The Jar Jar Theory

Darth Jar JarMy brother sent me an interesting theory. The link, since most of you will not bother to read it, states that Jar Jar Binks was in fact a Force user and that he was supposed to be the evil bad guy. I bet most of you read that and went “huh, I might want to read that theory.” For that last group of you who did not go read it, along me sum it up for you.

-Jar Jar is posing as a simpleton, when in fact, he is a master Jedi, or in this case, a Sith lord. You see, George Lucas once said, about Yoda, that he loved the stories where a hero meets an old, silly character, who eventually is revealed to be the master whatever. That was how Luke is introduced to Yoda. Remember, the old Jedi Master pretends to be this silly, annoying meddler who wants Luke to come eat dinner. He was testing Luke’s patience.

-Lucas also said that the prequels were basically a mirror of the original trilogy. So it would make sense that we meet a character who is a fool then turns out to be a master. The person proposing the theory makes some very valid points about how Jar Jar could be that character and that he was probably supposed to be the Phantom Menace as the title suggested. That title never really made much sense when you consider that we knew Palpatine was the Emperor.

-His idea is that in the second movie, Jar Jar would be revealed to be a Dark Lord and the audience would have been shocked. This helps to explain why Count Dooku just comes out of nowhere. We barely get any backstory to him, just that he was Qui-Gonn’s master, who turns to the dark side and becomes Darth Maul’s replacement.

-As this person puts it, George Lucas chickened out after the extreme backlash against Jar Jar Binks. He was forced to scramble and come up with a different character to fight Anakin.

I do enjoy this theory. However, it does have some problems. If Darth Jar Jar was actually the mastermind behind everything and Palpatine was his pupil, then that would violate that whole rule of two. You know, a master and a student Sith.

Also, this person seems to think that Abrams will bring this back and Jar Jar Binks will end up being a major villain. That would make no sense since he never shows up anywhere in the original trilogy. So if this theory were true, he would have been defeated in the prequels at some point. And yet, where would that point have come? If he were just a substitute for Dooku, then his death would not have been a huge deal, albeit a bit emotional since we “liked” Jar Jar at one point.

Now we have to imagine completely different second and third movies. If he was the real master of Palpatine, then perhaps there comes a scene where once Anakin falls to the dark side that Palpatine and Vader join together to bring down Darth Jar Jar. Not sure when that would have happened, unless Anakin was supposed to fall earlier. This theory makes it seem like there would have been a massive rewrite between the first and second movies. Okay, a quick look at the production history, the script was finished soon after the first movie, so I guess this is actually plausible.

Hmm, I think I am actually starting to convince myself of this theory. And to be honest, as I said earlier, I do like the theory. I just do not buy the idea that Jar Jar was the evil master above Palpatine. I can buy that he was intended to be a villain, or maybe I cannot. Who knows? What are you opinions on this subject?

Bonus question: can someone tell me why we never hear anyone refer to Palpatine as Darth Sidious? I mean, Darth Vader goes by that name, it is his official name. So how come he is Emperor Palpatine and not Darth Sidious, Emperor of the Galaxy?

Author: Ngewo