It’s a memorable scene from “The Empire Strikes Back”: Han Solo uses his light saber to slice open the carcass of a tauntaun, a large, furry repto-mammal, so that a nearly frozen Luke Skywalker can huddle inside and survive the deadly cold on the ice planet Hoth.
It’s so memorable that when thinkgeek.com offered a tauntaun sleeping bag last week—”complete with saddle, internal intestines and LED Luke Skywalker Lightsaber zipper pull”—the company was flooded with orders.
The only problem: The sleeping bag is as real as Jar Jar Binks. It was part of thinkgeek’s annual April Fool’s Day presentation. It doesn’t exist.
Well, not yet, anyway.
As a message posted on the company’s Web site explains: “Due to an overwhelming tsunami of requests from YOU THE PEOPLE, we have decided to TRY and bring this to life.”
It goes on to say that the company would work with Lucasfilm to try to get the sleeping bags produced (in adult sizes too!).
“I’m not 100 percent sure [if contact has been made],” says Shane Peterman, thinkgeek’s public relations manager. “That’s in the hands of the merchants who are trying to figure it out. I’m sure there’s been some initial contact, but I don’t know how long it’ll take to iron out.”
But Peterman is confident it will happen.
“I’m hoping the huge response and the current amount of visibility it has gotten online will work in our favor. We’ll be, like, here are countless examples of people saying, ‘I need this sleeping bag.’ ”