Hehe Darth Kimball

I was cleaning out my room when I ran across a printout from Corona Coming Attractions. The date was May 23rd 2000. Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones had no title announced and a few drips of information were starting to hit the net. A few of us over at TheForce.net's forum, the Jedi Council, JCers for short, thought it would be funny to pull a fast one on AintItCoolNews, Corona ComingAttractions (now Cinescape), etc.

We wanted something that sounded unbelieveable, but at the sametime wouldn't be immediately dismissed. To this date, there are 529 google hits on "Darth Kimball". Chyren was a JCer that was part of heading up the effort. I pledged to post on Corona Coming Attractions, did so and forgot about it. A week later, I checked the thread we were posting in and it got huge.


This is what Corona printed:

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May 23, 2000... Okay, put this in the pocket you reserve for wild, freaked out, unsubstantiated rumors. We've received numerous e-mails from a variety of sources stating that the next Sith badass will be named...Darth Kimball. Yeah, I know, we had the same reaction here. One scooper by the name of Joey told us that Kimball was named for a villain in a Japanese fable. And one anonymous scooper laid everything out like this. If he's right, then you're looking at major SPOILER material. If he's wrong, then you can look back on this and be amused. But for right now, grab your salt like he asks and look at this if you dare:

"I really can't tell you how I came about this info without revealing my friends who gave it to me, so you'll just have to take it with a grain of salt, unless you can confirm it yourselves. The name of the next apprentice in Episode 2 and 3 (yes, he will appear in BOTH films) is definitely Darth Kimball. What significance the name has I wasn't told, but designers are working on two drastic looks for this Sith Apprentice. By Episode 3, he will appear more 'monstrous'. This will be due to the effects of his battle with Yoda(!) at the end of Episode 2. He will survive and return in Episode 3 - and this where my sources might have been just speculating - and he will be the one to cause Anakin's injuries that lead to his wearing the suit. This is done out of resentment at being replaced by Anakin as Palpatine's apprentice. Word has it that Kimball strikes down Anakin (and into some kind of pit - lava?) in front of Obi-Wan as he is trying to convince Anakin to renounce the Dark Side. This causes Obi-Wan's guilt of not being to save Anakin, from himself or from Darth Kimball.

"The parts about Episode 3 are speculation on the part of my sources, although they say they have heard Lucas' outlines for 3 as well as 2. But Darth Kimball will be the name of the next apprentice. That much is true."

Now, a couple of thoughts spring to mind. First, we took Joey's notion that Kimball was based on a character from a Japanese fable and we started searching. Nothing. No hits. Granted, we're not exactly scholars in Japanese folklore, so we might not know where to look. But still, it gives one pause.

The other possible explanation for the name might be that it's a "Blue Harvest," i.e. a cover name for the true name of the new apprentice. At this point, we are without clue. Or it could be a rumor that somebody started to be cute and now it's got a bunch of people on board. But we'd be remiss if we didn't let you know that the rumor was out there. Now let's just get some more information, shall we? [Thanks to Joey and a few of his anonymous buddies.]

May 23, 2000...Later... Oh well, that's why we marked the thing as a rumor and asked you guys to help us out. A couple of scoopers were nice enough to come clean and point us to the forums on TheForce.net, where a conglomerate of fans decided to try and dupe various sites, apparently specifically targeting this one. Here's one posting from a "Jedi Knight" known as "dolphin":

"I will be contacting news and entertainment news agencies in the hopes of spreading the false rumor of a 'Darth kimball'. For those who don't know there IS NO Darth Kimball in Ep2 or 3 it is just an attempt at exposing the inaccuracies of the media. We need everyone to email news agencies and carry out the plan. Hopefully no one from those companies will frequent this site."

He then posted the URL to our scoop submission page and recommended us as a site that would bite. In that regard, "dolphin" was right.

While moderately amusing that Darth Kimball turned out to be bogus, and the touch that Joey gave with the Japanese fable bit was quite thoughtful, we'd like to point out that when we know things to be fact--we report them as such. When we're not sure, we tell you that as well. And when we're wrong, we come back and tell you that too. Like right now. Be warned that there were other stages to the disinformation campaign, as one user by the name of "Chyren" was supposedly working on a vidcap of the fake Sith apprentice. See for yourself here. [Thanks to manix27 and Anonymous for setting the record straight.]

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What I thought was amazing is how accurate this crap was. The new sith apprentice was indeed in both movies, he did have a fight with Yoda, he did strike Anakin down, and in some ways was what start Anakin toward the darkside; decapitating Tyranus/Dooku was the first example of that in Episode III.

Anyway, it was a fun trip down memory lane even if the room isn't totally clean. It appears the legend of the mysterious Kimball still lurks the net. 529 hits on google as of this posting...more than six years later.

So if you run across a reference to Darth Kimball you now are in on the joke

--Joey