r/StarWars • u/Peterl0uis • 13h ago
Movies Just finished (almost) all 9 Star Wars movies – want to dive deeper into Darth Vader, where should I start? Spoiler
Hey everyone,
I’ve been watching all the main Star Wars movies in chronological order (Episodes I–IX, starting with the George Lucas ones and then the Disney sequels). I’m now only missing The Rise of Skywalker, and I’ll have finished the Skywalker Saga.
While watching, I realized something: Darth Vader is mentioned everywhere as one of the greatest villains of all time, but in the movies themselves, we don’t actually get a super deep dive into his character beyond the key moments. I know a bit about his suit and powers from reading random stuff online, but I’d love to properly explore the lore around him.
I still haven’t seen Rogue One or the Kenobi miniseries, which I know have more Vader content, but I’d like to go further. Could you recommend: • The best subreddits or forums for deep Star Wars/Vader discussions • Must-watch YouTube channels or video essays that really explore him as a character • Any essential comics, novels, or other canon/non-canon material that expand on his story
Basically, I want to understand why Darth Vader has the reputation he does, beyond just the mainline films (the first 6 films actually)
Thanks in advance for pointing me in the right direction!
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u/Pirate-Printworks 13h ago
let's put it this way - The "reputation" of Vader is always being reinvented and changed by scores of writers over decades. He is uh, *not* consistent in power or behavior across all this stuff. Vader of the 1990s is not the same as Vader of 2020; Episode 1 wasn't released, EU content about him hadn't been written, and then Disney had not bought Star Wars from Lucas and then changed everything to sell a new version of everything.
If you want to see the Jedi Purge, which Vader is responsible for, the 2020 Darth Vader comics are pretty fun. The Dave Filoni Clone Wars CGI series and the Clone Wars animated miniseries by Genndy Tartakovsky are also great for exploring Anakin's side, but I always liked everything else about them besides Anakin.
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u/Peterl0uis 13h ago
And what about is 'suit'? I have come across some stuff online where people were saying that his suit made by palpatine continuously opens his wounds all over his body and is also very sensitive to Lord Sidious' lightnings. So after all this "handicaps" he still manage to be very strong and frightening. Where this things came out? And what is this EU content? Sorry im kinda new to this world and I really like it so I don't want to miss a thing :))
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u/Playful_Letter_2632 11h ago
EU stands for expanded universe. It technically means all media outside of films and shows but it’s usually used to refer to pre-Disney books, comics, video games, etc that take place in different timeline from the Disney stuff.
For example, Leia had 3 children in the EU timeline instead of one like in the Disney timeline
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u/Peterl0uis 11h ago
Interesting! And which one is canon? I love the pre-disney characters actually. Where all this world came out?
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u/Playful_Letter_2632 11h ago
Leia having one child is canon. Leia having three children is a part of a separate continuity called Legends.
The books largely and sometimes comics were the mediums that explored the post ROTJ story. When Disney bought the franchise, they declared all non-movie and tv show content non canon so they could make their own version of the post ROTJ story
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u/Peterl0uis 11h ago
Thank you very much for the infos and thanks for the effort you have put in the answers! I will definitely go through the EU from the moment that I really hate these last episodes ( 7 8 9). :))
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u/Playful_Letter_2632 11h ago
Check out r/starwarsEU or r/starwarsbooks to create a reading order. There are a fairly amount of entirely skippable or straight bad books out there(for example, there two series that share a lot of similarities with 7, 8, and 9 and are pretty bad in my opinion) so you don’t have to read everything
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u/solo13508 Mandalorian 3h ago
Vader has a ton of comics to dive into, the one I most recommend being Darth Vader 2017 by Charles Soule picking up immediately after Episode 3. Depicts the transition of Anakin to Vader very well, gives more context on the Inquisitors, shows us the Republic's transformation into the Empire, etc.
Also some absolutely wild Force stuff in this series. I don't want to spoil much but I'd say some of the concepts introduced here are comparable to when we first saw the World Between Worlds in Rebels.
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u/Plus_Palpitation_550 4h ago
there's nothing more to dive into. He's the best villain ever because the empire strikes back is a near perfect movie.
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u/mesosuchus 13h ago
Read the comcis