The irony of her dying because Annakin turned sith is huge. He only turned to the darkside because of a vision he had of her dying and he was looking for a means to save her. But she never would of died if he didn't turn sith in the first place. Seems like the original vision he had was poison planted by Palpatine.

My thoughts on this: Padme had two incredibly powerful Force sensitive children inside her, so some of the Force flowed into her. I believe she gave her life force to keep Anakin alive, whether willing or not. Also, remember she says there was still good in Anakin (which she would know as she was connected to him through the Force), and she says this as she delivers Luke. Luke eventually realizes there was still good in Vader, as I believe Luke was imprinted with this at birth. Luke could feel or hear Padme saying this like an echo in the Force. Leia had only memories of her mother, who she never saw. I think Leia felt and was imprinted with the memories of Padme being sad over the fate of Anakin. I can see Palaptine using the Dark Side to connect and use her life force to keep Vader alive but also unintentionally bringing a piece of the Light Side (the love Padme felt for Anakin and her children) to life deep inside Vader.

A life devoted to peace and love, Padme had the determination and compassion to inspire those around her to do better. Being around her was a refreshing experience, and I sensed she had all the qualities we look for in a Jedi (if she had the inclination and the midi-count). Her last acts came from love, giving birth to twins and pleading for others to see the good in Anakin (such as it was). When she died we lost not only her, but also a bright star of hope in the Universe that took decades to rekindle.

I always saw Padme’s death as the will of either the Force, Palaptine, or even Vader (after he felt betrayed). The thing was Padme’s will to bring Luke and Leia into the world was just strong enough and only strong enough to keep her alive long enough to see them both born.

People have completely forgotten that heart break is a real thing and you can actually die from it. Padme was stricken with such intense heartbreak and sadness, it literally broke her heart.

What's wrong with "she lost the will to live"? Couples have it happen when one dies, and the other ends up following. We even had Carrie Fisher's mother have the same happen after Carrie's death. Why are fans so pissy about the concept of being so heart broken that the body just doesn't feel like going on?

I like to think that it was a bit of everything. Childbirth, weakness, depression, sadness and even Palpatine. I always found it a bit suspicious that he knew about the dreams and Anakin's obsession with saving her. Yes, it is true that Anakin told him many things, but it does not seem that here he told him anything. In fact, it is Palpatine who brings up the subject of Darth Plagueis at exactly the right time.

This is why we need a real What If Star Wars series. Imagine stories being told by The Father, stories like if Padme never died, if qui-gon ginn never died, what if darth Maul never lost his legs, what if Grievous was force sensitive, what if Anakin killed Obi-Wan, what if Plagueis killed palpatine, what if Yoda gave in to his dark side. We can even have the dark side Son being the main Antagonist or even have Abeloth as the ultimate villain...so many possibilities 🤔

The "canon" explanation brings up two questions. 1, If Palpatine drained Padme's life force as she was giving birth to Luke and Leia, wouldn't Palpatine have felt the twins through the force? 2, If Palpatine drained Padme's life force through the force, wouldn't both Obi Wan and Yoda, who were present when the twins were born, have felt that through the force?

I remember there was a media or an explanation by someone that stated that in the audio, the moment Padmes Heart stops beating, vader breather for the first time. Palpatine drained her life so he could live and thats why he says "in your anger you killed her

I always thought the choking got her killed and she only survived as long as she did was because story plot had to get Luke and Leia out before she died. I think Anakin’s visions was more of a warning that his path he chosen got Padme killed. His anger has always been there long before Attack of the clones. He almost killed a fellow Padawan in a rage.

Anakin's story is a about a man who entirely went nuts because of nightmares that resulted in a lack of sleep. In episode two he already had a simalar nervous breakdown and the case was also a lack of sleep because of nightmares that haunted him.

This is a way better explanation for Padme's death than what many speculated. I actually theorized this when this phenomenon happened. The droids had no explanation for why she was dying. The force ability to heal others comes with the cost of the life force of either the user or someone else. Thank you for this video.

