Calling Darth Vader a cultural icon is a bit of understatement. He’s the pinnacle of dark lords, evilness, and, of course, Luke’s father. The dark villain has always puzzled his fans of whom he struck terror into, only to be later turned good. His confusion and the concept of who he was, allowed for George Lucas and his production team to go ahead to make the prequel movies (of which I find not as bad as my colleagues do).
What struck Darth Vader as such an awesome figure in our childhood imaginations is in his ambiguity and ominousness. To the older generations, it started in his emergence from the blinding smoke and later subduing Captain Raymus Antilles to the end. To others, it came when crossing blades with Ben Kenobi and to some, it was claiming to be Luke’s seemingly perished father. Darth Vader’s concept would only continue to entice us more based on his attire. “He’s more machine now than man,” as an old Ben Kenobi would say.
It is exactly his machine-like build and his mask that made us fans want to know more about our favorite dark lord. Only until recent years were most of Darth Vader’s machine-like functions revealed to us. And so, here are 25 weird facts only super fans know about Darth Vader’s body.
25 A Suit That Hurts
One glance at Darth Vader’s suit and you’ll think to yourself, “how can this ever be comfortable?” The whole suit looks freakishly heavy and there’s no way that the mask must be fun to wear, let alone breathe in. Darth Vader felt constantly claustrophobic by the suit. Vader even had to adjust the size and weight of his new lightsaber to fit his new suit and grip. In all, his suit was essentially designed for pain. His helmet alone possessed small sticky needles that would send neurological information of his brainwaves to the central computer of his suit, located in his chest.
Most of the needles could be found in his helmet, but they were placed throughout what was left of his body.
Due to this, Darth Vader was always being picked and prodded at by small little points to allow his suit to process and channel data. According to Emperor Palpatine, the needles had within them kouhunin chemicals that would diminish his feelings of pain, but this was false. As we all know, an angry Sith Lord makes a powerful one, let alone one that is in constant torment from his attire. Think about Vader’s suffering next time you feel uncomfortable in a new pair of shoes.
24 Life Support
It was pretty much hidden from sight, but Vader’s suit required a technologically advanced life support system. It was a built-in system that allowed him to continue living without the support of that painful looking medical display as we saw at the end of Episode III. An intricate collection of circuity could be found implanted into what’s left of his charred body; sounds quite painful.
What was awesome, however, about his suit, was its temperature-regulation system. This allowed Vader to remain virtually unharmed by any sort of climate. The suit’s temperature systems allowed for Vader to walk the freezing surface of Hoth and survive in space without feeling its powerful vacuum. His helmet was the most important tool to his survival. Without it, he would perish within seconds, unless he was super angry and used the force to his advantage.
His helmet constantly checked Vader’s surroundings to give Vader the necessary dosage of pressure, while diffusing generated heat from the suit’s electrical power. His belt was another significant area of his suit that he relied on for his survival. The belt had function boxes which regulated temperature and a respiratory sensor. In the belt could also be found a toolkit which contained spare parts, such as an energy cell and comlink.
23 Vader’s Vision
The majority of Anakin’s/Vader’s body suffered a rather fiery engulfment after his battle with Obi-Wan on the Mustafar system. It left him nothing more than a limbless charred torso on the edge of a lava bank, only to be stuffed into an uncomfortable suit to torment him for the rest of his life. His eyes suffered quite a bit as well. In the Star Wars novel, Allegiance, Mara Jade is said to have described Darth Vader’s vision as, “having both the benefits and drawbacks of that technology.” This would go on to indicate that Vader’s vision was worse than a non-suited human.
We were given a glimpse of what Vader could see towards the end of Episode III.
It indicates that Vader’s eyes would take longer to get used to a change of light, just like as if someone was wearing night-vision goggles. However, Vader’s vision is equipped with ultraviolet wavelengths which allow him to block out certain waves of light while repairing his damaged retinas. The helmet’s vision systems helped his damaged retinas adjust to incredibly intense light, such as the Death Star’s beam by using eye shields that slid over his optical blisters that activated within 5 milliseconds.
Although Vader’s suit was somewhat well-equipped with satisfactory gadgets that enabled him to see better, I’m sure Anakin would have preferred his original eyes than anything his suit would have offered.
22 Shoulder Pads
There is no way that Vader’s suit ever looked light to wear. Forced to following an ancient Sith tradition where wearing armor was required, Darth Vader was equipped with a bulk of heavy armor that weighed quite a bit. His shoulder armor was said to weigh a sum of 25 lbs. alone. This gave him difficulty to lift his lightsaber (when needed) above his shoulders, limiting him to a very singular stationary style compared to a much more athletic style than Anakin was used to.
