Nightmare Fuel / Obi-Wan Kenobi

"Now you will suffer, Obi-Wan. Your pain has just begun."

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Part I

• The opening scene is the Jedi Temple during Order 66 from the perspective of a group of Jedi younglings. The night is peaceful and the younglings are in sync training with their teacher... until a group of Clone Troopers barges through the door and start shooting without warning. The Jedi teacher leads her students through a hallway now brimming with clones killing Jedi left and right before she is brought down by the blaster bolts, leaving the younglings alone and defenseless as they try to run to safety. The fact that the scene bears resemblance to a school shooting in the United States only makes the scene more uncomfortable, which is why there's a viewer's discretion at the beginning of the episode on Disney+.
  • And the whole time, one sentence repeats itself in the background:
    "Execute Order 66."
• Reva randomly cutting off an elderly woman’s hand. Those familiar with Star Wars Rebels and the original trilogy may already be familiar with the ruthlessness of the Inquisitors and the Empire in general, but it's not hard to feel surprised at such a random outburst of violence, even from a servant of the Empire. A moment later, Owen nearly meets his end at Reva's blade, while she makes it clear that his family (including little Luke) will be next on her hit list.

Part II

• The Grand Inquisitor threatening one of the thugs Reva hired with his spinning lightsaber. Even as the man pleads ignorance, the Inquisitor still comes at him and we cut away just at his scream.
• Darth Vader's first appearance in this series is an Eye Awaken shot where unleashes a signature Death Glare. He finally understands that his old master is alive, and he is not pleased.
  • Considering this is alongside Obi-Wan's Stunned Silence from learning he's alive as well, it's like Vader can practically sense his shock and fear, which he probably would enjoy.

Part III

• An incredibly eerie sequence occurs when Obi-Wan walks along the countryside with Leia, and he suddenly looks disoriented. Gazing out into the countryside we see a hooded figure in Jedi robes, and for a moment we might suspect it's a vision of Qui-Gon Jinn. The figure then turns, revealing it to be Anakin Skywalker, who glares at Obi-Wan with barely-contained fury before vanishing when Leia snaps him out of it.
• In a more mundane sense, there's an underlying horror with the calm, folksy demeanor of Freck as things take a sudden dark turn when it's revealed that he's an Imperial sympathizer, justifying what the Empire has done without skipping a beat. Obi-Wan previously noted that the Empire ran a lot of people out of their homes to take advantage of the planet's resources, but Freck seems completely fine, in part because it hasn't negatively affected him. It's really not hard to see the parallels between Nazi Germany and the Empire here, and how evil succeeds when ordinary citizens turn a blind eye to evil.
• When Obi-Wan senses Vader's presence, he nearly doubles over in pain.
• Darth Vader, of course. As always, his reputation as the Empire's most dreaded man in the galaxy never fails to precede him.
  • The first we see of him is right after the previous episode, slowly pulled from a Bacta tank as little more than a limbless torso, much like in Rogue One. But unlike Rogue One, we get a far clearer look at what comes next, and it's not pretty. Piece by piece, the armor is attached, an artificial arm flexing, the suit placed on, the controls at the stomach blink, and finally that helmet locks into place, and then you hear him breathing. The way the red light of the chamber reflects on those "eyes" is the topper to it all. We also see how attaching the suit to Darth Vader appears to be a painful process, especially when we see just how extensive Vader's cybernetics are. The box on his chest impales him, and the spike on his neck piece goes into his throat. Yet, unlike the operation scene in Revenge of the Sith, we never once hear him shriek in pain, because he's so used to this by now.
  • Vader's descent on the village paints him less as a man and more as a force of nature. The scene goes quiet, broken only by Vader's signature breathing. The otherwise bloodthirsty Inquistors, even Reva, remain deathly quiet in his presence. The dark lighting on Vader's form, concealed by his massive black cape, makes him look like a walking shadow. All the villagers can do is barricade themselves in their homes and pray to whatever gods they worship that this evil thing doesn't decide on a whim to kill them all.
  • His callous murder of a father and child (especially since we're treated to the poor kid getting his neck snapped on-screen) shows that he's not the same man we once knew him. Anakin Skywalker truly is dead: only Darth Vader remains.
  • When Vader finally catches up to Obi-Wan, the latter is absolutely horrified at what became of the former. This fear, combined with his lack of practice over the past ten years, allows Vader to absolutely mop the floor with him.
    • Lest you suspect we're exaggerating here, Obi-Wan was so terrified because Ewan McGregor was so terrified. Seeing Hayden Christenson in full armor for the first time in twenty years left him stunned.
  • Much like in Rogue One, no shadow is as deep as the one in which Darth Vader lurks. At one point, he seemingly materializes out of the darkness solely to terrify Obi-Wan. Repeatedly, he allows Obi-Wan to try and escape, only to reappear and terrorize the poor man once again.
    • Just before this moment, after Obi-Wan makes a run for it, Vader taunts him and sounds very close, startling him enough to ignite his lightsaber. Obi Wan turns back and forth, but Vader's nowhere to be seen. Then, in the distance, he comes out of the shadows, showing that he wasn't even close. That's right, Vader is trolling Obi Wan with the Force just to terrify him.
    Vader: You cannot run, Obi-Wan.
  • Vader catches Obi-Wan with the Force, and Obi-Wan is unable to escape Vader's clutches. Vader then knocks over a container of flammable material and starts a fire with his lightsaber, then proceeds to burn Obi-Wan as payback for Mustafar. The only reason Kenobi didn't become a charred husk like Vader is because Vader stops the flames, saying "Your pain has just begun." and ordering the stormtroopers to bring Obi-Wan to him. What could Vader possibly have in mind that's worse than burning Obi-Wan alive?! Thanks to Tala's interference, we don't get a chance to find out.
  • What makes the above scene worse is that we've previously been shown that Vader has standards when it comes to his brutality and violence, namely that he's not overly sadistic like the Emperor is, in favor of having a more Pragmatic Villainy approach. Vader's hatred and rage for Obi-Wan is so great in the moment that he's actively breaking this philosophy, just so he can ensure his former master understands the pain and suffering he went through in becoming who he is.
• The last part of the episode where Leia meets the Third Sister is terrifying, mostly because Reva's face is entirely cast in shadow. It's like somebody just cut off her face and left an empty void behind.
• A Stormtrooper gets shot from the top of the checkpoint building and falls on the red laser grid below, which completely cuts him in half.

