Darth Vader is trying to get his old teacher back.
I am concerned about the future of Star Wars. Since the launch of Disney+, there have been three live-action TV shows, but only one has been good.
The bits and pieces in The Book of Boba Fett that focused on Mando were very good. But the last part? The story of Boba Fett was terrible. Cool stuff was introduced and then swept away.
Twin Hutts have arrived to take over Jabba the Hutt's crime organization. They are leaving because of the crime syndicate of fish people who want Jabba's empire.
The Sand People and Boba Fett are dead now so that he can have some revenge. It was against the fish people.
On and on. There were neat ideas introduced by Boba Fett. It made the main character boring and uninteresting. You didn't see the face of the bounty hunter. I can't think of a Space Marine who wore a helmet the whole series.
In Disney's third live-action Star Wars TV show, Obi-Wan is being made boring and useless. He has done a bit more over the last two episodes, but it is not much.
In the fifth episode, the Third Sister tells Darth Vader that the tracker she put on the droid has located the planet where Obi-Wan has fled to. He referred to her as the Grand Inquisitor. I was initially annoyed by this, but I will get to why my feelings changed. It was too easy for Reva to get into the ranks. She hasn't captured Obi-Wan yet. It was too easy. There is more on that in a second.
Everyone inside the hangar was trapped when Obi-Wan, Leia and the rest of the rebels showed up at the base. The tracker is more than just a device. They went to this place because they can recreate the last sequence of The Last Jedi, only worse.
The man is Darth Vader.
A New Hope and the video game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order were both copied by the show. One might argue that these were merely homages to previous Star Wars stories, but I think they went further than that, actually cribbing ideas from other movies and games.
At the end of The Last Jedi, Rey and Finn are trapped on a planet with the First Order trying to get in. In Obi-Wan, we get the same scene, minus the Force projection trick and the fearsome forces of the villain. The version is a watered down one. The bad guys are following the rebels after their transport ship's hyperdrive is broken. I think they will run out of fuel soon. The drama was heady.
It's weird how much of it goes on in Obi-Wan. Almost all of the six short episodes feel the same. Unlike Grogu, who mostly gets into trouble, Leia saves the day even though she is a small child.
The bad guys show up and try to get through the base door. About 64 stormtroopers are standing in ragged lines, and a couple heavy gunners have a gun. In order to fix the controls, she has to climb up into the vent. The children and aliens on this planet have never been in the vent. The breakers are in the vent.
A shocking twist was revealed when Obi-Wan talked to Reva through the door. She was one of the Padawans that Anakin killed at the beginning of Order 66 but she was able to get revenge on Vader by working her way into their ranks. Reva is not convincing and she is playing her cards too soon.
Reva was told by Obi-Wan that he was bringing Vader to her, not the other way around. She will have him where she wants him or something like that. Before Vader arrives, Obi-Wan escapes and returns to the rebels.
Rey pulls it back down to the ground when Vader shows up as the transport takes it off. The sides of the ship were torn off. The one with everyone on it took off a second later. Vader doesn't have enough time to pull down a second ship. He didn't reach out to the Force to find out if Obi-Wan was on that ship. It is cool to see Vader's power on full display, but it is not cool to have it all be a trick.
At this point, Reva walks up behind him. He stops her with a flick of his wrist. I'm not sure why she didn't try to pop the lightsaber up pressed against the back of his neck or skull, where it would have flashed right through him in a killing blow.
He might have stopped that as well. Darth Vader is his name. The fight scene was well done. There are toys with Reva. She isn't much for him. She is stabbed through the chest. The Grand Inquisitor mocked her, saying that her thirst for revenge was pointless before it became tiresome. I am not sure how useful it was, even though they haven't found Obi-Wan.
Reva played a long game and then threw it away. She waited for no reason, even though she could have struck. A decade in the making, she threw it away. They left her alive. She would have been tortured and executed by the Inquisition.
It felt too easy to make her Grand Inquisitor. They did an elaborate trick on Reva. It wasn't hard. How could Reva not know that she was playing a fiddle? It was only hours after she was almost killed that she was elevated.
There is a Darth helmet.
At one point during all of this, Obi-Wan gives his blaster, lightsaber and little hologram to Haja, a character who feels written into this show just because at this point, there is no reason for him to still be here cracking jokes. Obi-Wan received a message from a concerned Bail Organa who said he would go to Tatooine if he didn't hear back from Obi-Wan.
Reva is able to play back because the transmission is not damaged enough to ruin it. Obi-Wan is aware of it, but ignores it. Reva seems to have something else in mind.
There is a long, slow shot of a farm on Tatooine with a boy in bed. Why? The revere is done. She is done with her quest for revenge. She won't be able to lure Darth Vader into a trap again, even if she hasluke She thinks there's more to this in the first place. How did she find out that Obi-Wan had a relationship with the Princess?
It's all over the place. It feels like a lot of it was made at the last minute. It's a mess. The few moments of good Star Wars TV we have gotten are overshadowed by the ridiculous stormtrooper assault on the rebel base. Do they have a fighting coach?
The flashbacks of Obi-Wan and Anakin's dueling were enjoyable. The man looks too old. Disney has shown off some de-aging powers in its films, but they are not present here. That wouldn't be a big deal in a great show. It is a stone on the ground.
I am hopeful that this new era of Star Wars will be better. I enjoy going to the movies with my kids even if they don't like them as much as they first do.
I don't think we are seeing enough Star Wars. It feels like the powers that be, led by Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy, are just trying to cash in, instead of digging into what works for this franchise. A spare-no-expense tour de Force that gave us a really top-tier story, special effects and an exciting return of a fan favorite character would have been a game-changer. We have a show that is more expensive than Book of Boba Fett.
Rebellions are built on hope. I have high hopes for Taika Waititi's next Star Wars movie. When I was a teenager, I showed up to the movie theaters to see The Phantom Menace, only to discover Jar Jar Binks, and I am still mourning what could have been.
There are still one more episodes of Obi-Wan. My expectations have been set.
You can read previous Obi-Wan Kenobi reviews and commentary.
There are rumors about Reva getting her own live-action series on Disney Plus. It's more likely that Vader left her alive than that he killed her. A woman tried to kill the man because he slaughtered children. I don't know what to think.
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