Master Yoda once said, “Patience you must have.”
However, I don’t think the wisest the Jedi Council had this much patience. Fans who have been clamoring for years for Ewan McGregor to reprise his role of Obi-Wan Kenobi will have to wait a bit longer.
Collider reports that the Disney+ series is put on hold due to rewrites of the script. The decision came from Kathleen Kennedy, president of Lucasfilm. Cast and crew were reportedly sent home from the Pinewood Studios in London and were told the series will be on hold “indefinitely.”
Deborah Chow, who directed two highly rated episodes of The Mandalorian, is set to be the show runner of the much anticipated series. This development is coming right after earlier rumors where the show had been cancelled before getting off the ground. Now it appears that it will just be delayed.
This shouldn’t be cause for concern. Star Wars has a past of reworking scripts and changing course through the production process. Most notably in Rogue One where rewrites were happening during filming and even changing directors from Chris Miller and Phil Lord to Ron Howard for Solo. The quality of the product does seem to be of the highest priority. Further rumors state that the episode count for Obi-Wan Kenobi will be cut from six to four.
UPDATE: Variety asked Ewan McGregor about the delays, and he assured fans that they were nothing serious:
“I think we start shooting early next year as opposed to summer this year. I think the scripts are great. They’re in really good shape. They want them to be better. I think we keep our same airdate. All good. …It’s not really as dramatic as it might seem.”
Should Lucasfilm strike while the iron is hot from the success of The Mandalorian and shift focus to live-action television for Star Wars? Especially after Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker is set to become the lowest grossing entry in the Sequel Trilogy?
