The New Anakin Skywalker Ghost

I thought I was going crazy.

I just watched Return of the Jedi on HBO. It was listed as the reissue movie, you know, the ones from the late 90s with all of the new effects. It's a movie I've seen countless times. While my back was turned to the screen, I recited Jabba's words from the subtitles, all from memory. Amy was amazed, and poked fun at me when I said, "I like Captain Solo right where he is" when the line omits the word "right."

So at the end of the movie, I was surprised to find the actor who played Anakin Skywalker's ghost, the same actor who played Darth Vader with his helmet off before the second Death Star explodes, replaced with Hayden Christiansen from the new trilogy. I could swear that they did not do this for the reissue, plus Christiansen's age doesn't fit.

I thought I was going crazy. From the IMDB trivia section:

"A digital rendering of Hayden appears in the 2004 DVD version of Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983), as the spirit of Anakin Skywalker. This replaced Sebastian Shaw as the ghostly image that appears beside Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda at the end of the film. Hayden said in an interview that he had been unaware of this change!"

Now I don't like this on simply the level that if Anakin's ghost reverted to an earlier age, why didn't Obi-Wan's ghost? No one can say that Anakin reverted to the time before he fell to the Dark Side because, if the entire six movies are supposed to be about Anakin Skywalker's fall and redemption as Lucas claims, then he was good at the last moments before he dies.

And I just don't know if they should be tinkering with movies like this.