Although Darth Vader in Rogue One ended that group of unfortunate rebels, he was slow for a reason…
And when he needed to in the thick of lightsaber duels, he had to fight the weight to defend from those higher slashes and attacks against the Jedi he hunted down after Order 66. You can even see it in that fateful scene in Rogue One when he’s slaughtering those poor rebels one by one, that his blade never goes above his shoulders. It was only when Vader was angry enough to use the maximum of his force powers could he ignore the sheer weight of his heavy armor. That said, if Vader never lost that fight with Obi-Wan, he would have never been limited to weight and, as an expert duelist, would have been able to defeat any other swordsman that stood in his way.
21 Fireproof Cape
Darth Vader’s cape is more than just a black silky-looking robe. The cape’s material is made out of armorweave. It’s a heavily armored cloth. as the name of the material suggests. According to the Star Wars wiki, the cloth can dissipate the blots of blasters and even resist lightsaber strikes. It can be usually found being equipped by bounty hunters or soldiers. Other than Vader, the shape-shifting bounty hunter, Zam Wesell, could be seen wearing this in Episode II and General Grievous in Episode III and throughout the Clone Wars saga. Vader’s own armorweave cape had some unique attributes to it. Both the cape and Vader’s tunic were constructed to protect him from difficult climates while remaining light enough in weight to keep him mobile.
Like I mentioned before, Vader’s cape was capable of repelling all sorts of dangerous projectiles and lightsaber strikes. It served to protect Vader’s suit as well. The cape prevented hazardous materials from entering the system that would harm the suit’s circuitry. This would include elements of water, snow, dirt, ice, and even the dreaded sand. It seems that even the all-powerful dark lord Anakin turned into Darth Vader still needs some form of protection from the even eviler sand. Oh, and it was also fireproof.
20 Powerful Gloves
Vader’s gloves were more than just a pair of nice mittens. Like his cape, Vader’s gloves were created by Skere Kaan’s indestructible Sith Amulets - “a micronized Mandalorian iron weave.” This helped Vader defend himself from lightsaber attacks as well as blaster bolts. We saw this in the iconic dinner scene where Vader invites Han, Leia, and Chewbacca to dine with him. We see his gloves in action towards the end of Episode V where Han open fires at Darth Vader, only to be deflected by a wave of Vader’s hand. The gloves were encased with magnetic claps that clipped onto Vader’s prosthesis tubing that allowed for him not to change armor, clothing, or equipment, during the thickness of combat.
Vader’s unreal force-like abilities and power of his suit were revealed in Episode V when blocking Han’s blaster bolts.
The gloves, just like his boots were inflated with additional padding. This allowed Vader to have a better feel for his cybernetic arms compared to those he lost from his battle with Count Dooku on Geonosis and Obi-Wan Kenobi on the Mustafar system. You’d think that losing one arm would be enough, I’m sure these new gauntlets are sore reminders of what once was. That said, his cybernetic gauntlets also helped confuse enemies on which of Vader’s limbs were cybernetic and which weren’t, allowing for them to attack unnecessary areas of his body.
19 Artificial Skin
The title of this listing is enough to make your skin crawl (pun intended.). Alas, it remains factual that Darth Vader’s skin is no longer biological. This shouldn’t come much of a surprise considering that most of his healthy flesh, if not all of it, underwent some pretty powerful third-degree burns. Similarly to how Darth Maul survived, Vader survived by using the force to focus on his pain in order to keep him alive long enough - but that’s a story for another time. Darth Vader had something called synthflesh.
Much disgustingly, it was a material made from a synthetic gel that fused synthetic flesh with real flesh, or whatever was left of said flesh. It was used to repair burns and other related flesh wounds. Luke can be seen having some around his hand after getting it severed by Vader in Episode V. That said, almost all of Vader’s torso was covered in synthflesh. Not to mention, the process of replacing flesh sounds awful, let alone painful. Imagine how Vader must have felt, getting his burnt skin bound with new synthetic skin. Worst of all, Sidious kept him awake for the entire process, so he could feel every ounce of pain to further empower him as an apprentice.
