HipsterZOMBIEJoint TV Review: Obi-Wan Kenobi
HipsterZOMBIEJoint Experience
3 min read
You were the chosen one….you were supposed to bring balance to the force…
The worst thing a prequel can commit is to not be able to justify its existence. When you look past the hype, nostalgia, and the return of Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen, Disney+ mini-series “Obi-Wan Kenobi” is a hollow cash grab. The devil is in the details with its writers who said in multiple interviews that they did not have any knowledge of the franchise which is why the continuity of the show is all over the place. Characters who never met before A New Hope are acquaintances here while other characters act so far out of character that they might as well be new characters.
Speaking of new characters, we arrive at Reva. There is nothing wrong with actress Moses Ingram’s acting ability or really even the idea of her character. A youngling twisted by the dark side and made an inquisitor but secretly wants revenge against Vader for killing her friends, that’s the making of a great character.
Sadly this character was shoe horned into an Obi-Wan show where she does more throughout the mini-series than it’s two leads. Like Kelly Marie Tran’s Rose Tico from Last Jedi, it wasn’t the actress who was hated or the character per se, it was that core characters time was sacrificed for a new character. It’s a classic bait and switch move that has made fans mad. If Disney wasn’t so overzealous with their virtue signaling and white knighting, they would see that.
If you watch a show about Obi-Wan you want to see that character, not some other new character rammed down your throat. Disney didn’t help things any further when they called fans who weren’t taken with Reva “toxic” and “racist.”
Ewan McGregor tries really hard with his Alec Guinness impersonation almost to the point where it’s a parody. Often times the show makes Obi-Wan look like an aloof buffoon who is a coward and helpless. He relies on other people throughout the show to do the heavy lifting while he hides or runs away. Kenobi ability to use the force changes with each episode in ridiculous ways. Sometimes he can save a kid from falling to their death, other times he can’t move a cup across the table. Then in the last episode Kenobi is able to use some kind of video game cheat code to become as powerful or more so than Vader.
The writing is so pathetic on the show they even choose to copy a scene (almost exactly) from the animated Star Wars Rebels (which is supposed to be apart of the film continuity). Vader’s helmet is slashed by Kenobi revealing the eye of Anakin Skywalker. The writing team must have thought the fans watching this did not watch when the same scene was done on Rebels with a much stronger emotional impact between Vader and Ahsoka. Here, it, like the show, comes across as hollow.
In conclusion, Obi-Wan Kenobi, isn’t just a missed opportunity, it’s a stain on the franchise. It screws up continuity, it has Vader looking like an incompetent fool and Obi-Wan like a whipped weakling limping from scene to scene. If this was a back door pilot for Reva (who is already being rumored to have her own spin-off show) the show is a success. Hell, she is shown to be almost as powerful as Yoda in some scenes. but if this show was meant to showcase the untold adventures of Kenobi it failed miserably and is just a reminder of older fans disdain for the prequel films.
