Warning: This article contains spoilers for Obi-Wan Kenobi “Part V”.
It took until the Disney Plus series’ penultimate episode, but Star Wars fans finally got the Hayden Christensen content they’ve been craving in this week’s installment of Obi-Wan Kenobi. Alongside the return of Ewan McGregor, the show was basically sold on the fact that Christensen was coming back as Anakin Skywalker, and yet the prequel’s star has been stuck under Darth Vader’s helmet over the past few weeks.
Spoilers incoming!
Christensen finally got to earn his paycheck in “Part V”, though, which opened with a flashback to the Clone Wars era, depicting a training duel between the former Jedi Master and Padawan that was revisited throughout the episode, to mirror Obi-Wan and Vader’s tactical chess-match in the present-day. Fans have been waiting all season for this, so they were unsurprisingly thrilled by having Anakin back. Especially as it meant Christensen actually got to show his face.
BOOM!
The best part is we even got another flashback to Hayden’s pre-Mustafar Vader, too.
And he did the thing! He did the Anakin thing!
We won, people.
The king is back.
Christensen really got to showcase every side of Anakin/Vader’s character in this episode, huh?
Also, can we just appreciate that Disney didn’t de-age him for the flashback scenes? In a show in which Vader is literally voiced by an A.I., that’s a welcome old-school approach.
Much was made in the run-up to Obi-Wan Kenobi‘s release about Christensen’s return to the role and how he was getting to deliver a fresh take on the character. With just one week left to go, we’re finally starting to see what they were talking about. Fingers crossed there will be much more from him to come outside of the Vader costume in next Wednesday’s series (or possibly season) finale.