In The Phantom Menace, set 32 years before A New Hope, R2-D2 is portrayed as belonging to the Naboo defense forces, one of three astromech droids deployed for repair duty onboard Queen Padmé Amidala's (Natalie Portman) starship as it attempts to get past the Trade Federation blockade.
In the years before the Clone Wars, R2-D2 served the Royal House of Naboo. He was aboard Queen Amidala's royal starship when she tried to run the Trade Federation's blockade. Artoo repaired the ship's damaged shields under heavy fire, allowing it to escape into hyperspace.
R2 was later able to restore his companion during the Battle of Geonosis. After the battle, R2-D2 and C-3PO were the sole witnesses to the marriage of Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala in Lake Country. After this Padmé gave ownership of R2 to Anakin while she kept 3PO.
He's had several owners over the course of the movies. He is initially property of Naboo - an emergency repair droid on the queen's ship. The R2 appears to become Padme's property although Anakin seems to have a “personal” connection with him.
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Why didn't R2-D2 tell Luke?
secondly, in Legends, R2 was given programming that actually restricted him. from sharing any information with Luke or Leia. about their parents or relation to one another. this was all part of the plan. to conceal this information from the twins.
R2-D2 was an R2-series Astromech Droid first owned by Queen Amidala, and then by Anakin Skywalker. After briefly being owned by Bail Organa and Captain Antilles, R2 and C-3PO finally came to ownership of Luke Skywalker.
Darth Vader acts like he doesn't even know C-3PO or R2D2. They were with him since he was a child. He did everything he could to forget his past. Also, his plating had been replaced many times, and protocol droids all look very similar.
in the Dark Horse comic series star Wars Tales, which is now part of legends, it's revealed that Darth Vader did recognize C. 3PO on Cloud City. when 3PO was shot by Stormtroopers, his parts were brought before Vader. because the Imperials thought he could hold valuable.
They aren't abbreviations — they're model and serial numbers. R2 is a second generation R-series astromech, serial number D2. * And C-3PO is a C-series protocol droid with the serial number 3PO.
In Star Wars: The Force Awakens, set approximately 30 years after Return of the Jedi, R2-D2 is revealed to be kept in storage at the Resistance base on the planet D'Qar, having put himself in a low-power mode after Luke Skywalker's disappearance.
After C-3PO and R2-D2 landed on Tatooine, Jawas picked up the two droids, fitting them with restraining bolts. The Jawas sold the robots to Owen and Beru Lars and their nephew Luke Skywalker, a seemingly minor event that would change the fate of trillions in the galaxy.
C3PO was bought by Luke's uncle after he and R2 crashed landed on Tatooine. Luke came to own him after his aunt and uncle were slaughtered by stormtroopers.
The sequence calls back to a similar scene in Revenge of the Sith, when Bail Organa orders Threepio's memory be erased to prevent him from sharing information about Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side.
Anakin Skywalker's birth mystery is solved - his mother, Shmi Skywalker, reveals that there was no father and she can't explain what happened. Qui-Gon Jinn believed that the Force itself created Anakin in Shmi's womb, making him the Chosen One who would bring balance to the Force.
She senses Anakin when she reaches out to the pilot — and Vader realizes that Ahsoka, his former Padawan, lives on. In Season 2, Episode 18, “Shroud of Darkness,” Ahsoka's guilt manifests as a vision of Anakin, who's angry with her for leaving him all those years ago.
Because he never owned a droid. R2-D2 was owned by Padme and later Anakin, and after that Bail Organa. R4-P17 was assigned to him to assist, not given to him to own. So he really never owned one.
If Obi-Wan had admitted that he knew R2-D2 and that R2-D2 had belonged to Anakin, Luke may have started asking both of them more questions about his father. To prevent Luke from finding out the full truth before he was ready, Obi-Wan decided to tell more half-truths and pretend he had not known R2-D2 for years.
The real reason why Obi-Wan Kenobi, the Lars family, or Darth Vader didn't act in the original Star Wars trilogy as though they knew C-3PO or R2-D2 previously is that the prequel trilogy, in which they first meet the two droids, had not been written yet.
However, the same could not be said for R2-D2, who never had his memories erased. While there isn't a canonical reason for this decision, the likely explanation may have been that Threepio was more likely to say something he shouldn't have.
R2-D2, sometimes spelled Artoo-Detoo and often referred to as Artoo, was an R2-series astromech droid manufactured by Industrial Automaton prior to 32 BBY, who would participate in major galactic events for nearly two centuries alongside the Skywalker family.
Internally BB-8 was originally called "Ball-Bot". JJ Abrams previous explained why he named the droid BB-8: "I named him BB-8 because it was almost onomatopoeia. It was sort of how he looked to me, with the 8, obviously, and then the 2 B's."
