We’ve come to the conclusion of Obi-Wan Kenobi. There’s a lot to get to, so let’s not waste any time.
1. The cast
There was a lot of good in this episode, and much of it comes from Ewan McGregor. This entire series, more than anything else in the entire Star Wars canon, is built around an actor, not a story. We all wanted more McGregor as Obi-Wan, and this series delivered that in spades. While I’m not sure that is the best idea for a show on the surface, McGregor carries it in its lowest times, and leads the charge in the best of them.
Right behind him is Vivien Lyra Blair and Moses Ingram, both of whom gave excellent performances, especially considering the limitations of each of their stories, which we’ll get to in a few hundred words. Blair is so good as a young Leia that I’d be shocked if there isn’t going to be a Leia series spinning out of this, something I thought Disney would never have the balls to try. Leia: Princess of Alderaan by Claudia Gray is right there for adaptation in a couple of years, and Blair would kill it.
Ingram not only had to deal with some suspect writing, but also the backlash of thousands of racist Star Wars fans and turned in a truly memorable performance. There’s an article somewhere about how Reva is the best personification of Yoda’s warning that ‘Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.’ Her anger at the death of her fellow younglings led to hatred of Vader, which lead to her own suffering and, hopefully, catharsis.
While O’Shea Jackson Jr, Rupert Friend, Jimmy Smits, Joel Edgerton, and Bonnie Piesse weren’t given a ton to work with, all of them took this episode to distinguish themselves a little more. Edgerton and Piesse, especially, added some depth to their characters which, let’s be honest, needed it. Owen, in particular, seemed like a grumpy and burdened stepdad to Luke, and so it was nice to see him express some affection/love for the boy. Plus, the Lars family have never seemed more badass, especially Beru. You can take the boy from her cold, dead hands.
And last, but not least, is Hayden Christensen who got to do some truly good work as Anakin/Vader. I’m very glad that he is back in the Star Wars fold.
2. The juggling
Aside from ‘wrap up the story,’ the primary goal of this episode was “Make A New Hope still make sense.” And let’s call that a mixed success. The bit of dialogue about Obi-Wan and Leia not being able to talk about knowing each other makes that message sent via R2D2 make some more sense, and it also makes sense as to why Leia would reach out to him for help. I can live with that. Luke being introduced to Ben gives some context for how Luke knows who he is ten years later, so that sort of works, too. The Vader of it all is a little shakier. I suppose Vader could look at this loss to Obi-Wan and chalk it up to him still being a ‘student,’ but that’s a stretch, isn’t it?
The problem with making shows set between the films is that you run the risk of painting yourself into corners that require clunky dialogue to get out of, and this, more than almost any other Star Wars property requires a lot of hemming and hawing to get things lined up.
3. The action
Despite your feelings on the series in general, the final Vader/Obi-Wan fight was the sort of grand Force battle that people have been begging Star Wars to do for years. This instantly becomes a classic of that genre, with both using the Force to lift up some rocks (quoting “Weird Al” Yankovic) and do some extraordinary things. While I’m not someone who salivates over super choreographed action scenes, this accomplished a few things: it showed Obi-Wan reaching new heights with the Force, it shows him as a worthy adversary to Anakin/Vader, it set him up to be the very powerful Jedi we see ten years (and many grey hairs) later.
Continued below4. The logic
For all the good that this episode had, and I do believe the good outweighed the bad, there was a lot of bad writing, too. Reva’s character wanting to kill a child as revenge for killing children seems like flawed logic at best, as does Obi-Wan’s decision to, again, leave Vader broken but alive at the end of their battle. You can’t even go with “he’s letting Anakin emerge from Vader, as it is explicitly said, by Vader, that Anakin is dead, and he, Vader, killed him. This also plays into Obi-Wan saying that Darth Vader ‘betrayed and murdered your father’ to Luke.
But Obi-Wan’s ability to get to Tatooine in like 5 seconds seems lazy. Vader being able to pull a ship out of the sky but not being able to direct laser blasts to hit the Rebel ship seems convenient. The Force always makes for complicated stories and weird explanations of why certain things work and don’t, but this episode seemed to play especially fast and loose with Force conventions.
5. The future
If there is a second season of this show, and I really think that would be a mistake, as much as I’d likely lap it up like the Star Wars hound I am, Vader can’t interact with Obi-Wan at all. There has already been too much interaction between the two, and any more would really dull their A New Hope meeting.
That said, there’s a lot that could be done. It could almost be an Obi-Wan/Qui-Gon show, as the Jedi Master can finally be seen by his apprentice. We know of some of Obi-Wan’s actions from Rebels and, as the shot of Vader with the broken mask shows, Disney is happy to re-do moments from the animated series in live action. It would be interesting to see if Ahsoka or Bo-Katan would have any interactions with Obi-Wan. He could have an adventure with young Luke. He could see Bail Organa again. It seems like he’s less monastic than we all thought he was, so maybe he’ll go off-world again. He’s on Tatooine, so as my Force Ghost Coast to Coast co-host Matt says on tomorrow’s episode, maybe he’ll date Peli Motto (Amy Sedaris).
But the character that I really hope is going to return is Roken. While we never see him in the Original Trilogy, the Rebellion is more than we’ve ever really been shown. Maybe he’ll show up on Andor? Maybe he and Reva will get spinoffs?
Regardless, thanks for joining me on this journey. Until Andor in August, may the Force be with you.
