Flashbacks of Leia (with one obligatory flashback of Luke) make Obi-Wan have the best TK showings in the entire Jedi Order and mysteriously rob Vader of his own superior TK showings. It also causes +10 to Vader Uncertainty, and causes Vader to suck at fighting.
P.S: the choreography in Kenobi is utterly stupid. I know the PT basically turned the Jedi into wushu-meets-Errol-Flynn morons, but Kenobi has everyone fight like they're afraid of breaking a nail.
I've seen people disagree with me, but really it's because the fighting is better than the ST and that's a bar so low it might as well be a tripwire.
The problem with Kenobi series fights is a few things, so I'll clarify:
1. Vader moves badly in the suit. This is a big one. A lot of his dodges and movements seem to be Hayden compensating for a lack of peripheral vision and ease of movement in the suit. IIRC he's gone on record as saying it's hot and heavy to work in, and that's going to limit his ability. Really, this is a callback to the OT's Vader outfit and how it limited David Prowse's ability to move his arms much above shoulder level. The difference is David Prowse was a massive, strong man and he carried the weight better and knew how to make his greater weight impactful in his acting style. When watching Kenobi, I was struck by how jerky and fast-paced Hayden came across compared to the gravitas and intimidation of Prowse's Vader.
In turn, Prowse could use his greater strength to compensate for less flashy moves. At one point while filming ANH, he tagged Alec Guinness so hard the guy went flying. Vader's dueling style, largely one handed, worked in the OT because a strongman was in the suit. Hayden's just an above average height dude with a modest build, and he just doesn't quite match up.
2. There's some good thrusts in the fights and even some good ripostes, but a lot of what happens is badly telegraphed. You see Vader, Obi, and Reva dodging in almost real time to attacks that are supposed to be Jedi quick. There's a sense of no one is in good shape, or they're slowed down by their outfits, and so everyone's waddling around like overweight LARPers, trying to dodge attacks and look cool. Reva's super spin attack which took all of three seconds to charge up was casually dealt with by Vader and it just took me out of the fight.
3. The fights are too damn dark, ffs and zoomed out at the wrong times. Or shaky cam. All of this takes you out of the fight and ruins its flow. The difference between say, even a PT fight and a Kenobi fight is how the former actually convinces you there's some people near each other, fighting. Kenobi sometimes comes off as badly post-processed found-footage.
Really, my standards are a bit high these days. I've seen better duels replicated by fans, or actual fencers/swordsmen who are interested in the subject.
However, even in the flashback, we see Kenobi turning the tables on Anakin without even having a saber to fight with. Visually, it appears Kenobi just straight out beat him in combat. However, the whole purpose of that flashback (and that episode as a whole) was to show how so long as Anakin/Vader feels the need to prove himself, he will always be the learner. His sole focus on victory is what blinds him. That came straight from Kenobi's mouth. Kenobi appeared to just flat out beat him in their present-day second fight too by smashing his control panel - the overall theme of Anakin's weaknesses are the same.
These instances are the only time Kenobi "stands a chance," as he very much made it clear in the flashback that under NORMAL circumstances, Kenobi doesn't stand a chance - the only way that Anakin/Vader loses to Kenobi is when he beats himself.
While the show certainly had some instances of lazy writing, I thought this theme was brilliant. If you connect the themes of the show to the duel, it's not lazy and actually makes sense.
The bar i'm comparing it to is the revenge of the sith duel between anakin and kenobi where the vast majority of the duel provided little to nothing in terms of narrative or combative progression. Simply by not being multiple times longer than the timeframe they actually had substance to fill, kenobi vs vader(both fights) have a signifcant advantage.
Additionally the music syncs up much better with their movements/lightsaber whizzing and there's much greater visual variety. The da da da, da da da, works better as a theme between the two imo as it is distinct in timbre from the grand operatic themes for broader world-shifting narrative moments. Starting from a simpler sound with less instruments and then building works better for me then opening with a grand operatic theme and never really changing it up
It's visually much stronger as well imo as we get to see the fight from a variety of angles while also seeing a clear continuity of motion. The surrounding cinematrography is much stronger with the shadowy blurs behind them and the lighting of the sabers reflecting on their faces is a nice touch.
There's also a much clearer sense of momentum and "the winds shifting" largely because there's a much clearer sense of impact and harm done towards the fighters. Seeing the fight from the vantage point of the fighters themselves helps and generally makes the experience more engaging imo. You say it was "too dark" but personally i was able to make out everything visually and i think the range of solid things to blury things in the background fits them well.
I also like that they actually bothered to use the force here and vader ramming kenobi into rocks personallly felt cooler to me than any moment of the prequel duels. The fighting actually shows character/emotional stuff narratively while when anakin and kenobi fought in rots, nothing was really narratively communicated until there were lulls in combat.
Kenobi vs Vader also benefits from not having garbage ****ing dialogue. "The weakness remains was kind of dumb" but "FROM MY POINT OF THE VIEW THE JEDI ARE EVIL" is comically stupid.
There's finally alot of "aiming for the saber" which to me is more jarring than the telegraphed moments you point out.
I'd agree it doesn't look techanically as impressive and from the combatants perspective it's more impressive. I'd also agree in the second fight(not the first fight) "lightsaber styles" really aren't respected but since neither movie actually brings those up i don't really care. Those differences are really just aesthetic as far as I'm concerned.
