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The Darth Vader Clone is a character archetype originating in sci-fi begun by the popularity of the eponymous character from Star Wars.
These characters' traits may include the following:
- Wears a life support mask, a similar mask, or something along the lines of it. Bonus points if he has Vader Breath.
- Wears Dark Armor and black clothing, often including a kabuto-like Cool Helmet or a Cool Hat in a more realistic setting.
- Having a Badass Cape.
- The Character may turn out to be a colleague of the Mentor Archetype or related to one of the protagonists. Especially if he's an Archnemesis Dad, leading to a Luke, I Am Your Father moment. If the mentor is killed in action, the Vader Clone is likely the one to do it.
- May have been a Fallen Hero
- Often a Magic Knight or an equivalent.
- Can be the Big Bad, but is sometimes The Dragon instead, as the original Vader was. In case of the latter, the Darth Vader Clone often supports a physically weaker, less combative, or more magical evil mastermind.
- May be disfigured in some way, bald and/or unnaturally pale-skinned.
- May also have complex motivations that make this character more of an Anti-Villain, although still somewhat dark.
- Speaks in a really deep voice. Expect the Clone's voice to either sound metallic or machine-like as well if possible, which is tied to the mask, armor, and fall from grace. Bonus points if the voice also incorporates a Creepy Monotone.
- Carries a weapon. Commonly a sword. Bonus points if it's red. Or glowy. Or both.
- Possibly Reforged Into a Minion.
- May pull a Heel Face Turn and/or Heroic Sacrifice at the end of the story.
- May sometimes be the main character prior to their Face Heel Turn.
- May be a very talented, dangerous, and ruthless warrior even if they suffer a horrible accident.
- May have evil/dark supernatural powers (extra points if they grant telekinesis or supernatural senses).
- May have powers fueled by hatred and rage.
- May have a similar personality to Vader: Dark, serious, and easy to piss off yet stoic.
- These characters might share elements of Prequel-era Anakin/Vader such as a backstory involving a dead loved one (and parent), an unnatural and/or unusual birth, a poor background and have a young (and female) apprentice that shares a close bond with them similar to Ahsoka Tano.
- These characters refer to their past self as an entirely different person.
- May try to convince characters to join their side.
- May have a tendency to be lethally severe to minions who fail them.
Many characters of this type are found in the Star Wars franchise (and ironically, they often apply to characters who chronologically lived long before Vader was even born, which makes this played straight in a meta sense, but inverted in-universe, because Vader’s the one taking inspiration from them, not the other way around).
It goes without saying that many of these villainous traits were also around in fiction long before Star Wars popularized them further. Thus, characters may appear to be examples of this trope in retrospect, even if they originally had nothing to do with Vader and his franchise.
Not surprisingly, many characters of this type are found in Star Wars canon itself.
Sub Trope of Fountain of Expies and Sister Trope to Char Clone. Compare Obviously Evil, Tin Tyrant. See also May the Farce Be with You, and Fauxba Fett for an expy of another popular Star Wars character.
Advertising[]
- One advertising campaign for E. Wedel's chocolate features an obvious Darth Vader expy coming to Earth for (what else?) E. Wedel's chocolate, taking along a Robot Buddy in the vein of R2-D2. His activities include partying, assisting a cooking show host, and helping with the construction of a snow sculpture.
Anime & Manga[]
- Iron Mask from Mobile Suit Gundam F91, combining Darth Vader Clone and it's Japanese equivalent, the Char Clone.
Comic Books[]
- Star Wars Legacy: Cade refuses to let his childhood love Azlyn die, even though she asks him to, accepting her fate and the will of the Force. When all other option fail, he gets her to people who put her in a Vader-esque life support armor. After waking up, she was really pissed at him. Fortunately for her, she managed to avoid slipping to Dark Side and managed to get the scary black suit replaced with something much more elegant.
- Galaxy of Fear: Clones has a literal clone of Darth Vader
- Micronauts' own Baron Karza, in both the toy and the comic.
- Lumiya was trained by the man himself and is practically a Distaff Counterpart.
- There's also Dirk Raider from Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!. Not only is he similar in appearance to Darth Vader (although his helmet is more similar to Boba Fett), he even has a similar backstory to Vader's Start of Darkness in Revenge of the Sith. A notable difference, however, is that Dirk Raider's more of a Card-Carrying Villain instead of a complex character.
Films[]
- The original Darth Vader from the Star Wars films is the Trope Namer.
