Latest / Aggressive Negotiations: A Star Wars Podcast / Issue 326: Obi-Wan Kenobi: Part IV
Transcript
- 0:00Hello, then, welcome to the note polity. Hi, this is Nick
- 0:08Nastasu, story editor on Star Wars, The Clone Wars and Star Wars bad
- 0:13Batch, and you are listening to aggressive negotiations all the way from Jabeem to
- 0:26Tatoweene. You're here with aggressive negotiations where we're exploring all of the dark corners,
- 0:31high peaks, bright suns, and all the space in between of the
- 0:35Star Wars galaxy far far away. I am one of your humble hosts,
- 0:40Jedi Master John Mills. And without further introduction, because he doesn't need any
- 0:44introduction because he's out there, he's taken names and kicking Star destroyers, it
- 0:49is Jedi Master Matthew Rushing. Matt Welcome here. We are continuing our rewatch,
- 0:54our anniversary recap of the Obi Wan Kenobi series that aired on Disney Plus.
- 1:00We did a commentary last week. We decided this week we're just going
- 1:03to do a talk because we got feelings about this one. So here we
- 1:07are Obi Wan Kenobe Series Chapter four. But yeah, lots of plenty of
- 1:11feelings before we get to that. Remember everybody the nerdparty dot com slash contact,
- 1:15get in contact with us or go on Twitter at the Jedi Masters or
- 1:19find the network at joy nerd Party on Twitter, the Nerd Party on Facebook
- 1:23and Instagram. So, Matt, here we are. I got through that
- 1:25preamble as quickly as possible. Here we are. We had good feelings coming
- 1:30out of the last episode. The ending was a little clunky. Ending was
- 1:33a little clunky, but we were feeling better about the way things were going.
- 1:37We're like, all right, we're finding a groove here. We got
- 1:40Vader Vaders being terrifying, we're bringing the fear factor back with this, and
- 1:46we're coming into episode four. We agreed we're both a little jazz for this,
- 1:51and we come out of the gate and we pop right back in and
- 1:56we go through our recap, We go through all of this stuff and we're
- 1:57back with Obi Wan as we hit the ground running with this, we've done
- 2:05our rewatch. Does the opening of this episode keep the momentum going from the
- 2:12last episode? Does it amp it up in any way? Like? Are
- 2:15we treading water? How did you feel about how we opened as we pushed
- 2:20forward into this chapter. You know, as as we got into this chapter,
- 2:23you know, the whole aspect of building off of what had happened the
- 2:29previous episode, and you know the fact that obi Wan is injured, and
- 2:36not only is the injured, but he's injured pretty badly, you know,
- 2:38to the point where they are going to have to put him in a back
- 2:42to tank so he can hopefully recover. And you know, I found that
- 2:46to be pretty effective, and I think especially to the way in which we
- 2:52were mirroring that with you know, Anakin being in his tank. And I
- 2:58thought, you know, this is this is a great way to continue I
- 3:01think, connecting these two people together and the the way in which you know,
- 3:13obi Wan and Anakin here are still mirrors for each other. Um.
- 3:16You know, they're they're battered and bruised and beaten people. UM. And
- 3:22the experiences that they had before they still carry with them, and UM,
- 3:28we see how it's still affecting them. You know, I think we do
- 3:31an effective job of of of that here with this opening. I thought that
- 3:38they did a really nice job of allowing us to I think could just really
- 3:46feel the moment and that it is Um. You know this this might sound
- 3:53weird, but so I came away from this whole section really struck by the
- 3:59way in which this seemed to help explain a really strange thing, which maybe
- 4:05you'll think I'm weird for going here, but Obi Wan aged a lot in
- 4:11this series, you know, from when he was on tattooing to now and
- 4:15then you know, all the way to the episode four, and I was
- 4:17just really struck by that. This kind of helps explain, I think,
- 4:23very much as to why Obi one does look the age that he does.
- 4:29By the time we get there, you know, this guy has been through
- 4:31the ringer and you know he's been tortured, so all of these things.