Force choke + childbirth = a bad combination. I don't see why it ever needed to be more complicated than that. This is definitely one of those times where Star Wars is overdoing things.

In response to all the people saying “wouldn’t palpatine have felt the twins?” Etc etc….here’s a possibility. Anakins birth was seemingly a direct retaliation of midichlorians against darth plagueis for his attempts to subjugate them and create life and live eternally himself. They directly lashed out against him by creating anakin. Wouldn’t it make sense that since palpatine was plagueis’ apprentice, and carried on with some of his work in hunting for eternal life that they could also have continued the retaliation by masking like and Leia from sidious? They could’ve been playing the long game with the Vader/Luke/sidious rotj arc to return balance to the force.

The more I learn about things like Darth Vader's suit, how Padme really died and so forth, the more I wish that they were covered in the movies.

Unlikely, but it is possible to die from a broken heart. Although what you said is more likely given the fact that Palps put his hand over Vader's head presumably force healing him. When Padme said, "There's still good in him," she still remained optimistic despite seeing Anakin turned and being her being force choked.

I agree. That's why the necklace Anakin gave Padme was shown In the casket. I think Sidious used the necklace as the tool to drain Padmes life and transfer it to Anakin. I have noticed in SW the 1st meaning of something isn't always the real meaning..

Its soo sad! as I got older and rewatched ROTS and I realized palpatine killed padme all along. He had the power to save people from dyin; he kept saying it. during the vader suit scene You can hear Anakin say "Padme help me" right before his heart stops and dies only for padme to die instead and save anakin from death. This blew my mind years later after realizing!

If you havent watched the clone wars series, Padme is more than just a Senator.

If Palpy was able to reach out and drain her life force and feed it to Anakin, how was he unable to sense the other two life forces within her?

This explanation makes sense because before they took Vader off of Mustafar, we see Palpatine put his hand out over Vader’s burnt body, as if giving him life of some sort. And the idea of draining Padme’s life force to sustain Vader seems like an ability that Palpatine would be able to possess.

Seems legit. I always thought that when anakin choked her, it ended up delaying oxygen flow to her brain, and her body just focused on saving the babies.

It seems odd that Yoda wouldn't be able to feel that through the force. I mean Obi Wan wasn't particularly talented in using the force, but Yoda certainly was.

Wouldn’t Palpatine sense the twins while he was draining Padme?

Yes! This was what I wholeheartedly believed and it is true. I’m so happy. I love Padmé’s character so much. She deserves better than being thrown into the background of, “oh she just died because she was heartbroken and gave up”. She’s not the kind of person that would have done that. Despite it being incredibly difficult to move on from being betrayed so greatly. She still would have found a way. She would have lived for her children. And she probably would have held onto the hope that Anakin wasn’t entirely lost. Just as her dying words were. But Palpatine is incredibly methodical and knew would have been a great threat to him if she wasn’t killed. So what better way to make Vader completely consumed by the Dark Side then to say he killed his wife. The one person he was so desperate to save. And I love that this is reflected in Ben in the sequels. The only way to heal another or to save them is to give them your own life force. It’s an act of selflessness to sacrifice your own life to save others.

I never thought it was sadness, i thought it was a combination of birth and force choking.

Would Yoda and Kenobi not felt this strangeness in the Force? Would Palpatine not know about the birth? And the existence of twins? Too many holes here.

A simple question. How come 2 of the greatest force wielders of the galaxy(Yoda and Obi wan) who were present at the scene not sense something like this. Palps had to be using huge amounts of force energy, heck padme would be enjoying some kind of force signature as her life was being drained. Were the Jedi really going to be this damn stupid, because at this point their hubris is completely gone with Yoda himself recognising the hubris during his duel with palpatine. How could they not have sensed something like this happening when the force energy was literally being transferred halfway across the galaxy?

“She’s lost the will to live? What is your degree? In poetry?”

I can't buy the argument. The lesser flaw is Palpatine's knowledge of the twins' existence. Unless he kept it quiet in order to use it later, that is. The most obvious issue though is how would Obi Wan and Yoda have missed that? C'mon man!

Imagine if Vader came to padmè’s funeral and just said “I’m not fighting, I’m here for peace” and when the funeral was over he just got on his ship and kept to his promise

Where was this explanation found? If it was a common misconception, why wasn’t this particular explanation more obvious in the film? If this is true this is far more tragic than dying of a broken heart, but I feel like that would have been evident that he was draining her life force from across the galaxy in order to save Vader. Although a pretty dope scenario, it just sounds like a stretch to me. No offense.

If Palpatine did kill Padme then Anakin killing the Emperor in ROTJ avenges her death

Unless I'm missing something, everything I've seen about the power to syphon life force into another requires close proximity of all parts, the victim, the conduit (one conducting the force life exchange) and the receiver. In that case, Padme, Anikin, and Palatine would all have to be at the very least on the same planet which is not the case. Because of this, I do not buy that is cause of death.

I actually believed she died by giving birth to Luke and Leia cause she conceived twins who are two strong force sensitves with the chosen ones power in the force and that was the one that killed her

I understand this explanation, but is it actually canonized? If so, what's the source in canon? It totally makes sense, but I've seen nothing to indicate that it's the actual reason. Broken Heart is the official reason until it's been further explained elsewhere. And while I understand "broken heart syndrome" it isn't something that typically happens at childbirth when a mother has two beautiful and healthy children to love. As it currently stands (broken heart), it's still a poor ending for Padme.

I was under the impression that Anakin unknowingly drained Padme’s life force to prolong his own; instead of Palpatine doing this instead.

I’ve heard this before and I believe it-when you look at the scene and the way that they filmed it-it makes complete sense. There’s a reason they show her death at the same time they show Anakin’s surgery-because the emperor is draining the living force from her.

I have to disagree with this only due to the fact that if Palpatine was draining her Obi-Wan and Yoda would've been able to sense it. Yes I know he was very powerful and may not have been able to be stopped...but there's no way he would've been able to hide it since he had been exposed as Darth Sideous

It seems reasonable, but Obi-wan was also in the room during the delivery. Why didn't he sense it? Such a strong use of the force would have been sensed by him. Moreso, there were times Ahsoka, being a padme, sensed weird uses of the force in the clone war animated series not to mention a Jedi master like Kenobi.

It’s the Emotional Damage

Padme also declares there is good in him (I know) and I think part of the good energy or good/light life force in Anakin kept him alive while Padme faded away. Otherwise after such severe injuries, Anakin really would have died. So yes, Padme’s light went to Anakin, kept him alive and remained buried deep inside Darth Vader.

