The release date for Obi-Wan Kenobi's TV series has leaked online – and, in our view, its rumored launch date is plausible.
On Friday (February 4), Star Wars fans were whipped into a frenzy when a tweet from Brandon San Giovanni, Disney Plus's Enterprise Program Manager, appeared to confirm Obi-Wan Kenobi's TV show will be released in May 2022.
Unsurprisingly, the social media post garnered plenty of attention. That fan fervour led to San Giovanni deleting the tweet (thanks to this Reddit user for screenshotting the tweet beforehand!), setting his Twitter account to private, and then claiming that he got the show's release date mixed up with another product. What was the other item that led to San Giovanni's apparent confusion? A new Obi-Wan Kenobi comic book, which is due to be released – yes, you guessed it – in May 2022.
It's possible that San Giovanni simply got the the TV series and comic's launch dates mixed up. In our opinion, though, he didn't – and there's some evidence that suggests why.
The first piece of evidence is a simple game of ‘connect the dots'. As Disney Plus' Enterprise Program Manager, San Giovanni will be privy to release dates for the streamer's upcoming movies and TV shows. His LinkedIn profile suggests as much, too, with San Giovanni's role including “overseeing feature development, content, artwork and metadata planning” for Disney Plus Originals. How can you plan such content launches if you don't have some idea of when a Disney Plus movie or TV series will be released?
Next, The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision newsletter has backed up Obi-Wan's release date rumors. The bulletin's author claims that THR's own sources have endorsed the show's leaked launch date, which lends some credence to its May 2022 arrival.
Finally, Obi-Wan's potential release would coincide with Star Wars Day – aka May 4, the day on which Star Wars fans celebrate everything surrounding Lucasfilm's legendary sci-fi franchise. Add in the fact that May 4 falls on a Wednesday this year – the day that new episodes for Disney Plus shows air on the platform – and the Obi-Wan TV show's leaked launch date seems to have some truth to it.
There are, however, a couple of Disney Plus shows that could throw a spanner in the works for this rumor.
First up is Moon Knight, with the next Marvel Phase 4 project debuting on Disney Plus on March 30. Given that the superhero show will run for six episodes, and the fact that it's unlikely to receive a two-episode premiere like Hawkeye did in November 2021, Moon Knight's finale won't air until May 4. Naturally, that would put it in direct competition with Obi-Wan's potential launch on Star Wars Day, which Disney, Lucasfilm and Marvel are unlikely to agree to.
The Bad Batch season 2 may also impact Obi-Wan's arrival. The animated Star Wars TV series is set to land sometime in spring 2022, meaning that it'll be released on Disney Plus between March and June. Again, it's improbable that The Bad Batch and Moon Knight would run simultaneously on Disney Plus and eat into each other's viewing figures. With that in mind, we wouldn't expect The Bad Batch's second outing to launch before May 4, either.
Where does this leave Obi-Wan Kenobi's TV show, then? The important thing to note is that San Giovanni didn't actually confirm a concrete release date in May 2022. That means Obi-Wan could debut on another Wednesday that month – and the most likely date, in our view, is May 11.
If Obi-Wan launches on that date, its six-episode run would end on June 22, which would still allow The Bad Batch season 2 to make its spring 2022 release (by launching a week later on June 29). That May 11 date would also allow Moon Knight's own series to end before Obi-Wan begins airing.
So should we believe that San Giovanni genuinely made an error, or is there some truth to his accidental leak?
In our minds, San Giovanni is trying to pull a Jedi mind trick on us. Based on the evidence above, he unintentionally revealed Obi-Wan's release month and has tried to backtrack ever since. The saying goes that there's no smoke without fire, so we're pretty confident in saying that the Obi-Wan TV show will debut on Disney Plus in mid-May. If we're wrong, well, you can feed us to Boba Fett's rancor.
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