Fans ponder why the Jedi needed to depart Shmi Skywalker in slavery on Tatooine

Star Wars: The Phantom Menace lays the bedrock for the Skywalker saga, with Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi’s unplanned go to to Tatooine altering the course of galactic historical past. Most of this facilities on the younger Anakin Skywalker, who the pair shortly understand is very Force-sensitive.

Despite Anakin being too previous to start Jedi coaching they save him from slavery and take him to Coruscant, setting in movement a series of occasions that results in the autumn of the Galactic Republic, Luke and Leia’s births, and the rise of Darth Vader. But there’s one key alternative made that will have modified the whole lot – deciding to go away Anakin’s mom Shmi Skywalker behind.

This proved to have severe penalties. Shmi’s destiny ate away at Anakin, leaving him anxious about his mom’s situation, and when he lastly tried to rescue her, he found she’d been tortured to demise by Tusken Raiders. He took his bloody revenge in opposition to them, marking one of many first instances he really embraced the Dark Side.

Now fans on r/StarWars are asking why the Jedi couldn’t simply take Shmi together with them. While Shmi and Anakin would have needed to be separated anyway throughout his Jedi coaching, couldn’t they’ve discovered her a secure spot on a close-by planet?

The replies level out that Shmi had a bomb implanted in her that preveneds her from merely being flown away, however provided that the Jedi have apparently infinite assets certainly they may have simply purchased her? The counterpoint to that may be a fan mentioning that Shmi didn’t keep a slave for lengthy after The Phantom Menace, as Cliegg Lars freed her from Watto after which married her.

But maybe the largest takeaway is that the Jedi’s remedy of Shmi is proof that the Order wasn’t essentially all sunshine and roses. Their strict guidelines in opposition to private attachment have come again to chunk them on a number of events, and it’s foolish to completely take away kids from their households and never anticipate them to undergo emotional injury.

It’d be an attention-grabbing ‘What If…?’ to discover what’d have occurred if the Jedi had taken Shmi with them. We suspect the galaxy can be a much more peaceable place.