That's basically what I always thought... Palpatine was the cause of his dreams through the Force as a means of manipulation, to play on his fears and drive him towards the Dark Side. He'd probably been behind the dreams of his mother Shmi being captured by the Sandpeople and used that to drive him toward the Dark Side, as Yoda warned him about attachments and fear of losing people. I figured through the Force Palpatine even managed to guide the Sandpeople to Shmi to capture her. It makes sense he would drain Padme's life force to save Vader, and in the process claim through a distortion of the truth that Vader had killed her, even planting the fact that he had in fact taken on her life force willingly to save himself when he was dying, thanks to Palpatine providing the conduit by stealing her life force and transferring it to Anakin/Vader when he was weakest, without him really realizing til later where the source of life energy came from. Padme would NOT have 'died of a broken heart" or some such rubbish-- a mother's love for her children and need to protect them would have given her the strength of will to overcome her loss of Anakin to the Dark Side, except that Palpatine managed to suck her life force out of her to divert it to Vader while she was most vulnerable. The movie SHOULD have done better at explaining this. BUT like a lot of things in the prequels, they spent too much time on setup and diversionary stuff rather than really developing the characters and getting everything setup for the finale, where everything was basically "in place" for the years between Anakin turning to the Dark Side and Luke and Leia's birth, to the point where the original Star Wars A New Hope started off. That's one of the main things I think that left people so disenchanted with the prequels. Personally I think the prequels are definitely the best looking and most technically brilliant of the Star Wars films, the penultimate of the visuals and special effects. Too bad the writing and storytelling was so "all over the map." I think they bit off more than they could chew-- they should have just started later in Anakin's life, rather than in childhood, and kept a tighter focus on him. Of course it's a hard balance to strike. The entire premise of the prequels was going to cause a lot of divergence of opinion and a lot of unhappy people anyway-- we know that they started at point "A" (where Anakin comes into contact with the Jedi order) and ended up at point "M" (the beginning of "A New Hope"), AND we know that there were various points like C, D, E, F, and G along the way that happened to the other characters, like Obi-Wan and Yoda, and various events like B, G, H, and I, that occurred along the way (the decline and fall of the Old Republic, the rise of the Empire, destruction of the Jedi Order, Anakin becoming Vader and destroying the Jedi, etc). SO we KNOW starting out that we're gonna start at "A" and end up at "M" and that these other things have to happen in there SOMEWHERE, that we learned from the previous movies... BUT like a long road trip, there are MULTIPLE WAYS to get there. I drive from Houston to Indiana to see in the inlaws twice a year-- there's myriad different ways to go, different freeways, different cities, different states. Some are out of the way a bit but faster, some are more direct but slower, some go to different places we like to visit from time to time and aren't too far out of the way. In the same manner, the prequels have a definite start and ending point (more flexibility on the start point actually, but the ending point always had to have all the characters in place where they would end up in "A New Hope". WHATEVER path they chose out of the possibilities, SOME people WOULD have been upset, because people naturally take what they know and made up their own stories of how this or that happened... so the prequels BY THEIR NATURE were going to be controversial and leave some people disappointed when it didn't happen the way they IMAGINED that it did before they came out. The sequels on the other hand were just a complete betrayal of everything that had come before-- they'd have been better had they struck off in a new direction with new characters and not referenced the original movies or prequels hardly at all... other than the fact they were in the same universe 20 years in the future... the complete mishandling and sh!tting on everything that came before and all the original characters was just a travesty and unforgivable. Later! OL J R :)

honestly, no. Pandabear still died of a broken heart,otherwise Kenobi and especially Yoda are sidiously dumb

I remembered them saying in the movie she seems to have lost the will to live. I could never understand that quote and I just didn't get it. Fast forward many years and my wife's friend, her father passed away, and his wife, who had been with him pretty much her whole life, had three children together, she lost the will to live. She was healthy but heart broken and she simple stopped caring for anything and a couple weeks later she passed away. It was an eye opening thing.

The older I get and the more people I've known who 'lose the will to live' or 'die of a broken heart' grows, the more plausible Padme dying from that becomes.

I’ve always believed that Palpatine was the reason for Padme’s death. There’s a reason that he smiled when he lied to Vader, When Vader asked if Padme was okay. Palpatine definitely killed Padme.

Palpatine drained Padme’s life force to keep Anakin alive? From the moon Luke and Leia were delivered on? Palpatine is given too much credit in this explanation.

Excellent explanation! It makes sense. When Palpatine told Vader about Padme's death, he laughed watching his apprentice suffering. He was enjoying the moment, because he knew she was dead.

Well this is good to hear sorta. My initial impression when watching the movie was she died of sadness and it infurated me to no end. It felt so out of character for her and I wondered what was going to happen to the scene regarding Leia talking about her mother in the original three. Was one of my favorite old scenes no longer cannon? Padme was such a strong character and it still sucks she was fridged in the end but finding out it was due to the Palpatine makes it sting a little less.

I don’t like this explanation. Does this mean that Palpatine can drain anyone’s life force from wherever he is in the galaxy? Why wouldn’t he use this ability to kill Obi Wan or Windu from the other side of the galaxy? Or anyone else he wanted dead?

I‘ll take dying of a broken heart explanation over Palpatine sapping her life. See absolutely no reason why two of the strongest Jedi couldn’t have sensed that, especially given they were in Padme‘s company.

