Way back in 2006, Wisconsin filmmakers Aaron Yoda and Matt Sloan envisioned what it would be like if one of popular culture’s most famous archetypes of evil worked the day shift at your local supermarket.
A few days of shooting in a neighborhood grocery co-op and one $600 Darth Vader suit later, Yoda and Sloan released what would become one of the first, big online video hits to draw attention from both mainstream media and the early YouTube crowd.
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Under the banner of Blame Society Productions, Yoda and Sloan went on to produce 20+ episodes of Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager, spanning across three seasons, and garnering tens of millions of views, all with the same premise: “Life is hard when you’re Darth Vader’s less-talented, less-charismatic younger brother and you manage a grocery store.”
The happenings of a hapless dark lord with lady troubles and a blue collar job still remain relatively popular, even four years after the series premiere.
That kind of longevity is rare in the web series world, which is probably one of the main reasons why Babelgum just acquired the entire Chad Vader and Blame Society Productions library. The “integrated web and mobile video content platform” sees value in reintroducing Chad Vader to the world, distributing the series to the site’s “vast global network of rabid comedy and sci-fi fans.”
Babelgum wouldn’t tell us for how much they acquired Blame Society Productions’ content library, nor would they elaborate on any financial terms of the deal. If the series does well, however, expect Yoda and Sloan to create more web originals exclusively for Babelgum. In the meantime, one new episode of Chad Vader will premiere on Babelgum every month for as long as the force is strong with this series.
