The folks over at Disney dropped a brand new Obi-Wan Kenobi trailer earlier today, on Star Wars Day, no less. The six-episode series seems to promise an action-packed escapade for Ewan MacGregor’s Kenobi, but fans on Twitter have been having antsy reactions to the trailer due to the lack of any voice work from James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader.
The trailer ends with a small teaser of the legendary villain, showing a shot of the character’s body and a soundbite of his unmistakable breathing. We hear no lines belonging to Vader throughout the trailer, however, and this appears to have compounded fan anxiety surrounding whether Jones will return to voice Darth Vader.
Jones, whose career spans over six decades and includes Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony Awards, has been voicing Darth Vader since the character’s first appearance in 1977’s Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope, with his most recent portrayal being 2019’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Thus, the whiplash that would come from recasting the role would be quite resounding.
Obi-Wan Kenobi is set ten years after the events of Star Wars – Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, which ended with the titular character defeating and abandoning Anakin Skywalker after the latter was tempted over to the Sith. Traumatized and depressed, Kenobi watches over a young Luke Skywalker on planet Tatooine while attempting to avoid capture by the Empire’s Jedi hunters.
Obi-Wan Kenobi releases exclusively to Disney Plus on May 27.