Obi-Wan Kenobi starring Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen released its fifth episode and while it has some good aspects around it, it still continues to be baffling writing wise.
This review will contain spoilers.
As always, before saying what didn’t work about this episode, let's talk about what did. For one, the music was outstanding as usual, something that has been getting universal praise all around. Interestingly enough there were some good scenes here and there, one of those being the scenes with Obi-Wan and Anakin training in a flashback.
The one good thing that stood out was that they kept using the fighting styles that each were using back in the prequel trilogy. It’s something that should always be expected; however, after the lackluster fight in the third episode it wasn’t so sure. Another scene showing order 66 was good, but it was small. I will also be skipping over parts that I have already criticized in previous reviews such as Leia and Reva’s acting, and some minor plot points like Haja returning.
The episode begins with Obi-Wan and Anakin on Coruscant in the Attack of The Clones attire. One small thing about this scene that was slightly off was how each of the characters looked. Of course they don’t look the same, as it’s been 20 years since the original movie came out; however, with the advancements in de-aging technology that Disney has used in the past, you would think they would try to use it to make the characters look more accurate. Some people may not care about this, which is fair, but considering how much Disney uses de-aging it’s odd they didn’t try.
We then see Vader and Reva aboard Vader’s ship, where they confirm where Kenobi is and Reva is given the title of Grand Inquisitor. This scene is fine, but it’s mediocre compared to others. Afterwards we get back to Jabiim where we again get another “meh scene” of everyone regrouping. However after this, we see Lola (Leia’s droid) become evil at the end of the episode and cut a wire, not allowing the group to escape. This, by the way, will be the main plot point of this episode. Obi-Wan then gives an inspiring speech and the group gets working on escaping.
We then get to what is my favorite part of the episode because of the music. As the Empire is touching down on the planet and the Rebels are attempting to escape and block off entrances, we get an amazing piece. Just brilliant. However, everything goes downhill from here.
Going back to the main group, they have Leia decide to rewire the circuit board so they can open the hanger to escape. Leia, who is just ten years old and part of a royal family, is somehow a perfect electrician when the time comes. But she’s the “only one who can fit in there” so it has to be her. I guess this run-down rebel base doesn't have any technical problems as they can’t fix their own wiring.
Obi-Wan then gets a call from Bail Organa. He says, “If I don’t hear from you I will go to Owen’s farm to protect the other child.” This is completely unnecessary, as it draws attention to Luke for no reason. Obi-Wan then decides to give the hologram to Haja for safe keeping as he confronts Reva, which will be the only reason anything happens for the rest of the show.
Through the blocked-off door, Obi-Wan talks to Reva and somehow discovers that she was one of the younglings from the Jedi Temple who played dead while Vader killed everyone. We then get to what may be one of the weirdest bits of Reva’s character: she wants to kill Vader for what he did to her “family.”
This doesn’t make sense for many reasons. The biggest one being that she joined him and helped kill more families, especially women and children. Also, how would Vader, the most powerful force user in the galaxy, not sense your plans? There is an entire rabbit hole to go down with how stupid this plot point is but I will leave it as this: Reva would never help Vader if this was her entire plan or try to kill him early on when he was just getting used to his new body.
Either way Reva cuts the door open and the shaky cam fighting begins. The fight is ok, and it's nothing to ride home about. The shaky cam is terrible, too, as it’s hard to pay attention to the fighting and focus on anything. During the fighting, however, Tala and Ned-8 died, and considering we didn’t know who these characters were it didn’t feel very emotional.
After the Rebels block the door, Obi-Wan gives his belongings to Haja (who by the way is a scammer), to hold on to, but as they all escape he accidentally drops the hologram with Organa’s message. Kenobi then surrenders to Reva so he can try to convince her to be good and kill Vader. What follows is by far the dumbest part of this show, and there is no hyperbole in that statement. After this scene, Obi-Wan randomly escapes and somehow has a gun.
After this, Darth Vader confronts Reva who tries to stab him. Vader decides to be fair and splits the saber in half for each to fight with. After stabbing Reva it is revealed that the previous Grand Inquisitor was alive the entire time, so that plot hole is fixed from episode two. Reva then randomly finds the hologram and figures out where to find Luke. As the episode ends Kenobi senses something is wrong with Luke.
Overall, this episode wasn’t terrible but it wasn’t great either. It’s certainly better than the previous episode but that isn’t saying much. Hopefully they don’t completely mess up the finale.
Rating: 3/5
