Here I am, writing my first blog, and I decide to tackle probably the worst topic I can think of: Justifying Jar Jar.

Sure, the general consensus is that Jar Jar is downright the most annoying character any of us has ever seen, and I know many people who wish him an excruciating painful death, but he serves a purpose both from a financial and storytelling point of view.

First off, it should be common knowledge by now that one of George's reasons for putting Jar Jar in The Phantom Menace was to give the kids a character to enjoy. He didn't seem to feel it was necessary for the original Star Wars, but he wasn't a father at the time either. And a lot of the little tykes I've talked to like Jar Jar, and why not? He talks funny, is a nice guy and does some funny stuff. It doesn't take much, kids are great like that.

From a storytelling point of view, Jar Jar is important because someone has to be the idiot who's going to give Palpatine total power. As you recall, in Attack of the Clones, Jar Jar gets duped by Palpatine into putting forth the motion to give the Chancellor emergency powers. It would take a special kind of moron to do something like that, and Jar Jar was that very kind. It was established in the previous film, remember?

Granted, establishing Jar Jar's nice-but-bungling nature could have been handled in a way that we all didn't immediately hate him. As a friend of mine put it, his performance in The Phantom Menace was equivalent to an hour and a half of dancing back and forth chanting "Mesa stoopid! Mesa stoopid!" Perhaps if Lucas hadn't hit us over the head with Jar Jar's clumsiness and silliness, there wouldn't be quite so many Jar Jar haters out there.

Just something to think about the next time you start trashing this character we all love to hate.