- Darth Maul is obviously an Expy of Darth Vader in a The Dragon sort of way. Count Dooku is also an Expy of Darth Vader, but he's actually got more in common with The Emperor. General Grievous is a bit closer to Vader; Darth Vader has trouble breathing, Grevious has a cough, and they're both cyborgs.
- Word of God says the three were used for Foreshadowing, each one being an element of Vader: Maul as The Dragon who enforces the Emperor's will, Dooku as a fallen Jedi, and Grievous as a cyborg with breathing problems.
- Kylo Ren from the Sequel Trilogy. The Force Awakens outright says that he's trying to emulate his grandfather.
- Darth Maul is obviously an Expy of Darth Vader in a The Dragon sort of way. Count Dooku is also an Expy of Darth Vader, but he's actually got more in common with The Emperor. General Grievous is a bit closer to Vader; Darth Vader has trouble breathing, Grevious has a cough, and they're both cyborgs.
- Darth Vader's own appearance is often thought to be inspired by the Film Serial character The Lighting from The Fighting Devil Dogs.
- Dark Helmet from Spaceballs.
- Mr. Big from Adventures In Dinosaur City serves as a dinosaur version of this until the final half of the movie where he removes his hooded robe.
- Zurg from Toy Story, particularly in Toy Story 2, being an Evil Counterpart to Buzz and his father. Though he's also the Emperor.
- Buzz Lightyear himself ends up becoming this in Toy Story 3, thanks to Lotso resetting him to his factory settings.
- Lord Graal is a pretty blatant one from The Humanoid.
- The Doctor AKA Cobra Commander is this in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. The sequel had him closer to his original cartoon incarnation.
- Tron: Legacy has the masked, black-clad bad guy Rinzler who actually is former good guy Tron, who returns to the light side and tries to kill his evil master at the end.
- Megatron from the Bayverse. He was once a champion of justice, albeit a Good Is Not Nice sort, before his worst traits were encouraged and inflamed by the Fallen. Like Vader he's shown as the Big Bad in the first film before the sequel reveals his true master. Though he differs from Vader in that there's no Luke-analogue, Optimus is more Megatron's Obi-Wan (in the timeframe of Episode III) than anything else, and he lacks Vader's Tragic Villain aspects.
Literature[]
- Margaret Weis is a huge fan of the Vader character, so it's no surprise she borrowed his general aesthetic for several of the Dragon Highlords from the Dragonlance Chronicles, which she co-wrote. The closest to Vader in terms of both appearance and character, though, is not a Highlord at all, but rather the undead knight Lord Soth. The direction of Raistlin's story arc also parallels Vader's in some ways, though the two characters aren't very alike in terms of personality, appearance, or abilities.
- Star Wars Legends has a lot of books taking place after Vader's death, and a number of villains who call back to him, even if they'd never met him. Kueller of The New Rebellion is one of the most notable ones, though he also has callbacks to the Emperor. There's even a point where Luke, fighting him, decides to have an Obi-Wan Moment and let himself get killed so he can guide his sister - but his sister interrupts by just shooting Kueller.
- And there was of course, Galaxy of Fear: Clones which literally had Darth Vader's clone.
- The Horned King in The Book of Three.
Live-Action TV[]
- Wolzard from Mahou Sentai Magiranger. Heavily-armored, deep-voiced, sword-wielding black-magician dragon to the Eldritch Abomination N.Ma - and secretly the team's brainwashed missing father. His Mystic Force counterpart Koragg also counts, although he's only the Red Ranger's dad.
- Before either of them was Chouryou/Iron Face Xiang Lao from Gosei Sentai Dairanger. Fallen Hero and father of Ryou, the series' Red Ranger. He is by far the most blatant. His boss amongst the villains is a ripoff of the Emperor when in human guise, he dies saving his son from said boss's Electric Torture, and the spirits of his friends appear to forgive him when he passes.
Video Games[]
- A non-canon example is in The Force Unleashed's dark side ending, which has Galen Marek in a similar situation to Darth Vader by being made a cyborg.
- Darth Malak from Knights of the Old Republic is possibly the most obvious Darth Vader expy.
- Dark Madder from Warp Force.
- Kabal from the Mortal Kombat series.
- Grahf THE SEEKER OF POWER of Xenogears was specifically designed to resemble Darth Vader.
- Golbez from Final Fantasy IV is a more fantasy-themed version, complete with a Cecil I Am Your Brother moment. He wears black armor, is a Badass Baritone when he's voiced, has a rather ominous and rather badass theme whenever he is nearby, used to be good but was corrupted and brainwashed by Zemus, and once he comes to his senses he helps the heroes destroy him.
