'Star Wars' Original Series Icon Also Making Return for 'Obi Wan Kenobi' Series

By Alyssa Fikse

Star Wars fans have yet another reason to get excited about the upcoming Disney+ miniseries Obi-Wan Kenobi. Not only are Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen returning as Kenobi and Darth Vader respectively, but legendary composer John Williams has also written and recorded the theme for the show. 

Variety reports that Williams recorded last week with a Los Angeles orchestra and that the whole situation was very strictly supervised to avoid leaks. Williams, who is a 5-time Oscar winner, rarely writes for television but has been responsible for most of the Star Wars movies' epic scores over the years.

The first episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi will be released on Wednesday, May 25. That date is also the 45th anniversary of the first Star Wars movie's opening day in theaters. The original Star Wars, now known as Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope, opened on May 25, 1977. The late Sir Alec Guinness played Obi-Wan in A New Hope, while McGregor played a younger version of the character in The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith.

Obi-Wan Kenobi will be set during the "dark times" between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope when Obi-Wan lived in exile on Tatooine as he watched Luke Skywalker grow up. (Yes, that means this is another series set mostly in a desert, like The Book of Boba Fett.) It starts 10 years after ROTS.

Aside from McGregor and Christensen, Joel Edgerton and Bonnie Piesse, who played Luke's future Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru in Attack of the Clones, also returned. Moses Ingram, Kumail Nanjiani, Indira Varma, Rupert Friend, O'Shea Jackson Jr., Sung Kang, Simone Kessell, and Benny Safdie also have parts in the new series.

The series was written by Joby Harold (King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, Army of the Dead). Deborah Chow, who directed two episodes of The Mandalorian Season 1, directed each episode of Obi-Wan. McGregor, Chow, Harold, Kathleen Kennedy, and Michelle Rejwan are the executive producers.

McGregor's performance as Obi-Wan was considered one of the best parts of the Star Wars prequels. The actor hasn't hidden his excitement for returning to the part. "I'm really excited about it," he told The Hollywood Reporter last year. "Maybe more so than the first ones, because I'm older – I just turned 50 – and I'm just in a much better place."

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