Obi-Wan Kenobi series: speculation

And remember, Felucia is also where Sifo-Dyas' body was cremated.

Not necessarily, no. But mine is more a response to averages where women of a particularly afrocentric persuasion in fantastical genres are like shells depleted of their uranium sensuality, whether playing sidekicks or commanders or hunter-killers etc. There are variations in the details yet such remains a quantity I've since noticed for its consistency.

Here's hoping, then, that I'm just picking up on a lousy coincidence. If the character's trajectory zigzags outside or beyond the storefront stereotype (while still looking buff), all the better for it; likewise if her internal clockwork allows for some contrasting quirk of personality. Specific to Star Wars, there might even be an opportunity here for said stereotype to morph into a lasting archetype provided the writers strive for a deep infusion with thematically strong premises; if this Inquisitor storyline ends up owning the aesthetic -- inventively, passionately -- instead of merely catering to. But, hell, even if they do settle for a surface trope, I've seen worse from Disney's Star Wars and thus it's probably not something I'd weigh too negatively against the show.

I'd say the difference amounts to one being a select homage, not unlike Ben Kenobi and Qui-Gon as the Toshiro Mifune samurai type, while the other is merely a current-year convention that comes prepackaged ...again, going only by the marketing. 

Jesus fucking Christ, goddamn Cryo, goddammit fucking Christ, Cryo. Jesus.
Goddammit.  




Interesting. I'm sorta the other way around, being partial to the idea of Obi-Wan as a Maltese-Falcon-like totem who, courtesy of some clever plotting, becomes momentarily pivotal to the Imperial Inquisition. But then, I've always favored ellipsis over character study with Star Wars and remain none too eager for anything more from Obi-Wan that I haven't already inferred from the PT heading into this or the OT coming out. I think I'd much rather see McGregor reprise the role cryptically, with internalization relegated to countenance and little performance nuances, and with the narrative focused on surrounding vignettes. In short, I prefer they keep the episodes moving at a fairly brisk action pace versus copious amounts of McGregor hang-wringing. If saddled with downtime monologues + Malickian shots of Obi-Wan strolling through wheat fields or something, I'm gonna bow out. 

Yes, the obsession with "badassery" goes back to fans who admire Vader or Maul for all of the wrong reasons. Now some women want in on that, which is pretty weird.

Edit: There are indeed warrior-queens in history. And, any monarch who goes around conquering probably isn't the kindest human being. And feminists have this weeeird fascination with warrior-queens. Again, admiring a person for all the wrong reasons. Feminists realllly love power, and a warrior-queen is the perfect object of admiration as a result. 

Ack! While it's a good discussion, I'm a little sorry the thread went this route of gender politics. I suppose it's karma for all the times I've complained about these aspects in the past...





Well, I suppose that can happen; likely stemming from black people being held back for centuries. That said, as far as black women playing supporting characters in Star Wars who actually have some interaction with the mains, there's Naomi Ackie as Jannah in "The Rise Of Skywalker" (to pick an example I'm familiar with) -- a warrior, yes, but a real sweetheart of a character. I feel it's worth pointing out that most Star Wars villains have, up to this point, been almost entirely played by white actors (and usually white men). I mean, as a stiff-arsed Brit, I could take exception to the majority of imperial officers in the OT appearing as conceited, pompous, uptight fools with British accents, but I just go with it. Sometimes, that's just the way it is. Storytelling, y'all. 


I dunno. Is the problem that the cartoon series Inquisitors don't seem to have a black woman amongst them? Changes and adaptations are fine, provided they fit the premise. I don't see what's ill-fitting here, and some of this starts to reek of, "It's jarring seeing a black female playing a ninja cop". 


Can't tell if you're mad at me for explaining with pictures or a little flustered by the pictures provided. I'll say I'm not a fan of "resting bitch face" Rihanna, but the others are very nice -- especially, I must say, the girl at the very top. Goddayyyum!


