Hayden Christensen is bringing back Anakin for the Ahsoka series, too
Christensen will reprise his role as Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader in Obi-Wan and Ahsoka, both on Disney Plus
Aux News Hayden Christensen
Big news out of the Star Wars universe today, as THR reports that Hayden Christensen is extending his return trip to the role of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader for Disney+. Specifically, it’s being reported that Christensen will be bringing back his take on Young Vader for the upcoming Ahsoka series on the streaming service, which will pair him up with star Rosario Dawson, who first played the character in the most recent season of The Mandalorian.
This comes almost a year after news broke that Christensen would be returning to Star Wars for the also Disney+-pointed Obi-Wan, facing off with his old friend/foe Obi-Wan Kenobi, played by also-returning Ewan McGregor. That news marked 15 years since Christensen—whose performance as Anakin was never exactly helped by trying to make human sense of lines like his infamous “I don’t like sand” speech—had last appeared in any Star Wars project. (Outside of his voice appearing near the end of The Rise Of Skywalker in a big mish-mash alongside most of the franchise’s other Jedi characters, of course.)
Fans of the intervening years of Star Wars content—and especially the Dave Filoni-penned stuff that’s been such a huge part of the franchise’s move to Disney+—will know that it makes a lot of sense to have Anakin/Vader be a major part of Ahsoka’s story. The relationship between the two characters was built from Ahsoka’s very first appearance in the original The Clone Wars movie, where she was assigned as a 14-year-old Padawan to her reluctant new master. Their contentious, loving, and ultimately bitter relationship runs all the way up through Star Wars: Rebels, in which her final confrontation with Vader forces Ahsoka to accept that the masked, murderous monster in front of her really is her former master.
Heavy stuff, and rife for drama, which presumably explains why the Ahsoka series will tap into that conflict. One thing: The show reportedly takes place, like The Mandalorian, five years after Return Of The Jedi, so it’s not clear if Annie’s showing up as a Force Ghost or a flashback, given how the whole “Second Death Star” thing played out. Still, it’s exciting to see the show take advantage of Christensen’s apparent availability, and for him to get another shot at a character that’s come to define, for good or ill, the vast majority of his career.
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Lucas’ dialog has brought many masterful actors low. Looking forward to how Christensen’s appearances will go with directors and writers more adept at depicting human interactions.
He’s been legitimately good in other movies (Shattered Glass was the one that stood out for me) so I have no doubt he can get that character back and nail it this time. He also has tons of character reference in the Clone Wars show to use as additional background
No doubt?
A healthy amount
Everyone always mentions this with Shattered Glass, but has he given any other good performances? Plenty of wooden actors get a solid role that’s good for them. And not saying he’s a bad actor I’d just love to hear more than that one example.
YOU might not be saying that he’s a bad actor, so I’ll say it for you. He’s a bad actor. Unless you want someone who is completely stiff & uninspired, that is. Apparently he’s a nice guy, but I’m thinking he should be relegated to the local dinner theater circuit.
He’s pretty solid in Jumper, too.
good question I also want to know. I watched little italy last night (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6957966/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_5) and his acting is not good in that movie.
He played a good Bob Dylan in Factory Girl.
He was fine in Jumper, but that character was a little weird and it suited him well.
It’s amazing how much more I genuinely got invested in Anakin and Padme’s relationship after hearing them talk to each other like human beings for ten fucking seconds.
I’ve always wondered why Lucas didn’t just write the story to the Prequel Trilogy and hire someone else to write and direct. At the very least, he should have done that after Phantom.
I think after so many conservatives said they identify with the Rebels, thus missing the whole point, Lucas just wanted to make sure nobody would depict the Jedi or the Republic in a completely positive light in movies where about their less positive nature. He worked closely with Dave Filoni on The Clone Wars and it shows because those the Jedi and Republic can be downright nasty in that show.
I’ve always wondered why Lucas didn’t just write the story to the Prequel Trilogy and hire someone else to write and direct. At the very least, he should have done that after Phantom.According to Frank Darabont, he was very nearly hired by Lucas to perform script-doctoring duties on The Phantom Menace prior to shooting, but due to Lucas’s status as a non-WGA signatory, he was unable to take the job without scabbing (which doesn’t explain why he was perfectly happy to work for Lucas as a writer on Young Indy, but anyways):https://www.theforce.net/episode1/story/Frank_Darabont_Refutes_TPM_Rumors_75332.asp
Tom Stoppard did uncredited dialogue rewrites on Sith which is why SOME of the dialogue isn’t terrible.
After Lucas’s hissy fit over title cards on Empire, he probably couldn’t hire anyone in the DGA.
