#but i think some takes on anakin & order 66 fail to recognise the full evil genius of palpatine's manipulations? maybe?

[arianeemorythethird]

Today's horrible Star Wars thought, prompted by some meta I'm not sure I fully agree with: when would have Anakin actually found out what the inhibitor chips really do?

According to RotS Anakin's not present when Palpatine sends out Order 66, he's already heading out with the 501st for the Jedi Temple. And up until that point, just like the rest of the Jedi Council, he knew that inhibitor chips existed but had no idea they could actually control minds and cause the clones to act against their will.

So when would he have actually found out the truth? I think there's actually two options here.

Option one is that in some missing moment after Mace's death, while Anakin was swearing himself to Palpatine, Palpatine told him ahead of time exactly what the inhibitor chips would do. This is possible, and frankly I think there's a decent chance Anakin would have gone along with Order 66 regardless - but I don't think it's the likeliest option.

At this point Anakin is, frankly, delusional, and he's flipflopping all over the place. A few hours ago he was completely loyal to the Jedi and turned Palpatine over to them. Could Palpatine be totally confident Anakin was completely and securely under his control and wouldn't change his mind yet again?

Sure, by the time Anakin commits himself to the Sith he is fully onboard the Jedi=evil train with Palpatine, fuelled partly by his resentment towards the Jedi Council but primarily, imo, by his desperation to erase his guilt over betraying Mace by convincing himself that the Jedi were traitors all along so he did nothing wrong. But "support me, the Jedi are evil, btw these people you trust and feel responsible for don't agree so I'm going to have to use mindcontrol and fully enslave them so they help us" doesn't fit into this neat narrative Anakin is using to justify himself. And it surely would have had the potential to trigger Anakin's slavery issues - in the wrong direction for Palpatine's purposes. It might be a low risk, at this point, but it's still a risk.

But also, there was a better option and one that, imo, better fits Palpatine's usual style.

Because option two is that Palpatine doesn't tell Anakin the truth about the inhibitor chips immediately. He just tells Anakin that the clones are loyal to Palpatine and the Senate (and, critically, Padme), and the clones have realised that the Jedi are traitors too, and Anakin should trust them.

And sure enough! Anakin's men in the 501st willingly attack the Jedi Temple with him, even down to helping him kill kids. Anakin can sense as, all over the galaxy, other clones turn on their Jedi generals. The Jedi must be evil, if the clones are turning on them too; Anakin must be doing the right thing.

In the critical moment when Anakin was still only taking his first steps into the dark it would reinforce his delusions, it would reinforce the worldview Palpatine was trying to push him towards, where Jedi were evil traitors and Palpatine (and Anakin, and the clones) were doing the right thing for the greater good.

And of course, it would give Palpatine something extra to torture Vader with, much later - much, much later. Another atrocity to bind them both together, and keep Vader feeling like he was irredeemable, he was so deep in the dark he wouldn't deserve to find a way out.

And like - this is not an exoneration of Anakin. He should have known something was wrong. In their right minds the clones would never have killed kids on Anakin's orders, they'd never have turned on the Jedi - but quite frankly if Anakin himself was in a place to recognise that, he wouldn't have been killing those kids himself, you know?