11/24/2023 0 Comments Obi wan kenobi bird![]() As great as Obi-Wan Kenobi is in many ways, it hasn’t yet managed to do this. The Star Wars prequel films failed in that respect. Prequels and high-stakes excitement don’t have to be mutually exclusive, if the prequel in question is aware that it needs to do more than merely tell us how something we already know happened, happened. This is how Better Call Saul went from Breaking Bad prequel to probably the best TV show ever made. This is what The Clone Wars (the animated series set between Episodes II and III) did, and that succeeded in unspooling a superb, sprawling narrative out of it. ![]() The way around this, obviously, is to introduce secondary characters about whose fates we are unaware. There are no stakes, no danger, nothing of substance for us to sink our teeth into, and a howling vacuum where there should be a mystery to unravel. Obi-Wan Kenobi, so far at least, is circling that same plughole of ennui. The prequel films were a slog for many reasons, but high on that list is that nothing occurred at any point that was remotely unexpected. ![]() Like the prequels, audiences are going into Obi-Wan Kenobi knowing who lives and who dies, making the whole thing feel like a very expensive, very handsome entry in an appendix. They all survive unscathed until Episode IV. And what is going to happen is this: nothing.Īt no point – from their meetings, escapes, duels, captures and preposterous, trenchcoat-dependent rescues – has it felt like Obi-Wan, Leia or even Darth Vader were in any peril, because we know they weren’t. The one it failed to address was, sadly, the biggest the problem that caused that lightsaber duel at the end of Revenge of the Sith to, somehow, be duller than a Fisher Price butterknife: like the prequels before it, Obi-Wan Kenobi isn’t even remotely gripping, exciting or moreish, because we already know exactly what is going to happen. It feels like the TV show had a checklist of every flaw the prequels had, and set about addressing them all. There is none of the Senate plodding that smothered the prequels beneath a fatberg of stultifying nonsense. There are no more rubbish green-screen sets or unconvincing CG characters whose explosive deaths would give you a real, worrying thrill that you could only safely admit to a therapist. As we’ve come to expect since The Mandalorian, the production design and effects are so sensational as to be barely noticeable. The scripts sound as if they were written by people who have, at some point in their lives, said words to other humans. Obi-Wan Kenobi the TV show has generally felt like the worthy prequel we never had. Maybe it could even make up for the prequels’ overuse of greasy and weightless CGI, the rhythmless editing, stodgy exposition, or the cast of characters with barely a single definable characteristic besides “that one has a bushier beard”. ![]() Which is why the news that both actors would reprise their roles for a Disney+ Obi-Wan series, set a decade after the events of Episode III, was so welcome. The worst thing was, Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan and Hayden Christensen as Anakin were trying their best. Trying their best … Hayden Christensen and Ewan McGregor in Revenge of the Sith.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |