We all remember how Revenge of the Sith leaves Anakin on Mustafar, burned, screaming, and barely alive while Obi-Wan walks away. But the movie doesn’t stay with that moment for long. It cuts from Mustafar to other scenes, and before you know it, Anakin is already on an operating table becoming Darth Vader.
That jump always raises a question I think a lot of fans have wondered about: how long was Anakin actually lying there on the black sand after being burned? Minutes? Hours? Long enough for him to lose consciousness? Or was he left there suffering while the galaxy moved on?
Palpatine Arrived Soon After Obi-Wan Left
In the movie, it feels like everything happens back-to-back. Obi-Wan leaves, Anakin is left burning on the shore, and then Palpatine shows up to collect his new apprentice.
And usually we’d call that ‘film logic,’ right? The story can’t pause for an hour just so we can watch Palpatine travel to Mustafar.
But here’s the thing: in at least one version of the story, Palpatine really does arrive shortly after Obi-Wan leaves. Which means Anakin wasn’t lying there for hours. He was hanging on by himself for a very short stretch, more like minutes.
And one of the clearest sources for this comes from the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith graphic novelization. On the page you can see below, Palpatine arrives on Mustafar with clone troopers and finds Anakin, basically right after Obi-Wan has already left the planet.
And the same idea shows up in the novelization too, Obi-Wan leaving and Palpatine arriving happen almost back-to-back.
So How Did Palpatine Get There So Fast?
Okay, so we’ve got the first part of the answer: Anakin wasn’t lying on Mustafar for hours. Obi-Wan leaves, and Palpatine arrives shortly after. But that just opens the next question, how did Palpatine get there so fast?
To answer that, we have to look back at the graphic novelization again. Right after the fight with Yoda, Palpatine is still on Coruscant giving orders. First, he tells the Coruscant Guard to double their efforts to hunt Yoda. But then he gives another command at the same time, he tells them to contact Captain Kagi and have his shuttle prepared, ready to lift off immediately.