Actual solid dialogue and performance in the PT is Christensen and McDiarmid at the opera talking about the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise. Apparently, Tom Stoppard has an uncredited rewrite on RoTS and I’d guess he wrote the dialogue in that bit.
Probably the best part of the Prequels. No surprise it was written by someone other than Lucas.
That was mostly a monologue by Sidious, wasn’t it?
I’m not sure there is an actor alive who could’ve done anything with that horrid “sand” scene.
Christopher Plum……oh wait, you did say “alive”.I’m inclined to agree then.
Hot take: I liked him in ROS
He wasn’t in Rise of Skywalker… Wait… Did I just get “that’s the joke” ‘d?
He was in it, alongside Ewan McGregor, Liam Neeson, Sam Jackson and Freddy Prinze Jr
For whatever absurd reason I can only make it maybe a day without hearing his line “ if you’re not with me… then you’re my enemy!” in my head. At the very least he gave a distinctive performance.
Excuse me, it’ ROtS.We try not to speak about RoS for obvious reasons.
Same honestly. This weird switch flipped when they got to Mustafar, and suddenly everyone was allowed to emote. It was glorious.
Not ROTS. Rise of Skywalker. I liked his part.
He was awful in the prequels, but admittedly he didn’t have a lot to work with. Hope he gets better material this time.
He was really cute for maybe a minute. Nostalgia is a weird drug.
His role in the series always required more physical appearance (though, not necessarily physicality, because of green screens) and he managed to look the part of an arrogant, talented magician. I always want him to find redemption as an actor. I hope this is it.
As soon as I saw this on screen:I thought, “Ohhhhh, I get why he was cast.”
I know we’re supposed to pretend that “I don’t like sand” speech one throwaway line doesn’t make sense (and is the THE WOST THING EVER) but it actually does. Anakin—the guy raised on a shitty desert planet—is just making inane small talk with the girl he has a crush on as she’s telling him about her time growing up on her own, very different homeworld.You weird nerds should feel embarrassed over how you’ve overreacted to the prequels, George Lucas, Jake Lloyd, Hayden Christensen, and Ahmed Best since 1999-2002.
Glad to see he still looks to be in good shape, at least in that header image.
Bring back Jake Lloyd you cowards!
As soon as he’s out on parole.
I mean, that was 5 years ago, and he’s diagnosed with like, severe paranoid schizophrenia, but sure. Laugh it up fuzzball.
Man that’s a shitty, shitty, shitty card to draw. One of the worst.
“trying to make human sense of lines like his infamous “I don’t like sand” speech”Really? Because it’s pretty easy to make sense of. He’s trying to tell her that he has zero good memories associated with sand, because it reminds him of being a slave. Whereas on Naboo, sand is a luxury. One that she could leave or wash off whenever she wanted
Hey, George.
Next he’s going to tell us the Squid Game is about capitalism being bad.
Wow that’s.. that’s deep.
It’s not deep, but not being able to make sense of something that isn’t that deep is…something.
There was a throwaway line in a recent Star Wars comic where Luke mentions how much he loves sand, and yeah it was a gag, but it was also a pretty cool way to underline the difference between him and his father. Luke was bored out of his mind on Tattooine, but he was also raised in a loving home by good people and had a circle of actual friends, plus, y’know, didn’t grow up as a slave. So sand will always give him a nostalgic pang for his old home.
“Desert Power!!”
HA!!!
Yeah and that doesn’t make the writing any better, but it can’t be said that it doesn’t make sense. Like much of the prequel dialogue, it just needed some rewrites plus editing and it could’ve been great or at least good.
My kids and I have been running through Star Wars Rebels lately, and there’s an episode where the ship’s guns get clogged after a sandstorm, and when one of them complains that sand “gets everywhere.” we all LOL’d.
Considering that the Ahsoka/Anakin dynamic has been entirely developed over the years via the animated content – which was created in Hayden’s likeness, this is pretty cool news and makes A LOT of sense.
Considering that the Ahsoka/Anakin dynamic has been entirely developed over the years via the animated content – which was created in Hayden’s likeness, this is pretty cool news and makes A LOT of sense.
I admit, I’m a 90s kid and loved the prequels. I was actually convinced he would make a cameo in Rogue One and I remember being tooootally disappointed.
Rampant flashbackery to their Jedi days or maybe fitting in a Vader/Ahsoka confrontation before Twilight of the Apprentice would be great.But I’d be totally fine if it was just 6 episodes straight of Ahsoka bitching out Force Ghost Anakin for his terrible life decisions.
