I Warned Disney What Would Happen if They Ruined the Kenobi Series, and I Was Right

(Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

I want to start this article by quoting myself from a previous article.

The article in question was written before Disney+ released the Obi-Wan Kenobi series. I was cautiously optimistic as they brought back Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen to play Obi-Wan and Darth Vader respectively, and from the commercials seemed like something of a return to form for Star Wars.

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However, we live in an age where the woke have taken over almost every mainstream creative outlet including Disney, and I knew that it was highly possible, even likely, that Disney would pull a fast one and inject “the message” into the show. As such, I issued a warning to Disney effectively saying that if they screwed up here, Star Wars is probably dead for a good long while:

Fans might be attracted but attraction is no guarantee of success. If they mishandle Kenobi by making him a side character in his own show, consistently defeated by lesser characters, and making him say and do things outside of who we know him to be, then this show will flop and the goodwill from fans will dry up faster than a drop of water in a desert. If the show leans into social justice, injects feminism, or gets political in any way, it will drive fans from Star Wars and they wonโ€™t come back until it changes hands.

Sadly, Disney did exactly what I was hoping they wouldn’t do.

Obi-Wan Kenobi is a character that looks and sounds like Obi-Wan Kenobi but isn’t Obi-Wan Kenobi. He’s consistently being saved and outsmarted by the women around him, including what we’re being told is the child version of Leia Organa. His calm demeanor and skill with the force have been replaced with fearfulness and incompetence.

Other characters aren’t much better. The main villain isn’t Darth Vader but a character named “Reva,” who is more powerful and cunning than Obi-Wan, a Jedi Master, in every way. The only character acting in the manner that he should is Uncle Owen, who is highly reminiscent of the OG character from the original trilogy. Even Vader, still as menacing as ever, still seems to be making odd combat decisions.

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Nerdrotic gives a great breakdown of the disaster that the show is.

Sure enough, the show’s failure to keep modernity out of it has resulted in the fans turning on the show. As it stands, the Kenobi series is the lowest-rated Star Wars show on Disney+. While the series started strong, the fourth episode sports a 6.5 on IMDb.

The show is leaving a bad taste in the mouths of fans, and sure enough, the series is losing steam.

Keep in mind that this is after Disney painted Star Wars fans as racist for alleged racist comments toward Reva’s actress, Moses Ingram, of which they could only produce three. This included a video from McGregor, lamenting the racism being thrown at Ingram, of which there is still not a lot of substantial proof. It was predicted that Disney was conducting this “anti-racism” campaign to prepare for the fact that it had a stinker on its hands, and it seems these predictions aren’t far off.

The data hasn’t yet been released on the viewership numbers per episode but judging by the reactions by fans, I’m willing to bet there’s a good decline happening.

Star Wars fans don’t have an excuse to stick around at this point. Not only does the show fail to live up to the standards of good Star Wars, but it also fails to live up to the standard of a decent television show in general. Moreover, Star Wars fans can’t trust Disney to treat this beloved franchise with any kind of respect.

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Personally, I’ve lost any interest in the Star Wars brand at this point and have little desire to see what Disney is offering. Perhaps my interest can be won back again if Disney fires Kathleen Kennedy, the woman in charge who has unrelentingly injected politics into the Star Wars brand. Or, if Disney sold Star Wars to a company that actually cares about it, but that’s far less likely to happen.

Until either one of these things happens, I’ll probably not care too much about any Star Wars product in the future. I have no reason to. This means any future series that might have grabbed any interest, such as the upcoming Ashoka series, is also going to be ignored. I can’t trust Disney to do right by the series, and I’m willing to bet many others can’t either.

 

 

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