18 Super Strength
Darth Vader was strong. His suit made him even stronger. Vader’s suit was so technologically advanced that he could play with the mechanics of his suit in order to obtain more or less strength. Imagine squeezing harder and harder on a nutcracker, giving more power to the tool in order to crack the nut. Vader could even go the length of breaking the indestructible hilt of his red lightsaber with just a squeeze of his hand if he really wanted to. Not to mention, Vader’s suit allowed him to survive the tallest of falls and the greatest of impacts. This can be seen in episode 1 of the second season of Star Wars Rebels, where he tosses Kanan as if he was a rag doll. Or later on in the episode when Vader survives getting crushed by some All Terrain Scout Transports (ATST - those giant two-legged walkers).
Vader gets up as if nothing harmed him, lifting the walkers as if they were weightless. Another example is when falling down the staircase in Episode VII after getting kicked by Luke Skywalker. Only an incredible amount of damage to his suit or emotions could limit or even hinder his superior physical abilities, to which only a handful of his adversaries could ever achieve. This can be best seen during his fight with Galen Marek (Starkiller from Force Unleashed) where his suit was badly damaged to the point that it had led to his eventual defeat.
17 What Grievous Had That Vader Didn’t
Technically speaking, Darth Vader was a cyborg, although he isn’t generally seen as one. He’s rather seen as having mechanical attributes that allow him to continue to live and wreak havoc across the galaxy as Darth Vader, the Emperor’s Apprentice. Like another famous cyborg, (a favorite of mine) General Grievous underwent a similar process of cybernetic enhancements after having suffered the fate of an explosion from a bomb hidden on a ship.
“Listen to me, Jedi. I do not care about your politics. I do not care about your Republic. I only live to see you [PERISH]!”
The only difference between Vader and Grievous is that Grievous’ enhancements did not hinder his abilities. It instead improved his strength and speed as Count Dooku trained him to be literally a Jedi-ending machine. Much to Vader’s dismay, Grievous did not have to suffer and continue to suffer the pains that Vader’s suit forced him to undergo. Grievous, unlike Vader, was relatively comfortable in his new body. Count Dooku used the midichlorian-rich blood of a Jedi to keep Grievous alive. And aside from his vital organs, his brain and his heart, General Grievous was purely mechanical. Vader, on the other hand, was forced to continue to live with the ever-burdening pain of a burnt and limbless torso.
16 No Force Lightning
Being the all-powerful Jedi that Anakin was said to be, it’s puzzling as to why he never could use the Sith-exclusive power of Force Lightning to electrify and burn his enemies. Vader can technically use the force lightning ability, but summoning it is the actual problem. If Vader ever used force lightning, it would short-circuit the interior workings of his suit, thus ending him. Sidious taught him this lesson the hard way after Vader tried to choke him upon waking up with the suit, temporarily paralyzing Vader using force lightning. Theories suggest that due to his cybernetic arms, Vader could never even summon lightning if he even tried, given that force lightning needed to be summoned through actual arms and could never emerge from a pair of robotic fingers.
Regardless whether it was from a lack of limbs or from a threat of perishing, Vader suffered a disadvantage, being secluded from one of the most popular and effective weapons a powerful Sith Lord could ever have. It is even mentioned in the novel, Rise of Darth Vader that he couldn’t perform force lighting due to his arms and legs being mechanical and not biological. However, this does not limit him from using other powerful force-related abilities such as his infamous force choking powers as he is seen to use throughout the span of his existence.
15 He Can’t Sleep
If you’ve made it this far into the article, you should know that Darth Vader is more uncomfortable than most. Truth is, he was constantly uncomfortable whenever he was in his suit, to the point that it made him sometimes incredibly insane. Vader needed to take breaks, dipping himself in a liquid chamber where he allowed himself to meditate as we saw in a deleted scene of Rogue One. Vader barely sleeps, it’s a bit hard to if you take into consideration that you’re being repetitively stabbed by miniature needles that suck out your neurological information to feed it to a computer. Vader was always in dire need of his suit; that said, he needed it to fall asleep (especially his breathing mechanism) if he wanted to take a quick nap.
When Vader did sleep, he was awoken soon after by a disturbing series of visions, sounds and pain, most of which including Obi-Wan or Padme.
It’s entirely possible that he never really needed to sleep given the powers of his mechanical suit, however, his brain was still completely biological. The brain itself needs enough REM cycles to maintain a person’s sanity. He used his liquidized chamber to meditate to clear his mind and relax himself after too many claustrophobic hours in his suit. It’s entirely possible that given his inability to sleep, let alone comfortably, Darth Vader’s accumulated sleep deprivation turned him even more insane and unstable than he already was.
