Ewan McGregor Credits Star Wars Prequel Fans For His Obi-Wan Return

Disney+'s upcoming limited series Obi-Wan Kenobi will fill a hole in the Skywalker Saga between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, while expanding on ideas birthed out of Star Wars: Rebels. However, this show may not have happened if it weren't for prequel fans explaining their love of those movies to series star Ewan McGregor.

Arriving on the streaming service on May 27, McGregor reprises his role as the Jedi Knight, but years before this show came to fruition, McGregor didn't see his work on the prequels as positively affecting anyone. "One of the difficult things about being in the prequels was that, when they came out, it didn't seem well received because there was no social media," McGregor said during an Obi-Wan press conference. "There was no direct avenue to the fans at the time and also the fans were kids."

McGregor explained the prequel films were made for a younger generation, much like how the original trilogy was also aimed at younger kids. "When the first film came out, A New Hope, I was born '71, so I think I was six or seven when it came out, and I'll never forget that feeling and my relationship with Star Wars, all those original first three films. That's one of the crazy things about being in Star Wars now at all, is that I'm in it."

As time went on, McGregor found that the prequels had an audience and adoring fans. "Once those kids who were my age when the prequels came out, grew up a bit, and I was able to meet them, and I started hearing that people really liked them and they couldn't understand why I thought that they weren't liked when they came out, it meant a lot to me. So it's really helped. Why I wanted to do this again was because of that."

"The Star Wars fans are amazingly passionate, and there's probably some of the strongest fans in the world, you know, for anything," McGregor continued. "And so to be able to give them something like this to make a series, the Obi-Wan series, which it seems there's been a hunger for for some long time, and to be able to give that to them now, next week, is really exciting."

Obi-Wan stars McGregor in the titular role, along with Moses Ingram as Inquisitor Reva, Hayden Christensen as Darth Vader, and Rupert Friend as Grand Inquisitor. Deborah Chow will direct the series. Previously, Chow worked on The Mandalorian.