'The Mandalorian' Director Deborah Chow Talks The "Complex" Setting Of Her Obi-Wan Kenobi Series

Last week, the third episode of The Mandalorian arrived on Disney+, and many are calling it the best episode of the season so far. That's largely thanks to the directorial efforts of Deborah Chow, the first woman to ever direct a live-action piece of media in the Star Wars universe. From action to touching moments with Baby Yoda, Chow handled Star Wars with grace and excitement, and she's about to do it all over again with the upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series.

Originally planned to be a feature film, the new Obi-Wan Kenobi series coming to Disney+ takes place between the time of Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. There's a lengthy period of time between the two movies, and the Obi-Wan series will dig into a small chunk of it. For her part, Chow is happy to have the added hours to really dig into this time period and explore what the galaxy is like during this time.

With her episode of The Mandalorian making such a splash, Deborah Chow spoke to The New York Times about getting behind the camera even more for the Obi-Wan series. First of all, she's very grateful to have been guided by The Mandalorian creator Jon Favreau and longtime Star Wars animation mastermind Dave Filoni. Chow said:

"One of the biggest benefits is that I just spent the last year in the Star Wars universe and I had great mentors, coming in under [Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni]. Absorbing that, I feel, was the best training I could have had to take on the next one"

But it's not just having two outstanding mentors that preps you to tackle something like Star Wars. Chow added:

"So much of it just feeling it and understanding it, on an instinctual level, to know what's right and what's wrong with it. And there's so much knowledge — every prop, every costume is important. Every detail really matters."

Chow certainly showed that she has good instincts when it comes to expanding the Star Wars galaxy in The Mandalorian. So it only makes sense that Lucasfilm would want her to play in a sandbox that would do the exact same thing in a completely different part of the franchise's timeline. And when it comes to turning what was intended to be a feature film into a six episode series, Chow is happy to have the extra time to sink her teeth into the series. Chow explained:

"The situation is so complex both for [Obi-Wan] personally and in a way, the state of the galaxy, you sort of need time to explore it and to be honest there are loads of other stories within that period as well, it's quite a few years. There is so much going on between [Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope] that hasn't been explored. The idea of being able to go into a character journey plus the politics and plus all the vastness of the empire and what's going on is exciting just because it feels like a proper period of history and sometimes that is hard to do in two hours. Sometimes with two-hour movies there is always an imperative for the action and the plot to move particularly fast and quickly and to go from action sequence to action sequence and there are many more aspects to storytelling that I find interesting."

Indeed, with the exception of Rogue One, Solo, and Star Wars Rebels, not to mention some comics and novels, we have only seen a very small window of that time period. Establishing what's going on in the galaxy will clearly be important to the series, much like understanding the state of the galaxy five years after the Empire collapsed as the setting of The Mandalorian. The writer of the Obi-Wan series also said something similar recently.

The Obi-Wan Kenobi series doesn't have a release date yet, but production is slated to begin next year.