May The Blog Be With You

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Comments aren't always reliable indicators of a blog's popularity: their number depends on various factors, including the subject (you'd be surprised how interactive a technology-related post can become!) and the mood of the readers.

However, all arguments come to naught when you come across a blog post that has nearly 900 comments on it.

But then you'd expect Star Wars, with a cult following that runs into the millions, to have that effect. The Darth Side: Memoirs of a Monster (http://darthside.blogspot.com/ ) is an innovative personal home page maintained by none other than Darth Vader, the black-armoured Sith lord who rivalled Gabbar Singh as a preferred nightmare source for many of us who grew up in the early 1980s. Vader started off by being the villain of the series but eventually turned into its central figure.

On this blog, Vader (originally Jedi knight Anakin Skywalker) tells his fictional story: from his childhood as a slave on the planet Naboo, his rise to become the greatest Jedi, to his eventual crossing over to the Dark Side and his concern for son Luke. The blog is set roughly around the time of Return of the Jedi, the last film in the original Star Wars trilogy.

Fan fiction has, of course, been around since the early days of the Internet. The man behind Darth Side is Maurice Frederick David Hemming, who has also written Simon of Space, a free sci-fi novel serialised online (http://simonofspace.blogspot.com/ ) and who additionally blogs at "I am a Cheeseburger" (http://mfdh.blogspot.com/) .

What makes Darth Side work is the quality of writing and Hemming's in-depth knowledge of Star Wars mythology: of both its silly and its more poignant elements.

The voice in general is consistent with the personality of the solemn Vader. As Hemming put it in an online interview, the entries are best enjoyed if you read them keeping in mind the deep baritone of James Earl Jones, who voiced Vader in the original series.

The writing conveys the push-pull relationship many Star Wars fans have with the series: fascination combined with an awareness of its inherent geekiness.

The first entry, for instance (the one that got all those comments), is a thoughtful one that shows a close understanding of the series' back-story and showcases Anakin/Vader as a conflicted, split-personality anti-hero.

But subsequent entries have fun with the sillier aspects of the series. A description of an "Ewok cook-out", for instance, where the hooded teddy bears from Return of the Jedi are served up as "crisp kababs". By the way, don't miss some of the comments on this entry!

If this doesn't satiate you, also check out the official Star Wars blog (http://blogs.starwars.com/ ), where just about anyone can log in and post on anything "" from the "hottest chicks on Star Wars" to "how C3PO acquired a single silver plating on his right shin area". This is a more expansive site but also, predictably, much more erratic in its quality.

On the Internet, democracy isn't always a good thing!

Jai Arjun Singh, aka Jabberwock, blogs at http://jaiarjun.blogspot. com