Leia: Who's your daddy?

NOTE: Credit where credit is due. This is actually co-written with my wife. We totally geeked out and this was born.

Return of the Jedi has been on twice today and it raises a shitload of questions about continuity. Actually, it doesn't raise them. It brings up inconsistencies between the original trilogy (the real Star Wars movies) and episodes 1,2 and 3 (glorified, and sloppily written fan-fic). The one point that we'll be focusing on is Leia and her actual lineage.

In the original trilogy we are told a great many details about the Skywalker family tree

• Luke is Vader's son
• Luke is Leia's sister
• Luke an Leia are twins
  (I was doubtful that this was in the original trilogy but both Obi-wan and Vader mention it briefly)

What strikes out as strange is that there are multiple instances where Leia and Vader are emotionally distant to each other despite expectations. Leia meets Vader face to face after he ship is captures in A New Hope and there is not emotional recognition. This seems odd since we know that both are strong in the force and that Vader's relation to Luke let them sense each other later in the series. But we'll come back to the "Force paternity test" later.

The second thing that seems strange between Vader and Leia is that Vader searches the force and feels that Luke has a twin sister: Leia. He then goes on to refer to her as "your twin sister" and "your sister" (to Luke). Never once does he even acknowledge her as his own daughter.

Third, Leia doesn't attend the ritual burning of Vader's body on the forest moon of Endor after the destruction of the second Death Star. At this point Luke as told her that they are sibling and that Vader is his father. He never says Vader is her father and she isn't shaken by the fact that he seemingly is hers as well. Shes doesn't feel the need for closure with Vader, either for the destruction of her home planet Alderaan or to deal with the death of her possible father, by attending his funeral.

From all of this is seems that Luke and Leia, while twins, do not share the same father. And this is a point that has bothered me for a while now. There is absolutely no connection between Leia and Vader but there is between Leia and Luke. How can this be? And it becomes even more evident when the "Force paternity test" is brought up.

What is the Force paternity test? It is the ability of one strong with the Force to simply know biological relationships between people. We see Luke use it to tell whether Vader is being truthful about their father/son relationship. Luke feels that it is true. We see Leia use something similar to verify that she and Luke are siblings in Return of the Jedi. We possibly see Vader use it to tell that Luke has a twin sister (though it could just be him pulling out the memory of Obi-wan telling Luke) and furthermore we may see it in the fact that Vader seemingly refuses to call Leia his daughter. The last instance I'll postulate this occurs is when the family tree is revealed to Leia. She searches the Force and sees that she and Luke are related but never even hints at a suspicion of being related to Vader.

At this point I need to note that I will not be accepting the Episode 3 events as fact. If anyone doubts that Episodes 1-3 are in a different continuity than 4-6 all one has to do is look at the fact that Luke asks Leia :

"Do you remember your mother? Your real mother?"
She replies: "She was very beautiful. Kind, but...sad."

And if you're going to tell me that Leia remembers that from her birth (that's ridiculous) and Luke does not (that's doubly ridiculous) you're a fool. And if you need more proof, how is it that Obi-wan doesn't know of Leia's existence until Yoda tells him about her, though he was present at her birth in Revenge of the Sith?

So without the actions that take place in episode 3 we don't know that Luke and Leia share the same father. From all evidence in A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi it truly seems as if they only share a mother. And that's possible.

There is a medical term "hetero-paternal superfecundation" or bi-paternal twinning. This refers to an event when a mother carries two children at the same time from two different fathers. Most often this is when the mother releases two eggs (dizygotic) and has intercourse multiple times, leading to each egg being fertilized by different fathers. It is also possibly that an egg can be released during an already existing pregnancy and that egg can be fertilized by a second person, though this is much rarer. This is all true and it really does happen.

Theory: Luke and Leia are a result of bi-paternal twinning. According to the original trilogy this answers every question raised about the family of Vader, Luke and Leia.

• It answers why Leia remembers her real mother.
  Because she is kept by her real mother and Luke is sent away in order to protect Leia if Vader ever comes looking for his son.
• It answers why Leia feels no connection to Vader though she does feel a conncetion to Luke.
• It answers why Vader never aknowledges any relation to Leia, even when searching the Force on the second Death Star.

And this makes the most sense to me. The fact that I went out to hunt down this information (my wife actually mentioned the medical phenomina from it's inclusion in a One Life to Live plot line) rather than accept the story fed to me by Revenge of the Sith just goes to show how terrible a movie Episode 3 really is. And with that I close my case.

What follows is pure speculation. I would guess, without knowledge of episodes 1-3, that Obi-wan is Leia's father. It seems that she does have a conncetion with him the way Luke does with Vader. When she is captured by Vader and the fate of the rebellion is in jeopardy she trusts her gut instincts and sends a message to Obi-wan, a man she has never met before. It also fits that she has been told of Obi-wan, though not enough to make her think that they are related. Also, when Alderaan is destroyed not only would Obi-wan feel the destruction of the planet but the emotion that he experiences would seem to be shared between he and Leia. He is visibly shaken by the even even though he has never been to that planet to our knowledge. He seems to be feeling it through Leia.

Is it crazy to think that Luke and Leia's mother was involved with Obi-wan and that Anakin raped her after he turned to the dark side? It fits into original trilogy continuity. However it is just a theory. And while it fits it is not hinted at to nearly the degree that the other theory is; That Luke and Leia are twins that share only a mother.