- 4:36I was just thinking, there's a lot came into my mind with this,
- 4:40and to me, I found it to be an effective opening for this episode,
- 4:46mainly because I think what it did is it continued the emotion that we
- 4:50felt from the previous episode, you know, and to me that's the most
- 4:55important thing, because I felt like that episode finally really tapped into the emotion
- 5:00that we wanted to be feeling with Anakin facing off against Obi one again and
- 5:04it not going well for one, feeling so weak and helpless really at this
- 5:09point, and so all of that work for me. I'm really interested to
- 5:12know, though, did this work for you? Did you feel like coming
- 5:15into this episode that it had continued the momentum that you know, it had
- 5:21carried with it from that third episode. I think it erased actually some of
- 5:26the misstep of the ending of the last episode. Nice, Okay, it
- 5:30picks up and it brings you back into it. And even if you know
- 5:34I love the fact and I know I harp on this, I love the
- 5:39idea that what happens is when you have the next chapter in any story,
- 5:45if you're coming into it cold, you should be able to pick up what's
- 5:47going on and you're able to pick up what's going on here. And the
- 5:53only thing I might have, like just being a nitpicky sort of mindset,
- 5:57is I might have layered in either some audio or even some flashes while he's
- 6:00in the back to tank of their fight on Moustafar to act as a,
- 6:08you know, a counterpoint to what was going on. But that's that's literally
- 6:12that's like a cloud talking sort of thing. Because I think it was very
- 6:15effective what they did in giving this sense that Vader and obi Wan are sensing
- 6:20each other while they're having this collective nightmare, and it's sort of like obi
- 6:26Wan now understands the nightmare that Vader is continually living later is seeing that fight
- 6:31on Moustafar in his brain all the time, and now obi Wan has this
- 6:35fight in his brain all the time, and when he closes his eyes,
- 6:38he's going to remember the ass kicking that he got, and Vader is seeing
- 6:44it as he's going to be messed up forever now. In terms of obi
- 6:47Wan aging, I always always love to point out that Alec Ginnis, I
- 6:51think, turned sixty on set, so he was not as old as everybody
- 6:56thinks he was. It's just he was carrying himself with that stiff upper lip
- 6:59British meaner that makes everybody seem like they're twenty years older than they actually are.
- 7:02Yeah, but I like you backing into sort of the reasoning there where
- 7:06it's like, you know, obi Wan really had it rough, and that
- 7:10that's going to take its toll and maybe accelerate the hard times that he's going
- 7:15to show. I like it. I could work with that. What I
- 7:20wonder though, is how you felt about whether it maintains that momentum coming out
- 7:27of it. Because we you know, we show up at the Secret Base,
- 7:29we get this, we get introduced to a new character who's an interesting
- 7:32character. I'm instantly like, oh, okay, this guy's interesting. Roken
- 7:36right, that that was his name? Yeah, I always had trouble.
- 7:40I always want to say Roku and I'm like, no, no, no,
- 7:42that's the thing, streaming stuff, It's Roken. But I thought he
- 7:46was an interesting character. I was immediately like, Okay, I like this
- 7:49guy, like his story. Okay, I like, you know, the
- 7:53story of his wife and everything, right, but of course we have to
- 7:56just let's just embrace it head on. Does it maintain that momentum as it
- 8:01shifts away to the other story of Reva with Leia I have I have a
- 8:11perhaps surprising answer, but I want to know as we're establishing the Riva and
- 8:16Leiah, does that work for you as we go back to them and we
- 8:20know we're not focused on Kenobi. One of the things that I felt like
- 8:26that this episode did with that storyline is that I felt that the Reva performance
- 8:35was better in this episode. And I also felt like that this helps us
- 8:43see the reason that Leia herself. We already know she's special, right,
- 8:48we know who she is. I loved how this connected with Star Wars and
- 8:56that she has a strong resistance to the mind probe, right, and so
- 9:03this plays directly into that, as you know, Reva's trying to read young
- 9:09Leiah's mind and she says, you know, you have a strong mind.
- 9:11And I think, to me, that was something that was great about this
- 9:16part of the storyline is that it really did actually feel like it was it
- 9:20was connecting with what came before, but it was also allowing little bits about
- 9:28Reva's past, I think, to creep into the storyline, which I thought
- 9:33was well done. It's not ham fisted or I feel like overshadowing anything here,
- 9:39but I think it was just doing an effective job of reminding us of
- 9:43what you know, we saw at the very beginning, is that this person
- 9:46was somebody who had been part of the Jedi Order. She had been a
- 9:50youngling, and she had felt abandoned. And so all of the conversations here
- 9:54with Leia really interesting because she's really just talked to herself, and she's trying
- 10:01to use all the rationale that she's used on herself over the years to talk
- 10:05herself into what she's doing, and she's trying to use it on Leia and
- 10:09it's just not working. And I think that's really interesting and much better.
- 10:16I think character play than we've seen so far with this storyline or with this
- 10:22character, So that's kind of how I took it. I agree, and
- 10:28I think that this scene is why you saw the casting for Riva and Leia
- 10:37pay off. For all of the issues we might have had up to this
- 10:41point in certain scenes, this is where it pays off, and you're like,
- 10:45Okay, yes, they cast them for this type of interaction, and
- 10:50they've got chemistry, and I applaud them both for working well together. I
- 10:54think an added layer to probing Leia's mind and having her besistant would then play
- 11:03in to the original Star Wars, because when Vader has a shot at Leia,
- 11:09he skips all the pleasantries and goes straight to trying to weaken her with
- 11:18doctor ball MD, as they said on Real Chicken. But in terms of
- 11:24Vader doesn't sit there and try to sweet talk her before trying the mind probe.
- 11:31He's like, Okay, look, I already know you're strong because I
- 11:33got that report from Riva, so I'm just gonna jab you with this and
- 11:35try to make you and that makes it seem when Vader then says her resistance
- 11:39to mindprobe, like at that point, he's like Okay, we took a
- 11:45crack at this kid ten years ago. I cheated this time and used drugs
- 11:50on top of the force, and she still had a strong mind. This
- 11:54actually winds up building up Leia's mythos for the rest. So that does exactly
- 11:58what these sorts of things should do, which is add the layer. I
- 12:03love it, So we actually both wind up loving that scene. How do
- 12:09you think that the break in works? Do you think that is effective?
- 12:13When the way that obi Wan is broken into the inquisitorious? So I think
- 12:18that that part works relatively well. I think that again, us using the
- 12:24fact that Tala is a spy. You know, she had been a part
- 12:28of the empire. She's got these credentials, we're going to use them plays
- 12:33into much of what we saw with the rebellion, them using technology that they
- 12:35had stolen and you know, codes that they had stolen and all these kind
- 12:39of things. So I think all of that works really well. And I
- 12:45really this is the thing. There's just a couple of nitpicks that I have.
- 12:52You know, when they're at the base and the Jabeem when they first
- 12:54get there, right when they land the ship, it feels like a base
- 13:00there's lots of people there. This is a place where movement is happening,
- 13:03A lot's happening. And then the rest of the scenes that we have there
- 13:07very strange because there's almost nobody in the scenes, which didn't seem to make
- 13:13as much sense. Now I know this is the headquarters and so but it
- 13:18still felt like you've only got like five people in this room. It seems
- 13:20a little bit strange. And so that's the thing that really stuck out to
- 13:26me the most in this section, not so much the plan being dumb or
- 13:35not working for me. It's just some like little nitpicky things that just kind
- 13:39of bothered me a little bit. It's funny you say that, because the
- 13:41thing that I really latched on this time because having the benefit of like the
- 13:45rewatch and able to put my finger on it this time, and this again
- 13:50goes back to the changed protocols for COVID and all of that type of stuff
- 13:54that we're going on at the time, is there are a lot of people
- 13:58walking around with no clear destination of where to go. When we're on the
- 14:03Death Star. In the original Star Wars, people are walking down hallways and
- 14:07I understand I'm going from this part of the hallway to that part of the
- 14:09hallway. We have people touching panels, we have people in different groups moving
- 14:15around. The hallways are a little tighter, Okay, but I get it
- 14:18right. We want to be wide open, and it also makes the inquisitorious
- 14:24a very weird place, which it should be. I like that, right.
- 14:28It would have been nice to see people walking two things, because we
- 14:31see when she lands, when Tala lands, Yeah there are stormtroopers walking everywhere,
- 14:39but I'm not exactly sure where they're walking too or why. It looks
- 14:41like it's just busy work. And so it starts to falter and when she
- 14:46goes in, have that wide open space, But would it have killed you
- 14:50to have a couple of terminals on the side so it would look like people
- 14:54were walking two things ahead of the security gate. And that goes into and
- 15:01I think this is something they could have leaned into, even with the changed
- 15:05protocols or whatever that they're they're under at the time, is to actually have
- 15:11cubicles when she's at the station that she sits down at. Yes, you
- 15:16could have erected walls. Then you could have used digital trickery to overpopulate that
- 15:22section and the presence of a wall, a divider of some sort would have
- 15:28given her cover to be talking the way that she was, because that's where
- 15:31it really breaks down for me, is she's sitting at this terminal and she's
- 15:35talking in the open, and it's like, how is anybody not piecing together
- 15:41that something's off about this? Like if I'm sitting at a library basically,
- 15:46and somebody's talking and I hear somebody like, all right, I'm opening the
- 15:48door so that you can go down this thing, and like you're opening the
- 15:50what now? I heard that I'm sitting right over here, Whereas if there's
- 15:56a cubicle wall, I'm like, okay, I can buy that somebody might
- 16:00not have heard that. Yeah, I was you know, I thought about
- 16:03that too here in the rewatch thinking through this scene, and I I was
- 16:10kind of thinking to myself, you know, if you have one of these
- 16:11kind of open terminals or whatever, and you know, we know these calm
- 16:18units that people use in Star Wars are pretty innocuous people have them, and
- 16:23so I was rationalizing in my head that it's not that weird that she would
- 16:29be talking to somebody, you know, and you know, relaying information and
- 16:33all that kind of stuff. But I absolutely see what you're saying, and
- 16:37I think that it's one of those things to which you're one hundred percent right.
- 16:42You know, I think that the INQUISITORI is base itself. When we
- 16:48were walking into that that classified section, it does seem a little bit strange
- 16:52that there are not more like barriers other than this thing you have to walk
- 16:57through. I think that would have all been great to see just a little
- 17:02bit more set design there. And I think the idea of you know,
- 17:10these being like specially partitioned library units because we're in a classified area would again
- 17:18make more sense, right, Um, even a library room, you know,
- 17:25in the sense that you have this you remember those uh like microfiche rooms
- 17:30and stuff you used to have in a library, you know, and it
- 17:33had a door and you got so you know, you could be looking at
- 17:36things you didn't you know, necessarily want to have everybody know you're looking at.
- 17:38So no, no, I don't mean like naughty stuff. But I'm
- 17:42just saying like, as you're researching in all this charity, didn't match,
- 17:45didn't everybody knows what you're talking anyway, Yeah, so I agree with you,
- 17:52Um, but for the most part, I think that this works pretty
- 17:56well, and you know, I think, you know, one of the
- 18:00things that actually really works about this storyline in this episode is the fact that
- 18:07this whole thing really we've had this broken obi Wan kenobi right, and this
- 18:15is the episode where we've seen him use the force. He used it to
- 18:21save lay Up, but he's struggled with it so far. And here I
- 18:26think they do a great job of just like you know, it's it's it's
- 18:30do or do not. There is no try because Obi Wan must do all
- 18:33of the things he needs to do with the force in this episode or they
- 18:37would have been caught. And so it just forces him to be able to
- 18:42do that thing instinctively that he used to be able to and it's really fun,
- 18:48I think, and Gregor really sells it with the way in which slowly
- 18:52the lightsaber movements get more fluid, you know, and everything starts to take
- 18:59on and ease that he used to have. And I think all of that
- 19:03is just so great about this episode and exactly what you would hope the story
- 19:08would be doing at this point, because we're in the fourth episode. There's
- 19:11only two more after this. Real credit to Chow because that is a director
- 19:17knowing how to build and not bringing Obi Wan right back to immediacy with his
- 19:25powers. I'll take the cheap shot. It's not the sequels where all of
- 19:32a sudden you're a Jedi master level. It shows that there is effort,
- 19:36skill and practice that's necessary. And additionally, it plays into Vader saying again
- 19:45in the original Star Wars, your powers are week old man. Obi Wan's
- 19:48out of practice again when he gets to that point and he's a little bit
- 19:52more comfortable and resigned to it. He's using old age and subterfuge to get
- 19:56around and use little bits of skills that he has. But this is the
- 20:00retired fighter. He's not really at the top of his game. It's always
- 20:06how the film is read, but this supports that very very much. The
- 20:11one thing that I viewing at this time is when he breaks in, there
- 20:18is a part of me that wonders why he doesn't don the Stormtrooper uniform of
- 20:23the person he knocks out, because that seems like it would have made a
- 20:29lot of sense and also solved some of the things with the episode of him
- 20:37sneaking around because he can blend in. And then you have another mirror with
- 20:45Star Wars because Luke is in stormtrooper uniform looking for Leia, and you know,
- 20:49again it's armchair quarterbacking. I wasn't there. It works fine the way
- 20:56that it does, but I also thought it would have been really neat if
- 21:00when he goes in to get Leia we get an image of essentially what Macquarie
- 21:06originally painted, which was a stormtrooper with a lightsaber. How neat would that
- 21:11have been to see? And he whips out the lightsaber, he chops them
- 21:14up, and Laya's still freaking out and he has to take his helmet off
- 21:15and he's like, no, no, no, it's me. It's Ben.
- 21:18It's Ben, It's Ben, and he has it right, like right.
- 21:21But again, I'm not trying to rewrite the thing. I think that
- 21:23it works the way that it does. But I still think that's one of
- 21:27those little tweaks that I wish I could have been a birdie on somebody's shoulder
- 21:30and said, you know, he didn't shoot that guy. He could have
- 21:34taken his armor, just just saying do you think that would have helped alleviate
- 21:40some of the no I think issues. I think that's actually a really great
- 21:44idea. I think what it does is again, you know, when I
- 21:49think these stories are at their best or when they're alluding to all of that
- 21:56type of stuff, right, you know. I think that's one of the
- 21:57things that we all really gravitated towards the Rebels series with is that so many
- 22:04of the designs we had seen them before that they just had been unused.
- 22:08Ralph mcquarie are you know, and making those come to life because they finally
- 22:14found a place where they fit. And I think that this could have been
- 22:17a place for that. You know. It's it's interesting because it I feel
- 22:26as though by choosing to not have him like done the armor, one of
- 22:33the things that it does is again I think it accentuates the fact that Obi
- 22:37Wan's out of practice. You know, we've seen him in the Clone Wars
- 22:41take on Disguises, right, and I think here what we're seeing is a
- 22:45guy who he's really flying by the seat of his pants at this moment.
- 22:51Yes, his power is starting to come back and the force, his comfort
- 22:56and ease level with that, and yet I don't think he's quite yet at
- 23:02the top of his game, just when it comes to his general thought process,
- 23:07you know about everything. Um, you know, this is still not
- 23:12there will be one Kenobi from the Clone Wars at this point, and so
- 23:18I think it's a great point. It would have been really cool. But
- 23:21of course, you know, it also allows them to do what they need
- 23:23to do in the sense of, yeah, they have to find a way
- 23:27out. And then he does dawn to disguise, which allows him to cover
- 23:32up lay enough, which it's a little silly because it's you jump, You
- 23:36jumped right there, Okay, because I love the way that there's actually somebody
- 23:41here on the network. Tristan Riddell, founder of the Nerdparty dot com,
- 23:45and he he basically sent me a meme at the time that it was like
- 23:52a Scooby Doo episode at that point, and I have to agree, there's
- 23:56so many more elegant ways they could have done it. And again, what
- 24:00was odd about the staging is the alarms going off and everybody on that landing
- 24:07platform is still just walking, and they just seem to be like walking in
- 24:11these aimless sort of like pinball lines, and I'm like, nobody's running.
- 24:17You don't use digital duplicates to make a column of stormtroopers running off down a
- 24:22hallway. You don't have people like that is a that speaks to me of
- 24:30scrambling to adapt to the protocols but not taking the extra two hours to say,
- 24:37however, we do have certain tricks at our disposal that they used even
- 24:41all the way back in the Young Indiana Jones chronicles. To turn five people
- 24:45into twenty what we could turn two people into ten, And especially if they're
- 24:51an armor, we could all have the marching and make it look like there's
- 24:53a base. That's all. You know. Everybody's throwing their barriers up,
- 24:56everything's closing things down or even shouting at each other. But everybody seems too
- 25:03nonchalant during this moment while the alarms are going off. Okay, so we
- 25:10agree on that. Could not agree with you more. But I am desperately
- 25:14seeking something for us to disagree on, and I think I have it now.
- 25:18Okay, I keep taking a swing and a miss here. The Jedi
- 25:22trapped in amber don't have a problem with it. I think it's kind of
- 25:30cool that Podawan and training armor. I need you to ameliorate that for me,
- 25:38because I'm seeing a bunch of people where I can see not necessarily as
- 25:41Jedi, and there they might have just been forced users. They found they're
- 25:45trapped in amber. I look at it, I see the amber. I
- 25:48think, oh, okay, they're they're doing like cloning stuff. They're trying
- 25:51to like this is tying into that larger cloning sort of thing that we know
- 25:53they have to work into the lore because what happens with the sequels, Okay,
- 25:57kind of cool, kind of cool. But the kid in the training
- 26:03gear it I have something I'm trying to write in my head that makes it
- 26:10make sense after this viewing, I think I have it, but I want
- 26:12to know what your explanation is. I mean, I didn't actually a think
- 26:21anything of it when I saw it, So this is an interesting conversation to
- 26:25have to me. Though, if I think about it, it almost feels
- 26:30like Vader's first prize, right that in some way Vader is proud of what
- 26:37he did, so proud that he's put it on display in the inquisitorious base.
- 26:42And I would argue that two, as I think about the idea that
- 26:48this is a place for the inquisitors themselves, that it's also and so many
- 26:55of them used to be a form of Jedi. This whole room is a
- 26:59reminder of what will happen if you cross Vader in the Emperor, and so
- 27:03therefore every single person in this room that was a Jedi that's there and or
- 27:08a Padawan is a reminder. I don't care who you are, what you've
- 27:12done. I will straight up murder you if I have to, if you
- 27:15get in my way. So that's how I would take it. I take
- 27:22it in a slightly different direction. First, all of them there, I
- 27:27see his potential science experiments. But additionally, not just as a warning,
- 27:34but just like Vader's castle being built on Mustafar, he is forced continually to
- 27:40see, this is what you did. Don't ever think yes that you can
- 27:42be who you were. This is who you are. You can't go back
- 27:48right look at everything that you've done. And that's the thing that always traps
- 27:51somebody and makes them not seek redemption, as they say, I'm not good
- 27:55enough. I can't I can't be redeemed. I'm me. Look at these
- 27:59terrible things that I've done. And that would make a lot of sense to
- 28:02torture Vader, to torture the inquisitors themselves and be like, this is who
- 28:06you are. You don't have anywhere to go this, embrace who you are
- 28:11and just stay in the dark side right with the Potawan and specific in my
- 28:18head, and I hope they never do anything to overwrite this. In my
- 28:22head, it speaks to the idea that the Emperor was at this before the
- 28:26Clone Wars were over, which we know he was with capturing kids and taking
- 28:33them to Moustafar originally. And I would see this as a kid maybe that
- 28:40I don't know, cad Baane grabbed for him and he couldn't do anything with
- 28:44him, so or he died in the process. Fine, why does the
- 28:47kid still have the helmet on? I don't know, because he you know,
- 28:51that's how he was delivered or something like that. So that's how I
- 28:56see the kid. What I like about it is there's no forthright explanation.
- 29:02And I think some of the coolest things in Star Wars are those things where
- 29:06you and I can have this sort of conversation and you say, oh,
- 29:08well this x Y and Z, and I'm like, you know what,
- 29:11I can see that. But for me x Y and Z. I think
- 29:15that that's what makes that scene work very very well. And I think McGregor
- 29:18plays the horror of it very well. Yeah, I like that completely.
- 29:23And I think you know, one of the things that was so terrifying about
- 29:29watching the episode, even the first time, is when you see that you
- 29:33know, Terriss and Ube is in there, and you know, and it
- 29:36just kind of breaks your heart because it's a great deep cut for all of
- 29:40those of us to watch the Clone Wars and had this amazing character that we'd
- 29:44kind of fallen in love with even though they had only been in a few
- 29:47episodes. Well, and I think the idea that you know, these YETI
- 29:55are there for Palpatine to be able to use Possi in the future with his
- 30:00cloning experience experiments makes complete sense. And I like the idea you know two
- 30:07of you know, maybe cad Bane taking someone. We saw that and Children
- 30:10of the Forest there in the Clone Wars exactly. And so I think that's
- 30:14a great poll there. And it's one of those things where it's like,
- 30:17however they all got here? There are probably multiple ways you could think of
- 30:22in your mind that this you know, that they got captured, right,
- 30:26you know what, I just realized, Oh my gosh, and this would
- 30:30be such a cool story because one of the things I'm like, oh,
- 30:32okay, so they were hunting down potential Jedi and stuff like that. I'm
- 30:36like, but that's kind of a big task. I've realized as we're sitting
- 30:37here having this conversation. Once they took the Jedi temple, they would have
- 30:41had access to those records of four sensitive children. Oh yes, yeah,
- 30:45and they could have spent years because those kids were never found sort of thing.
- 30:51And that would could even be Rokan's wife. They intended to go get
- 30:55her, yes, great point yep, but they didn't. I mean,
- 30:57I'm sure he's too old or something like that. But the name would have
- 31:03been on record somewhere, and so these kids would have been immediately marked for
- 31:11the pogrom that the Empire goes on. And oh see that, Yeah that
- 31:17works. That's a story I want somewhere. Yeah. No, I think
- 31:19that's a great poll. You know. One of the things that I thought
- 31:22was great about the episode here too, is that the you know, we
- 31:26introduced this character Tala in the previous episode, and here I think she really
- 31:33becomes such a great character as the way that she plays the third sister here,
- 31:41you know, with her knowledge and you know, playing the fact of
- 31:45course I'm a spy, you know, and all of that. I think
- 31:49it's so well done, and it really really works, and justin the you
- 31:55know, two episodes that she's been on screen, she's become I think,
- 31:59a real interesting character that I want to know more about, and I end
- 32:05you know, I am connected to, which is great work. It's really
- 32:10interesting because I think that this episode, even though there are bits that maybe
- 32:16could have been better here or there, we've talked about the staging. We've
- 32:20talked about that stuff up to a certain point, like this is the episode
- 32:23where I'm like, Okay, it's paying off. Okay, my patient's paid
- 32:27off. Great, We're really there. But let's go back to the one
- 32:31huge problem we both know we have. That speed or attack staging never ever
- 32:39should have happened the way that it did. And I remember in the first
- 32:45time I saw it. I remember this time I saw it. When they
- 32:49fly in firing, my thought isn't oh cool. My thought is where the
- 32:53hell are they going to go? And I never see them fly out,
- 32:58and I know, okay, well that's a that's implied. Obviously they turned
- 33:04to the side and got away before you know, after their first strafing run.
