Who is Anakin Skywalker's father?

Question

In Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, Anakin's mother, Shmi, said that he does not have a father, although it seemed to me that she doubted that.

Is there a canonical answer as to who Anakin's father is? If so, who?

Answer 1

According to Wookieepedia, Anakin didn't have a father. While "virgin births" can and do happen in real life among many non-mammalian life-forms, all of them are daughters and are effectively clones of the mother (or twin sisters if you prefer).

Skywalker's mother, Shmi Skywalker, claimed that her son was conceived without a father, but could not explain how that had happened. It was the theory of Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn that the will of the Force caused his birth. There is evidence to suggest that Skywalker's birth may have been engineered by the Sith Lord Darth Plagueis as part of an experiment in immortality.

And pursuant to rule 34:

If you are old enough, check out the March 1985 issue of Penthouse . Males under about 30 cannot tell them apart, while females of all ages surveyed can distinguish mother from daughter.

Answer 2

There is a recently published book, Star Wars: Darth Plagueis, that supposedly answer this question. From Anakin Skywalker Wookieepedia article

In addition, although Darth Plagueis did attempt to influence the midichlorians to create the ultimate Sith weapon alongside Darth Sidious, the experiment was ultimately a failure, and the midichlorians, sensing the Sith's inherent malevolent intention, not only refused to do so, but in retaliation, conceived Anakin Skywalker in order to destroy the Sith once and for all.

So, according to this, neither Darth Plagueis nor Darth Sidious are Anakin Skywalker's father, the midichlorians really conceived him without any outside direct intervention.

Answer 3

Shmi specifically states there is no father. By later conversations among the Jedi, it is generally to be concluded that the midichlorians created Anakin in Shmi to bring balance back to the force.

She never claimed to be a virgin when he was conceived, so it is not necessary to assume it was a virgin birth, just that there was never a biological father.

Answer 4

There was a line in The Phantom Menace that was cut out of the original script in the scene where Qui-Gon Jinn and Shmi Skywalker are talking about Anakin's father that I personally found interesting:

SHMI: There was no father, that I know of... I carried him, I gave birth....I can't explain what happened.

This tells us that when Anakin was born, Shmi wasn't in a current relationship. By this statement, it could seem possible that Anakin could have had an actual father (but the line was cut out of the film). However, the canon answer to this question is still The Force:

Skywalker was born in the year 41 BBY before moving to the Outer Rim planet Tatooine during the Age of the Republic. Although he had a mother, the slave Shmi Skywalker, the truth about his parentage was that Anakin had no father—leading Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn to suspect that Skywalker's conception was the work of the midi-chlorians.

Believed to have been conceived by the midi-chlorians, Anakin Skywalker was born to the slave Shmi Skywalker.

QUI-GON JINN: Had he been born in the Republic, we would have identified him early. The Force is unusually strong with him, that much is clear. Who is his father?

SHMI: There was no father. I carried him, I gave birth, I raised him, I can't explain what happened.

Star Wars did drop some hints that it could have been Palpatine/Sidious who manipulated the midi-chlorians to create Anakin. The comic book, Darth Vader No. 25 seems to directly imply that Sidious created Anakin in a sequence on Mustafar.

Recently, Lucasfilm Story Group Creative Executive Matt Martin and Darth Vader No.25's comic issue writer Charles Soule revealed on Twitter that they hadn't intended to imply Sidious as Anakin's father.

Matt Martin tweeted:

This is all in Anakin's head...I can tell you definitely, as someone who worked on the comic, that is 100% not the intended implication. It's part of my job to ensure the stories are aligned with the overall vision of Star Wars. If the intention was to make a direct connection between Palps and Anakin's birth, I would have had it removed.

Charles Soule supported Martin's statements, replying:

"I am, in fact, the writer. Matt and I worked closely on this series and this point in particular. I hate explaining stuff in my work in too much detail, but you need to understand the scenario happening here. The Dark Side is not a reliable narrator.

However, George Lucas originally intended for Sidious to be Anakin's father as the book, The Making of Star Wars Revenge of the Sith reveals the scene on page 42.

"On Coruscant, PALPATINE completes his seduction of ANAKIN, who at first refuses to go over to the dark side-- until the Chancellor makes a startling confession:

DARTH SIDIOUS: I have waited all these years for you to fulfill your destiny... I arranged for your conception. I used the power of the Force to will the midichlorians to start the cell divisions that created you.

ANAKIN: I don't believe you.

DARTH SIDIOUS: Ahhh, but you know it's true. When you clear your mind, you will sense the truth. You could almost think of me as your father.

ANAKIN: That's impossible!

DARTH SIDIOUS: Nevertheless, you must decide.

This was cut from the final version of the film, most likely because it was too close to The Empire Strikes Back's parentage reveal between Vader and Luke. The only implication of the Sith manipulating Anakin's birth lies in the opera scene in the final film , where Palpatine remarks:

PALPATINE: Darth Plagueis was a Dark Lord of the Sith, so powerful and so wise he could use the Force to influence the midi-chlorians to create life ... He had such a knowledge of the dark side that he could even keep the ones he cared about from dying... He became so powerful . . . the only thing he was afraid of was losing his power, which eventually, of course, he did. Unfortunately, he taught his apprentice everything he knew, then his apprentice killed him in his sleep.

This line is only an implication, not a direct fact, that Sidious could have been the apprentice in question that killed Plagueis. But later in the film, Sidious admits he doesn't know the secret to cheat death, which could imply he wasn't Plagueis's apprentice or was lying about how much he was taught by his dark master.

SIDIOUS: To cheat death is a power only one has achieved, but if we work together, I know we can discover the secret.

Despite all this, however, it appears that the canon answer is still The Force.

Answer 5

When writing The Phantom Menace, an answer was actually never planned by George Lucas, as it is simply echoing the story of Jesus Christ.

But in the first draft of Revenge of the Sith, when Palpatine tries to lure Anakin to the Dark Side and the young Jedi finds out that Palpatine is actually a Sith Lord, Palpatine tells him that he was the one who orchestrated the death of his mom.

In that same script, there is no mention of Darth Plagueis, but Palpatine tells Anakin that he fathered him through midi-chlorians in his mom.

Voilà!

Answer 6

The canon "answer" is that the Force itself caused Anakin to be conceived w/o explanation as to the biophysics involved. IMO, this has been ASSUMED since Shmi simply declares in Episode I that Anakin had no father, that she'd become pregnant w/o benefit of intercourse (poor Shmi, for all that grief and work she deserved at least one night of fun). This echoes the 'miraculous' conception of Jesus Christ. Likewise, following the script of Episode I doesn't preclude a biological father for Anakin, but also gives no clues as to the identity of said father.