#starwars #darthvader #sith
Hello there and welcome to Star Wars Noob. Anybody who has seen Star Wars, has seen Darth Vader, and anybody who has seen Darth Vader, has seen his suit! But just what did those flashy buttons on the front of his suit do? Find out here!
After Anakin and Obi Wan Kenobi had their duel on Mustafar at the conclusion of Revenge of the Sith, Anakin was left fighting for his life. This is due to the triple amputation caused by his former Master’s lightsaber, and the horrifying burns sustained from sliding into molten lava.
Rescued by his new Sith Master Darth Sideous, he was encased in his new suit of armour. This suit of armour caused him much pain and discomfort throughout the rest of his life, but ultimately allowed him to operate and function as the sith lord Darth Vader.
This suit was created by sideous with the primary function of keeping Vader alive and therefore acted as a life support system. Despite causing him significant pain and torture, all parts of the suit, from his helmet to his feet would work in conjunction with one another in an effort to keep Vader alive.
The most important part of the suit however was the buttons on the front of his control box and belt But the question is - what did they do?
Firstly lets find out what the control box itself is and what it does? This box essentially housed all of the critical components of his life support system. Inside this system was a processor that analysed the information that was being sent from all around the different parts of his body. Every inch of every injury and every vital organ was monitored whilst vader was inside his suit, meaning that this little box worked overtime to help to keep vader alive.
Whilst Vader’s box has slightly different appearances throughout the movies and series, this is likely explained through canon as upgrades or added components, however the main function and layout of the box generally stayed the same.
If we firstly look in the top left of his control box we will see three quite apparent red lines. These lines were actually displays that showed the functioning of three key life support systems. From top to bottom we have the Neural system display, then the respiratory system display, and then the pulmonary system display.
These three display systems would gather information from thousands of microneedles located around his flesh. Whilst these microneedles would keep Vader in a constant state of agony and effectively made his suit a walking torture chamber, ultimately they would be fundamental in keeping him alive to ensure that his life support system reacted when and where it was supposed to.
Next we move on to the buttons on the right hand side of the box. The top green button activated the suits auto control function. This would typically be the default setting. This essentially meant that the suit would automatically provide life support to Vader. The red button just below this green button activated the suits manual override, and could be used by Vader when removing the suit, or used by imperial doctors when administering medicines or performing surgery. The suit’s function and its control system could also be remotely controlled by Palpatine’s scientists, and therefore cemented Palpatines further control over Vader.
Beneath these buttons and displays were the four switches located along the bottom of the life support control box. Three of these were grey, whilst the righter most one was red.
These were Vader’s life support system command switches. Starting with the red switch, this was the system reset button. As his suit was essentially a computer system making him a cyborg, just like your laptop or desktop, it would require updates or hard restarts. This button essentially performed a system reset that would reboot his life support if required.
The three grey buttons were his programming baseplates and essentially gave Vader the ability to programme the system and enable greater freedom in the administering of medicines, painkillers and control of his breathing system.
On either side of the control box were the two rod like devices that served as the life function sensor arrays. These life function sensor arrays worked in tandem with the other parts of the suit to ensure that his life support system operated as it should do and that all parts talked to eachother.
Ext we move down his suit to look at his belt
This belt was actually super important for Vader’s survival and similar to the control box it also consisted of three separate, but connected parts.
The silver buckle in the middle was the release catch that assisted with the fastening and releasing of the belt that was connected all of these systems, wires and micro needles.
More important however were the two boxes that were located either side of the release catch. Both of these boxes allowed Vader to have greater control over the suit and enabled him to regulate the systems accordingly depending on the environment.