Obi-Wan Kenobi: Part V

Hello there!

Welcome to my weekly review of Obi-Wan Kenobi, where I will be walking us through each episode and giving my thoughts on the show. My reviews will follow my usual format: an overview of the plot (so be aware, there will be spoilers!), my review of the show, then a few “Moments in canon” – references that link to other media and the galaxy as a whole. Today, we’ll be looking at the penultimate episode, “Part V”.

Plot Summary

Reva joins Darth Vader on the bridge of his Star Destroyer and reports that they have tracked Kenob to Jabiim. Vader has her kneel and promotes her to the rank of Grand Inquisitor before ordering the captain to set a course for Jabiim.

Obi-Wan, Leia, Tala, Roken and Sully arrive back at Jabiim and land at the Path’s base. Disembarking, Obi-Wan finds dozens of people—including Haja, who was forced to flee Daiyu after his run-in with Reva led to him having a bounty placed on his head by the Empire—who are waiting for the Path to get them to safety. Roken explains that the Path had been planning to move the fugitives, but delayed to help Kenobi, who agrees to now help the Path with the fugitives. The Path begins preparing the fugitives to depart.

On the approaching Star Destroyer, Vader orders the Path’s base to be locked down. A signal is sent to Lola, who flies into the vents and hacks into the electrical systems, sealing the hangar roof so that the Path cannot fly their ships out. Guessing that Vader is leading the hunt and will attack the Path’s base upon arrival rather than begin a siege, Obi-Wan addresses everyone present, telling them that he understands their fear and anxiety and stating that they will aim to hold off the Empire long enough to reopen the hangar roof. Kenobi sets Roken to reopen the hangar roof, while he and the other fighters begin sealing all other entrances.

“That was underwhelming.”

The Empire arrives: Reva, a couple of purge troopers and scores of stormtroopers. Finding the outer doors to the Path’s base sealed closed, the troopers assemble a heavy cannon and begin bombarding the doors.

Inside the base, Roken is having issues getting the hangar doors open and is too big to enter the vents, so Leia volunteers to help. Obi-Wan gets a message on his holoprojector so tasks Haja with looking after Leia. Finding a quiet spot, Obi-Wan watches a holographic message from Bail Organa, who is worried by the lack of communication and fears that Vader may learn of the children. Organa says in the message that if he does not hear from Kenob soon, he will go to Tatooine as Owen will need help with “the boy”.

With the outer doors suffering heavy damage, Obi-Wan stalls for time by opening a parley with Reva. Obi-Wan questions how she knew Anakin was Vader and deduces that she was a youngling who saw Anakin leading the attack on the Jedi Temple during Order 66. Reva admits that she saw Anakin and believed he was there to help, leading to her shock as she saw him murder Jedi. She explains that she survived by hiding amongst the bodies and playing dead. Obi-Wan realises that Reva is planning to kill Vader and asks her to work with him, however she refuses, believing that she can win on her own. Reva ignites her lightsaber and cuts her way through the doors. With the entrance breached, a firefight begins between the troopers and the Path’s defenders. The Imperials’ better experience and superior numbers see them advance, while the Path’s defenders are forced to pull back towards the hangar. As they retreat, both Tala and NED-B are shot, and realising that she will not be able to reach the other defenders, she shoots the nearest blast doors closed to seal off Obi-Wan and the defenders from the Imperials, before activating a thermal detonator as she is overrun by stormtroopers.

“Go! May the Force be with you.”

Realising that they are close to defeat, Obi-Wan gives Haja his weapons and holoprojector and tasks him with looking after Leia, before surrendering to the Imperials. Brought before Reva, Obi-Wan asks her if she is going to let Vader slaughter more civilians, including children, and reiterates his offer to help stop Vader, noting that Vader will be fixated on him. Reva has 2 stormtroopers escort him back inside the base. Vader arrives and Reva reveals that Kenobi is inside, but Vader is determined to bring Kenobi in himself. Obi-Wan successfully breaks free of the stormtroopers and flees deeper into the facility.

Leia is attacked by Lola as she tries to reopen the hangar roof doors, but she manages to catch her droid and find the restraining bolt, which she removes. Now freed of the Imperial influence, Lola helps Leia open the roof doors, and she reunites with Obi-Wan. The refugees and all of the surviving defenders board the transport ship, though Haja drops the holoprojector as he runs.

Vader forces his way into the hangar bay as the nearest transport takes off and attempts to flee. Using the Force, Vader grabs the transport, forces it to the ground and rips the side off, only to find that the ship is empty. A second transport takes off and escapes, carrying the Path fighters and refugees, along with Obi-Wan and Leia. Reva attempts to kill Vader, but fails to catch him by surprise and is easily defeated in combat, with Vader stabbing her through the torso. aderis joined by a unit of stormtroopers led by the former Grand Inquisitor, who tells her that her rage was useful but has now become tiresome. The Imperials leave, abandoning Reva. As she lies there, she notices the dropped holoprojector. Though it is damaged, she is able to see the message from Bail Organa, learning that Owen is hiding a boy on Tatooine.

