of Anakin's childhood enslavement. Watto would have beaten them. He made Anakin, a child of 9 - and I read somewhere once that Anakin started in the races at 6 - ride in a pod race that no human has ever won before, with the full expectation that he would die. This is a being whose entire life has revolved around the certainty that society is not only capable of functioning, but functions best, when sentient beings can be bought and sold like property. And, to be real with you, because this is a thing that happens to people who suffer enslavement, he very likely loaned them out temporarily for sex trafficking purposes for a quick buck - a practice that is noted historically in virtually every society that operated on a system involving slaves.

It's important to recap that, because I do think it's impossible to understand how deeply horrifying the conversation they have is without that context. Like, let's look at how he tells Anakin about Shmi -

This scene is....so telling to me. From the outset, Watto said he sold her as a slave. Like, it was a slave exchange. Watto heard about her freedom later - clearly, Cliegg bought her, and behaved in a way - intentional or not - that Watto believed he was buying her as a slave to own as a slave. That part is not subtext, that's just actual text.

"But Mikhayla" some will say "he freed her the second he bought her - he bought her in order to free her." Except....there is genuinely nothing in the movies, and off the top of my head, the wider narrative, that ever indicates that that's true. In fact it makes no sense in that case, for Watto to have not known that Cliegg was buying her in order to free her. Why would he have to hide that? Watto presumably doesnt care what happens to her, because he's selling her. In the larger materials, its said that his shop fell on hard times, and in the movies, we can see the proof. The script says he's sitting outside his shop, but at that point it resembles more of a kind of beaten down stand. He's still selling junk, but less and of poorer quality - presumably, he's spent all his money on gambling debts. And the thing is, slaves are expensive. He sold her years prior, and I bet he fed himself on that money for a very long time - he was a very motivated seller, as barbaric as that language is to use about a transaction involving a human person. He's not going to be fussy over why the person buying her wants to buy her. There's also the fact that this is a society that vastly runs on slavery, and large plantation owners would often "rent" out slaves to smaller but still profitable farms. And Cliegg is a moisture farmer with presumably a large tract of land for water vaporizers. If anything, I can see Watto having rented Shmi to her, Cliegg taking a liking to her, and then approaching Watto to buy her. I mean, if he's profitable enough to just buy a slave, then he clearly had at least some money. "He spent his whole savings!" Show me that in the text. "He loved her from the start!" Show me that in the text. "But Mikhayla," yet others will say, "he did free her! And then married her! He clearly meant from the start to free her, and only bought her to get her away from Watto. He could have never seen her as property. Who would marry their slave?" Except, in the real world, this is...another thing we see across multiple historical records, masters buying women as slaves and then later freeing them in order to legally marry them. PARTICULARLY in societies that operate so heavily on an entire caste system involving slaves - we can look to the Roman Empire, for example. Countless Roman officials, merchants, and military officials bought women, fell in love with them, and freed them in order to marry them. "But maybe she said yes!" (I know these are not your objections, but as you know, I'm an attorney, which means I constantly have to find an argument to fight against). So, to this imaginary detractor I say: I feel like it should be rather obvious, but I'll say it just in case - it is impossible for a slave to consent to any action they perform at the request of a slave master. It cannot happen. A woman who is enslaved cannot consent to marrying the man who bought her, and who has very likely been raping her up until this point, and wants to now marry her - usually, to make any children he had by her legally his children, and therefore citizens, rather than slaves themselves.

