If you are a fan of the new 6-inch scaled Hasbro Star Wars Black Series *and* were paying attention to my AFPRon Instagram account (that’s AFP Ron, not AF Pron :D), you’d have seen that Hasbro added Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi to their Black Series display. I like the application of soft goods here – Kenobi’s front flaps are sculpted plastic, but underneath that are a soft goods bottom to his tunic – that should help keep his hips well-articulated with good motion.
I am sure some of you are Star Wars purists and would rather not have figures for the Prequel Trilogy. But remember – Obi-Wan does have the high ground.
You have to admit, all of Ewan McGregor’s lightsaber battles were far superior to the one Alec Guinness hobbled his way through. But part of me wishes they made the Padawan Kenobi – because the best lightsaber battle was the three-way with Qui-Gon Jinn and Darth Maul. Damn. I guess I need a Qui-Gon Jinn now too.
I don’t have to admit any such thing — the choreography was more complicated, absolutely. It was faster and more difficult to pull off, certainly. But everything you needed to know about Obi_Wan and Darth Vader, their personalities, their relationship and how they’d evolved– it was all there, even if none of it had been planned yet. Vader toys with a feeble old man, but that old man is really the victor: he was simply buying time, and he knew it. It’s an elegant dance subtextually. All three saber battles in the original trilogy are externalizations of the internal conflicts. They are about emotion, not about special effects. The effects and choreography were used to further character and plot development, not to simply make ADHD fueled, emotionally and thematically vapid eye candy.
Watching the blank expressions on the faces of even skilled actors like Ewan, as they are clearly thinking out the pattern by which they were trained to perform the proceeding dance may be nice to look at, but it has no emotional hook. It’s just a bunch of STUFF happening.