If you ask a Star Wars fan what they didn't like about the saga's prequel trilogy, the character of Jar Jar Binks will often be among the first reasons listed. The clumsy, bumbling alien has been the subject of much fan hate over the years, often being singled out as one of George Lucas' biggest blunders.

Over the weekend however, a new fan theory posted on the official Star Wars reddit page has painted the much-maligned Binks in a new light. The lengthy, amusing, and downright absurd piece of speculation posits that the Gungan was actually a powerful force user who was pulling the strings all along. Creator Lumpawarroo writes:

'Here I will seek to establish that Jar Jar Binks, far from being simply the bumbling idiot he portrays himself as, is in fact a highly skilled force user in terms of martial ability and mind control.

Furthermore, I assert that he was not, as many people assume, just an unwitting political tool manipulated by Palpatine-- rather, he and Palpatine were likely in collaboration from the very beginning, and it's entirely possible that Palpatine was a subordinate underling to Binks throughout both trilogies.'

What follows is an extremely detailed explanation of this thesis, which uses various movie clips and other pieces of evidence to support the theory that Binks was in fact - the one responsible for the downfall of the Republic and the creation of Darth Vader.

The thread has received thousands of upvotes and has been featured on a host of other sites.

The entire discussion has been nicely condensed on the newly created website darthjarjar.com; but we still highly recommend checking out the original reddit post.

To see if Lumpawarroo's theory is right, we'll have to wait until December 17 when Star Wars: The Force Awakens hits theatres.