I always had the feeling Luke never really got a straight answer about why his father became Darth Vader. In the original trilogy, Obi-Wan just tells him Anakin was “seduced by the dark side,” and that’s all Luke has to work with, while we only see the full tragedy years later in Revenge of the Sith.
So the real question is: did Luke ever actually find out what pushed Anakin over the edge and turned him into Darth Vader?
R2-D2’s Locked Memories in The Unseen Queen
In the Legends novel Dark Nest II: The Unseen Queen, Luke finally gets that answer, and it comes from the one character who was there for everything: R2-D2.
By this point in the timeline, it’s decades after Yavin. Luke is a Jedi Master, the Empire is gone, and R2 is still carrying data from the end of the Clone Wars that he has never shown anyone. Luke and Han are aboard ship with C-3PO and Alema Rar when Alema plays her card: she has a security override code that can force R2’s most protected files open. Luke tells her to use it, even though he can tell she’s trying to manipulate him.
R2 panics and literally tries to roll away. Luke just reaches out with the Force, pulls him back, and has Threepio read the override sequence. R2 lets out a long, miserable whistle and finally brings up a holo. The image that appears is a simple room with a brown-haired woman walking past a wall and a young man sitting hunched over some work. Luke hears the man’s voice before he even sees his face: it’s Anakin Skywalker. And the woman is Padmé.
That’s how Luke starts to learn what really happened—by watching his parents in the moments that led up to the fall.
First Recording: Anakin’s Fear of Padmé’s Death
The first recording is quiet. No clones, no fighting, just a private conversation on Coruscant.
Padmé tells Anakin that Obi-Wan came by and that he’s worried about him. Anakin is tense and defensive straight away. He complains that the Council doesn’t trust him, that something is happening, and that he’s “not the Jedi [he] should be.” He even admits he’s “one of the most powerful Jedi” but still isn’t satisfied and wants more, even though he knows he shouldn’t.
Padmé tries to pull him back to normal. She tells him he’s only human, that Obi-Wan loves him like a son. For a second that works—his mood shifts, he walks back to her, and he puts a hand on her pregnant stomach. Then he says it: “I have found a way to save you.”
When she asks what he means, he explains he’s talking about his nightmares, the dreams where she dies in childbirth. He promises he won’t lose her. Padmé smiles and says she’s not going to die. Anakin doesn’t back down. He tells her he promises, and that he’s becoming so powerful with his new knowledge of the Force that he’ll be able to keep her from dying.
The narration makes it clear how this looks to Luke. Anakin’s smile is described as “small” and “hard,” full of secrets and fear, and when he hugs Padmé it feels less like a normal embrace and more like he’s claiming her. Luke watches that and ends the scene feeling uneasy and a little afraid for her, even though he already knows how the story ends.
That’s the first big shift. Luke finally sees that his father didn’t start from pure ambition. Anakin is terrified of losing Padmé and is already convinced that more power and forbidden knowledge are the only way to stop it.
Second Recording: The Temple Massacre
Later, Luke forces R2 to open another locked file. This time the angle is different—not from R2’s own recorder, but from a stolen security feed from the old Jedi Temple’s Room of a Thousand Fountains.
At first the room is empty, just water and stone. Then the sound of blasterfire cuts in. Blue bolts rip through the holo, shattering fountains, burning holes in the walls, disappearing into the high ceiling. A stream of Jedi children starts backing into the chamber.
The youngest kids turn and run or try to hide. The older ones fight back—using the Force to throw benches and debris, firing captured rifles, or trying to deflect bolts with freshly built lightsabers. Most of them don’t last long. They block a handful of shots before one finally gets through.
Then teenage Padawans arrive, forming a line with their lightsabers against a column of advancing troops in early stormtrooper-style armor. Han recognizes the armor and calls them what they are: clone troopers.
A huge, stoop-shouldered Jedi steps in to anchor the line. He sends bolt after bolt back into the clones and cuts troopers down one by one. For a brief moment, it works. The Padawans and this single Jedi hold the corridor. Nothing gets past them.
Then a blue lightsaber sweeps in from the edge of the frame. It drops one Padawan, then another. Behind it we see the back of a blond head and a caped figure pressing the attack. The duel with the older Jedi is short. The caped figure slips a strike and brings his blade down into the Jedi’s shoulder, cutting deep into his torso. The defender collapses, and without him the line falls apart. The clones flood past and finish the children.
Only when the last body falls does the attacker pause and look straight toward the security cam. The face is sunken, angry, the mouth a hard line—but there’s no doubt who it is. It’s Anakin Skywalker, already acting as Vader in everything but the armor.
Luke cuts the recording there and walks away. When Han checks on him in his quarters, Luke is sitting cross-legged with his eyes closed, quietly meditating while the furniture around him floats in the air. It hits him that hard.
What Luke Finally Understands About Why Anakin Became Vader
By the end of those recordings, Luke finally has more than Obi-Wan’s line about Anakin being “seduced by the dark side.” He’s seen his father scared of losing Padmé, convinced he needs more power and secret knowledge to stop her dying, and willing to reach beyond what the Jedi teach to get it.
Then he’s forced to watch Anakin leading clone troopers through the Jedi Temple, cutting down Padawans and Younglings in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Seeing that with his own eyes – from the security feed, not as a story – makes it clear this wasn’t just a fall in name only. Anakin chose a path built on fear and never stopped until it turned him into Darth Vader.
Put together, those recordings give Luke a straightforward picture: Anakin was terrified of losing Padmé, convinced he needed more power and secret knowledge to stop it, and willing to follow that path all the way to leading clones into the Temple and killing Jedi children. It isn’t some clean, distant fall—it’s a chain of choices driven by fear, and Luke finally gets to see each step instead of just hearing the final verdict.