Star Wars Collectible: Episode 2 : Darth Vader (Bespin Duel) Action Figure

Darth Vader The evil and much feared military commander, Darth Vader seeks to bring young Luke Skywalker over to the dark side. As the two battle on a precarious outer walkway on Bespin, Vader reveals a shocking secret that shatters Luke’s world. - blurb from the action figure package.

Character Background: Darth Vader: Bespin Duel

Of all the characters from the six-film Star Wars series, perhaps none other is more interesting than Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith. Two meters tall and encased in a life-sustaining suit of armor topped off by a Nazi-looking helmet and gargoyle-like breath mask, Vader was initially thought to be the personification of evil itself. In Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope he was presented as one of the Emperor’s sinister agents; a fallen Jedi Knight who had once been Obi-Wan Kenobi’s pupil and was seduced by the dark side of the Force. And although writer-director George Lucas revealed that Vader had various Force-derived powers (such as being able to sense other Force users or to strangle people from a distance), he didn’t give Vader too much depth of character in the first movie.

In The Empire Strikes Back, we saw a more developed but still mysterious Vader. He dominates the film (perhaps a bit more than Lucas intended) with his dynamic presence, and it is his pursuit of Luke Skywalker and his friends that basically drives the storyline along to its stunning climax in the bowels of Cloud City. As written by Lucas and screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan, Vader is not only shown to be the Emperor’s main enforcer and most dreaded commander, but as a man with a secret plan: on the surface he says he will bring Luke to the dark side to serve Sidious/Palpatine, but what he really wants to do – consistent with the nature of the Sith – is to train his son as a Dark Lord and overthrow the Emperor: