Does he reveal that he can actually frickin' fly when he's doing the bare minimum to help his 'friends' out of scrapes in the entire original trilogy?
Well done prequels, you've reframed R2 as an intergalactic asshat.
Obi Wan's memory
So not only has Obi-Wan Kenobi's time 'hiding' on Tatooine clearly not worked wonders for Old Ben's looks, but it's clearly addled his brain as well. We try to remember Obi-Wan as a wise old sage and guide for Luke, but actually he's either a massive liar or he's gone a bit, well, off the boil.
He doesn't remember R2 and C-3PO, because why would you remember the droid your padawan built before he went evil, or the astromech he flew hundreds of missions alongside? He doesn't remember that Anakin definitely didn't give him his lightsaber for Luke, or that Luke has a twin sister who probably has plenty of Force strength as well. He doesn't remember that Darth is not Vader's name but his honorific.
He also doesn't remember that hiding out IN HIS JEDI ROBES and concealing the most important baby on the planet WITH HIS UNCLE are terrible, terrible plans. Come on, Obi-Wan, get a grip.
He's not the only one with a case of forgetfulness either. Han's best friend Chewie could probably have mentioned that he knew exactly how powerful Yoda was…
Anakin's fall
If there's a backstory that Lucas could not afford to mess up, it's Vader's. It's the core of the prequels, and it was clear that the films needed to establish a genuine hero whose fall from grace was the shocking moment that defined the new generation of films.
And we got a midi-chlorian filled brat who turned into a sand-hating brat who somehow earned the love of a beautiful woman and fell for the worst brainwashing since a long time ago.
Oh Vader – perhaps we'd have been better off not knowing.
This amazing universe got so much smaller
Star Wars' universe is so incredible – a massive place full of intrigue and conflict and complications. However, the original trilogy played out over a handful of key places, some remote and some central, and through a handful of protagonists. And yet we almost felt that there were a million stories being played out across this universe.
Then, 30 years before, the key events in this massive world played out on the same handful of planets, with pretty much the same people and it shrank our universe to a depressingly small place.
The robots we loved had all been built or owned by people we'd already known, the distant outposts were clearly not all that distant, and the ever-present Force that could touch anyone was actually some bugs that tended to cluster in the same old families.
Such a shame.
