Lucasfilm Announces Release Date For Their Obi-Wan Kenobi Series

John F. Trent |

Feb 9, 2022

Disney+ and Lucasfilm announced their release date for their upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series.

In a press release, Disney+ and Lucasfilm revealed that Obi-Wan Kenobi will arrive on Disney+ on May 25th.

They also released a new poster featuring the release date.

The press release also included a brief synopsis for the series.

It states, “The story begins 10 years after the dramatic events of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith where Obi-Wan Kenobi faced his greatest defeat—the downfall and corruption of his best friend and Jedi apprentice, Anakin Skywalker, who turned to the dark side as evil Sith Lord Darth Vader.”

The series was initially announced during the Disney+ panel at the D23 Expo in 2019.

Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy made the announcement by bringing McGregor on stage and asking if he would play Obi-Wan Kenobi again. McGregor responded, “Yes.”

Kennedy would go on to claim the show’s scripts had already been completed, “We are really close. We have all the scripts written. We are ready to start shooting next year. We could not be more excited. Can’t wait to start production.”

However, by early 2020, reports indicated the series’ production crew was sent home and the show was put on hold.

The Hollywood Reporter claimed the show was put on hold because the scripts sucked. They claimed, ““Sources tell THR that the scripts — only two were written — and story became an issue and that the entire package has been jettisoned.”

They noted at the time the scripts might have been too similar to The Mandalorian with Kenobi taking a young Luke Skywalker and Leia under his wing similar to Din Djarin’s journey with Grogu.

In December 2020 during Disney’s Investor Day 2020 presentation, Kennedy touted the series claiming it would feature a rematch between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

She stated, “Obi Wan Kenobi begins 10 years after the dramatic events of Revenge of the Sith, where he faced his greatest defeat, the downfall and corruption of his best friend and Jedi apprentice, Anakin Skywalker turned evil Sith Lord Darth Vader.”

“Our fans will be thrilled that Hayden Christensen will be returning in the role of Darth Vader. This will be the rematch of the century,” she added.

The show’s showrunner Deborah Chow confirmed this rematch telling GamesRadar, “We couldn’t tell the story of Obi-Wan without Darth Vader.”

She added, “We will definitely see Obi-Wan and Darth Vader get into it again.”

Chow would provide further details in a short teaser for the show on Disney+.

She said, “This is quite a dark time that we’re coming into with him. Just being a Jedi, it’s not safe. There’s Jedi hunters out there.”

McGregor added, “At least he has this one task left, which is to keep Luke safe.” Chow then states, “That’s definitely a starting place for our story. The interesting this is gonna be where it goes from there.”

Chow would later state, “We couldn’t tell the story of Obi-Wan Kenobi without addressing Anakin or Vader.” McGregor added, “Have another swing at each other, might be quite satisfying for everybody.”

The series stars Ewan McGregor as Kenobi. It also stars Moses Ingram, Joel Edgerton, Bonnie Piesse, Kumail Nanjiani, Indira Varma, Rupert Friend, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Sung Kang, Simone Kessell and Benny Safdie.

The series is executive produced by McGregor, Kathleen Kennedy, Michelle Rejwan, Deborah Chow, and Joby Harold.