So really, whether or not Cliegg had a change of heart doesn't actually change my mind about his actions towards Shmi. I don't care if Cliegg DID love her - in fact, I'm sure he DID love her. People can and have convinced themselves of all kinds of moral superiority, people can claim to love someone while owning them as property! Shmi could never consent to marrying a man who held her as a slave. Even if he freed her, and she willing chose to stay there for a few years, and then he asked her to marry him. In my head, you can't overcome that power imbalance. Cliegg will never not be a man who once believed Shmi was a thing to be owned. He will never be a man who didn't see her as property. Like, at some point, it actually becomes kind of more and more unlikely that this is a guy who took up this transaction for non-malicious purposes. Because we simply do not see it in the movie. What I see in the movie is a slave owner saying he fell on hard times and sold his slave to a farmer who probably needed help on his land or in his house - he has no wife, so the latter is probably more likely. I see him saying that at the time of the transaction, he had no idea that Cliegg intended to free her. And for all that Cliegg calls Shmi his darling, his love, his wife - not once do we ever hear of any evidence that Shmi saw this as a love match. In fact, the only thing we find out about her daily life with the Lars family is that in the mornings, she wakes up early and goes to pick mushrooms. You know. A task for the house. An unpleasant task, done before everyone else is awake, that she does absolutely alone. I'm just saying. These implications are not good ones. I will say though, for all this, do you know what really sells me on the idea that the relationship between Shmi and Cliegg is is not a consensual one, is Anakin's reaction to it. This is a boy whose entire hopes and dreams have revolved around his mother's freedom. You have more excellent writing than me on this, but the moral injury Anakin suffers leaving his mother behind is. Intense. All he wants is to one day free her. In a way, a part of him is always that tiny boy who couldn't bear the idea of leaving behind his mom, who swore, the last time he saw her, that he would free her. And at this moment, all of his dreams have seemingly come true! His mother is free. According to Watto, she's found love, and married. For all he knows, she's had other children. Maybe that could involve SOME complicated emotions, but mostly you would expect that he would feel, at the very least, relieved. Happy. Interested, curious. Instead, this is his reaction:

He's grim, business like. He is not happy. He is not relieved. He doesn't even seem to acknowledge that she's still alive - the way he reacts is not a man who thinks his mother is out of danger. To Anakin, who grew up enslaved until 9 and knows how this society works, it seems almost immediately apparent that the Lars are just a different kind of danger. There's also this rather interesting detail:

This is a boy who bleeds, every second of every day, longing for a family. He basically begs at obi-wan's feet day and night, to be acknowledged as a son. His reaction to his wife's pregnancy is radiant joy - his reaction to know she could die, profound existential horror. I mean good god, he basically turns Palpatine aka Satan Himself into a father figure, because he's that desperate for one. And here, this man is claiming him as his family. He's talked about being excited to see him. He talks about planning with Shmi to meet him. He calls him "son". And Anakin doesn't give him another moment of his time, the second those words are out of his mouth. It's silence. For a boy who is so starved for intimacy he genuinely falls in love with the very first girl who was ever nice to him, to react to a claim of relationship this way. It's bizarrely out of character for him. Unless it isn't. UNLESS he's disgusted by that claim, instead of relieved by it. If he thinks his mother has been bought and then forced into marriage, of course he hates Cliegg. I remember when we were watching the movie together, and remember I said to you "You can just tell Anakin is thinking, 'Call me son one more fucking time'" And can I be real, I have so much more to say about this. As you know, I actually have essays of opinions and feelings about Shmi Skywalker and her horrible life, and how Anakin was the one bright point she had in that horrible life. I have feelings about how she gave away her only happiness, because she knew he did not deserve the life of a slave. I had ideas about how you could turn this into a way to actually fix AOTC and make it better, a way you could use it as an excuse to get rid of the Tusken arc entirely without losing the tragedy of his mother's death. But this post is already so fucking long and I'm sure you're tired of me talking xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

#star wars #human trafficking tw #abuse tw #csa tw #rape tw #slavery tw #all the trigger warnings #GOD THIS MADE ME REALIZE HOW MUCH I FUCKING LOVE SHMI SKYWALKER #BECAUSE SHE HAD JUST #THE SHITTIEST LIFE RIGHT #LIKE SHES BORN INTO SLAVERY AND SHE DIES IN SLAVERY SHE LOSES EVERYTHING HER SON IS GONE SHES MARRIED TO HER SLAVE MASTER SHE DIES IN PAIN #BUT HER LOVE FOR ANAKIN WAS SO GOOD #SO INTENSELY AFFECTIONATE AND VALIDATING #EVEN IN ALL THAT HELL #THAT WHEN ITS RIPPED AWAY FROM HIM FOR GOOD ANAKIN BASICALLY LOSES HIMSELF ENTIRELY

356 notes · View notes