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In fact, it doesn't redeem him at all.
Sure, we see glimpses of what he was like as Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Knight and Master to Ahsoka Tano's apprentice. However, Ahsoka's fondness for him does not erase the atrocities he has committed. Let's not forget that he slaughtered the younglings in the Jedi Temple at Coruscant, as part of Order 66, also known as the Great Jedi Purge.
Anakin has committed more crimes, but I focus on that mostly because as he was killing Jedi children, his wife Padme Amidala was also pregnant. Granted, he didn't know until after the events in Coruscant. Although not knowing your wife is pregnant does not excuse his killing of children.
Who is Anakin to Ahsoka?
But let's go back to the dichotomy of who Anakin is to Ahsoka. As Anakin Skywalker, he was her Master (although he was never formally given the title, despite having been asked to serve in the Jedi Council) and akin to an older brother judging by how he spoke to her on the bridge in the fourth episode of Ahsoka, “Fallen Jedi.”
Even before that, Anakin was the one who uncovered the real culprit of the crime for which Ahsoka was framed. He also he prevented her from being convicted of sedition.
Ahsoka knew Anakin as both Skywalker and Darth Vader, similar to the way Obi-wan Kenobi did. The difference is that Anakin was her Master, and he was Obi-wan's apprentice.
Disappointment and heartbreak in a student is expected, but those in one's teacher — as the kids these days say — hit differently.
Masters teach their apprentices and when they fail, they are corrected and set on the right path. Apprentices trust their Masters to teach and guide them. However, when they make mistakes (and Masters' mistakes tend to be on a larger scale compared to apprentices'), the apprentice may see this as forgivable but also an abject failure.
In the fifth episode, “Shadow Warrior,” we see a teenaged version of Ahsoka during the Clone Wars. We see the horror and carnage through her eyes. She was taught that Jedis were peacekeepers, but here she was — a child soldier.
She tells Anakin, “This isn't what I trained for.” However, she finds no comfort in the words of her Master as Anakin replies, “We must adjust to the times. When Obi-Wan taught me we were keepers of the peace, but now, to win this war, I have to teach you to be a soldier.”
And in one of the most impressive visual scenes of the episode reminiscent of Akira Kurosawa's Kagemusha (which means “shadow warrior”) as referenced in Kotaku, a young Ahsoka watches Anakin walk off into the dust and for a moment she sees him as Darth Vader — donning his signature helmet and red lightsaber— before the vision turns back to the Anakin she'd been speaking with before.
The next scene we see them together is the Siege of Mandalore. Anakin asks Ahsoka about it, and she tells him that they had parted ways by then. Translation: You had gone over to the Dark Side by then.
In their conversation, Anakin sounds proud that she's become a warrior as he's trained her to be. When Ahsoka asks him, “Is that all?” he tells her that they're both part of a legacy, his tone still proud.
But when she counters, echoing what Baylan Skoll (Ray Stevenson) said to her during their duel, that her “part of that legacy is one of death and war,” his tone changes.
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“But you're more than that,” he sounds more serious but you still hear his fondness for his apprentice. However, when he continues with the second part, “because I'm more than that,” he now sounds both stern and a little angry, maybe even offended.
And therein lies the crux of Anakin's supposed redemption. His legacy is of death and destruction. The “more” part of it came before all of that.
As Darth Vader, he was evil almost the entire time. Until at the end, when he saved his son Luke, killing Emperor Palpatine but dying afterwards.
However, let's remember that one crime of his I couldn't let go of: the massacre at the Jedi Temple in Coruscant. He did that as Anakin Skywalker, not Darth Vader. Not yet.
At the end of their duel back on the bridge, when Ahsoka disarms Anakin and throws away his lightsaber she says, “I choose to live.”
A good master, a terrible evil
Unless Season 2 tells me otherwise, I choose to believe that Ahsoka now understands that she has to live with the fact that her Master was both Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader.
His good deeds as Anakin, her Master, do not outweigh the evil he did as Darth Vader. That two things can be true at the same time: Anakin Skywalker was a good Master to her, and Darth Vader was evil. And they were the same person.
She can love him and still acknowledge the evil that he's done. For some things, there is no redemption. Even after death.
Ahsoka is streaming on Disney+ now.