I might also be a bit the other way around -- I kind of felt that way after I wrote it. Yes, an episodic approach would be fun, and maybe that's what they've gone and done. However, in order to make a satisfying series that lives up to its title, it simply must feature a good deal of Obi-Wan. Anything less than that would, I feel, be a cheat. If "Solo" can be broadly about Han Solo, and the prequels roughly about Anakin, why can't Obi-Wan be focused on in his own mini-series?




Again, I think the fact that black people were once legally enslaved weighs heavily here. Now, instead of being a loyal cook or maid, a black woman is the slave-catcher (or Jedi catcher). We also don't know much about the morality of her character, other than what her occupation suggests. Her character could end up being a bit of a surprise or possessed of a certain complexity that makes her more of a tragic figure than an out-and-out villain. That's where your analogy to Palpatine (and Putin) falls down. Palpatine is blacker than black (no pun) -- a heart of pure darkness. That said, you're right that Palpatine functions as a reminder of where treachery, chicanery, and bad deeds ultimately take a person to.

But in Star Wars culture, as you note below, villains have often been admired and cheered since the moment Darth Vader casually strolled through the door of the Rebel Blockade Runner back for the first time back in 1977. For example, the Black American film critic Elvis Mitchell noted in an essay entitled "Works Every Time" how he felt that the voice of James Earl Jones brought a "bullying vigor" and "malevolent elegance" to Darth Vader, adding, "Given that Vader was about the coolest thing going in the first Star Wars, it made the possibility that he was black perfectly acceptable". The idea that on-screen thuggery is cool is -- rightly or wrongly -- nothing new. Look at all the people who admire the machismo of screen acting legends like Al Pacino, Robert DeNiro, and Joe Pesci in their iconic work under Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese.

Lurking in your text is the implication that people cannot separate fantasy from real life; and the idea that there is some obvious thread that runs from the most banal of bad guys to a narcissistic dictator like Putin threatening nuclear war. I'm not sure how I feel about that. But Star Wars has always made fascism seem appealing. Lucas portrays democracy to be a sham in the prequels, even before Palpatine gets his paws on the Senate; while all the gadgetry and pageantry of the bad guys brings a strangely erotic appeal to evil. Seeing Palpatine's patient scheming come to fruition in Episode III as he reveals his true face and cements his Galactic Empire is supremely satisfying -- his window orgasm vicariously drawing a viewer into his despicable nature. In some sense, as impolite as it is to say, Star Wars is a celebration of evil and a cathedral to nastiness. Even Anakin's slave existence on Tatooine has a milquetoast, cutesy element to it (i.e., we're still waiting for all that cool fascism to appear). It's the pantomime element of Palpatine that creates some manageable distance between his deplorable acts and our perverse enjoyment of watching him fulfil those acts -- were it otherwise, we would surely be aghast that we derive some sense of fascination and pleasure from watching a character as twisted as Palpatine performing and promulgating evil.

Alas, this topic is really too complex and heavy to get into -- at least, for this thread. I'm just saying that Star Wars is a many-layered cake: a gloriously rich feast. Viewers are able to identify, to varying degrees, with all manner of archetypes within its multifarious fabric. Heck, even when the aforementioned Episode III was being advertised to eager fans, a sneak peek released on the now-defunct Hyperspace (members-only area) was a montage of behind-the-scenes craziness (mostly focused on duelling and fight scenes) set to the AC/DC song "Back In Black" (unfortunately, at the time of this writing, the original clip doesn't seem to be on YouTube):

www.ign.com/articles/2004/01/27/episode-iii-footage-leaked

Fair. I know and believe that is very much your sensibility/inclination, and I should have done more to finesse the comment above. The whole ideological agenda underpinning modern entertainments, or creasing up and dominating the optics of the outfits that bankroll them, definitely gets in the way and distorts discourse. I feel, in a way, it's why we're both here, and not, well... over there... at that other place, anymore.