As much I LOVE this explanation, I wanted to comment that "broken heart syndrome" is an actual medical condition called "Takotsubo Cardiomyopathy", which can be triggered by extreme stressful emotional situations and result in cardiac arrest. Anakin and Padmè's argument on Mustafar, as well as all that had happened in the previous weeks leading up to Irder 66, and culminating in Anakin force choking Padmé while pregnant, is more than enough reason to trigger an event like that. This explains why the Medical Droids and the rest of the characters (as well as the audience), willingly believed it to be so. It has nothing to do with "strength of character", age, or physical health. The way GL wrote it, was to fuel the irony of Anakin causing Padmè's death, while trying to save her.

Maybe the droid misdiagnosed her and the dream came true that she actually died in Childbirth.

I figured Palpatine implanted the visions of her death into his dreams so he would turn to the darkside to save her, and then when he choked her in that scene the stress from that event is what caused things to go wrong in childbirth, making it so she never would have died had he not tried to save her in the first place.

Can you really call it a "misunderstanding" when you have to dive deep into the lore to come up with an excuse and the movie (the main and vaunted Stand-Alone cannon) does absolutely nothing to justify this explanation? I don't think so. I just think George F'd up and now we're making excuses.

"Common misunderstanding by fans" is a funny way of saying "what they were explicitly told"

Yes! Thank you for this video. I’m obsessed with several Wayward Jedi KZfaq videos on this exact topic under “Love is the Balance” theme 👍 Yin/Yang

if I remember correctly is Palpatine use Anakin and Padme connection to give her life force to Anakin also I blame Obi-Wan for Padme death if he never told her he fell to the dark side she would never went to the planet but there is one Theory I'm still trying to figure out did Palpatine give Anakin those bad dreams

I always thought that aniken rly was the one who killed her when he force choked her he did something which injured her which is why the emperor actually says “in your rage you killed her”.

As Dexter Jettster once said in regards to the analysis ability of droids, “I should think that you Jedi would have more respect for the difference between knowledge and… heh heh heh… wisdom.”

Well that makes a lot of sense. This is my opinion because the way Padme died seems to suggest that she never moved on into the afterlife, if there is one in the Star Wars Universe. Because the way Padme died, it seems like her spirit lived on around her son, Luke and she likely influenced him, which could explain why Luke thought highly of his father and make it common goal to redeem Darth Vader.

Emperor Palpatine murdered her😤

Here's a question. If Yoda and Obi-Wan were there when this happened. How come they did not sense this or uo force heal to help her.

She died of a broken heart, as Lucas explained. The same way Carrie Fisher's mother died.

Took Death & Dying (sociology class). One of the speakers was hospice nurse. She said mothers of young children hold on to life the hardest

I love this so much more then a 'broken heart.' This woman was an absolute badass and I truly believe if she had lived she would have been one of the founding members of the rebellion against the Empire.

The Stupendous Wave: "It was Palaptine, and his dark side ability of using Padme's life force to keep Vader alive that killed her, and not simply a broken heart." Me: "I know. Somehow... I've always known."

The only thing Luke remember of his Padme his biological mother was her saying before she died that “There’s still good in him.”

That can't have been the reason because they were in a different system when she died and both Obiwan and Yoda were near her and sensed nothing...

Plagueis could "keep the ones he loved from dying". Palps told Anakin 'together, we can learn the secret' (which Palps did). Later, during childbirth, the med droids tell *us* Padme is healthy but still dying - and that is when *we* learn how he saved people from death: by transferring (stealing) life force (no pun intended). We see Anakin, Padme, Anakin, Padme; it was right in front of us.

We shouldn't have to buy additional books/comics to get the full story. If people don't get what your intention is because you don't tell them the fault is with you

Before even watching the video my headcanon has always been that Palpatine drained her life and used it to keep Anakin alive. I don't remember who but someone once mentioned the possibility in a video and said thats why Lea died right before Hans ghost came to speak to Ben Solo. Lea drained her own life to bring Han back long enough to reach Ben. Edit: I'm an idiot I think I got this headcanon from you.

