“Justice”
Episode 6 of Obi-Wan Kenobi starts with us back on Tatooine with Reva looking for Owen. Somehow she’s got there before Obi-Wan and the others, and she’s at full power now too. How did that happen? How did she recover from her injuries enough to make it here? “Don’t ask questions, just consume product” and all that. Her goal here though is Luke, whom she’s desperate to find. Meanwhile, Obi-Wan and the other rebels attempt to hold out from relentless blaster fire from Vader and the star destroyer. Obi-Wan admits to Leia that he’s scared, but he’s going to try and give Roken and the others some time by drawing Vader’s attention away. He tasks Haja with getting Leia home and hugs the princess goodbye before leaving to face Vader one more time. Roken sets up a dropship, which Obi-Wan jumps into and takes off. The Grand Inquisitor believes they should keep tracking the rebels but Vader is blinded by hate and demands they follow Obi-Wan. With the blaster fire failing, and Obi-Wan heading toward a deserted planet, Vader prepares his ship as he wants to face Obi-Wan alone on this planet. It turns out Obi-Wan has Lola in his possession. Why? Well, it’s to stop him feeling so scared, apparently. On the surface of the planet, Obi-Wan and Vader fight. This time Obi-Wan isn’t running away. But Vader gets the upper-hand, taking out Obi-Wan and burying him under a whole rabble of rocks. “You have failed, Master.” Vader says, taking off. Through the power of remembering Leia, Obi-Wan causes a shockwave to blast the rocks off him and confronts Vader, using rocks of his own to take out his former pupil. This time, Obi-Wan bests Anakin, knocking him down and causing sparks to fly from his helmet. In fact, he rips it open and manages to see Anakin inside. Obi-Wan’s heart breaks as he sees his former pupil. “Anakin is gone. I am all what remains.” Vader says. Obi-Wan eventually takes off, leaving Vader alone on the planet and the Star Destroyer, surprisingly, not firing or chasing Obi-Wan’s ship. That’s lucky! Meanwhile on Tatooine, Reva breaches the perimeter of Owen’s farm after Owen puts Luke in hiding. When Reva approaches, with her broken lightsaber, Owen starts firing on her with his blaster. Owen protects Luke while he’s inside the house, using a bit of metal to try and stave off Reva’s lightsaber. It obviously doesn’t work! “What do you want?” Owen asks. “Justice.” The murderer says. Reva is blinded by hate, anger and suffering (sure sound like traits those in the Dark Side have!) and eventually chases after Luke, lightsaber flashing an angry red. With Obi-Wan fresh from his victory over Vader, he heads down to Tatooine where Reva knocks out Luke and looks set to kill him. Before she does, she sees herself in Luke’s position and, realizing she’s pure evil, changes her mind. Reva carries an unconscious Luke across to Owen while Obi-Wan is watching on. This time Reva is on her knees before Obi-Wan and starts crying. “I couldn’t do it.” She says tearfully, somehow regretting the fact she was unable to kill a little boy with a lightsaber. (I know this is her referencing the Jedi Temple and the Younglings, I jest.) “Have I become him?” The murderer asks, tears staining her eyes. Thinking back to the merciless way she cut an old lady’s hand off, hunted Jedi, hung a Jedi in the middle of town before everyone, killed and murdered children and adults alike, tortured Leia and almost killed Luke, Obi-Wan says “No. You have chosen not to. Who you become now, that is up to you.” Reva drops her lightsaber, Obi-Wan helps her up and tells her she’s free. And he walks away, leaving Reva to her devices. Meanwhile, Vader heads back to Mustafar and speaks to the Emperor about how he’s going to probe every system and find Obi-Wan. The Emperor is not sure he’s thinking clearly. Time passes and Leia is back on Alderaan, armed with the blaster holster that Obi-Wan gave her, something that’s a reminder to Tala’s sacrifice in episode 5. Leia decides she wants to change some things in the established hierarchy, as Obi-Wan touches down and admits that Leia is the one who has saved him. After gushing praise on her, he warns Leia not to tell anyone about him if she should call on him in the future and takes off. What about Luke? Well, Obi-Wan decides to leave the cave and rides over to Owen’s farm. Obi-Wan decides that Owen and Beru are the only protection Luke needs and decides to walk away, after meeting Luke with his trademark “Hello there”. After handing over the toy plane, Obi-Wan takes off and notices Qui-Gon’s force ghost out in the desert. He encourages Obi-Wan to follow as they leave Luke unprotected.
The Episode Review
A nostalgia-baiting final episode sees Obi-Wan Kenobi stumble over the finish line, a move that will undoubtedly paper over a lot of the problems this show has had for many fans excited to see a lightsaber duel and the nostalgic nods to the past. The most notable problem comes from Reva within the first seconds of the episode. The character has been poorly written from the start, with skewed motivations, and there’s absolutely no mention of how she managed to teleport from the “gutter” of that planet all the way over to Tatooine given the hangar was empty, Vader left and she’s supposedly badly injured. And doing so faster than Obi-Wan who’s being pursued by Vader, I may add. The fight between Obi-wan and Vader is a nice touch and one that sees this duel bring their conflict “full circle” back to A New Hope. But at the same time, it also slips into even more continuity problems. In Revenge of the Sith it makes sense that Obi-Wan walks away from Anakin given he’s a crispy mess and close to death. Here though, he just walks away from Vader while he’s on his knees. And then he manages to leave the planet without the star destroyer bothering to chase him or send anyone down to check on Vader. Problems aside, this is still the best part of the episode, and that’s just as well given it’s sprinkled around skewed scenes involving Reva. Reva’s new mission is to kill a young boy because she wants “justice.” But the only reason she can’t kill Luke is because she sees herself in that position. And then, by the end, Obi-Wan lets her live. And on that same subject, are we to believe a 10 year old Luke forgets what a lightsaber looks like after a traumatic experience from a crazy lady wielding one around in his house and chasing him? I personally think it would have been a more fitting end if Obi-Wan killed her, seeing what happened to Anakin and not wanting Reva to succumb to the same thing. Or, if Disney don’t want that, then have Reva shoot herself in the head, unwilling to live with the guilt from causing so much pain and devastation on everyone around her. Instead, she’s just forgiven for torturing and murdering numerous innocent people. As for Obi-Wan, he’s basically been a foot-note in his own story and ends it by deciding not to watch over Luke after all, letting the dangerous Reva live in suffering (which is a path to the dark side of course) and leaves Luke in the care of Owen and takes off to parts unknown. But hey, we saw force-ghost Qui-Gon which is at least a nice touch! Bad writing and editing have been a staple of this series from the first episode and no amount of nostalgia bait can hide that. At least not from those asking questions or looking at this critically. I know I’m in the minority as a lot of the media and other people are gushing over this series but when it comes to storytelling, directing, editing, acting, visual design and continuity, Obi-Wan is lacking in all those areas – especially when you start asking questions and looking at the logic of this. The finale is probably the best episode of the entire show, but that’s hardly a high bar to set.
