The man responsible for some of the most memorable sword fights in cinema for nearly the past 50 years, recently passed on at the age of 89.

Many may not have heard of him but he has been the hand behind the sword in many a movies, an exhaustive list that spans his 50 year career, even training Errol Flynn in his earlier years. More recently, he was the sword master for the Lord of the Rings movies (including the upcoming, The Hobbit) and the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. However, he resonates with me more prominently for his work on the original STAR WARS movies, both choreographing the fights in Empire and Jedi as well as doubling for Darth Vader during said swordplay (uncredited for years for his work to maintain the illusion of Darth Vader being a singular figure).

Staged fights were never done with more skill, precision, emotion, and imagination than those under the umbrella of Bob Anderson and no one person, I believe, has spurred so many playground sword fights, scraped/bloodied so many knuckles (memories and scars that I, and I'm sure many of people out there, still cherish today), and inspired so many fights in awful, awful, awful fan films.

Being that actions speak louder than words, lets sit back and revel in the glory of one of my personal favorite fights, done no better than by the subject of this short blog. Here's one to you, Mr. Anderson.