Choose your destiny

I just saw a commercial for new Star Wars Episode III lightsaber toys. The bit that caught my interest is one which allows you to change it's color from blue to red. The tagline attached to that product is, "Choose your destiny, like Anakin Skywalker." (I may be getting the exact language wrong, but the idea is the same.)

I find this very disturbing.

This is downplaying some pretty horrific events from that movie. Not only did poor little Anakin kill a large number of fully-grown Jedi, but he put down all of the little preschool Jedi! I trust this is not the mode of choosing one's destiny that the toy company means to endorse. "Impress your friends! Kill your friends! Kill your friends' little brothers and sisters!"

Not cool.

It was really easy to fall in love with the character of Darth Vader from the original movies. He would walk around all threatening, and choked some stupid British guy for his "lack of faith". But that's about the worst that we ever saw him do. Well, he did cut off Luke's hand. But honestly, he had it coming.

Darth Vader was pretty cool.

But in these new movies, I just don't know. At first he's too little and annoying. He's ok for a little while, as a good Jedi. But then he starts whining about how powerful he is, or should be, or something. I don't know. The exact dialogue can be a little too much to stomach in these movies.

To be fair, I think just about everything up to and including cutting off poor Samuel Jackson's forearm can be forgiven. They were extenuating circumstances, and given Anakin's knowledge at each point, his actions were basically excusable. They were brash, and maybe a little stupid, but not really evil.

What I love, and by "love", I mean "am completely boggled by", is that at this point, it's like a switch gets thrown in his head. The Emperor is like, "Kill the little ones." And for no apparent reason, with no thought or pause, Anakin goes, "Ok." Because clearly, killing all of these children will help him save his wife, not to mention the fact that nothing impresses the little woman, especially the PREGNANT little woman, like slaughtering a bunch of ankle-biters.

This was not too well thought out.

So yes, little ones. Choose your destiny, like Anakin Skywalker.