In Episode 3, Obi-Wan Kenobi is uninteresting.
I question why I had such high expectations when Obi-Wan is not living up to them. You keep holding out hope when you love Star Wars so much.
Rebellions are built on hope.
Oh, and then there's more to come.
It is hard to shake the feeling. Every time a new Star Wars show or movie or game is announced, I want to be cynical, but I also want to be a part of the franchise. The Jedi: Fallen Order is a collection of films. There is a Baby Yoda for every Jar Jar Binks. For that matter, an Obi-Wan Kenobi.
It's really sad.
What can I say about the adventures of Old Ben and Princess Leia?
I'm not feeling it. I was hoping that the first two episodes were just a rocky start, but this latest one has me feeling pretty gloomy about the whole affair. We are halfway through a six-episode limited-run series and it is just mediocre. Nothing important has happened. We already know when and how Obi-Wan, Darth Vader and Leia die, so it's not a very good TV show. It isn't very entertaining.
I'm pretty sure that Ewan McGregor is a good actor and he does a great job with Obi-Wan Kenobi. If the direction and script could keep up with him.
They can't.
The script is bad and the direction is sloppy and uninspired. The show is cheap and poorly edited. It is dismally, dreadfully dull.
Allow me to elaborate.
In my last review of this show, I noted that I didn't like the casting choice for Reva, the junior Inquisitor and Third Sister who just wants to show everyone that she's got what it takes. The casting feels off to me, but maybe it's the way she wrote it. She's just a cliche wrapped in a cliche dipped in a cliche and I think she'll be just as predictable as all that makes her sound.
It's not just Reva! Fifth Brother gets more and more ridiculous every scene he is in. There is a lot of Very Serious Grumbling that goes on between these two and the other Inquisitors. There are lots of people jockeying for position. It is all very generic and cringey. I want the Inquisitors to stop being very evil around one another and go be Jedi hunters.
The Inquisitors have shown up in other Star Wars shows and video games. The Inquisitors are clowns.
Silly inquisitors.
I thought it was a cool way to head fake us with a friend and have a bonding adventure. As a character, she is way over-cooked. Disney can write strong female characters without Mary Suing. It is not fair to female characters to write them this way. There are a few flaws that we like.
She's written above her age and that makes her less interesting, even though she gets Ben in trouble time and time again. Grogu was fifty years old and powerful in the Force, but he was still a baby. He was ruled by his id, not his ego, and anyone who dared lay a finger on Papa Mando was Force-choking.
Maybe I wouldn't care so much if there had been no Baby Jedi in the first place. She's just second fiddle, more than anything. She's Baby Yoda lite. She has New Coke Grogu. We have been here, done that. This feels like a recycled plot that isn't new or interesting.
We are halfway through the series, so maybe I'm jumping the gun here. Obi-Wan is established as a burnt out old Jedi who has given up the ways of the Force and taken up work in a meat-cutting factory, but come on already. Enough is enough.
Obi-Wan used the Force one time. I wonder if he should have used it to save her from falling to her death. He wrestled and blastered his way through most crises, but he messed up his way through the rest, including calling her by her real name.
I will talk more about the confrontation with Vader in this episode, but Obi-Wan is just so bad right now. He had no problem with Jedi Mind-Tricking a Stormtrooper in A New Hope. Here he is a fool, agape at any new obstacle. He let the drone scans him and then shoots it instead of blasting it straight away or Mind-Tricking the Stormtroopers into not calling it. Thinking quickly.
You should go back to Dorne.
We saw a lot of this in the first two episodes, but only one example for Episode 3. In this episode, a small group of Stormtroopers captured Leia and Obi-Wan after they defeated a larger group.
They lay down their arms, bow to the ground, and are saved by their person on the inside of the Empire, played by another Game of Throne alumni. She killed the Stormtroopers that were too much for Obi-Wan.
After running away and hiding, Darth Vader shows up and Obi-Wan goes one direction to draw his ire, while the other two go down a long tunnel. Halfway down it, Leia implores her to help Obi-Wan, the full grown man, against the Sith Lord that she cannot possibly do anything about. The child abandons the adult after she agrees to what the child says.
She just let her go on her own, so she can help the Jedi Master, who is only in this situation to begin with. By the end of the episode, Reva was able to get Leia back. All of this makes sense.
Other things don't make sense.
Which leads us to.
We have had a few battles between Obi-Wan and Anakin. In the original Star Wars, they wave their laser swords at one another meekly, George Lucas and his team completely unaware of what a smash hit this will all become. They thwack at one another until Vader gets the kill blow.
The two finally came to blows, and in the process of becoming more machine than man, Anakin was cast into the magma.
I can't think of a reason to watch their big confrontation in Obi-Wan Kenobi. The majority of the fight is Kenobi running away. We need at least three episodes to shake Kenobi out of his reverie and get him back in fighting shape. We need three hours to do that in Cat Ballou. And then some.
I don't know why we had to endure such a disappointing encounter, maybe we'll get a better one later on in the season.
I wanted more. This feels like a show that wants to piss everyone off.
What else is there to say? Despite my complaints, it is not terrible. If you turn off your brain, you will enjoy it as a bit of light adventure space opera junk food.
It's not great either. It's fine. Absolutely watchable. The script is mediocre and filled with plot holes. The score by John Williams seems to have a different vibe to it.
I am still holding out hope that the second half will be better because I think Kenobi and McGregor deserve better material. I'm pretty sure that what we've seen so far is what we should expect for the next three weeks.
It's a shame.
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