Continuity mistake: When Anakin and Padmé's son, Luke, is born, the baby is swabbed clean as the midwife droid hands him to Obi-Wan. But in the shot where Padmé says, "Oh, Luke." there's blood on the baby's head and chest. (02:00:45)
Continuity mistake: When Anakin is in the medical centre lying on his back being transformed into Darth Vader, you can see the main part of the mask being lowered into place but Anakin is not wearing the neck section of the mask that it connects to. We then see the main part lowering directly downwards, in the next shot the neck section is in place. (02:01:20)
Other mistake: During the scene of Anakin's transformation into Darth Vader, there is a close up shot of his face just before his helmet is put in place. All of his face is shown as being badly burned with the exception of his eyelashes, which are still impossibly there. Subjecting one's face to any heat source hot enough to sear one's face will also burn away one's eyelashes as well. (02:01:25)
Continuity mistake: In the first shot of the scene Bail Organa, Yoda and Obi-Wan discuss the future of the twins, most of the holster of Bail Organa's blaster is visible, but in the next shot, most of it is covered by his cloak. (02:03:50)
Continuity mistake: At the beginning of the scene where Obi-Wan, Yoda and Bail Organa discuss the future of Anakin and Padmé's children, Obi-Wan's hand is positioned against his chin. The position of his hand, as well as his left arm, changes between shots. (02:03:50)
Continuity mistake: When Bail Organa hands Leia to his wife, Breha Organa, the floor around Breha is covered in shadow. In the close-up of Leia being held, there are no shadows, and the design of the floor is different. (02:07:20)
Continuity mistake: When Obi-wan arrives at Tatooine and about to give the baby (Luke) away we see that he has the baby under his cloak. In a wide shot as he is walking he removes his cloak from the baby. When it cuts to a close shot he removes it again. (02:07:35)
Continuity mistake: When Owen and Beru are standing next to each other at the end of the movie, in the shot facing them, they are standing closer together than in the previous shot. (02:08:05)
Continuity mistake: On Utapau, when Obi-Wan faces off with Grievous, Grievous sends 4 MagnaGuards against Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan Force-pulls something from the ceiling to crush the droids. But in the ensuing fight between Obi-Wan and Grievous, the ceiling thing and crushed droids are gone.
Continuity mistake: When Palpatine fights the four Jedi Masters, his lightsaber hilt changes from his to Anakin's and back again. This happens throughout the scene. [This mistake is pointed out in the text commentary.]
Other mistake: To escape from the elevator, Anakin cuts a hole in the ceiling. Later, when they rescue the Chancellor, they almost get crushed by another elevator (it is another one. Each elevator has a number. Obi Wan said the number of this elevator before and it was different than the one that had the hole). However, when a shot of this elevator is shown, it has the same hole that the other elevator has (better seen in slow motion).
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Anakin returns to Padme's apartment after the fight at the Jedi temple, watch R2-D2 in his compartment in Anakin's ship as the camera angle changes. In some shots, R2's "legs" are flush with the hull of the ship, and in others, they are well above it.
Continuity mistake: When Palpatine is talking to Anakin in his office, there is a table at the end of the hall with a large object in the middle, and a gold cup on each side. When they leave the office and are talking in the hall, and a thin purple lamp/object appears on the end of it for a few shots, and vanishes whenever seen from then on.
Continuity mistake: When the Emperor and Yoda flip backwards out of the pod from the "kickback" of the Force lightning the Emperor falls onto the sloped side of the pod.When they show him again he is hanging on the side of the pod with handles.(If you look at the pods each has a sloped side and a part with guardrail or handle)
Continuity mistake: When R2 is at the terminal near the beginning, the two super battle droids start to walk over to him and their red dots are on the left hand side but when they get to R2 they have moved to the right hand side.
Other mistake: In the final stages of the Obi-Wan/Anakin battle, they are fighting while floating over lava on a piece of metal. Just before Obi-Wan jumps to the high ground, we get a close-up shot of Obi-Wan (lightsaber pointing left off-screen) and then Anakin, (lightsaber pointing right off-screen) In this shot, Anakin's right hand is uncovered/real, and his left is gloved/mechanical, when it should be the opposite.
Continuity mistake: When Anakin chokes Obi-Wan, the sleeves of Obi-Wan's tunic move up and down his arms between shots, especially his right arm.
Continuity mistake: During the Sidious and Yoda battle, the number of missing pods off the wall isn't consistent between shots. Sometimes a few are missing, then a lot then back to a few.
Continuity mistake: During the Anakin vs Obi-Wan fight, there is one bit where they are balancing on a thin pole. The shot starts off above them and you can see that there is nothing underneath them. They take a few steps backwards while fighting, but then they both jump off on to one of the arms of the structure they are fighting on.
Audio problem: When Padme is trying to convince Anakin to turn from the dark side on Mustafar, Anakin says "And I'm doing it for you, to protect you." If you look closely, his mouth says "And I'm doing it because I love you, to protect you."
Chosen answer: Powerful force users seem to have some degree of control over their bodies even after death. In the later series, Luke's wife Mara Jade Skywalker only allows her body to disappear when her killer, and nephew Jacen Solo arrives at her funeral as a clue. Thus it appears that a powerful force user can simply choose if they wish their body to disappear.
Darius Angel