Is The Obi-Wan Kenobi Series Canceled? We Got An Answer
There is currently no plan to make a second season of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Fans felt a disturbance in the force this weekend as Star Wars Celebration came to London and, with it, came a nerf’s herd worth of announcements. Obi-Wan Kenobi season 2 was among the various projects discussed over the weekend, and the future of the Disney+ series might disappoint fans of the bearded hermit. Variety reports that when asked if the Obi-Wan series would return, head of Lucasfilm Kathleen Kennedy replied, “That is not an active development.”
Kennedy followed up her disappointing answer with the more hopeful “But I never say never, because there’s always the possibility.” Kathleen went on to say that she was proud of the job done by director Deborah Chow on the first Obi-Wan Kenobi series and that the show had been well-received (Kennedy didn’t specify whether she meant by critics or fans). Kennedy even claimed that actor Ewan McGregor was champing at the bit to make a second season of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Kennedy deflected further discussion about season 2 of Obi-Wan Kenobi by alluding to everyone at Lucasfilm being too busy with the recently announced projects like The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew to think about what might come after. Kathleen’s last word on the subject was, “We’ll turn our attention to that again maybe down the road.” So basically, a non-committal “we’ll see.”
The main issue with a second season of Obi-Wan Kenobi (or even just the series in general) is trying to shoehorn it into the existing Star Wars lore. When the character of Obi-Wan Kenobi was first introduced in Star Wars: Episode IV- A New Hope it was implied that he was a former Jedi-turned-hermit living on his own on Tatooine and watching over Luke Skywalker until the boy was old enough to train.
What the first season of Obi-Wan Kenobi showed us was that, apparently, he left from time to time to go on high-profile rescue missions. While technically nothing that Kenobi did retconned any major Star Wars events, it definitely requires a lengthy explanation to fit the series comfortably into the established timeline.
Take, for example, the duel between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader, which some people consider the highlight of the series. When Obi-Wan meets Darth Vader on the Death Star in A New Hope, Vader makes the statement, “When I left you, I was but a learner. Now I am the master.” The statement doesn’t include the words “That time we fought on Mustafar that changed both our lives forever, that’s the time I’m referring to,” but that was widely considered to be the meaning of his words for many years.
Fast forward to the Obi-Wan Kenobi series on Disney+, and the two have a second duel which again needs some explaining to fit into the Star Wars timeline. Specifically, why didn’t Obi-Wan kill Vader when he had the chance? Having the two combatants meet for a second time in between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope was an interesting choice, to say the least.
Still, there are some Star Wars fans that love the Disney canon above all else and were tickled pink by all the events that transpired during Obi-Wan Kenobi (little Leia was undeniably awesome, even if her presence created more plot holes that needed explaining). These fans will no doubt be bummed out to learn that Obi-Wan Kenobi season 2 isn’t in active development.
Luckily there were so many other series and movies announced at Celebration that they should get over it pretty quickly.
