Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi - Season 1: Part 6

Mon0Zer0

Well-Known Member
Supporter
Joined
May 24, 2021
Messages
1,014
Lots of unintentionally funny moments in the final episode.

Turns out OWK was the most powerful jedi of all, and history's greatest monster. He could have prevented the destruction of Alderaan and the murder of Beru, Owen and hundreds of rebels, ewoks and stormtroopers if he had just finished Vader off there and then.

The fight scene is one of the worst choreographed and shot fight scenes I've ever seen. Every time there was an overhead shot where the camera spun round made me laugh out loud.
 
All right, so...

This was one of the better episodes, which in a show this badly written only means it was maybe slightly less excruciating than the rest.

The episode was off to a really bad start, with Vader's Star Destroyer giving chase to a puny unarmed vessel full of, well let's call them rebels. Of course, the jewel of the Empire's might proves unable to hit anything. 'But were they trying to hit anything?' you'll ask. And I'll answer that yes, they very much were. Or Vader wouldn't have asked to increase the firepower. Or they'd just have destroyed the vessel in a heartbeat once Kenobi had made his escape. Because, yes, in another example of just how pedestrian the screenwriters have been on this project, all it takes is for our dear Obi-Wan to escape on another, punier ship as a diversion for the Star Destroyer to change course and forget about the rebels on the main ship. As if they couldn't send a flurry of TIE fighters after them. And then of course, once the Star Destroyer reaches Obi-Wan's destination, Vader asks his little helpers to stay back and prepare his personal ship, so he can face Kenobi alone. Seriously, my head hurts just to try and comprehend the logic behind any one of these decisions. When Kenobi said he wanted to leave the rebels to save them, I thought he was being written as an imbecile, as there was no way an imperial Star Destroyer would allow anything to get in the way of frying a couple of rebels. But then it turns out Vader is written as an even bigger imbecile for not only ordering to stop chasing the rebels, but for doing f-all with the extra firepower he had diverted from their original objective to follow Kenobi.

With that being said...

I liked the duel. I thought the setting worked and had a dreamlike atmosphere to it that made the scene quite beautiful in an abstract or painterly manner - ruined only by those horrid neon blades casting their murky, fluorescent glow all over the screen. While I usually agree with @Mon0Zer0 when it comes to this show, I think he is being way too harsh in describing the fight as one of the worst choreographed fight scenes he's ever seen. I thought it was much better than anything the show had given us until now, and the couple of ridiculous moves that found their way in were no worse than those one can see in other Star Wars projects. I'm looking at you, Revenge of the Sith.

star-wars-anakin.gif


To me, that was the highlight. Of course it makes no sense that Obi-Wan chose to leave Vader after defeating him (again) when he himself said it was a him-or-me scenario. Well, again, Obi-Wan, just like everyone else in the show, is written as an imbecile. Can't expect an imbecile to make anything sensible.

The rest of the episode is filled with one scene of fan service after another: Oh, here's the scene where Obi-Wan talks to Leia about her real parents. Oh, here's the scene where Obi-Wan meets Luke and gives him his T-16 toy. Oh and he even said his trademark "Hello, there!", isn't that great? And oh, here's the scene with Palpatine! Oh, here's the scene with Qui-Gon's ghost! I'll be honest, this was pathetic. There was zero payoff to any of these scenes, no emotional weight whatsoever. They were not intelligently woven into the story, they were just tacked on at the very end of the show as if mere afterthoughts that the writers didn't really know what to do with. I felt like the victim from the first murder case in the movie Se7en, the one who's forcibly fed spaghetti bolognese for hours until his stomach pops like a balloon.

The main flaw in this paint-by-numbers episode is the absence of any palpable sense of threat at any stage. Never do you fear for even one second that the Empire will send a squadron of TIE fighter after the rebels' ship. Never do you fear for even one second that Reva will even slightly singe Luke's pretty hair with her blade. Never do you fear for even one second that Obi-Wan can lose the fight. And they could release a second season tomorrow with six more fights between Vader and him and it would just be the same thing, over and over again. Two guys fighting to preserve a status quo, with no one losing or winning anything. Well, no one except the audience (who are losing all hope) and Disney (who are winning millions).