Part IV

• The tomb of Force users captured by the Inquisitors. The victims have been encased in an amber substance and left frozen in horror and despair. While most of the victims appear to be adults (one of which happens to be Tera Sinube), one of them is a Youngling who looks like he was taken during the assault on the Jedi Temple.
• When Leia refuses to give up the location of the Path's base, Reva has her taken to a torture chamber and strapped into a machine similar to the one used on Trilla. They're interrupted before anything can happen, but the fact that Reva was willing to put a ten-year-old through that is horrifying.
• Vader sounds absolutely pissed when Obi-Wan escapes. He marches straight into the Fortress, at a much faster clip than he usually walks, and Force-chokes Reva. If she hadn't been able to say that she left a tracker in Leia's droid, Vader would have killed her right there.
  Vader: You were warned! What defeat! Would bring! I will tolerate... your weakness... no longer.
  • The fact that Vader is shouting. Usually Vader doesn't let his anger show to the point of him yelling at you, but he's pissed off enough here that he makes a beeline straight to Reva and immediately starts Force-choking her. He wasn't even that pissed off with Krennic or Ozzel.
  • At least Krennic and Ozzel stayed on the ground. Here, Vader's so pissed at Reva that his Force grip slams into her hard enough to knock her off her feet, and the Dark Lord's Force choke has her suspended in the air.
  • Hell, his entire body language when he enters the room is practically screaming to the audience, "I'm pissed, and someone's going to die for letting Obi-Wan escape."
  • Vader’s break of his usual Tranquil Fury goes beyond his yelling. Even after he calms down when Reva reveals she has a tracker on Kenobi, the Sith Lord’s tone is still dripping with barely contained anger and hate. One gets the impression that, even when saying he underestimated her, that he’s relishing the thought of just killing her there and then. Reva knows perfectly well that this only barely saved her skin, and Vader will kill her without a second thought or breaking a sweat should she give him a reason.
  • What doesn’t help is how Vader looms over her. Reva isn’t an especially small woman, but Vader looks absolutely massive when he gets close to her, and makes her look tiny in comparison.

