Lucasfilm’s Obi-Wan Kenobi series was a glorious return to prequel-era Star Wars. The series’ thrilling finale saw the rematch of the century with Obi-Wan Kenobi fighting Darth Vader.
As we all expected, Obi-Wan Kenobi took the victory again in the rematch. However, the original version of this story had a much different outcome.
Darth Vader was supposed to win
Original Obi-Wan Kenobi writer Stuart Beattie has revealed that the rematch between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader was much different in the original version. With the original pitch for the series being a trilogy of movies, the two were set to fight multiple times.
Speaking to The Direct, Beattie explained that Vader took the win. Instead of a battle on a dark planet, the two fought on a space station. The writer explained:
“In mine, Vader won the fight. They were fighting on this space station. It was falling apart in the atmosphere of this big planet and Obi-Wan basically fell off. Vader pushed him off and they separated. They didn't get the chance to find Obi-Wan, basically. But what was going through Obi-Wan's mind is the same thing which is, 'My brother is truly dead. He's gone. And while I absolve of that guilt because I didn't kill him, Vader killed him, I'm still just devastated. I'm absolutely devastated.'”
Beattie explains that Darth Vader had to truly believe that Kenobi was dead by the time of A New Hope. By seeing the aged Jedi fall, this would be enough to satisfy his obsession with revenge.
“Her really did believe that Kenobi was dead at the end,” he explained. “Because it always seemed that in [A New Hope] he was shocked when he was like 'I sense something, a presence I've not felt since...' Why do you stop talking to yourself? It's because you're that shocked, you know?
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There’s still good in him
In the interview, Beattie revealed that the core purpose of the original story was Obi-Wan losing all faith in Anakin Skywalker. This is due to one line in Return of the Jedi where Vader tells Luke Skywalker that Obi-Wan still believed in him once.
“The big radical idea was Obi-Wan must have left Tatooine at some point in these 19 years. And further than that, he must have had a confrontation with Darth Vader,” he said. “There's a moment in Return of the Jedi when Luke hands himself over to Vader. And he says, there's still good in you. I still believe there's good in you.' And Vader's reply is, 'Obi-Wan once thought as you do.”
“At no point do you ever see that happen in Revenge of the Sith,” he continued. “Obi-Wan just goes to Mustafar and they have their big fight and he leaves him to die. And they're [Lucasfilm] are like, 'Oh, my God, you're right, there must have been a point.'"
While the Obi-Wan Kenobi series may be far different from Beattie’s original vision, it still hits a lot of the same beats. However, maybe it would’ve been cooler as the movie trilogy it was planned to be.