I will say this for the show, though: As forgettable, botched, stale as it was, it was still head and shoulders above the character assassination that was The Book of Boba Fett.

So overall I will give it a merciful 4 out of 10.
 
Spoilers follow. If you've read this far into the thread but never watched it, then that's your own fault!
So overall I will give it a merciful 4 out of 10.
Sorry, but the "fans" are loving this. Let me quote some Twitter posts:

one of the best experiences i have ever had as a star wars fan and will never ever get over this
Obi-Wan broke the right side of Vader's mask and Ahsoka broke the left side of his mask. But only Luke was able to fully unmask Vader and bring back Anakin.
He did the pose! He did the pose! He did the pose!
He did it, he said the thing!
The "thing' being "Hello there!" like Alec Guinness.
Ian McDiarmid's cameo as Palpatine
Liam Neeson's cameo as Qui-Gon
Yes, there is plenty of fan service, but when they also start to parrot the Disney+ line, this is just not true:
perfectly bridges the prequels with the original
No, it does not "perfectly" anything. I'm a fan of the original movie, I must have seen it more than any other film. I know most of the lines.

I've already mentioned how Leia's lines now make no sense:
General Kenobi, years ago you served my father in the Clone Wars. Now he begs you to help him in his struggle against the Empire.
Rather than, "Ben you rescued me when I was 10, now I need your help again."

But now they are doing the same with Luke:
Obi-Wan Kenobi... Obi-Wan? Now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time... a long time.
Well of course, of course I know him. He's me! I haven't gone by the name Obi-Wan since oh, before you were born.
"At least not since you were 10-years-old!"

"Yes, I remember when you came to see me and gave me a mass produced toy spaceship, I think it's still knocking around in the basement somewhere!"
Your fathers lightsaber. This is the weapon of a Jedi Knight. Not as clumsy or as random as a blaster.
"So, that woman who attacked us and chased me when I was 10, she was a Jedi? She had a lightsabre too!"
 
It's good to see someone loved it. I think a lot of diehard fans probably will for all the fanservice it provided. Me, I'm with @Mon0Zer0 and @The Crawling Chaos and @Dave in struggling to get past, not just the plot holes / Episode 4 inconsistencies, but the poor workmanship involved all round.

Yes, this was probably my favourite epsiode of the lot, but still only a 6/10. It's funny how different things irk us. I can live with the way it undermines A New Hope in the ways @Dave underlined, provided I get a decent show, with great set pieces and good dialogue. But the script has been appalling. A primary school English student could write those lines.

Running through it: Reva - how is she alive still? And how was the Grand Inquisitor alive? I actually thought Reva was going to croak at the start of this, but no - just a flesh wound. Rebel / Empire chase: yep, dumb - as in Last Jedi / fuel levels of dumb. Obi-Wan taking 10 minutes to dawdle and THEN escape in a warp-capable ship, but at sublight speed to a planet that just happened to be there. Meh - I can get past that bit. The whole Reva / Owen / Luke bit? Totally forgettable and pointless because we KNOW exactly how it ends. I said to my son, you can live with knowing how something turns out if they actually give the irrelevant characters some emotional investment, decent drama, and a noble end (i.e. Tala). But Reva didn't have that. I didn't care what happened to her, only her motivations for doing / not doing what she was going to do... which she didn't really provide.

As for the fight: decent. I'm in the middle. The choreography was average, with some ludicrous moments, like the OB1 leap. Vader burying OB1 and walking away: dumb - but then this is something he does now, after Reva. The mask cut and the half-face voice thing: very good, a very nice touch. Shame about the bland dialogue. The acting for that exchange was good too. The fact that OB1 walks away?!?!? Ridiculous. He should have seen the evil in Vader and finished him off. It would have been far more believable had OB1, tearful and tormented, not killed Vader because he fears that it will drive him to the dark side. This could have been a rolling theme about OB1 losing his religion and fearing that he could cross that line between good and evil, given that Annakin had done the same. So he essentially lets Vader go to save himself. Maybe he also sees some good in Annakin too, and that he might ultimately be the one that DOES bring balance to the force by killing Palpatine (I'm ignoring Rise of Skywalker's unprecedented retcon at this point). As it was, he just said 'goodbye, Darth' and wanders off. 'Goodbye Darth?' Really?

