Star Wars Obi-Wan Kenobi (tv series)

But so, they didn’t credit Liam Neeson, but they did credit the other returning cameo role… so was that a deepfake Qui-Gon? With reused lines and/or an AI voice?

Palpatine felt more deep-fakey for some reason than Qui-Gon. Maybe they cg'd the make up onto McDiarmid over a zoom call recording but that felt really off to me. Liam just wore a bad beard and wig.
 
Well that's it for any new Jedi related stuff for a few years I guess until that High Republic show comes out. They just released the first teaser pic of it, I'll be nice and place it in a spoiler tag. I wouldn't want to ruin it for anyone.

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But then why credit one and not the other?

Probably for the element of surprise. Liam was for a great many years vehemently against doing anything like Phantom Menace/Star Wars again because of all the blue/green screen stuff (which was tame by today's standard). Among some personal tragedy, it's one of the reasons why he turned to doing a slew of terrible-to-mediocre action movies.
 
I've never seen McDiarmid turn in a bad performance until this. That was downright awful. He didn't look or sound evil, he just came across as exhausted.

Again, it felt like a Zoom call. Something literally phoned in last minute and they put his face on a double's body and then super-imposed make-up on top of that. It was genuinely bizarre in the editing too.
 
You can thank JJ Abrams for instantaneous space travel in movies and television. He introduced that in his version of Trek which carried over into Star Wars and seems to be the standard practice for most sci-fi these days. He seems to think space travel works the same way as teleportation. I get that it's meant to be a shorthand technique to speed the narrative up, but it typically causes more problems than it solves.
 
You can thank JJ Abrams for instantaneous space travel in movies and television. He introduced that in his version of Trek which carried over into Star Wars and seems to be the standard practice for most sci-fi these days. He seems to think space travel works the same way as teleportation. I get that it's meant to be a shorthand technique to speed the narrative up, but it typically causes more problems than it solves.
Would a subtitle that says 23 hours later help, or would you actually like a single episode of them in their cockpits traveling?
 
A 5 second shot showing a character staring pensively out the front viewscreen of the ship while inside the wormhole of hyperspace would suffice. At least it would hint at the passage of time without having to drag down the pace. Especially in this instance where Kenobi is in a hurry to get somewhere. If anything it would only ratchet up the dramatic tension because he can't get there fast enough.
 
I just listened to a great review of the show that perfectly sums up my feelings about the show.

First of all, it was MILES better than BoBF, but that's a low bar, admittedly. BoBF had exactly ONE BA moment, & that was the teaser for it at the end of Mando's 2nd season.

This show had a few moments for me that will be ICONIC in my mind forever, whether it be for the giddy 'THIS IS AMAZING" moments, or the emotional one, BUT those moments covered about 45-50 minutes, & I did not need 4-5 hours of what those moments came wrapped in.

Second, according to an interview with Moses Ingram, BEFORE the show started, she was warned by Lucasfilm that her character would probably be divisive & she could endure some negative reactions from the audience. So, if you are aware of the way this new character MIGHT be perceived, the WHY IN THE WORLD wouldn't you put everything you had into making everything from her dialog, actions, & motivations to just her overall presentation? Obi Wan & Anakin/Vader sold us on watching the show, but YOU needed to sell Reva to US. Moses Ingram is a capable performer, & she was done dirty in this show for the reasons I stated, because I actually FELT something for her in the scene with Ben in the desert, so to stifle that for 5 hrs & 50 mins beforehand was a crime.
 
I just listened to a great review of the show that perfectly sums up my feelings about the show.

First of all, it was MILES better than BoBF, but that's a low bar, admittedly. BoBF had exactly ONE BA moment, & that was the teaser for it at the end of Mando's 2nd season.

This show had a few moments for me that will be ICONIC in my mind forever, whether it be for the giddy 'THIS IS AMAZING" moments, or the emotional one, BUT those moments covered about 45-50 minutes, & I did not need 4-5 hours of what those moments came wrapped in.

Second, according to an interview with Moses Ingram, BEFORE the show started, she was warned by Lucasfilm that her character would probably be divisive & she could endure some negative reactions from the audience. So, if you are aware of the way this new character MIGHT be perceived, the WHY IN THE WORLD wouldn't you put everything you had into making everything from her dialog, actions, & motivations to just her overall presentation? Obi Wan & Anakin/Vader sold us on watching the show, but YOU needed to sell Reva to US. Moses Ingram is a capable performer, & she was done dirty in this show for the reasons I stated, because I actually FELT something for her in the scene with Ben in the desert, so to stifle that for 5 hrs & 50 mins beforehand was a crime.
Yep...that moment with Kenobi was Reva's best...honestly, I feel the best thing done in the show was the very end where " Ben" went up to a smiling Luke with the toy ship and says " Hello There"... my wife agrees as it was the only reaction she had in the finale.
 
I enjoyed it overall. Not the best series, but Obi-Wan and Leia were great together. For me, this series actually set up their interactions well.

For the ANH hologram- Leia is a diplomat and it’s been 10 years - maybe she wasn’t sure if OB would remember her, or just going for formality at first. However, it DOES put more weight behind “Help me Obi-wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope.” It was never “our” only hope. It works as a personal connection now, as does her enthusiastic “Ben Kenobi! Where is he?!” when Luke mentions him.

I loved Owen and Beru. I wish they’d been in the series more. After this episode, you know they went down fighting in ANH. It also makes that scene feel more tragic.

The more cinematic music score was great in the finale - I wish they’d used it more for the rest of the series.

My main nitpick with this one was “I’ve got to go, to buy you more time. But first, I’ll have a few heartfelt conversations and sit around for a while.” The second convo with Leia could have waited until the end - it would have been ok if they parted on less than good terms. In fact, it might have helped explain the more formal tone she took in her message with R2.

As for Star Destroyer chases - while I think they could be handled better, this is the norm now… We’ve seen them go down this way in ANH, ESB, TLJ, TCW. Is it poorly thought out, yes. Is it consistent, yes… A smart captain should have used TIEs. A smart Vader should have just chased OB in his shuttle, while the SD chased down the transport- with TIEs. And the SD was still there when OB left the planet…

Vader/OB duel was pretty good. I liked that he cut loose. His reaction to shock and stop upon seeing Anakin’s face reminded me of Luke in ROTJ, stopping when he cut off Vader’s hand. Maybe OB still couldn’t do the deed, maybe the Force made him hesitate - obviously he couldn’t kill Vader for story reasons. But I also thought it better set up “he’s more machine now, than man - twisted and evil.” Having seen and experienced Vader first hand feels more significant than him hearing about it off-screen.
 
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