Aboard the Path’s ship, Roken informs Obi-Wan that their hyperdrive isn’t working and the Empire is pursuing them.

On Tatooine, Luke Skywalker sleeps during the night, unaware of the danger he is now in.

Review

OK, so I find myself in an interesting place. While I did really enjoy the episode, I also find myself being really critical about it.

So let’s start by getting my quibbles out of the way.

First up and it’s Reva’s motivations. Maybe it’s because I’ve seen one Inquisitor redeem themself at the end already, while Vader and Kylo have also redeemed themself, so I’m a little tired of the redemption arc for our main villains and was therefore a little disappointed that Reva was actually working against Vader. Granted it seems more of a revenge thing than a full redemption, but how hard is it to keep a bad guy bad? I must admit that I’m still a little confused as to how all the pieces fall together in her story:

• How did Anakin not realise that she was just playing dead in the Jedi Temple when it would appear that he wiped out all the younglings with her?
• How did Reva become an Inquisitor?
• Why is Reva considered lesser by the rest of the Inquisitors?
• Why did Vader not kill her after all this? Not only did she fail him again (which should have already met the threshold for him wiping her out as he had threatened) but she then tried to kill him! Between Vader and the Grand Inquisitor, you would have thought they would have enjoyed finishing her off there and then.

Moving beyond that, and a word that keeps coming to my mind watching this series is “convenient”, and that ugly word when it comes to storywriting really kept coming to mind. That tracker that Reva placed in Lola last week in case everyone escaped Fortress Inquisitorius… well it turns out that it could also control the droid, but was obvious and easy enough for a 10-year-old to find and remove. The convenience of Vader only noticing the one transport freighter (the real one would have been in full view the moment the decoy took off) and not thinking to use the Force to stop the second as he realised the first was a decoy. Organa happening to leave a message that namechecked Owen and Tatooine. Reva getting to see said message due to Haja dropping the holoprojector. Oh and lets not forget that everybody jumped in to the transport with a failed hyperdrive, so now can’t escape. Had this not been the case through the rest of the series, I could have maybe let it slide, but there has been too much convenience in how things have played out, which is honestly getting frustrating now.

“Mercy doesn’t defeat an enemy, Master.”

Now the last one is a bit of a mixed point, and it revolves around the Imperial assault. While I think it was a great action piece, and Tala and NED-B got a great end, I feel that NED-B was a little underused, which limited the impact of his loss, while I was also a little surprised how few defenders the Path appeared to lose. Yes, Obi-Wan was there and yes they were pulling back, but they did not look anywhere near the same quality as the stormtroopers, and yet it was the Imperials who appeared to be taking more losses. We even saw some defenders getting shot and then getting pulled away to safety, while even Tala’s shot was not an instant kill. It was great to finally see and feel some stakes, but could they still have been higher?

Have I forgot anything? Oh, yes! WE GOT HAYDEN!!!! Even though I predicted we would get a flashback of Obi-Wan and Anakin, I still felt that I was predicting it more in hope than expectation, but I am so glad that we got one! It was so great seeing Hayden and Ewan back on screen together as Anakin and Obi-Wan, and though they did both look a little older than they used to, I can’t help feel that it was only really noticeable to me as I had literally just watched Attack of the Clones last night, I certainly don’t think that any de-ageing ws needed here! I also really liked the way that yes it was just one scene, but it was split throughout the episode to expand on what was going on in the present day, and helped to just highlight Anakin (and as such, Vader’s) flaw of being too focused on might and power and trying to prove himself, which then tied in nicely to Vader’s focus on Obi-Wan.

“You are of no further use.”

So with one episode, we still appear to have a lot to cover. The Path (or at least Obi-Wan and Leia) need to escape. If everything is to be believed, we still have another duel between vader and Kenobi to come. We need to get Leia back to Alderaan without making the Organas’ allegiances obvious. Oh and now apparently we need to stop Reva from going after Luke. How are we going to get this all closed off in a satisfying ending?

A few final thoughts on the episode:

• I recognise that the CGI may not always be quite at movie level in these series, but the footage of Vader using the Force to hold the freighter and pull in back to the ground did not look great to me.
• The shots of Anakin leading the attack on the temple and killing younglings were so well done, with the focus very much on Anakin and not his victims, and just quick flashes of the full violence. Much like the famous moment from Revenge of the Sith, I think that Star Wars has found a very tasteful way of making clear what he has done without explicitly showing it, keeping the possibility of being able to watch this as a family and not having to deny children the opportunity to see their favourite characters.
• The purge troopers really have been dumbed in this series down to basically just troopers in a different attire, it’s crazy to think that they used to be able to take on Jedi themselves!

Moments in Canon

• Tala refers to Force-sensitives being rounded up on Garel, roughly 7 years later, another Force-sensitive child on Garel would become a target for the Inquisitors during Rebels

What did you think of the episode?

Thanks for reading. May the Force be with you….