Part V

• The Assault on the Jedi Temple during Order 66 is once again brought up… except this time we actually get to see it through Reva's (who was a youngling when it took place) point of view. It is both heart-wrenching and terrifying. From Reva's point of view, she thought that Anakin was there to help them, but once he started striking the younglings down one by one, that's when she knew she was doomed then and there.
  • This scene also shows us Anakin, in his full "early-days Vader" mode, wearing a look of Dissonant Serenity as he cuts down the younglings left and right. While we saw him freshly under the Dark Side in Revenge of the Sith years ago, it usually shows him as The Berserker (especially at Mustafar), or alternatively his face is flat-out obscured by the atrocities he commits. Through Reva's POV, we actually see him as The Hero and dashing Jedi Knight people still thought he was, committing child murder without even the hint of remorse he would later exhibit privately. The fact that it has been documented that some people committing murder rarely exhibit emotion in their faces makes this a disturbing case of Truth in Television.
  • This is the first time Anakin is seen murdering the younglings on-screen. The fact that a "viewer discretion is advised" notice appears before the episode even begins makes it even more horrific.
• Reva's duel with Darth Vader. Curb-Stomp Battle doesn't even describe it. Vader dodges or bats away her lightsaber strikes with contemptuous ease. He finally snatches her weapon away, but splits it in two before tossing the second one back to her. He gives her the lightsaber back just to drive home the point of how out-classed she is. On a first viewing, it might look like some of his swings missed her, but Vader is so good at feints that you realize he's missing on purpose to fake her out.
  • The way Vader slowly looms over Reva before stabbing her makes the Sith Lord look like the Grim fuckin Reaper, and the emotionless expression on his mask when he does it is eerily similar to Michael Myers.
• You'd be forgiven for breathing a sigh of relief that Darth Vader missed the fleeing refugee transport by mere seconds as it took off... only for him to suddenly and single-handedly hold it from taking off with the sheer power of his rage and hatred alone, before forcing it to crash and wrenching open the steel-hull like wet-cardboard with the same left hand. The contemptible ease with which he does so is all the more horrifying considering that Darth Vader has consistently been shown to be a right-hander even before he lost his limbs. Legends would have you believe that the Hellfire that burned away Anakin Skywalker on Mustafar made him a pale shadow of his former self, but this scene proves he is still just as strong as the day that Obi-Wan Kenobi crippled him. Thank goodness it was actually a remote-controlled empty transport, a rope-a-dope feint-punch to distract him from the actual transport taking off a mere few feet behind it, or all of the dozens of fleeing refugees would have been single-handedly slaughtered by Darth Vader that day.
  • This is even with the seemingly remaining canon aspect that the Force isn't channeled as easily through an artificial limb. For comparison: Master Yoda at the height of his powers strained with all his being to stop a substantially less heavy metal pillar from falling on Anakin and Obi-Wan, concentrating with both arms to stop it from crushing his students. Darth Vader crushed a spaceship accelerating into full speed in mid flight like it was a child's toy with his weaker mechanical hand.
• Reva finds Obi-Wan’s discarded commlink device and learns of Luke’s existence on Tatooine from it. Panic sets in when you realize that Reva is fully willing to murder Vader's children if she can't kill Vader himself.
  • Not only that, Vader was literally only a few feet away from it. He was that close to finding out his kids were still alive. Had he been just a bit closer, the original trilogy would’ve never happened.
  • The episode closes with ominous music under slow zooming shots that close closer and closer in on the Lars homestead and Luke sleeping, blissfully unaware of the danger he's in.
  • Reva seeing Bail's message is intercut with Obi-Wan sensing a grave disturbance in the Force. Whatever Reva's intentions are for Luke (which we will learn next episode), they're dire enough that Obi-Wan can sense something horrible has just happened. Something worse than an extra-pissed-off Darth Vader being hot on his heels.
• The flashbacks to the sparring session between Obi-Wan and Anakin end with an eerie hint at the darkness the was already lurking in Anakin, as when he loses the match and Obi-Wan begins lecturing him on why he lost, there's a brief uncomfortable flash of him visibly seething with anger and embarrassment, almost like he's holding himself back from punching Obi-Wan's lights out. The Clone Wars may have brought it to the forefront, but Anakin's ego and temper were always there.

Part VI

• Vader uses the Force to collapse the ground from under Obi-Wan's feet, and then uses it to bury him under a pile of rocks. Obi-Wan is able to stop himself from being crushed by also using the Force, but still comes very close to being buried under the weight.
• After defeating Vader by slicing half of his mask off, we’re treated to one of the first live action sights of an unmasked Vader still immersed in the dark side.
  • Vader’s face is still badly deformed from Mustafar from ten years prior. While looking slightly better, the bacta tank baths haven’t done much to heal his charred flesh. The skin surrounding his exposed eye is very sunken — the upper half of his head looks positively skeletal.
  • Vader looks Obi-Wan in his eyes and states that he isn’t a product of Kenobi’s failure, he himself "killed" Anakin Skywalker, with a chilling smirk on his face.
  • In essence, Vader tells Obi-Wan that all the evil he has done for the Empire has been of his own accord. When Obi-Wan leaves him behind, Vader furiously calls him back in a bid to kill him or for Obi-Wan to end his suffering.
  • The Vocal Dissonance of Anakin's youthful voice being distorted by his destroyed mask. It shows that beneath the terrifying, emotionless mask of Vader is just Anakin, and that all of the evil he has committed are the actions of not a monster, but a person. It's even more frightening hearing it fluctuate between Anakin and Vader, with his final scream of "OBI-WAN!" in particular having both voices scream in rage simultaneously.
• Emperor Palpatine's brief appearance at the end has him questioning Vader's resolve and making note of his weakness due to his obsession with Obi-Wan, hinting at consequences that will come to Vader should he let his desire for revenge get the better of him. Vader, who was in a complete rage up until that point, stops and reaffirms his loyalty to his master and that Obi-Wan "means nothing" to him. Vader may be powerful, but Palpatine is the true force behind him and the Empire.
• Reva hunting young Luke Skywalker to satisfy her revenge against Vader and Obi-Wan. And Obi-Wan is nowhere near Tatooine due to fighting Vader on another planet, so Luke's only protection from Reva is his uncle and aunt, who are no match for an enraged Inquisitor. The fact that Luke only lives because of Reva's sudden flash of conscience shows just how close Luke's destiny was to being cut short.
• The planet that Obi-Wan and Darth Vader’s final duel takes place on is just unsettling. A dark, mist-filled, barren land full of rocky spires and devoid of life. If Mustafar was hell, this place is purgatory.