- 33:08And maybe people think I'm too childish and simple for this, but I
- 33:15need that shot of them flying out because the visual language is they flew in
- 33:20firing and then they just evaporated until they needed to show up again. And
- 33:24that is a major major violation of film language in general, but also especially
- 33:34Lucas and Feloni school. I need to know where they went. I need
- 33:38to know where they're going. I need that plotted out on a map so
- 33:42that every time it cuts, I can say, I know where that speeder
- 33:45is right now. So when I go back and I rewatch it, where
- 33:47did that speeder turn? Where did that speeder come back? How did that
- 33:51speeder get there? Where did that speeder go afterward? And this is magical
- 33:57speeders that show up where they need to various points, and that bothers me?
- 34:02Does it bother you as much as it bothers me? So it does,
- 34:07And especially rewatching it now, you know those speeders come in and it's
- 34:12almost like they just seem to hover. Yes, And that wouldn't be a
- 34:17problem for me if you actually just showed them hovering there, you know,
- 34:22any kind of shot there. And I think, aside from the visual que
- 34:31editing issues, it just looks bad, like the the the effects work here
- 34:39is not great. It's it's real cheesy I mean that shot of Riva going
- 34:46up against the speeder just looks silly, the way it's composited and shot,
- 34:52and it just it's not working. There's something about it that looks off.
- 34:59The other thing, how does Obi, wan, Leia and Tala all fit
- 35:07into the back of one of those speeders. Where in the world is the
- 35:09space for that? Well, these are different speeders than the ones we saw.
- 35:21I get what you're saying. These are different speeders than the ones on
- 35:23howth they were adapting those speeders. I'll let it slide this time because I
- 35:30have to. I don't want that to be the thing that ruins it.
- 35:36What struck me this time is that the other two inquisitors never seem to take
- 35:46aggressive action, even though they both hate Reva. They both want to usurp
- 35:51Reva. They hate They just want are gone. But Reva's the one that
- 35:57throws the battery. I guess it blows up Wade. If the fifth brother
- 36:04is that piste, why doesn't he walking up? I was like, what
- 36:07are you letting him get away? And he throws a whole bank of him
- 36:10out there. Like the other inquisitors never take actual action that I would expect
- 36:16them to take they this moment more than any other, really teases out the
- 36:24fact, or not teases out, but you know, highlights the fact that
- 36:30these two characters seem only to exist to interact with and talk about the shortcomings
- 36:37of Reva. That they Pirsteve well, but they're just window dressing at that
- 36:44point. That's no good to me. I want them doing things and taking
- 36:52action and showing that they're trying to show Reva up. So final question,
- 36:59then that's a problem. We get past it. How do they fit in
- 37:04there? Okay, this is a different type of Speeder. I'll wave that
- 37:07away in my brain. And so we're hitting the same sort of problem where
- 37:12hey, we've got a stronger episode and then the end of it is sort
- 37:15of unraveling a bit. Vader shows up at the end, and even at
- 37:22the time, the way that it ends, I think the logical ending of
- 37:28this is the Speeder's going away and Riva standing there almost as an echo of
- 37:35Darth Maul watching Ana can fly away holding the saber and looking up Iris out
- 37:39you're done. But then they bring Vader on. He doesn't kill Riva.
- 37:45Doesn't the ending feel I know they're trying to set up the tracking thing.
- 37:53But doesn't this ending feel like it should be the opening of the next episode.
- 37:59I think that's a really good point, and I like it a lot.
- 38:05I agree with you that it feels almost tacked on in that sense,
- 38:12because if you wanted almost to do anything, you could have xed out all
- 38:15of the Reva stuff and you could have had that moment where Obi one and
- 38:22Leia are sitting there, You've got Tala on the other side, you know,
- 38:25and have that moment and then that be the end. Do a shot
- 38:31that includes Lola and so that in the next episode we can put all the
- 38:40pieces together, right, So I think that's what I would do, you
- 38:45know, have Reva standing there, show them get back, have their moment
- 38:50of you know, morning, but then this connection with Leia and Obi one
- 38:55where they formed this bond together, and that be the end of the episode.