So all in all, i don't really think preferring the prequel fights is a matter of having a "higher standard". I'd say kenobi vs vader is much stronger for all the other stuff. I am not talking about the sequel fights as a whole but the three main duels here(not reva) were way more interesting to watch for me than the prequel duels even if the story around it was bad
Last edited by Rockydonovang on Jul 16th, 2022 at 07:56 AM
"You can't just go right into the sword fight, so I decided to go back to The Empire Strikes Back of throwing things at each other, even though I knew they were equal to each other, so it was a hopeless gesture and they would've figured that out in two seconds. But for the audience it's nice for them to go through this process of throwing everything around." - Lucas about Dooku vs Yoda
As I can't care less about shitsney, they did a good job with Vader. Some shit-authors may hype him, but 'Kenobi' tv show has shown, that - as Lucas said - Vader is just half machine, inferior to his current master, as well to a former. How Lucas answered that question about Vader not using his Force Powers in ANH? Because he is a level 4 and Kenobi is 5 in the Force?
It should be a joke or half-joke. But, as always, Vader has a shit-shoowings against Forcu users who are above medicore. And in that moments he can put his hype in his own ass
I suppose. But it was before TCW. First episode of TCW Yoda freezes Ventress. Dooku clearly wasnt capable of that when he faced Ventress.
He was also casually force choked by Palpatine, who provably was Yodas equal in the Force.
Yeah if we just ignore Vader burying Kenobi with his clearly superior force powers before Kenobi got his focused amp. And he buried him AFTER noting Kenobis strength had returned. IOW ROTS Level.
Vader also ragdolled Kenobi in episode 3, but that was a mentally broken Kenobi.
And thats ignoring all the insane ripping ships apart he does.
So yeah lets not pretend Vader is all hype with nothing to back it up under Disney.
Well, Sidious didn't ragdoll Dooku in actual fight. It was more like punishing him for his failures.
Anyway, yeah, Vader might has superior TK to Kenobi, IT was a semi-joke. But in that show Kenobi is just a superior fighter. Vader took an asvantage due to Kenobis' mistake with trying to over power him with TK. In a middle of a sword fight Vader was too hard-pressed to being able to use his TK succesfully.
Have to admit though, Kenobi was winning the Saber fight almost the entire time. So that to me suggests ROTS Anakin was a better saber duellist than Vader at this point in time.
But clearly this Vader could ragdoll ROTS Kenobi and his force abilities are above Dooku's.
Last edited by Darth Thor on Jul 26th, 2022 at 10:10 AM
^
I'm not sure that Vader could ragdoll ROTS Kenobi. For me, ROTS!Kenobi and Kenobi!Kenobi are comperable.
Actually, I have no idea if Vader created that hole in the ground or was it some mine below them and Vader just use the Force to collapse it. It was a very good feat, but I don't think that it would work again.
Vader has shown superiority over Kenobi as he managed to overpower him with TK while using in saber fight. Kenobi then overpowered him with his own TK, but it was mostly due to fact that Kenobi was winning duel and Vader was really hard-pressed.
This fight has shown another thing - Kenobi wasn't bad at offense at all. It's confirmed, that he burried his saber and didn't train. It might be a best evidence for Dooku. While he was able to overpower Kenobi in a saber fight, as was shown in their last fight in TCW and as was suggested in ROTS novel and ROTS comic (a some kind of "what if?" questin), it was always lowballed with counters like:
"oh noes, Kenobi lost because he had Anakin on his side so he had to be agressive and couln't use his masterful Soresu"
And many other like that. In that case, Dooku has shown that he is capable of beating Kenobi - a strong Ataru user who could always switch to his even greater Sores - who was supperted by Skywalker - possibly the greatest master of Djem So.
This, combined whith Dooku's - at worst -slightly superiority over Kenobi in TK, and perhaps slightly ifnferiority to Vader's TK (but could be his equal as well) would place Dooku well above this version of Vader for me.
Good point about how good Obi-Wan is on the offensive. That really does take away the previous excuses for him against Dooku.
But im not buying Vader only buried Obi-Awan due to a mine underneath lol. I realise youre semi joking again, but seems clear to me that Vader is just on another TK Level
He is tbh. But Obi-Wans overall combat ability was superior which make it hard for Vader to use TK succesfully. That mine is just a guess. Not even sure if it was some moon or a planet after all. I'm just saying, that if there was something like a mine or a hole, then it makes that feat a bit less impressive. If Vader split a ground with his TK and made that hole by his own, it would be far more impressive. And It was possibly this.
Look at Obi-Wan and Anakin performances against Dooku in last two fights. In TCW both Anakin and Obi-Wan attacked Dooku with combined Force push. Possibly raw power superior for Dooku to defend, so he evade. But before, Dooku attacked them with his own Force push, they both defended themselfs, it pushed them a little back though. How to rate this? How to rate that Dooku in ROTS was still able to Force push Kenobi, while Anakin was there? And that this Vader wasn't able to do that in a single duel?
Was Dooku on another TK level then Kenobi or even Skywalker? I'm serious, as I'm a big fan of "combat ability" case. A clear superior was Yoda to Ventress. Even Sidious couldn't - in my opinion - do everything he wanted with Maul.
^ I think Dooku was just good at taking on multiple opponents. He was clearly > Kenobi in the Prequel era though. And thats no small feat especially by ROTS.
And yeah it seems Anakin was stronger in Sabers than this incarnation of Vader 10 years post Sith.
I think Dooku was just a more skilled fighter than Kenobi tbh. Getting a force push is a standard move in a saber fight, so even if their TK were equal, still Dooku was getting in more hits. But yeah given that choke his TK did seem superior to Kenobis.
Hard to say with Skywalker. I know he stalemated Kenobi in a force push, but he clearly had access to more raw power (as showcased on Mortis).
Jun 29th, 2022 03:31 PM
