Obi-Wan in all the other posters is holding a lightsaber, like in the fifth brother’s poster. See Obi-Wan in Tala’s poster:
Butthis is Vader’s poster:
Is that meant to be Obi-Wan without a lightsaber, symbolizing Obi-Wan’s reluctance to fight Vader?? Or is it…someone else? Vader’s past self? Or someone else entirely? WHO IS THAT!!??
Obi Wan’s message meant that all the surviving jedi knew he was alive. They couldn’t know about anyone else but they knew he lived. He looms so large in their rebellion because of his message. Quinlan carved his own message into the wall of the safehouse for any jedi but knowing only of Obi Wan. He must have been thinking of Obi Wan. Obi Wan immediately knew it was from him. It was intended for him
…really starting to look like Lucasfilm got my memo. We’ve already practically gotten half of these just from the damn TRAILERS.
(Let’s hope this means they also heeded the “Shirtless Nightmare” section of the chart.)
OK gang, let’s review.
In the first TWO EPISODES ALONE, we got:
Staring protectively at Luke
Skywalker Saber looked at with Regret and Sadness
Kicking someone’s ass while looking glorious
Partial Credit for Clone Wars Flashback (in that it was TECHNICALLY flashbacks to the Clone Wars era, even if it was largely old footage)
Less Partial Credit for Shirtless Nightmare, because it was a Shirted Nightmare but still emo
As the OP of this post I’m gonna go ahead and award full credit for “taking care of his bantha friends”, just swap “bantha” for “eopie”
Also gonna award like…~80-90% credit for Crying about Anakin even though he did not literally shed tears because that face at the end of the second episode devastated me
Full points for Hair Blowing Majestically In Wind
Somebody at Lucasfilm did their homework. God bless.
this show was tailor made for me. i literally do not care in the slightest if the wider star wars fandom doesn’t like it, if they think there’s not enough action or if some things have weak writing or whatever because finally, a show with good emotional payoff. all of the inquisitors could spontaneously explode out of plot convenience and i would be like, fine, cool. can we talk about ‘i am what you made me’ again
Every single episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi has had the Inquisitors using the Jedi’s compassion against them, very deliberately. That’s how they find Nari in the saloon on Tatooine, who only reveals himself to protect the owner for a secondtime. That’s how Reva lures Obi-Wan out of hiding. Vader kills villagers as he marches through the town, not because he’s even looking for information, but just purely because he knows Obi-Wan is there and it hurts him, it will draw him out.
Meanwhile, Reva’s speech on Tatooine says, “The Jedi are cowards. They failed you, abandoned you. There is no point in protecting them. They would not do the same for you.”
This is what Star Wars does. It uses lies and propaganda and manipulation, it says one thing about the Jedi, and then shows you how they really are, that Star Wars is and always has been built on unreliable narrators and outright lies expressed by characters that aren’t directly challenged because that’s the point. The galaxy just accepted those lies because it was easier than standing up for the right thing!
The Jedi died to protect innocent people in the war, they and their children died when the clones were mind-controlled into killing them, they were trying to stop a Sith Lord, not seize power for themselves, they were trying to protect the people of Tatooine, they abandoned you because they’re all dead now. They all died protecting someone, we see that in the opening Order 66 montage, where a Jedi Knight fiercely protects the children, we see it in the opening of The Bad Batch, where Depa dies to protect Caleb’s life, we see it in Jedi: Fallen Order where Tapal dies to protect Cal’s life, we see it in The Book of Boba Fett where several Jedi die to protect Grogu’s life.
Star Wars characters will tell the audience one thing, because the characters have their own agenda within the narration, and then it will contrast that with showing us what the Jedi actually say and do, like the level of commitment to unreliable narrators and propaganda in this franchise is actually really, really good, because goddamn that’s a lesson we could all stand to remember when we look around the world today and are on social media where reactions and outrage and misinformation spread far faster than actually checking our sources.
I can’t stop thinking about that George Lucas quote, “Darth Vader is the bad father. Ben Kenobi is the good father.“ and this episode, “Are you my real father?” “I wish that I could say I was.” and how that’s Obi-Wan and Anakin’s functions in the narrative, that each of the twins was adopted by a family that loved them and raised them, but within the story, the scenes that we the audience see, the looming figure of Darth Vader is the bad father they never knew and Obi-Wan is the good father that helped them, watched over them, comforted them when they needed it, protected them.
That Obi-Wan and Anakin are entwined in each others’ lives in a very personal way, but also as a narrative function way, that Obi-Wan was the first person to hold Leia as a baby, that he’s the first person to tell her anything about the Force, that he guides her and protects her, just as he’ll do for Luke one day, that Vader will be the one to harm his children, to use the Force to hurt them, to torture Leia, to cut off Luke’s hand, to constantly hunt them down.