I beleive padme was an actual "ascended" or "earth Angel" in terms of an accomplished soul living as humans to guide humanity. Her homeworld is the same as palpatine and when Anakin as innocent as a child ask her if she was an Angel. She chuckled as to any kid inocence. She was proeficient in pretty much every field of work she went in and parted extensive maturity for her age.

THANK YOU! I have always hated the broken heart crap for such an iconic character. Always thought good ol Palpy was behind it in some way.

So big papa Palpatine can remotely drain life force from one person a great distance away and feed it into someone else remotely? I always thought that the broken heart line was crappy but I honestly think this explanation is even lazier. Maybe if it had been previously hinted at he had this incredible power I wouldn't hate it as much but as it sits it just makes it worse imo.

As someone said in the comments, it's Anakin's vision of the future of Padame dying that caused him to become a Sith, and in turn it is because he became a Sith that Padame died. In timetravel, this is called a casual loop. A causal loop is a paradox of time travel that occurs when a future event (Anakin's visions) is the cause of a past event, which in turn is the cause of the future event. Both events then exist in spacetime, but their origin cannot be determined. A causal loop may involve an event, a person or object, or information

Anakin’s past with his mom and padme’s death makes you want to cry😭 because they were both close to him❤

Maybe I'm looking too much into it But if this is the case, would part of padme still be within Vader? And seeing Luke triggered that in a way as help to show that the good was still a part of him?

I never understood how people thought Padme died of a broken heart in the first place. Vader is born at the very same time Padme dies. Palpatine learned how to keep people from dying - he wouldn't have killed Plagueis before learning this. He drained her life force and gave it to Vader. I have been saying that since the film came out... seemed pretty obvious.

I believe it is by far the best explabation of Padmes death that I have heard!

Glad to hear this confirmed from someone else. Not only does it make for a better story than ... "uh she died because she was sad" or because Vader accidentally force choked her too long. Rather the transferring of life essences, plays into the Sith 's / Palpatines overall attempt to manipulate life force. The great irony and tragedy that Vader was lured in the dark side with the promise that he would be granted the power to save Padme, only to be the cause of her death. And then Palpatine lying to him saying that was his own fault fault is just poetic gravy. I re-watched it last night the whole movie just seems to fast forward through major plot points , but I think they went out of their way to give that droid the line ...."Shes perfectly healthy, but were losing her" Star Wars is the GOAT for having the best story told in the worst possible way

I always thought it was Anakin(Vader) That killed Padme but the reality is that he did kill her not the way i imagined it so from a certain "Point of view" Anakin(Vader) did kill Padme

I always thought Anakin was the one who killed her unintentionally by reaching out with the force to preserve his own life.

Instead of keeping his promise, Sidious used his power to drain the life of Padme to strengthen his new apprentice. This is tragedy at its finest.

Palpatine, her smile at telling to Vader that he (Vader) had killed her, is totally revealing.

I think padme really loves anakin so much she wouldn’t tell obi wan where he went, and why the hell anakin would force choke his own pregnant wife is beyond me

I wonder if Anakins barely audible "help me padme" just before he is fitted with vaders mask had anything to do with Palpatines ability to drain padmes life force?

The problem here isn't what actually happened. The problem (as so many things are in the Prequels) is how it's represented and explained in the movie. There is no explanation other than the passing comment by the droid leaving the fans to draw their own conclusions. In any narrative, the story has to stand on its own. You cannot depend on someone tracking down another work (especially a different media like comics, books, games, etc) to find that one explanation that somehow justifies an event. In RotS, Padme dies without explanation, the end. This happens after they cut down her screen time to "I'm pregnant," "I'm crying," and "I'm dying" which was breathtakingly disappointing to everyone involved (my friends and I saw it in theaters, literally everyone walking out was talking about the duel on Mustafar and how they ruined Padme). Frankly, considering the retcons that Lucas has already done, I'm very disappointed that he hasn't called Natalie Portman and begged her to do a few scenes for a more complete cut.