True. Star Wars used to be more of a bastion and something of an affront to Hollywood "norms". The sui generis of its fantasy brethren. A unique citadel. Now it's part of the same imperialistic, money-printing, franchise-expanding, image-conscious machinery. The hallucinogenic punch is now just soda water, the guns are BB-shooters, and the A-class drugs have either been dumped in the ocean or locked away in the cellar. The franchise has undergone something of a lobotomy. Heck, it has almost been castrated. It's like when Jar Jar starts wearing proper clothes in Episode II. No-one ever even comments on it; it's just something that happens (just as Threepio gets covers). The "rudeness" of the saga is being moved away from and the whole thing is more consumable than ever, but it no longer has the same kind of pulpy defiance running through its veins. Thinking almost isn't required. Just viddy the screen and move onto the next piece of sparkly slop (made safe and inoffensive in advance: no thinking required!). 

Yikes. Even for me, that's probably overly cynical -- but I blame you, Ingram. (Naturally). But yeah. Safe sex.

I almost wonder if Lucas dealt the death blow to Star Wars, not necessarily when selling, but when he introduced the world to digital cinema. By that, I mean there's an ultra-convenience and an aesthetic sameness in digital cinematography, especially, that's not so obvious with film. Film is grubby. Film is bumpy. Film is grainy. Film is difficult. Film is life. By contrast, there's virtually no prestige, nothing delicate, and little that's romantic about modern-day digital cinematography. It just allows people to do anything and deliver it en masse a day later on YouTube (or Pornhub) in gleaming High Definition, where it basically competes with a million other gleaming High Definition things, also on YouTube (or Pornhub) and elsewhere. It's like some kind of artistic version of the iron law of oligarchy. Things become concentrated and tend towards sameness. Just the act of production itself, with handsome production qualities guaranteed, is enough to induce fleeting salivation in the herd. "Wow, this thing has been made, and this thing is happening".

But since you've never been the herd, you're immediately unimpressed -- because that's ultimately what sameness provokes in the soul: an inescapable, ominpresent feeling of "blah". I do remember a time when Star Wars was more than washed-out beige desert landscapes and night scenes with poor black levels. I think. Jar Jar is the ultimate in suckitude in this Brave New World because he has the indecency to expose himself in glorious Technicolor -- a synecdoche for Lucasian Star Wars (especially Prequel Wars). The strange thing about all this diversity is how amazingly homogeneous it is. I think that's what you're getting at, isn't it? It's like... Damn. Remember the 1980s? Four overgrown turtles living in a New York sewer, named after Renaissance artists, using surfer speak, practicing ninja, and gorging themselves silly on pizza, trained by an abandoned, sapient rat. Now that's a concept. Not this aesthetically inoffensive, iPhone-ready crap. Instead of leading the way, Star Wars has put on its little stormtrooper helmet and decided to conform. How normal. How very not-Star Wars. Welcome to the desert of the real.


Well, if you looked exactly like Sandra Bullock, I'd be very disappointed at your refusal of sex -- even the virtual kind -- right now.

And yes: "Demolition Man" is an underrated movie. Especially now.


You're such a gas, Ingram! Unrepentantly funny, enviably articulate, randomly smart, and a total one-off. That's a killer analogy you delivered there. Yes, yes, yes (Jeff Goldblum voice), I'd be okay with that. A mini-series, as you emphasise, does lend itself to that type of approach rather nicely. Although I also can't help thinking it's a mini-series because Disney doesn't have the balls or keenness of vision to deliver this thing as a feature film. Too risky. So they're playing it safe and it's confined to the idiot box. Like the difference between real and virtual sex. 

I'm kinda hoping it will be. But in my case, while I sound like a broken record, it's "The Rise Of Skywalker". That film actually reminds me to cool my jets a little bit about this whole "Disney now owns Star Wars" thing.


I bet parties at your house are fun.

And if you turn the other way, you might catch a glimpse of Dark Rey in the mirror.

Admittedly, my monitor doesn't help matters, but yah.

Unexpected reply, by the way!