Little girl turns to the Dark Side at Disneyland

This video made my day! While at Disneyland with her family Sariah Gallego got picked to jump on the stage of the Jedi Training Academy feature. But this was one girl who wasn't satisfied with being a mere Padawan learner! No, she wanted something... more. She wanted to follow her passion. Even if that meant turning to the Dark Side of the Force.

And so in front of everybody including no less a person than Mace Windu, Sariah swore allegiance to Darth Vader and became his Sith apprentice! Behold the video...

Don't know what else to say but... you go girl!! :-)

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Darth Vader robs Long Island bank

So I'm able to get back into blogging this evening and the perfect story lands in my lap for it...

A man dressed as Darth Vader - complete with helmet and cape but curiously camouflage pants - robbed a Chase bank in Setauket on Long Island in New York this morning. "Vader", described as being 6'2", brandished a handgun at the bank teller (I'm compelled to comment: "So uncivilized...") before fleeing the premises with a drawer-full of cash.

Ummm... just, wow.

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Psychologists determine Darth Vader suffered from mental illness

Anakin Skywalker, also known as the Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Vader, has a "borderline personality" described as "a prolonged disturbance of personality function in a person (generally over the age of eighteen years, although it is also found in adolescents), characterized by depth and variability of moods." So sayeth a group of French psychologists who studied the Star Wars villain and found that he suffered from severe mental illness.

According to the study which will soon be published in the journal Psychiatry Research, Darth Vader was examined per the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSMV IV). Of the nine borderline personality disorder criteria, Anakin/Vader fulfilled six of them. Five are required by the DSMV IV to be diagnosed as suffering from the disorder.

From the article...

For instance, the future Darth Vader showed both impulsivity and anger management issues as an overexcited, lovelorn Jedi. He went back and forth between idealizing and devaluing Jedi mentors, such as a humorless young Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Abandonment issues also surfaced. Skywalker had a permanent fear of losing his wife, Padme Amidala, and he went so far as to betray his Jedi mentors and companions to try to prevent her death.

Two displays of dissociative episodes took place when Skywalker tried to distance himself from stressful events. The first episode took place after he slaughtered a local tribe of Tuskens responsible for his mother's death. A second episode occurred following his murderous rampage among young Jedi trainees, as he voiced paranoid thoughts about Obi-Wan Kenobi and his wife.

Lastly, any "Star Wars" fan would recognize Skywalker's identity issues and uncertainty about who he was. His fateful turn to the dark side and change of name to Darth Vader could represent the ultimate sign of such identity disturbance, the researchers said.

So Darth Vader has issues. Geez... ya think?!? I thought that was pretty obvious, personally.

It's prolly just a matter of time before some enterprising psychology student hits the federal government up for a $100,000 grant to go to Gotham City and study the criminal insanity of the Joker :-P

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The Darth Vader Toaster

Time for another entry in the "Things We Don't Really Need But Are Lusting For Badly" file...

Wouldya believe that StarWarsShop.com is now selling the Darth Vader Toaster? For $54.99 you can have this kitchen appliance, which burns the evil visage of that most famous Dark Lord of the Sith into the surface of a slice of bread. Kinda sick, when you think about how the living remnant of what was once Anakin Skywalker is so charred and roasted under that black armor.

But I guess it's true: there really isn't any merchandise that they won't stick the Star Wars brand name on :-P

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Darth Vader tries to join Lutheran priests in Reykjavík

Is that the most weird title in the history of blogging, or what?

But it's true: Darth Vader tried to take part in a procession of Icelandic Lutherans in that island country's capital of Reykjavík. Here's the video...

And here are some pictures on Flickr of the incident.

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STAR WARS BLUEPRINTS: THE ULTIMATE COLLECTION coming in August

This has to be the gnarliest cover for a printed Star Wars product that I've ever seen. Behold the box for Star Wars Blueprints: The Ultimate Collection...

That pic alone reinforces something that's taken me awhile to really grasp: that for all his dreaded reputation, Darth Vader is a pretty pitiful character. Imagine being a scorched torso with no arms or legs, not even able to breathe on your own, being surrounded by all of that intrusive technology just to keep you alive. Never mind about also having to use it to enforce the will of your dark master. Last week I was able to finally score - after months of looking - the Battle Damaged Darth Vader action figure from The Force Unleashed line. The girl at the checkout counter saw what she was ringing up and said "Oh God that's sick!" And then she said that she could no longer hate Vader as a character either, that it was "so sad" what happened to him.

Funny how our perception of things changes over time, eh?

Anyhoo, Star Wars Blueprints: The Ultimate Collection is scheduled to come out August 4th with a list price of $19.99, and will also include details plans of the Millennium Falcon (the current accepted version of the layout anyway), the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO, the Death Star, and lightsabers and blasters.

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