so since ur such a big padmé fan too, I have a bit of a question for u. so when padmé is telling anakin all the reasons they can't be together, she mentions how she's a senator, so before I thought oh I guess senators can't married (which I realized was incorrect). now however, it seems she brought that up just bc of both their statuses and how it especially wouldn't look good for a jedi and senator to be involved w/ how close the two organizations often work together. do u have any thoughts??
I’m SO GLAD I’m not the only one who thought that Padmé meant Senators couldn’t marry, lol. I basically just went “Huh, space politics are weird,” and just kind of wrote it off until I got back into Star Wars earlier this year and rewatched The Phantom Menace recently. And @evaceratops and I have talked about this issue at length!
And yes, I definitely think it’s because of how the Jedi have been conscripted to work under the Senate (huehueue); @gffa has some meta on this that has been buried in my likes somewhere; otherwise I’d link it! IIRC, it was basically written into the founding documents of the Republic that the Jedi would be merged into the Republic as a peace-keeping force? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that’s the (very basic) gist of it. So the Jedi already have the No Relationships/Marriage thing, and added to the fact that Padmé was a very influential Senator, a relationship with a Jedi could have negative repercussions for both of them.
Eva and I also have this headcanon that, for Padmé, as a prominent member of one of the Naboo noble families - House Naberrie - her relationships were tied to social standing. The Naboo are very traditional, and traditionally, relationships/marriages had to be Approved by the families. For her to be in a relationship with a Jedi, and not a Good Noble of Excellent Standing, would have been a minor scandal among the more austere traditionalists in Nabooian society. (oh, ha, this headcanon definitely comes into play for arcmaiden, too, I just realized)
Anakin has to work with the No Attachments rule, and Padmé has her career as an active politician in addition to her family’s expectations for relationships. A nice combination of canon-and-headcanon for an answer :D
