@ lightninglouie

The stormtroopers were originally envisioned by Lucas to be failed attempts at bulk cloning by the Emperor of Jedi Anakin Skywalker, of which Darth Vader was the only successful clone. This was supposed to have been revealed in Episode 6 "Revenge of the Jedi", in which both Obi-wan's story to Luke about how Darth had killed his father, and Darth's claim to be Luke's father are essentially proven to be technically true.

Lucas, of course, changed course for reasons known only unto himself, and the brilliantly moody atmosphere of "Empire" became the slap-happy shambles of "Return", instead of the equally grim "Revenge". The Ewoks, for example, were supposed to be Wookies (is anyone surprised? no? moving on...), which of course didn't show back up until one of the later "earlier" episodes, and the clones were morphed from Jedi into mercenary (Jango Fett).