Obi-Wan Disney+ series is currently "improving the script"
The coronavirus isn't stopping Disney's Obi-Wan series from getting better in the drafting stages.
Star Wars fans, I've got a bad feeling about this. Production on the Obi-Wan Kenobi series for Disney+ is still delayed over script rewrites, but production may stall even further due to the current novel coronavirus pandemic.
In an interview with Inverse, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker stunt coordinator Eunice Huthart, who recently wrapped on Marvel's November 2020 movie The Eternals, says her two biggest upcoming projects — the untitled Obi-Wan series for Disney+ and the DC superhero movie The Flash — are currently on hold.
For Obi-Wan in particular, it isn't just COVID-19 keeping the show from filming. It's script rewrites.
"We were due to start Joshua Tree, which is the Obi-Wan Kenobi [series] with Lucasfilm," Huthart tells Inverse. "The scriptwriter just fell in love with it, they’re improving the script."
In January 2020, months after Disney and Lucasfilm announced an Obi-Wan series starring Ewan McGregor (reprising his role from the prequel film trilogy) for Disney+, the series was put on hold to accommodate for script rewrites. Later, in a statement provided to the Associated Press, McGregor said it's not "on hold" but "it’s just been pushed back a little bit."
"The scripts are excellent and they just want them to be better," McGregor told reporters in January. "So we just pushed it back, but it’s not — it very dramatic, it would seem, online, there’s all kinds of shit online about it, but it’s only just slid back a bit. We’re still shooting it, I think it will still be aired when it was meant to be and I’m really excited about it. It’ll be fun to play again."
Ewan McGregor, at the 2019 D23 event in Anaheim, California, where Lucasfilm's Kathleen Kennedy announced the series.
Huthart didn't say that the coronavirus has also been a factor for the delay of Obi-Wan, but amid the global pandemic, Disney has halted virtually all production shoots. That includes theatrical movies as well as shows and movies for Disney+, including the Marvel shows The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and WandaVision.
Huthart added she was due to begin work on The Flash, a Warner Bros. movie in the DC superhero film franchise, "but availability keeps moving it." The Flash is still expected to make its theatrical release date of July 1, 2022. "But yeah, Flash with Ezra Miller, I’m excited [to do] because that boy works so hard," she praised of the film's star.
Correction: An earlier version of this article quoted Huthart saying the series creators were "redoing" the script, not "improving the script" and that the scriptwriters "fell out" of the project. We have updated the article to reflect these corrections and regret the error.
