STAR WARS: From Naboo with Love (and Fascism)

Sun-warm and silent, Anakin and Padmé lounge in a field of flowing grass on the planet Naboo, drifting in the reverie of carefree lovers.

Padmé punctuates the perfect moment with a question. “You really don’t believe in democracy?”

Anakin scoffs. “That’s what you’re thinking about it?”

“What are you thinking about it?”

Anakin scowls, raising a sinister hand.

“Oh no. Not another force choke, Annie.” Padmé shields her neck. “I’m on my fifth pair of panties for the day. You can’t possibly want to do it again!”

Anakin glowers with mock menace. “I find your lack of faith disturbing.”

“Stop! Stop! Stop!” She giggle-shrieks as unseen fingers tighten around her throat. “Democracy! Democracy!”

Anakin lowers his hand. “You’re really hung up on that huh?”

Padmé breathes a sigh of relief, tinged with just a hint of disappointment. “I’m a senator. Shouldn’t I be?”

“I don’t know.” Anakin shrugs. “I just feel like somebody wise should be in charge.”

“You keep saying that.” She eyes him. “What would this wise person be like? How would he rule?”

“Well…” Anakin ponders the question, mentally cataloging all he knows about Senator Palpatine. “He would be old and venerable. And wise.”

Padmé smirks. “You want the wise ruler to be wise. Okay.”

“He would be filled with ancient knowledge and stories and he would know the answer to everything. He would have a solution for every problem.”

“Annie…” Padmé sighs. She had come to see Anakin as a man—his deft use of the Force helped with that—but he still had the political intuitions of a child. “Just because someone has a solution doesn’t mean it’s a 𝑔𝑜𝑜𝑑 solution.”

Anakin went on. “And he’d have the authority to unilaterally execute his Will anywhere in the universe at any given time.”

“Uh.”

“This Will would be enforced by an army conscripted under the pain of death—soldiers trained to imprison or shoot any dissident who threatened our perfect order.”

“Uuuh.”

“He’d be the Emperor of the Universe, but he wouldn’t sit on a throne adorned in royal regalia for all the worlds to see. He’d be too humble for that.”

“Oh good,” Padmé quips. “At least he’s humble.”

“Instead, he’d wear a simple cloak and hood, all black. And he’d just be creeping in the shadows all the time. Just slinking around like a vampire. And he’d only show up when he wanted to say something weird and ominous to a high-ranking officer. And again, he’s the emperor, he doesn’t need to do any of this. But he does it for the love of the game.”

Padmé cracks up. “Anakin, this is—”

“And every Tuesday he’d get his old wrinkled prostate milk by a big titty Twi’lek with a fat head-tail.”

“Wait what.”

“And he’d be a Virgo.”

“Sorry, what was that last part again?”

Anakin shifts. “Virgo was a bridge too far, huh?”

“No before that.”

“The ruthless jackboot conscript army?”

“I mean, that was bad too, but—” she sighs. “Anakin, look. I know what we have is imperfect. But it’s worth fighting for. And it’s worth preserving. When you talk about your vision for the galaxy, it frightens me…”

Anakin looks at her. “…because it sounds like a dictatorship.”

“It’s a little authoritarian.” She nods. “I don’t love it.”

Anakin scowls again, lifting the sinister hand. “I could make you love it.”

Padmé’s eyes flick between his face and the hand. She blushes, before bursting out: “Oh choke me, your authoritarian animal!”