- As two more Shout Outs, in Dissidia Final Fantasy he has an attack called "Cosmic Ray", which fires blasts of electricity from his hands in a manner heavily resembling Force Lightning (ironically, the original Darth Vader never actually learned this attack and in fact was killed by it), and he calls the CPU boss from IV to fire lasers, the CPU greatly resembling the Death Star as a large black metal Attack Drone.
- Gabranth in Final Fantasy XII is The Dragon to The Emperor, Vayne, is revealed to be Basch's Evil Twin and is a Fallen Hero who is pretty much single-handedly responsible for the fall of Dalmasca and the Empire's reign in the region. Clad in dark silver armor with a black cape and having a metallic echo to his voice due to his helmet, Gabranth is actually a broken man who feels he has nothing to live for except his servitude to Vayne, his home and family having been taken from him or given up. By the end of the game he helps the heroes defeat Vayne, but is mortally wounded for his heroism and dies soon after.
- Ardyn Izunia qualifies to an extent. His backstory has him being a messianic figure who (supposedly) was supposed to ascend to the throne, only to end up becoming evil due to extremely breaking circumstances, including betrayal and the loss of a woman he loved dearly.[2] He also ends up acting as the right hand to the Emperor by the events of the main game, and his Villain Episode reveals that the outfit he wore as Chancellor was created specifically to allow him to operate fully unhindered during daytime hours thanks to his status of hosting several demons from his time as a healer, similar to how Vader had to wear a life support suit to survive. Oh, and he's also revealed to be a relative to the game's main protagonist, Noctis, specifically his great uncle from ages past. In Dawn of Future Past, he even redeems himself in a sense.
- King K. Rool behaves this way in Donkey Kong 64.
- Darth Malgus in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Also, most Sith Warrior PCs can give it a decent go, especially with some of the late game helmets like this.
- The bosses of the 1987 Star Wars Licensed Game for the Famicom are a long line of Darth Vader knockoffs, such as Scorpion Vader and Wampa Vader, who drop their masks and cloaks soon into the Boss Battle. The actual Darth Vader is defeated before the assault on the Death Star.
- The Darkshine Knight from Seiken Densetsu 3 qualifies. He wears bulky dark armor, is a formidable swordsman and is second in command to the Big Bad. Later he is revealed to be working for the Dragon Emperor, which actually makes him third in command. Oh, and he's also Duran's (one of the protagonists) father
- In the arcade game Xain D'Sleena (also known as Solar Warrior), one finds on the top of a temple located in the planet (named Cleedos Soa/Jupiter [3] respectively) a flying head that looks suspiciously similar to Darth Vader's helmet and that must be destroyed in order to follow on the level. If one skips the planet, it will appear in space chasing your ship from behind. Worse, it cannot be killed since your ship just fires to the front, so you must just dodge its bullets until it retires.
- Arguably, Xemnas from the Kingdom Hearts series in terms of appearance and backstory. He wears a black cloak, wields "ethereal blades" that resemble red lightsabers, and his past incarnation Terra is a very blatant Anakin Skywalker Clone with a similar Fallen Hero backstory.
- Epsilon from Mega Man X Command Mission.
- The Gamecube game Custom Robo has Sergei, who not only possessed a baritone voice (well, it's implied due to the eight-bit speech sounds being deep), a face mask obscuring all but his right eye, being a high-executive to the Z-Syndicate, and The Dragon to Oboru, but is also the older brother of Marcei. Likewise, he also pulls a Heel Face Turn late into the game.
- The Magic Emperor in Lunar the Silver Star, being a Fallen Hero on a Knight Templar quest to return the world to divine rule, and clad in black armor and robes with an enclosing helmet that makes his voice sound much deeper than it does otherwise.
- Jill Valentine plays this role in Resident Evil 5, being a former ally of Chris Redfield who ended up brainwashed by the main villain, and up until the reveal, wore a bird-like gas mask that deepened her voice and a cloak, not to mention served as the Dragon to the Big Bad (Albert Wesker). Also serves as a rare female example of this trope.
- Ironically, Wesker himself also fit the trope in the same game, based on what Adam Clarke stated about Wesker and Spencer's relationship.
