Obi-Wan Kenobi delights fans with epic flashback scene
Finally, Hayden Christensen gets to show his face in the new Disney Plus Star Wars series. **CONTAINS SPOILERS**
For the past few weeks, fans have wondered – did Disney really convince Hayden Christensen to return as Darth Vader, decades on from his last appearance, only to have him wear a mask or lurk in out-of-focus areas the whole time?
Well, the penultimate episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi has finally answered that question. You see, in Chapter Five a couple of different flashbacks give us the chance to see Christensen play Anakin as he used to be – and it’s safe to say that fans were pretty ecstatic to see him in action.
The main meat of Christensen’s appearances comes through a series of flashbacks sprinkled throughout the episode, which look back at a sparring session between Anakin-as-padawan and Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Jedi Master. Presumably, based on their costumes this takes place around the time of (through probably slightly before) 2002’s Attack of the Clones.
This practice bout acts as a kind of framing device for Obi-Wan Kenobi’s fifth episode, exploring the dynamic between the aggressive, impetuous Anakin and Obi-Wan’s more defensive style, which apparently maintains even in their very different circumstances.
Still, fans mostly just seemed excited to see Christensen and McGregor properly on screen together for the first time, even if both actors were visibly quite a bit older than they were the last time they were styled in those costumes.
Though of course, this wasn’t the only Christensen flashback fans were given. As the truth of Reva’s Jedi Temple youngling backstory was revealed, we also got a glimpse of Anakin as he attacked the temple shortly after succumbing to the Dark Side.
Unpleasantly, there were more explicit scenes of him murdering children than were seen in the prequel trilogy, helping to remind fans that Vader and Christensen’s version are really one and the same.
Altogether, it was a clever way to get Christensen back in the action and give fans another nod to the prequel trilogy all these years later. And who knows? With one more episode to go, there might be time for a few more flashbacks yet...
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