Shmi Skywalker was Anakin Skywalker’s mother in The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. After Anakin left with Qui-Gon Jinn to become a Jedi, Shmi stayed in Tatooine as a slave. Cliegg Lars later purchased her and then freed her. They married and lived happily until Shmi was abducted by Tusken Raiders which led to her death.
In Star Wars canon there isn’t very much known about Shmi beyond the fact that she was a slave to both Gardulla the Hutt and Watto before she met Cliegg Lars and that she claimed Anakin did not have a father (midichlorians birth!) Shmi appeared in many adaptations (books and comics) of Episodes I and II and appeared as a vision to Anakin in The Clone Wars episode “Overlords” and as a vision to Darth Vader in Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith 5: The Chosen One, Part V.
In Legends, Shmi is mentioned or appears via flashback in even more stories. In Tatooine Ghost, for instance, Leia finds a journal Shmi kept during some of her life on Tatooine.
Actress Pernilla August (see her Day 11 page) played Shmi in The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones and voiced her in The Clone Wars.
Check out the entire list of women in 365 Days of Star Wars Women in the Women in Star Wars Index. It includes highlights from each post plus notes which posts include new 365 interviews with actresses, writers, artists, and more.
