Disney+ released a sizzle reel for the upcoming Star Wars series Obi-Wan Kenobi.
The video is the same one that was released and then swiftly deleted on Nov. 11, which offers up some concept art of an aged (but not quite Alec Guinness level) Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan, as well as the much-anticipated rematch between Obi-Wan and Darth Vader. However, at the time of this writing, the footage is only available on Disney+.
As early as 2015, there were rumblings of an Obi-Wan Kenobi project, though it was believed there would be a trilogy of films. "I'd be happy to do the story from Episode III where I finish up and Alec Guinness starts," McGregor said at the time without acknowledging the rumors. By 2018, the rumors shifted from film to TV series for Disney's yet-to-be-named streaming service. Even then, however, McGregor played coy, saying, "There’s no plans as such to do it, as far as I know."
At D23 in 2019, it was finally confirmed that McGregor's Obi-Wan Kenobi would headline his own Disney+ show set between the events of Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope when the former Jedi Master was in exile on Tatooine. The following year, Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy revealed Hayden Christensen would return to the franchise as Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader for "the rematch of the century." Also returning are Joel Edgerton and Bonnie Piesse as Owen and Beru Lars from Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and they're joined by newcomers Moses Ingram, Kumail Nanjiani, Indira Varma, Rupert Friend, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Sung Kang, Simone Kessell and Benny Safdie.
Obi-Wan Kenobi is directed by Deborah Chow, whose first foray into Star Wars was directing episodes of The Mandalorian Season 1. After some controversy surrounding the initial batch of scripts, the show tapped writer Joby Harold to replace Hossein Amini.
"It's not been put on hold, it's just been pushed back a little bit," McGregor said when reports surfaced that Lucasfilm was unhappy with the initial Kenobi scripts. "The scripts are excellent and they just want them to be better, so we just pushed it back. It's very dramatic, it would seem, online. There's all kinds of shit online about it but it's only just slid back a bit, but we're still shooting it, it'll still be aired when it was meant to be, and I'm really excited about it. It'll be fun to play again."
While the wait for Obi-Wan Kenobi has been tedious for anxious Star Wars fans, it's been even more daunting for McGregor, who knew about the project for years and was forced to remain silent. "I'd see stuff on social media like, 'They better cast Ewan as Obi-Wan,' and I wasn't able to say anything," he recalled in April. "But it was pretty humiliating to think that [Disney] might be thinking about casting someone else."
Source: Disney+
0 Comments