Darth Vader is the bad father. Ben Kenobi is the good father. NARRATIVE PARALLELS, THESE TWO ARE MIRROR IMAGES OF EACH OTHER, always inescapable from each other.
“Are you my real father?” hit like a truck because Leia Organa is tremendously powerful in the Force, some part of her remembers her mother, just vaguely, but she does. “She was beautiful, kind, but sad,” Leia says in Return of the Jedi. She remembers that day on Polis Massa in some way, just brief, fleeting memories, but she does.
“Sometimes when I look at Luma, I see her mother’s face. We all miss her very much.“ rings with so much truth in the Force that Leia, with her ability to see into people, to know when they’re lying, to read them like an open book, knows that’s true.
Somehow, he knew her mother. From there, it’s not a big leap to, “Are you my real father?”, it’s a reasonable conclusion, if the wrong one.
But some part of her feels it, too. Because some part of her must remember him as well, Obi-Wan was there that day, even if she may not knowingly recognize him.
If Leia remembers her mother, she likely remembers Obi-Wan, too.
i am so pleasantly surprised how the kenobi series is acknowledging how traumatizing it was for obi wan to lose padme. i mean he was friends with her for just as long as anakin and literally saw her give birth and then die in front of him. fans when talking about post prequels obi wan depression era have historically focused on the drama of him losing anakin so i am just happy that this piece of canon is giving padme and her death’s impact on obi wan the narrative importance it deserves
I’m watching Kenobi and I love how this show is like “You really wanna know how this man ended up looking like Alec McGuinness? One afternoon with Leia Organa.”
me: Obi-Wan is 10 years out of practice when it comes to fighting, especially with lightsabers. Even with the Force that’s a perishable skill, so he wouldn’t necessarily be on top of his game. Plus, a major part of his whole fighting strategy as we have seen in literally every medium is getting beat up a whole lot. So it makes sense that if he duels someone in the Obi-Wan show he’s probably going to get beat up at least at first.
also me: I swear if any one of these brand new little baby inquisitors try to go up against Obi-Wan Kenobi, a Real Jedi™, raised in the Temple, trained every day of his childhood and adult life, forged in the crucible of daily war against multiple high-level lightsaber-wielding darksiders, and he doesn’t WIPE THE FLOOR WITH THEM IMMEDIATELY I will LOSE IT
Obi-wan teaching Leia the basics of the force before he could teach Luke, not knowing that his impact on her life also leads to the success of the rebellion.
Obi-wan showing that he’s a Jedi, protecting her and teaching her how safe it feels being connected to the Force even after he’d been suppressing it for so long.
Obi-wan had Leia as an unofficial padawan without even realizing it.
I love that they gave Obi-Wan a job as a butcher. There’s no elegance, no precision. It’s just a job. Just him and the knife and the blood on his hands
darth vader voice: if i had a credit for every time some ginger jedi fuck broke into my inquisitorious and flooded the place, i’d have two credits. which is nothing compared to the power of the force but it’s weird that it happened twice
the stormtrooper he was talking to:hgrhrrkk (is being force choked to death)
From the moment that Obi-Wan found out that Anakin was alive, from the moment that Obi-Wan started reaching out into the Force again, Anakin fucking Skywalker has been like a cat yowling at the top of his lungs outside the bathroom door because you didn’t let them in when you went to pee.
Every single episode has shown the two of them connected in the Force, that Vader’s eyes snap open in the second episode when Obi-Wan says his name, that the way in the third episode the camera tilts and slowly spins and the sound goes distant and underwater echo-y in both scenes on Mapuzo, where Obi-Wan sees Anakin’s furious face as Anakin and it’s framed the exact same way as when he senses Darth Vader physically on Mapuzo, both of those were Obi-Wan and Anakin connected in the Force, and in the fourth episode, they’re connected again when Obi-Wan and Anakin are both in their bacta tacts.
When Reva screams, “You can’t run, Obi-Wan! You can’t escape him!” is about Obi-Wan’s grief and Anakin’s legacy being everywhere, it’s the dreams that Obi-Wan is haunted by, it’s the mourning he can’t let go of, it’s seeing the 501st clone, it’s watching over Luke, it’s seeing Leia, it’s being unable to dream of anyone else without it being about Anakin, his presence is everywhere.
But it’s also about Anakin fucking Skywalker standing outside the screendoor of Obi-Wan’s mind and scream yowling in rage because he will get in and he is going to tear the mental furniture to shreds and puke in your mental shoes and leave a path of destruction in his wake.
