'Obi-Wan Kenobi' – Episode Five.


One more episode to go… It feels like this story has flown by and my opinion of it has changed pretty much every week; sometimes I love it and sometimes… not so much. Am I just getting all middle aged and cranky or is ‘Star Wars’ just becoming less ‘my thing’? Or is work just a bit too much, at the moment, and I’m too tired to really enjoy any TV at all? I suspect the answer lies somewhere in the middle but anyway… Here we are with the penultimate episode of ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’, lets do it.


Before we do though, here’s the regular paragraph where I warn you about spoilers (there may well be spoilers here) and point you in the direction of the Tor Review for the episode recap (because I’m not doing one here). If you’re still with me, lets talk some Episode Five shall we…?


The more I think about it now, the ‘Star Wars’ shows on Disney have really sparked off a conflict in me between the kid who loved (still loves) cool space battles and the older me who is like, ‘that’s cool but what about the actual plot…?’ ‘The Mandalorian’ really set my expectations high but since then, it feels like plot has taken a back seat to satisfying the nostalgia urges of the fans whose subscriptions keep Disney+ going. And I’m feeling that really strongly here with ‘Kenobi’.


There’s a big part of me that was happy to just disengage my brain and enjoy the massive scrap that was Episode Five, with Stormtroopers dying all over the place, but also those intense waves of emotion that ‘Star Wars’ is happy to dish out. We finally get to see what led Reva to this place, in her life, and while there were no big surprises here, ‘Kenobi’ is still really good at making you feel Reva’s struggle, even feel more than a little sorry for her in the process. Another lead dies, partway through, and while I saw that coming a mile off (about a second after her big confession in fact), her death is a moment designed to make you feel all the appropriate feelings. Having said that, I’m still not sure why she had to die, unless it was one of those ‘randomness of war’ moments, but anyway… And then there was the ‘flashback fight’ between Kenobi and Anakin… It signposted Kenobi’s eventual strategy, for beating Vader, a little too heavily but there was still a whole lot of emotion tied up in a fight that we ultimately knew would solve nothing. Like I said, ‘Star Wars’ is great at playing on your emotions and investing in whatever you’re watching.


But then…


But then there was a part of me that thought, ‘why is the plot doing this?’ If you’re orbiting a planet that your worst enemy is trapped on, don’t waste a whole load of Stormtroopers on digging said enemy out of a defensible position. Two words, ‘Orbital Strike’. If you think that Kenobi has probably died, don’t send a message saying that you’re off to Tatooine to look after the surviving twin… Who did you think would receive that message if Kenobi was dead? The answers to those questions are the same, it’s about spectacle and getting people back for the finale, I get that. If you’re making a TV show then that has to be consideration but when you’re prioritising these over a coherent plot… I don’t think that’s a good look, I certainly don’t think that’s a good look here. What you have is a great looking show but one that has too many ‘why?’ questions about it.


And that’s where I am with ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’. Of course I’ll be back next week but they’re going to have to come up with something pretty special to rescue it…


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