I'm a firm believer in taking the things you want to happen in a story and laying them out in front of you to try and actually work out if they should / could and whether the characters involved are acting true to themselves in going along. And I think if you can't, then you have to change the plot. And if you can't change the plot because it conflicts with something that has already been established, then you don't tell the story at all. A good creative team could ABSOLUTELY have written knock-out dialogue, and filmed compelling, emotional scenes to justify Vader's reasons for not killing OB1 outright, and then OB1's reasons for not killing Anakin. The viewer could have come away with sympathy for everyone involved; OB1's torment at failing Anakin, his fear of crossing to the darkside, his true purpose for the rest of his life (maybe he has a vision that shows him sacrificing himself to Vader for the good of the rebellion, so realises he can't kill Vader now); and then Anakin, starting to remember who he was when his real face is exposed and he is vulnerble. Maybe begging for OB1 to kill him to put him out of his misery, but then also laughing disturbingly, knowing it will drag OB1 into his place as Palpatine's puppet, all the while fighting the chemicals and endorphins pumping his system and fueling his rage (no one has mentioned that, as far as I'm aware - he must be in agony without the pain killers). Good writers can write this stuff and have us crying in our seats. But, as we've established, streaming companies don't feel they have to work that hard anymore, and our ongoing subscriptions continue to prove them right.

Again, my biggest overall issue is the flatness of it all; the muted colours (Tatooine has never looked so bland); the bare, baren look of the showdown (Mustafa had action, colour, sound, light - excessive, yes, but cinematic). This was just flat, dull mountain spikes, far too dark. But not just the visual flatness. I just felt no ones hearts were really in it. That scene at the end, with Vader sitting in his temple, speaking to Palpatine. I just sat there watching it thinking, 'Yep, okay.' Nothing either of them said was remotely interesting; no personal / coaching / psychologically-framed dialogue to perhaps coax Vader back from having doubts. No internal conflict from Vader. No hints that Vader might be beginning to suspect he actually has offspring. Just a flat, boring scene with no relevance to anything.

I'd give the series 5/10 overall, with my favourite characters being Owen Lars, Tala, and the mute robot (who, with silent action alone, displayed far more charisma, nobility, and stoicism than any other character in the show). But I have to say that I disagree with you, @The Crawling Chaos: I found OB1 a notch BELOW Boba Fett. Boba Fett was far from compelling, with plenty of flaws, but it was relatively unknown territory, and there was definitely a lot more of the Star Wars look, sound and spirit in that than in OB1, in my opinion.
Oh, and in the actor they chose for young Luke, they have achieved what I consider to be the worst casting of all time, especially for a character than had 1 line. He looked NOTHING like Luke, remotely. Alden whatshisface from Solo was a masterclass in casting by comparison.

Hopefully Andor gives us something better to dig our teeth into.
 
After all those copious comments, I've little to add. Let's just say I find myself squarely in the camp of the "Who in the world would act that way?" and asking myself "Does a mouse really have a chance if it can't hide when a lion's chasing it?" [a small part of me wondered if it was storm troopers who manually fired the big guns] And, how long does it take for failing shields to actually fail? [And to make things worse, I never gave tie fighters a thought!] ---- Sigh! as much as I wanted to really like this, I found myself thinking that this might be the worst thought out conclusion to a series ever.

This episode 3 of 10
This series 5 of 10.

If Boba Fett was a disappointment (as I believe) than this was a failure
 
I thought this was a weak series that finished surprisingly strong. Chalk that up to the aforementioned fan service, but I am a would-be Tatooine emigrant.
I'm not among those anxious to see other locales in the show. I'd be happy if the characters never left Tatooine.
The planet has enjoyed considerable world-building, no pun intended, since the original film. It seems to be a focal point for galactic commerce and military operations. It offers multiple indigenous populations and a surprising assortment of monstrous wildlife for a desert planet.
All of these could be further developed. The Book of Boba Fett provided some insight into Tuscan society, but what about the Jawas?
 
a surprising assortment of monstrous wildlife for a desert planet.
I can't remember which now, but either the Mandalorian or the Book of Boba Fett, hinted that it hadn't always been a desert, but that there had been some ecological disaster in the past.

