#autistic character
Rating: ★★★★★
What starts off as a seemingly lighthearted tale of an autistic boy solving a mystery like Sherlock Holmes would, quickly snowballs into more deep and personal subjects. Family relations and the way children see them as well as react to them are very important, but there is also the theme of pushing through your fear for a cause, and so many more.
The care taken to create and give this character’s thoughts and actions justice shows us that the author, Mark Haddon, is very knowledgeable about autism. This is one of those characters that in just 226 pages made me feel so much empathy for them, and so much heartbreak when they did. I’m highly appreciative of the representation of autistic people in this book, as well.
This was an absolutely wonderful read, a new favorite of mine, and I would highly recommend it.
–
Saylor Rains
Find me and this review on Goodreads.
- Hyperempathy toward people he’s close to (Qui-Gon, Anakin, Padmé), low empathy toward people he isn’t close to.
- He wears the same outfit in all 3 prequel movies, and his outfit in A New Hope is very close to it as well. This is common for Jedi, so that might be the reason, but it could also be because Obi-Wan is sensitive to fabrics and finds this outfit comfortable.
- Dislikes the sensation of flying, especially when a reckless pilot like Anakin is in control (sensory overload).
- Stims by touching his beard.
- Obsessive about following the Jedi Code, even though he was trained by Qui-Gon, who follows the Code more loosely.
- Uses sarcasm to cope with stressful, awkward, or otherwise negative situations.
- Avoids confrontation. Not just physical confrontation, which he tries to avoid through negotiation and diplomacy (we don’t see much of this in the movies, but it’s implied), but emotional confrontation. He avoids having emotional conversations with people. This leads Anakin to believe Obi-Wan doesn’t care about him, and is also the reason Obi-Wan lies to Luke and tells him Darth Vader killed his father.
- Not very in touch with or comfortable with his own or others’ emotions.
- Just has lots of difficulty with emotions in general. Expressing them, talking about them, reading them in others (without the Force).
- Speaking of which, relies on the Force to pick up emotional and nonverbal cues from others.
- Frequently repeats himself (could be echolalia or scripting).
- Much of his social interaction comes across as scripted, especially small talk, much of the advice he gives Anakin and later Luke, and some of his dramatic moments during fights.
- Stoic and often expressionless. His facial expressions are rare and usually mild (small smiles, subtle looks of disappointment) unless he’s feeling very intense emotion.
(Requested by @philcoulsonismyhero.)
Ever since that scene in the last season of the clone wars where Bo-Katan implies Obi-Wan didnt care enough for Satine, I cant stop thinking that Obi-Wan doesn’t show his emotions in quite a neurotypical fashion. I know a lot of people just automatically assume its “emotion trained out of him by the evil jedi” but even other jedi characters do seem to have more facial and visual cues in their expressions. Obi-Wan’s most clear emotions seems to come out in heightened times of stress (Battle of Theed, Mandalore, Mustafar), and if he can he tries to hide what he can (Turning away from Bo-Katan and everyone else after her accusation). He also has certain mannerisms that he falls back on such as chin stroking and folding his arms underneath his clock. I often feel like his and Anakins missed communication skills come from not Obi-Wan not caring or trying to get Anakin to stop talking about things but that Anakin assumes that Obi-Wan doesn’t want him to talk even when he offers because he’s not portraying the “correct” emotions. Obi-Wan does take the time to check on Anakin and ask how he’s doing and even talks to others about his worry for Anakin, but he also doesn’t push Anakin to tell him. Anakin seems to have a personality where he both pushes and wants to be pushed but Obi-Wan seems to want to wait until Anakin is ready. Unfortunately Anakin most likely is ready, he’s just waiting for answer from a cue that Obi-Wan doesnt see.
Anyways the point is that, I can 100% see Obi-Wan on the autistic spectrum. Adherence to tradition and routine (or at least wants and tries to do so, see his Jedi specific clothing when its not required), self-soothing behavior (folding arms within his cloak, crossing arms), stimming (constant chin/beard stroking plus it was confirmed that Padawan!Obi-Wan chewed on his padawan braid), not following cues (see Anakin bringing up his dreams but not expanding on them, basically waiting for Obi-Wan to pry but Obi-Wan doesnt figure that out), emotions aren’t shown heavily and when they are its almost always in high stress situations, dislikes droids (no reason shown why), and extremely good with animals.
Obi-Wan Kenobi is autistic and you can’t do anything about it sorry
Autistic Character of the Day.
Saga Noren: The Bridge.
