Ewan McGregor Talks About His Return As Obi-Wan Kenobi
Photo credit: Lucasfilm
Via Men’s Journal:
Star Wars fans were delighted when it was announced earlier this year that Ewan McGregor would be reprising the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi in a spinoff TV series on the new Disney+ streaming platform. But one person who wasn’t even remotely surprised by the news was McGregor himself; despite having stated on numerous occasions that he has not been asked back into the Star Wars universe, it turns out he has actually known he would be making his return as Obi-Wan since around the time the new movies started coming out.
“It’s been four years of saying ‘well, I don’t know’,” he said during his appearance at Disney’s D23 Expo. “Now I can say ‘yes, we’re going to do it’.”
Speaking to Men’s Journal, McGregor added that he welcomed the day that Disney publicly announced the show, as he was getting tired of sitting on the secret. “It’s a f**king massive relief,” he said. “Because for four years, I’ve been having to lie to people about it.”
The series, consisting of six hour-long episodes, will reportedly catch up with Obi-Wan in the aftermath of Revenge of the Sith, the movie in which he fought with Anakin Skywalker-turned-Darth Vader, and spirited the twins Luke and Leia away to Tattooine and Alderaan. The viewer’s first encounter with Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars took place years later in the chronology of the saga, where he was going by “Ben” and was played as a much older man by Alec Guinness. The new show will fill fans in on how he spent those intervening years.
McGregor mentions a timeline of four years, suggesting that he was first secretly cast in the new series in 2015, the same year that the third film trilogy kicked off with The Force Awakens. Might this mean there will be some link between Obi-Wan’s later adventures and the conclusion of the saga? Perhaps not: his character was long-dead by the time the new generation’s story began. Still, knowing Star Wars, this spinoff will doubtlessly contain Easter eggs galore.
The entire interview with McGregor can be read on the Men’s Journal website.
