By: Braydon Chen
Disney+ recently released a new Star Wars series based on the original Star Wars movies, written by George Lucas, called the Obi-Wan Kenobi series. Is this new spin-off TV series worth watching or is it just a waste of your time?
The Star Wars Obi-Wan Kenobi series is about a broken man trying everything he can to protect a young Luke Skywalker, who believes that Luke’s father, Anakin Skywalker has died. In reality, Anakin Skywalker has become the evil Darth Vader. Obi-Wan Kenobi is played by Ewan McGregor who takes the twinkle out of Obi-Wan Kenobi’s eyes as he acts as a man filled with defeat and regret.
In the TV show, Kenobi, unfortunately, has to go into hiding and be separated from everything Jedi-related. If he didn’t, the Empire’s Inquisitors would find and hunt the Jedi down. However, the hiding Jedi is forced into action when a young 10-year-old Princess Leia is kidnapped.
The TV series is realistic and is said to have felt like an actual Star Wars story rather than some random spinoff. The first two episodes are well-made, with each scene paired with well-written scripts that don’t make a scene seem extraneous or just a waste of a scene. However, Obi-Wan definitely deserved a better stage and props. The background and setting of the Obi-Wan Kenobi series feel artificial.
Even so, the Obi-Wan Kenobi series still has a whole lot of good stuff jam-packed within it, like the dynamic between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Princess Leia, and Kumail Nunjiani’s jedi who wears a bathrobe instead of the regular Jedi clothes and uses magnets to move objects across the room to copy what the force, a Jedi’s version of telekinesis, usually could do.
In the second episode, more secrets are revealed. Obi-Wan Kenobi learns that Anakin Skywalker is still well alive but in the form of Darth Vader. This is something important that happens in the series—it brings shock to Obi-Wan Kenobi and forces him to think about what to do next. The last shot in the second episode is of Anakin Skywalker, all bruised and burned and cut, in a bacta tank, preparing for his transformation into Darth Vader.
Overall, so far, the new Disney plus Star Wars series Obi-Wan Kenobi has without a doubt a strong first two episodes and has the potential to be a great TV series as it grows into a complete collection of episodes.