*Premise spoilers.*
The latest Disney Plus Star Wars series was polarizing, for some legitimate reasons and some trash ones. Personally, while I acknowledge some flaws and inconsistencies, I ultimately came down on the side of loving it. As someone who’s lukewarm at best on the prequels but whose admiration for Ewan McGregor began specifically with The Phantom Menace, I thought the miniseries did an excellent job of offering up entertaining adventure and strong emotion in the gap between the prequels and the original trilogy.
Ten years after the events of Revenge of the Sith, Obi-Wan Kenobi has been quietly languishing on Tatooine. He’s there to keep an eye on Luke, but Luke’s uncle doesn’t even want him doing that, so he spends his days in drudgery and his nights wrestling with his regrets of the past. However, when Leia is kidnapped back on Alderaan, her father begs Obi-Wan to help recover her.
At its heart, the series is pretty simple. It’s about Obi-Wan rediscovering his connection to the Force, in large part through his growing friendship with young Leia. But within that, there are a lot of individual threads weaving in and out of the main storyline. We have a look at the galaxy under the Empire, the fledging rebellion, an Empire Inquisitor who’s hell bent on capturing Obi-Wan, Leia’s uncertainty about her own future, and painful, much-hyped encounters between Obi-Wan and Anakin, now Darth Vader. That’s quite a bit to juggle in six episodes, and there are moments where plots feel rushed or handwavy, but the characters are always compelling and the emotions always hit home.
Because if I was going to sum up Obi-Wan Kenobi in one word, it would be, “Feels.” Oh, so many feels! The interactions with the characters range from uplifting to heart-wrenching, and they get me every time. I especially love the journey between Obi-Wan and Leia as she learns to trust him and he recognizes her parents in her, and while the Obi-Wan/Anakin scenes are used sparingly, they’re every bit as good as advertised. I’m also pleased that the series remembers Padme and gives her her due, and I’m always here for scrappy rebels fighting for something bigger than themselves.
Ewan McGregor is simply splendid in his return to the role of Obi-Wan, a broken man who’s finding the sparks of strength and hope that remain in him. I teared up multiple times watching his performance, and he also made me laugh. In just a few scenes, Hayden Christensen demonstrates that he’s capable of far more as Anakin than the prequels gave him to work with (as is almost always the case with Star Wars, though, I need to acknowledge that he’s an ablebodied actor playing a disabled character.) Vivien Lyra Blair is just wonderful as Leia, who’s a little firecracker full of attitude and heart. For me, she’s the Grogu of the show: the adorable badass you didn’t know was going to be in it, but whose arrival almost immediately reveals the shape the series is going to take. Moses Ingram turns in a fine, understated performance as Inquisitor Reva, a woman driven by anger and pain. The series also features nice turns from Indira Varma, Kumail Nanjiani (who’s now 2/3 of the way to a Disney triple crown!), and O’Shea Jackson Jr.
Warnings
Violence, scary moments for kids, thematic elements (including PTSD,) and ablebodied actors playing disabled characters.
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