Talk:Qui-Gon Jinn/@comment-31778166-20170501133422/@comment-30591854-20180801122733

We can only speculate.... It's true that Qui-Gon's wisdom outranked Obi-Wan's by far, but Qui-Gon's wisdom was outranked by Palpetine's social manipulation skills, which is not only shown by how he seduced Anakin into the Dark Side, turning him into Darth Vader in the process, but even more in how he could turn an entire galatic republic into an empire in which he would be an emperor who could rule it as a dictator for many years, something even Qui-Gon would very likely not have foreseen.

The main reason Anakin fell to the Dark Side was not just the failure of Obi-Wan as a mentor. The prime concern (which is exactly what Palpatine exploited) was his fear of losing the two women he loved most (his mother and Padmé). He made his first step to the Dark Side when he found out that his mother was totured to death and Palpatine played into his fears due to his visions about Padmé dying (which turned out to be the reason that vision became a reality, Padmé lose her will to live once she found out Anakin is no more and Darth Vader took his place). Yoda had foreseen that Anakin's fears would be his undoing, yet nobody in the council acted and Qui-Gon was still alive when Yoda made this prediction. The key question is if Qui-Gon would have recognized Anakin's fears? Would he have allowed Anakin and Padmé to marry and bring forth a child (or even two, in their case)? And would he have managed to make Anakin keep his self-control as Qui-Gon would not have been able to prevent Schmi from being kidnapped, tortured and killed? And would he have been able to pacify Anakin's fears coming forth from his nightmare visions of Padmé's death? And would have have unmasked Palpatine as Sith Lord Darth Sidious in time? If the answer to any of those questions is "no", no matter which one, it would be very likely Anakin would have fallen to the Dark Side anyway, although Palpatine may have needed more time to make it happen. Palpatine is not that easily outsmarted.

(Although ironically Anakin's fear or losing his loved ones, not only drove him to become Darth Vader (his fear for losing his wife) but in the end also allowed him to beat Darth Vader out of himself, killing Palpatine in the process (his fear of losing his son), although this may be an oversight in Palpatine's cleverness, or his arrogance over his own success blinded him).