14 He’s 68.85% Man
One of Obi-Wan Kenobi’s most famous lines remains, “He’s more machine now than man. Twisted and evil,” when having to refer to the humanity of Darth Vader as Luke’s father. One glance at Darth Vader will understate Obi-Wan’s comment, before having watched the movies, I thought Darth Vader was a genuine robot for his inhumane and mechanical look. But Obi-Wan’s comment begs to differ, how much of Darth Vader was actually human, and how much of him was truly man. Having lost his right arm to Count Dooku and his left arm and both of his legs to Obi-Wan, we can assume that Anakin/Vader lost approximately 75% of his limbs from every cut.
According to this Star Wars fan’s math, it can be estimated that Darth Vader is at least 68.85% man, with the loss of his limbs alone. That said, there’s enough evidence to suggest that even less of a man than he was given how he’s needed his skin to be replaced and parts of his body restored like his vital organs and lungs. This estimate can go even further if we take into account that Vader’s spine is artificial, which we will cover in the next listing.
13 He Has An Artificial Spine
Given how heavy his new armor was to become, Anakin’s/Vader’s biological spine was not strong enough to hold up his new body, especially without the help of his legs. His spine although not completely damaged from Obi-Wan’s quick high-ground-centric strikes, suffered some dramatic injuries from the lava burns. During the surgery, Vader had the first vertebrae of his neck replaced synthetically by a mechanical version. There was also an electrode-studded collar he wore around his helmet to support the weight of his mask. The rest of the vertebrae’s were replaced by mechanical versions making Vader’s spine strong enough to support him.
You can see his mechanical spine for a brief second when being electrocuted in Return of the Jedi.
It was indeed the aspect of having a mechanical spine that dealt him the most pain as he walked in his suit, however it was specifically this area of his body that allowed him to stand at 1.88 meters tall. Without the aid of his artificial spine, Vader couldn’t stand and would need the help of something else to keep him standing. It was in Vader’s drastic height and darkly appearance did he have such a reaction with those fearful around him, limiting his height would limit his frightening image.
12 His Waste Gets Recycled
Vader technically still operated on a human digestive system, thus he needed to eat. How his suit allowed this was a complicated process. His suit possessed an implanted bladder that contained RepMed vitapaste that he used to eat and get nutrients. Apparently, this had a disgusting taste, but was much easier for Vader to eat; if he wanted to consume something orally, he could, but needed to do so in his liquid chamber as he needed to take off his mask. Often times, Vader chose to absorb his nutrients instead of eating actual food; this was a form of self-loathing as he chose to separate himself from his humanity as much as possible.
With this in mind, Vader was equipped with a Waste Recycler. It broke down all the food he ate and recycled it into a compartment of his suit and then was vaporized. Think of it as a mechanical diaper. Waste Recyclers could be found equipped on asteroid miner’s to prevent them from going to the bathroom. Likewise, Vader possessed a technologically advanced version that prevented the Dark Lord from ever going to the washroom while staying eco-friendly. Given how he doesn’t need to eat, it’s safe to assume he doesn’t need to do the former either.
11 Ingesting It
As we mentioned above, Darth Vader seldom needs to eat physical food. He actually chooses not to when given the opportunity given how he’s elusively trying to be less human, doing so from hating his human form. Vader was constantly on a hunger strike. We never see him eat canonically, much less so in Star Wars Legends. The only time we see Darth Vader close to any sort of food is in Episode V: Empire Strikes Back where he invites Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and Lando to a dinner. Easily one of the most awkward dinners…
When Leia teases him in the novelization, Vader mentions, “I have had to forego those simple pleasures, along with many others; but there are compensations I survive.” He technically can eat, but it would require him to take off his mask which is both a humiliating and difficult act. That said, he ingests nutrients from Vitapaste from an artificial bladder implanted into his body. After some time after being forced to ingest the disgusting taste, he demanded his surgical medical droids to construct him a custom-made system that took away the need for him to eat, let alone digest anything at all.
10 Nonexplosive Eyes
If someone had the misfortune of ever being exposed to the cold vacuum of space without the necessary measures of tools, they’d perish in seconds. You wouldn’t necessarily explode from the pressure of space, nor would your blood would boil. The air molecules of your body would be sucked out and your blood vessels would break, especially the blood vessels located in your poorly protected eyes within a matter of moments. During the span of his dangerous missions, Vader has been exposed to literal space.
Darth Vader’s vision was poor due to damage caused by Mustafar’s dangerous climate.