Finally the real story behind Padre's death! I could never accept her dying because of Anajin's betrayal. This makes far more sense

i do think it's a reasonable explanation that he drained her to save him and fuel his pain and anger to strengthen his dark side connection, and honestly makes more sense given her character and all the facts. but the power the mind has over the body is also very strong, and saying that dying from a broken heart is "disrespect" or a "joke" or a "disservice" is in itself actually disrespect. as if feeling deeply is somehow shameful. this is toxic and a big problem in our society. for example, sometimes elderly couples will die within days or months because of the deep sadness or loneliness and that is nothing to be ashamed of. please get rid of the toxicity mixed in with your otherwise reasonable argument.

If only Padame never died

Thank you! I have been screaming about this very thing for years, there's no way Padme would have died in childbirth of a broken heart when she just gave birth to twins. She was a strong woman with plenty of reason to live.

Remember in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace when newly minted Senator Palpatine aka Darth Sidious aka The Emperor said that he’d watch Anakin’s Jedi career with. great interest. He knew that he was powerful and used every Darkside trick in the book to manipulate Anakin to turn. That included his love for Padme. That’s why he helped kill Windu. It all came down to Padme who died because Palpatine drained her life force to keep Anakin alive after Mustafar so that he could fully become Darth Vader.

If palps could do this why would he not take out anyone he wanted at anytime. I'm not saying I don't like the theory I'm js it's a bit of a stretch with the amount of information we are given.

The one thing I disagree with you on is that it was "the fans misinterpreting Padme's death". No it was Lucas's shoddy screenplay and script with no other explanation for her death other than what we saw on the screen and what the droid's said. For all intents and purposes if you just watch the film, thats how she died, she lost the will to live. As much as I love how expansive SW is, it seems like Star Wars and/or Lucas have this habit of making things or events or explanations grander in the books and comics than in the films. Because this could have been shown in the prequels, but it wasnt. I doubt this explanation wasnt even really thought up until after.

Wow... This is extremely dark and so ironic... I think it fits the narrative pretty well. Thank you for bringing this to our attention and I'm surprised to have not heard about it sooner.

My take on this is not concrete, but I do not believe Padmé died of a broken heart. She’s far too strong of a character to do so. So that leaves two possibilities in my mind: 1. Anakin killed her with a force choke, or, 2. Sidious killed her in some way. Since the medical droids would have picked up any physical damage caused by the force choke, we can rule #1 out. This means the Sidious had something to do with it. I see a lot of people doubting Sidious’ power, which to be fair is not definitively stated, but this guy was able to deceive the likes of Yoda, Obi-wan, and Mace Windu, which means he’s no dark side slouch. I have no doubt in my mind that he also planted the dreams Anakin was having, which is why Yoda was having issues seeing the future when Anakin sought advice from him (Sidious was clouding the future to conceal his mechanisms from Yoda). Sidious also managed to get a whole army built right underneath the Jedi Order’s nose and use it to kill them with no issues whatsoever, while still keeping the republic completely at his fingertips. I don’t find it hard to imagine that someone this powerful could transfer life force across star systems or just outright kill a weakened individual in a state like Padmé was. I personally believed Sidious outright killed her, but the life force transfer also makes sense. Not to say that it’s impossible she died of a broke heart, but extremely unlikely. As others have stated, Padmé’s death also ignited the rage and suffering inside Vader, which made him an extremely effective weapon. I’ve also seen it pointed out on other threads that Padmé and Vader’s breathing is even somewhat in sync as Padmé dies and Vader rises, reinforcing the life force transfer theory. Either way, I think this was intentionally left vague by Lucas to generate this type of curiosity and debate, furthering the fascination with the storyline. Quick side note, Palpatine’s mistake of keeping Vader alive would ultimately be his undoing, as I’m sure many of you know, as he allowed the chosen one prophecy to fulfill, a prophecy that resulted in his death. Before he came back because, you know, plot armor.

the title is misleading and practically click bait 🤣 what REALLY killed her is a broken heart and losing the will to live. that makes more sense than a silly un-proven "theory". 🤷🏻‍♂️