"return of the jedi" takes place four years later. at this time, the empire is building a new death star. it is half-finished in the movie. darth sidious (ian mcdiarmid) and darth vader (david prowse/james earl jones) send the rebels false information with the intention of trapping the rebels, saying that the station's weapons systems are not fully functional. they also want to get skywalker on board so they can turn him to the dark side of the force. in the movie's climax, vader throws sidious down one of the station's reactor core, apparantly killing him. however, sidious fires a large amount of sith lightning during this process and critically damages the electronics on vader's suit that keeps him alive. luke tries to get his father out of the battle station but he dies shortly after. luke then takes vader's body and leaves the death star just before it is destroyed by lando calrissian onboard the "millennium falcon."