Good for him. Most of the garbage heaped on him, Jake Lloyd and Ahmed Best was due to the terrible writing and directing they labored under. They deserve a chance at redemption in the public eye.
Many of the people who have supported them over the years are also hardcore George Lucas fans, so most of them aren’t really the type to blame George either. I think Lucas just picked Hayden because he’s just about right at portraying someone steered by their environment and upbringing into a toxic relationship.
Honestly, at least half the criticism is because Anakin was a whiny emo bitch, and the fandom wasn’t happy with one of the biggest badasses being turned into a space incel.
Incel grows up into a tool of fascists, which makes too much sense now.
It’s like none of them took five seconds to consider just how genocidal villains are created.
People unironically loving the prequels and loving to see Hayden back in this role is hilarious.To grow up to see this transformation is wild.
Nostalgia is a helluva drug. The sequel trilogy also managed to be even worse, so it’s made people re-evaluate the prequels. For all their faults, they at least tried new things, and even the awful stuff was at least memorable.
Nothing will ever redeem the prequel trilogy, even if I agree that there were some good concepts and fantastic ship and set designs but at least they’re memorable and at best, they spawned the superior TCW series and many of the shows that followed, like TBB.I honestly can’t remember much of anything from the sequel trilogy.
Yeah, I’ve been watching the Clone Wars series for the first time now that I have Disney+, and I went back and watched the prequels because I didn’t remember some of what was going on. The prequels obviously have some terrible dialogue, bad acting, and nonsensical plot beats, but at least there is a coherent and compelling overall arc to the trilogy. They’re about the parallel falls of the Republic and Anakin Skywalker. I know have no fucking clue what the sequel trilogy is about.
The prequels obviously have some terrible dialogue, bad acting, and nonsensical plot beats, but at least there is a coherent and compelling overall arc to the trilogy.That last bit is what Lucas does very well. He created an incredibly rich universe with some truly fantastic, iconic characters and then set up a truly brilliant framework of a story to leverage them.Where he falls down is the rest of it, and that’s why, when left unchecked, we get something like the prequels and the “Special” Editions.
I hear this argument a lot. I didn’t especially like the sequel trilogy but I’d far rather watch any of them than any of the prequels. The prequels in general and Attack of the Clones especially are just badly written, acted, directed and paced. Just trash movies.
Last Jedi excepted.
And The Force Awakens, in a vacuum is a better film than any of the Prequels. It’s just a tired rehash of Episode IV. Like Snatch is great if you haven’t seen Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels
Films should generally stand on their own, but franchise pictures all take place in the context of the other films in the series. By that measure, contrasting the Prequels with Rise of Skywalker and the whole recent series in general certainly brings out a lot of their positives for me.I don’t think anyone ever thought Christensen was the problem with the Prequels. Shattered Glass proved he could act, and other talented actors – Portman and Jackson to name two – didn’t look their best in Lucas’ movies either.
Of course many Prequel fans have liked it from release. Now they just have more people that agree with them,
Chalk it up to shitty dialogue and having to spend 80% of the time acting off a tennis ball on a broomstick in a big, green room.Everyone looked tired and disinterested and I can’t say I blame them.
Nah, lots of people though he was the problem – same with the really little kid in the first of the prequels.It’s only lately people have awoken to the fact no actor in the world could perform the absolutely horrendous dialogue that is Lucas’ signature writing style.
It’s because the RLM reviews. Seeing the things and people they love get slandered makes them more willing to stand up for it.
Seeing the things and people they love get slanderedOr as the rest of us call it, film criticism.
From RLM though.
And if that kind of bile had come from Half in the Bag, Re-View, Best of the Worst or the other RLM features then I might agree with this “slanderous” description.But it didn’t. Mr. Plinkett is a fictional character. An elderly, insane, cat-hating serial killer who obsesses over films like the Star Wars prequels while occasionally referencing his dark past.The specifics of his reviews, like describing films as “the most disappointing thing since my son” are not necessarily meant to be taken literally.
That’s not really a specific point made in the review, and I agree the asides about pizza rolls shouldn’t be taken seriously. The one thing I remember specifically about the Phantom Menace review was that there’s no main character in the movie. He really gets into the weeds of screenwriting, and successfully argues that the script is poorly constructed.
There’s a lot going on in those movies. Deeply flawed as they are, there’s enough to like in them that someone could make a case for liking them.And as others have said, Rise of Skywalker moved the bar further down.
Disney made five Star Wars movies and only The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi could conceivable be called better than the prequels. So they look better by default. Also, they actually expanded the universe and seemed like there was a point to them being made beyond just making more money.That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement, but I think even people who like some of the Disney movies will admit it has been dire recently.