- Cia from Hyrule Warriors arguably qualifies as a female example. For most of the game, she wears a black menacing face mask that hides most of her features, she is revealed to have originally been good only to have been corrupted to becoming evil thanks to a greater evil, and she's even revealed to be directly related to one of the main protagonists, Lana (although in this case, it's more of Lana being an Enemy Without for her instead of being a biological relative, being an embodiment of the light that was excised from Cia), even with a similar Reveal that shocks everyone involved (save for Lana, obviously, who ironically also engaged in From a Certain Point of View earlier to her allies regarding how exactly they were related.). In Legends, she even ends up redeemed similar to Vader, aiding the protagonists in taking down the Big Bad (or, more accurately, a phantom of the Big Bad from an alternate dimension). Heck, considering her corruption largely dealt with uncontrolled love for one of the main characters (Link), she even comes across as a female expy of Revenge of the Sith Anakin Skywalker as well.
- Super Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair: Izuru Kamakura, built as the "Ultimate Hope", with the combined talents of multiple Ultimates, is subverted by Junko and becomes her main general. Being Hajime, his backstory is also quite similar, with Chiaki as the "Padme" who was killed by Junko to motivate him.
- Infinite from Sonic Forces has several similarities to Vader, including being Eggman's main enforcer in the Eggman Empire, constantly wearing a mask, and being enhanced due to an earlier defeat. However, most of his overall personality is more similar to that of Kylo Ren in The Force Awakens.
- Metroid Dread's Raven Beak has the appearance down to a tee: impossibly tall, scary armour, cape, red-glowing energy weapon, deep robot voice, kabuto-like helmet and mask hiding a Bald of Evil underneath. He also conducts himself similarly, acting in a calm but menacing fashion, rarely raising his voice, and readily Neck Lifting the life out of potential threats. Backstory-wise, he turns out to be the leader of a Chozo tribe who, discontent with a sister tribe's pacifist ways, slaughtered the whole lot of them with intent to bring peace to the galaxy by force - but not before he passed on on some of his warrior genes to a young Samus Aran, setting her up for an interspecies Luke, I Am Your Father and We Can Rule Together.
Western Animation[]
- Dark Laser from The Fairly OddParents!. Some TV guide misprints even refer to him as Vader.
- Dark Vegan from Johnny Test - though he's probably more of an Expy of the aforementioned Dark Helmet.
- Both are obsessed with destroying the protagonists (Timmy Turner and Johnny Test, respectively) for their many defeats they've suffered.
- Duck Vader from Tiny Toon Adventures.
- Baron Ryang from the Trapped in TV Land episode of Teen Titans
- Darph Bobo from Tripping the Rift
- Loonatics Unleashed: Slyth Vester, a combination of the cat Sylvester and Darth Vader!
- Jack Thompson in Ctrl+Alt+Del.
- Emperor Zarkon in Voltron: Legendary Defender. He was once a respected champion of justice before he began to fear that his wife and unborn child wouldn't survive, driving him to villainy. In Season 4, he even gets a full Vader-esque life support suit.
- Hordak in She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. Like Vader, he suffers from a myriad of physical defects, requiring a suit of Powered Armor to cope, and is ultimately subordinate to The Emperor. Even his Heel Face Turn is just like Vader's. Throwing his former boss down a bottomless pit for attacking a loved one with the Emperor surviving that through a Body Surf.
- Per Word of God, Vilgax of the Ben 10 saga is one, being described as "Darth Vader, without the sense of humor" but there's very little similarities between the two characters. If anything, Eon, especially in Ben 10: Ultimate Alien, is a better fit.
- The Superman from the episode "Brave New Metropolis" in Superman: The Animated Series has traits of this in his characterization, including wearing a black version of his standard uniform, being Lex Luthor's chief enforcer a'la Vader and Palpatine, and his pulling a Face-Heel Turn largely thanks to his failing to save Lois Lane from Intergang's Car Bomb in that reality's version of a prior episode, similar to how Anakin became Vader in a desperate attempt at saving Padmé from death. Also like Vader, he ultimately turns against Lex Luthor when confronted with evidence that Luthor was exploiting him to create a despotic state, though he ultimately survives.
Real Life[]
- The Fedayeen Saddam, a military unit created by Uday Hussein, whose troops were designed to invoke the image of Darth Vader, wearing black shirts, black ski masks, and black helmets modeled after Darth Vader's.
- Certain units of police in Brazil around the 2014 World Cup.
- ↑ The protagonist is his brother, they fight in space, and he regrets his wrongs deeds in the end, fighting the Big Bad.
- ↑ Though in this particular case, Ardyn is the victim of betrayal via his brother Somnus, not the actual betrayer
- ↑ despite being a desert world with even a Shout-Out to Dune