ack, I meant to agree about Vader's awesomeness being at least partly driven by his not being a soulless monster like Tarkin and Palpatine, or merely amusingly 100% evil like every other Imperial ever. I think this is what some of the fanboys fail to get when they're complaining about him actually loving his wife or, in ye olde days of fandom, loving his son - that's what makes his villainy stand out so much. In fact, I'm pretty sure I wrote about this at some point.
Re: I expect this will be a long reply
*searches* Oh right, here. Sorta.