Rogue One is not in your list of movies that could be called better than the prequels?
Rogue One is easily in the bottom three Star Wars films. Only Rise of Skywalker and (maybe) Attack of the Clones are worse. That speech about hope is as embarrassing as any dialogue in the prequels. The characters are forgettable, and while at first it seems ballsy to kill them all off in the end, that’s sort of counteracted by the fact that I was just happy that I would never have to see these dumb people again. The CGI Peter Cushing is one of the worst special effects in Star Wars, even worse than the overuse of green screen in the prequels which at least had the excuse of being cutting edge technology at the time. Tellingly, Halloween Kills more convincingly brought back a dead actor with just really good makeup, and that film probably had one-tenth of Rogue One’s budget. Rogue One has a good action set piece at the end, but all the prequels had solid action. But that’s it.
but all the prequels had solid action
I stand by my statement. The pod race, the lightsaber fight between Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon, and Mail, the chase through Coruscant, the ever expanding battle on Geonosis, the opening space battle in Sith: these are superb action scenes. Marvel has put out dozen movies, and they haven’t even come close to one of those set pieces. The one thing Lucas could still do as a director is direct the hell out of an action scene. Directors half his age look tired by comparison. And Skywalker couldn’t give us a single action scene that rose even to the level of mediocre.
the ever expanding battle on GeonosisYes, much better than the elevator fight in Winter Soldier.
Rogue One?
“Disney made five Star Wars movies and only The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi Rogue One could conceivable be called better than the prequels. So they look better by default.”I fixed your sentence for you.
“People unironically loving the prequels and loving to see Hayden back in this role is hilarious.”Now do the original trilogy.
I waited in line to get presale tickets for The Phantom Menace. The night before the premiere, I blew out my back and ended up in the ER. I told my neurosurgeon that I was absolutely not going to have back surgery because I had to see that movie.I was very much caught up in the moment and enjoyed it that first time I saw it. Once that wore off and I saw it a second time, I… did not enjoy it anymore. I grew to dislike and even resent the prequels as the height of Lucas’ hubris, and proof positive that it was the likes of Irwin Kershner, Richard Chew, Paul Hirsch, and Marcia Lucas that allowed Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back to be the classics that they became.All that said, I am here for Christiansen getting some sort of redemption here. He was saddled with absolutely horrendous Lucas-speak and a terrible director who was convinced of nothing moreso than his own directorial genius and no longer had the guardrails in place necessary to make his vision succeed.It’s rare that someone gets another bite at the apple like this, and I hope he kills it.
I would not be surprised if the success and general well-regard of the Filoniverse is about 90% of that. I mean, I stayed away from The Clone Wars for a while, and only really started going back and watching it when The Bad Batch drew me in.
You know what else? New Coke really isn’t so bad.
Oh, the prequels are still awful, imo the stilted tone and numerous questionable creative decisions are hard to get past and make it difficult to appreciate what Lucas is doing well. But:1) The prequels were not for me, who grew up with the original movies, but for kids several generations younger. This was their Star Wars, many of them love it like I love the originals and I’ve learned not to begrudge that.2) The Clone Wars series added much depth and nuance to the world building and characterizations in the prequels so, while I still don’t really enjoy the movies, I appreciate the overarching narrative that they were the building blocks for.3) Never held my dislike of the movies against the actors in it, because I had seen them all (including the guy playing Jar Jar Binks) be much better elsewhere. My disappointment was solely focused on the shortcomings of the filmmaker and director. Christensen, like the other actors, was doing the best he could under the conditions created by Lucas.4) Even with all those caveats, I never found Christensens performance bad — although I thought the romantic scenes were very cringey — and I genuinely liked his portrayal of Anakin’s fall into evil in episode 3.
Ok but when are they bringing Jake Lloyd back?!
I was a child, pre-teen, and teenager by the time ROTS came out. I truly loved those movies as a kid. Of course, now I see all the problems with them, but coming from a Star Wars family (my grandma has a room in her house dedicated to Star Wars memorabilia), finally seeing Star Wars on the big screen was the moment I had been waiting for.I still watch them once every year or so, now I just point out all the random things I notice, good or bad… and laugh at all the moments-turned-memes.
Revenge was good. I stand by that.
Hayden and Jake Lloyd for some reason get so much blame for something so common. Other than Liam Neeson and Christopher Lee, most of the performances in the prequels, which was stacked with the creme-de-la-creme, came out wooden as fuck. I’ve seen Life As A House so I know Hayden Christensen can act the fuck out of the right material. I can only assume that, given how cruel Star Wars fans and the internet at large can be, he’s had good material to come back to.