However, thanks to his incredibly pressurized helmet and boot soles, he can remain protected from the dangers of space. These parts of these suit create ferromagnetic cores, generating magnetic fields that both shield him from space’s vacuum and allow him to remain afoot on platforms of ships. He also holds an emergency oxygen tank that provides him the necessary gas if anything were to go wrong and if Darth Vader was exposed to space. He’s seen doing so at the end of Rogue One and the beginning of A New Hope when leaving his ship to board Leia’s to get back the Death Star’s plans. Darth Vader has the equivalence of a super-powered astronaut.
9 Sith Witchcraft
Aside from the near god-like technological abilities of Darth Vader’s cybernetic suit, there is a hint of mythicism in the suit that allows Vader to be even more powerful. Back in the days of the Old Republic, when the rule of two Sith Lords wasn’t applied and the Sith warriors were many, they would wear a certain armor that would make them look more intimidating while offering them more protection in combat. Darth Vader’s suit is replicated off this ancient model. Vader’s suit isn’t basically indestructible because of its advanced technology, it’s further protected by a magic alchemy from the Dark Side to be used by Sith priests when wanting to enchant armor to make it both better and stronger.
Kind of reminds you of Skyrim, does it not? For example, one of Vader’s gauntlets is Mandalorian, built with a magic iron-weaved Sith amulet that once belonged to Jedi Master turned evil, Skere Kaan. The Sith magic doesn’t just improve his armor, it improves Vader, as well as the chemistry of the Sith alchemy, which can be absorbed by his synthetic flesh to make him faster and stronger. It seems that both magic, the force, and machine must be applied to make Darth Vader a reality.
8 His Lungs Would Rot
I never really took much thought to it, but Vader’s lungs were among the most injured areas of his bodies after his fight on Mustafar with Obi-Wan Kenobi, obviously from his chopped off limbs. Turns out that the Mustafar system’s molten lava gave off certain incredibly dangerous ko-shol gasses. With his open wounds and inability to move, Anakin/Vader was forced to inhale the poisonous fumes. The ko-shol gasses destroyed the interior of his lungs and the tissue around him. Vader could hardly breathe once Sidious found him; all of his airways were constricted.
To save him, the medical droids installed an artificial lung made of iron in the back of his suit that remained hidden with the help of his cape. This lung could transfer the oxygen from his back to his helmet where he could breathe. Furthermore, an air pump of some sort was located at the top of Vader’s mask next to syncopated ventilator. Vader’s voice could be hardly heard due to the destruction his lungs had to face. To repair the damage, Vader’s medical droids installed within him an annunciator (Stephen Hawking-like) that enabled him to speak with a deep and intimidating voice.
7 It Itches
We mentioned before that Vader underwent a long, complicated and painful process of having to replace his deceased and burnt skin by synthetic versions to keep his bodily organs intact. The thing is, Vader needed to be periodically removed from his suit to be scrubbed by droids when necrotic flesh started to grow back. This made Vader itch endlessly. Given that his arms were cybernetic and the parts of his body that itched couldn’t be reached, this drove Vader to a breaking point of near-insanity. In the comics, it is reputed that Vader was in constant discomfort due to his newly replaced skin.
When Vader underwent these procedures, he worried about going insane.
It is theorized that it smelled terrible and was a painful process to get it removed. Given how it was a constant thing and how powerful in the Force he is, he eventually got used to it and focused on the pain to make him stronger. In one of the Legends comic book panels, it can be seen that Vader is begging the medical droids to keep him sane. Who knows how that must have felt like? And it wasn’t like he could just fix the problem, he was in continuous need of the suit - the only safe haven he could ever achieve was in his liquidized chamber, and that was only for a few minutes.
6 Implants
I never asked myself how long the process of Anakin/Vader’s surgery was, transferring his torso into the infamous dark suit. It turns out that the whole process was 8 hours long, and Vader was kept awake for all of it. This was decided by Sidious so Vader could feel every ounce of pain in order to make him angrier and stronger. Many of his bones had to be replaced by durasteel. As for his organs, many were also synthetic. The plastic girdle around his abdomen was there to protect and house his many synthetic organs.
Although his heart was one of the few organs that weren’t terribly damaged by the lava or from a lightsaber strike, a machine was used to regulate his heart rate so it couldn’t quicken when he needed it the least although he could alter his heart rate if he really wanted to. Like I’ve mentioned, many of his bones, either broken or cracked during his fight with Obi-Wan, were replaced. However, his rib cage needed to be removed in order to implant the new synthetic organs inside his body. Imagine having your ribs removed, have organs transplanted into you, attached to their systems and have your ribs placed back in… crazy.