- 39:00I think that works better. And then it makes more sense for that
- 39:05fifth episode to open with Vader coming in and be pissed, you know.
- 39:08And yes, so that's great opening with Vader just storming in, And what
- 39:15would be great about it is Vader's storming in and he is throwing people across
- 39:19the room left and right, He's like running down hallways where like I'm on
- 39:27guard anymore. I'm getting out of the way here, you know, or
- 39:30or even have an officer come up and be like, lord Vada, We're
- 39:34so please at you, and Vader just like throws him is like shut up
- 39:37sort of thing. See, the two of us we sit here. This
- 39:42is this is why Disney you need us to come on board this This show
- 39:47acts as yet yet another calling card for us to say, we think we
- 39:53have some good innovative ideas. We think we think that we could make a
- 39:58good show even better, so on our way out. On a scale of
- 40:01one to five, inquisitorious assists, is what are you rating the fourth chapter
- 40:08of the Obi wan Kenobi series? I think that this is probably a three
- 40:14point five maybe three point seven five, mainly because I think that the story
- 40:19elements for Obi wan Kenobi are really strong in this episode. You know,
- 40:23I'm knocking off those points though, because of all the things that we talked
- 40:27about. But it does feel as though, you know, we're at the
- 40:30fourth episode and things the trajectory is looking up for the series, and so
- 40:37hopefully you know that will continue as we do the rewatch, where are you
- 40:39John, where did your ratings change at all from the previous watch? I
- 40:45don't really think so. I think probably three point five is where I would
- 40:50land, But because I have so many problems with that ending, I'm not
- 40:52going to go up to three point seven. Five have might come down to
- 40:54three point three, which brings us the magic number thirty three and brings us
- 40:59to the question Master Rushing of where people can find you online to discuss your
- 41:07thoughts about the Obi Wan Kenobi series. Well, I hope people will check
- 41:12me out online. I'd love to interact with you, whether that's Twitter,
- 41:15Instagram, vero, or letterboxed all same name, Matt Rushing zero two.
- 41:22You can also find me here on the network. I've got a completed show
- 41:24I did with Drea Kaufman and we talked about every single chapter of Harry Potter,
- 41:29one chapter time, So check that out. It's called owl Post.
- 41:34You'll find me over on the TFM network with a bunch of shows. The
- 41:37six O two Club is my main place to hang out talking about all of
- 41:40the fanoms that we love. John's a frequent guests over there. We have
- 41:45a lot of fun to check that out. You can also find me over
- 41:47on a few other shows there, Literary Treks, The orb or five,
- 41:52Artificial Tango, and Saddle Up. But John, you know, maybe people
- 41:57are like I like this John guy. He has good story ideas, which
- 42:00is shocking. Where can they find you? Well, boy, would it
- 42:02be shocking if anybody even reached out to me on Twitter. I'm just killing
- 42:06some of you do some of you do? I know you do. I
- 42:08appreciate you. I appreciate all of you because honestly, I don't care if
- 42:12I get a thousand replies or whatever. It's the meaningful quality content that keep
- 42:17this guy that's on many shadow pants and blocklists perfectly happy. You can find
- 42:22me as Kessel Junkie, you know, look for me over on letterbox.
- 42:27I have a lot of fun there, trashing classic nineteen eighties movies that everybody
- 42:30tells me I should love because you don't tell me what to do. And
- 42:32again, I mean it's okay because don't start it. Yeah, okay,
- 42:38I'm sorry. I won't say anything about the never ending story because we might
- 42:42never end this podcast. I'm right about it. No, you are?
- 42:44You are? I'm backing you up there. No, yeah, my brother
- 42:50in I will get kicked in the Teeth by somebody someday for our views on
- 42:54the never ending story. So go on over and check that out over on
- 42:58house Lights, which is a director podcast. Imagine a podcast talking about films
- 43:02and directors. Nobody's heard anything like it, and that's right here on the
- 43:07Network with Tristan Riddell and Darren Moser. But Master Rushing, I feel like
- 43:13I could need to get into a dry set of robes, so it's probably
- 43:15time to close these negotiations. Well, John, hopefully you find the detergent.
- 43:21I think Yoda use it all. But negotiations are closed. Join the
- 43:30Revolution, Join the Nerd Party.