To be honest though, Tatooine was Arrakis, at least it must have been in George Lucas' original visions. Sure, it wasn't the same even back then, and it has been built upon successively since the original films, so that it is now much more than a rip-off, however, in Dune, Arrakis was a focal point for trade and military operations because of "Spice." No one has explained why Tatooine is a focal point. The scripts mention several times that it is a forgotten backwater and exists out towards the outer rim. It's only claim to fame is that it was the birthplace of Darth Vader.

Anyway, the Star Wars worlds aren't hugely original. They ripped off Flash Gordon to have an Ice planet, a planet with a sky city, the arboreal planet, and a planet with fire lands (not to mention having am evil tyrant who rules in a harsh and oppressive manner.) But at least Mongo had those different ecosystems existing on the same world. In the Star Wars universe, how come planets have the same climate and vegetation over their whole surface? As well as a desert planet, and an ice planet, this series introduced us to the planet of semi-arid scrublands! And what appeared to be a waterworld.
 
@Dave it's true that Star Wars used items that had been used before but two things occur to me that mitigate their use. One, there are only a limited number of planet environments where humans could exist without the aid of very high tech. And related Two: These have likely all been used and re-used, and likely before George Lucas was even born. So I don't mark the stories down for that.

If I were to mark the stories down it would be their piecemeal use of tech. I would have imagined that a society with such a level of tech as the Star Wars universe displays would see that tech reflected more in the daily lives of people. As an example, most of the housing on the planets in Star Wars has nothing on a mid-twentieth century home as far as creature comforts go, and likely less.
 

"It's not [the showrunners'] job to tell a good Star Wars story. It's their job to get people watching."

Disney's Star Wars in a nutshell.
 
Obi-Wan saving Owen's bar from review bombing by bringing back outfashioned dance moves is such a better use of six episodes than what we got.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ctg
Auralnauts have now finished the Larry series with episode 7. I haven't watched the original but love the parody. It stands up as a story in its own right, with some great call-backs to the film reimaginings, and is surprisingly emotional.
 
I don't mean this as a takedown at all but the ages of the actors playing Obi-Wan should not be taken into consideration at all. Who knows if Obi-Wan was even supposed to be 62 in A New Hope. At the time in 1977 he may have looked like your average 55-year-old. To modern audiences he looks more like a 75 year-old man. And McGregor could realistically pass for a 45-year-old today. Who knows, with the right diet, physical exercise and... luck, maybe in 20 years he'll still look like a man in his early fifties.

And that's also assuming one season of the show equals one year in-universe.

Anyway, if Disney wants to milk the cow dry, they can release three decades' worth of Obi-Wan TV series and then some. And when McGregor bites the dust, asks for too much to come back or quits, whatever happens first, they'll just replace him with a Deep Fake McGregor.

There's going to come a day when technology will render actors obsolete.
 
Watched this series this week. Actually enjoyed it. :)

It helps to start with low expectations. :D

Yeah, there are criticisms to be made - too much convenience at times - but you know, we get that everywhere in everything.

And, for all its flaws, it does connect really well with the prequels - just not so well with the original Star Wars.

But, it was fun and entertaining viewing if you didn't expect much and just wanted something reasonably fun and entertaining.

Btw, thought Leia was superbly cast - the words, the mannerisms, the looks - I was utterly convinced that I was watching a young Leia!
 
Andor’s great. But thankless and miserable with not one likeable character. I’ve watched it through twice but it’s quite a heavy watch compared to space wizards and B-wings. (And god help Disney if I ever get to be a famous authorrrr, I’ll write a novel about b-Wings so good that they’ll make a film about them.

And i’ll include lots of astromechs, too.
 

Similar threads


Back
Top