The face of the Star Wars movies, Darth Vader may be a villain but he is the guy that made Star Wars the legend it is today. With a Black Helmet, the heavy breathing sound, the coarse Voice, the black cape and with a Hulk of a figure; Darth Vader’s image screams – ‘Mess with me and I will rip your heart out!’ But many do not know a lot about his past. Sure he was Anakin Skywalker but what about after he became Vader? Presenting the Fascinating Origin Story of Darth Vader’s Red Lightsaber….
Spoiler Alert: The Following Paragraphs contain Major Spoilers for the Darth Vader comics. If you still haven’t read it yet, run away little rabbits….
The Origin Story of Vader’s Lightsaber has been finally revealed. As Anakin Skywalker, he held a Jedi Lightsaber in combat but that is now owned by Obi-Wan Kenobi and will be passed down to Luke Skywalker after Luke becomes a Jedi. But Vader does indeed hold a Lightsaber in combat during the start of the Original Trilogy. How did he obtain one when he had lost his own Lightsaber??
If you think the Empire made one for him, you are dead wrong. The Sith Order proclaims that Lightsabers for a Sith initiate can only be obtained by the candidate by killing a Jedi in combat. Since the Legends Expanded Universe has been declared non canon, the burden of rewriting Vader’s Origin Stories now falls to Marvel comics. And they have found out an interesting way to do it. As soon as Darth Vader opens his eyes after surgery in the new comics’ series, Emperor Palpatine greets him. They look over the public destruction of the Jedi Lightsabers in Coruscant as Emperor Palpatine gives him his first mission as Darth Vader – Kill a Jedi that escaped Order 66 and claim his Lightsaber as your own.
The Fight begins:
Since the Jedi Order has been mostly annihilated, it is a bit of a conundrum for Vader to obtain a new Lightsaber by killing a Jedi. It is then revealed that there exists a sect of the Order called the Bashar Vow. The Vow is a form of penance that a Jedi voluntarily undertakes. He cuts himself completely from the world and surrenders himself to the Force. A Jedi that has taken the Bashar Vow will only observe and analyze the world but never interfere. One such member of the Bashar Vow is a champion fighter by the name of Kirak Infil’a. And Vader is coming for his head.
As soon as the two meet, Kirak realizes Vader has destroyed the Order. The two fight and Kirak, the clearly more experienced fighter of the two, immediately makes quick work of his artificial limbs to defeat Darth Vader. Even when broken and limbless, Vader is not someone who will stay down and shy away from a rematch. Vader unleashes his rage on Kirak. Kirak is killed along with a nearby city filled with Innocent civilians as collateral damage as punishment for making Vader angry.
The Lightsaber is made to bleed:
There was once a time when Khyber Crystals were mined from planets. Then it was ret-conned. In the new story, the Khyber Crystals (the gem like things that create the laser blade in the Lightsaber swords) are synthetically created by the Sith and the Jedi. The Sith then perform an additional step. They intentionally make the Crystal Red as a tribute to their ancestors’ ‘Bloodshine Blades’.
That has also been ret-conned. The new story is even more intense and darker. The Khyber Crystals have a will of their own. They are objects of the Light Side of the Force by default. A Sith has to break its will by pouring all his hate into the Crystal. The Crystal tries to fight back by showing Anakin Skywalker glimpses of his past, one last ditch attempt to bring him back to the Light Side. Anakin returns to Palpatine and shows his Red Lightsaber. He has now become a True Sith Lord.
The Lightsaber is then destroyed when the Khyber Crystal inside it breaks into shrapnel on one of his later missions to track down potential Jedi recruits.
Vader then finally builds his famous Red Lightsaber:
While asking the Computer A.I as to who set up the ambush that destroyed his Lightsaber, Vader is seen working on repairing his laser blade. The original chrome lined design of Kirik’s sword hilt is gone, replaced with a design that is reminiscent of Anakins’ first Jedi Lightsaber. The new Red Lightsaber now has a hilt that puts more emphasis on Black and a metal body to match the all Black metal bodied frame of Darth Vader.
That is the same sword you see later in the Original Star Wars Trilogy until it is lost forever in Return of the Jedi.
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