Why Anakin’s Lightsaber Didn’t Turn Red in ‘Revenge of the Sith’?

‘Star Wars: The Acolyte’ concluded its final episode this week. Despite struggling with pacing and other issues throughout its run, the show managed to redeem itself to some extent with two major cameos and one standout moment, leaving viewers hopeful for the future. The standout moment occurs after Osha kills Master Sol, showcasing in real time how Sith lightsabers are made.

When Qimir approaches Osha, who is looking at the dead body of Master Sol, she activates her lightsaber. We briefly see the Kyber crystal becoming corrupted as her lightsaber slowly changes from blue to red. The official in-universe explanation is that Osha poured all her negative emotions, such as grief, hatred, and anger, into the Kyber crystal, corrupting it. This process can also be reversed, which is how Ahsoka created her white lightsabers.

Given that Osha isn’t the only Sith experiencing extreme negative emotions on screen, it raises the question of why this is the first time we’ve seen a lightsaber turn red. A notable moment when this could have happened is in ‘Revenge of the Sith’ when Anakin kills the younglings, yet his lightsaber remains blue. Why?

Firstly, while it logically could have happened it also couldn’t. Lightsabers don’t automatically turn red when someone embraces the dark side, and his crystal wasn’t taken from a fallen Jedi. Additionally, Anakin’s lightsaber needed to stay blue for continuity purposes.

The process of bleeding a crystal requires a conscious effort. When Anakin killed all those people, he wasn’t holding his crystal, so no matter how many he killed, his lightsaber wouldn’t have turned red because he wasn’t trying to bleed the crystal.

Osha’s situation was different; she bled the crystal unconsciously while holding it, meaning her emotions were directly connected to it.

Darth Vader’s process of creating his red lightsaber is shown in ‘Star Wars: Darth Vader #5,’ highlighting the difficulty involved.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments below!