Just gonna say I’m pleasantly surprised at how chill the comments are. Even the greys don’t have a lot of toxicity.
The second season finale of Rebels is right below Empire for my favorite Star Wars-related…anything. Ashoka and Vader’s showdown was so well-built, and the emotion and pain on both sides felt really earned.
Plus, having none other than James Earl Jones himself playing Vader opposite Ahsoka elevates that episode to absolute freaking near-perfection in my eyes.
emotion and pain on both sidesBoth sides my ass. Aw, Anakin got his feelings hurt because Ahsoka was fed up with the order’s bullshit after she got framed for a terror attack? Screw him (but James Earl Jones and Matt Lanter were both great in that scene).Ahsoka’s “I am no Jedi,” on the other hand… chills, man. I know the story doesn’t allow for her to do Vader in, but she kicked his ass more than anyone had or would until his son showed up.
1) I like the prequels, somehow their flaws make them even more charming to me. They have a lot of heart (real heart, not the manufactured kind you’ll find in the sequels) and while the dialogue is not very good (safe for a few bright spots, like the “This is how democracy dies” bit), I still like the story and the characters. Which brings me to2) Hayden Christensen’s performance, which I admire a lot for how hard he threw himself into the character. The character (Phantom Menace notwithstanding) is a bit of a shithead right out the gate (albeit one with a good heart somewhere deep down). Basically you can already see a lot of Darth Vader in him, and not a lot of Luke, the latter being what many fans expected, I think, and were thus disappointed.3) I look forward to seeing him reprise his role. I’m interested to see what he’ll bring to it after all these years.
Didn’t he get disfigured when he was about 22 years old?
little disappointed, but i guess i shouldn’t be surprised. i kind of hoped the star wars tv shows would go off in weird, interesting, untapped parts of the galaxy*, but it obviously makes sense that it would ultimately just go back to being about boba fett and darth vader.so i guess this means the obi wan show and the andor show will be in a similar timeline, while the ahsoka show and the boba fett show will be in a similar timeline?*i did really like visions and i would like more of that!
…………………Why?
This revisionist history is fascinating to watch. Listen, I love Star Wars and I’m not trying to drag down the party, but Hayden Christiansen was one of the worst things about the prequels and casting him was one of the worst decisions George Lucas ever made about Star Wars. His acting in Attack of the Clones is beyond obviously bad. Not just bad – legendarily bad. Laugh-out-loud bad. MST3K bad. As in failed to convey a single emotion or line convincingly in the entire film bad. He’s only slightly better in ROTS. I’m not trying to rag on him, he’s *pretty good in Shattered Glass, the only film people cite as evidence of his ability to act, but unlike Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor and Liam Neeson, the man is mediocre-terrible in everything else he’s ever been in his entire career (Jumper, Awake, numerous DTV Nicolas Cage movies, etc). I’m happy for the prequel fans who feel excited or even validated. I sincerely hope with better writing and a more actor-oriented team of filmmakers, they can pull a better performance out of him. Bring in some dialog coaches, bury him behind prosthetics and makeup, whatever it takes. Considering anyone can play Vader from behind the mask, and play it better, this is an odd choice. I guess it’s meant to be wish fulfillment for prequel fans. I’m actually envious of people who can unironically enjoy them. I remember seeing The Phantom Menace on opening day and walking out with a feeling of pure elation, because I was still a kid with no standards whatsoever. Which was helpful, because the prequels fail at nearly every fundamental of filmmaking and storytelling, apart from the sets/costumes & some of the worldbuilding.
If you enjoy something when you first see it and then over the years hate it so much that you would write three paragraphs of vitriol about it, that isn’t evidence that your “standards” changed with age, that’s evidence that you are very easily influenced by popular opinion.
I saw Attack of the Clones on opening day and nearly walked out in disgust about halfway through, so that’s hilariously false. The only reason I liked Phantom Menace on initial viewing (and not any subsequent viewings) is because I was a child who only cared about seeing more Star Wars. I realized it was shite even as a 15 year old with collectable Star Wars plates hanging on my wall. Also pretty disingenuous to suggest a Star Wars fan having a strong opinion about some of the films is indicative of anything other than passion about the source material. I’ve tried repeatedly over the years to find something – anything redeemable about I and II in particular, to will myself into enjoying them, because I love that universe so much.
You seem mad about something.
Is it surprising that a person going by the burner Toiletbeard, is mad about something?
The answer can be a simple one: nostalgia baiting.
Disney continues its never-ending quest to make everyone hate Star Wars!
This thing is usually seen as them trying to win back the old fans.
Darth Vader is gonna beat the shit out of Ashoka then get abuse counseling?