Star Wars: Original Obi-Wan Kenobi Movie Plans Included Commander Cody

The first season of Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi featured a cameo from Temuera Morrison as an unidentified clone trooper, but according to writer Stuart Beattie, the original plans for an Obi-Wan Kenobi movie were to more heavily feature Morrison's Commander Cody from the prequel trilogy and Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Around the time of the release of Solo: A Star Wars Story, Lucasfilm's plan was to bring back Ewan McGregor for a standalone movie, though when Solo fell short of financial expectations, the entire narrative was reimagined as a limited series for Disney+, which kept some elements from that movie yet abandoned others.

When asked by The Direct about plans for the abandoned film and whether it incorporated more familiar figures, Beattie detailed, "Cody was the big one. I love the idea of Obi-Wan having a buddy on Tatooine. Like a secret buddy. So like the first time he goes into town, you see, Cody, and he's following him through the streets and attacks him, takes him into an alley with a knife to his throat and says, 'You're dead.' And then you realize, 'Oh, no... Cody's making a point.' Like, 'Come on. You got to be more careful.'"

In The Clone Wars, audiences learned that the clones had a chip implanted into them that allowed Palpatine to control them to execute Order 66 and kill the Jedi. Cody, however, managed to remove the chip to maintain his free will.

"And you realize, 'Oh, Cody has now morphed from someone who was trying to kill him when we last saw them to someone who is now devoting his life to protect him,'" the writer explained. "Because by now he's had the biochip taken out of his head, and now he realizes, 'Oh, my God, what I did was wrong.' And he has driven by guilt, as much as Obi-Wan is driven by guilt. So you got these two kind of old warriors bickering like this old married couple, bitching about, 'God, it was so much better when we had an army at our backs,' you know?'"

In both the planned movie and the final TV series, Obi-Wan would leave Tatooine, but in the movie, Cody would have been tasked with keeping an eye on a young Luke Skywalker.

"And the idea of mine was that when Obi-Wan had to leave Tatooine, he left Cody in charge of Luke. And that gave us a fun little B-story to keep cutting away to," Beattie confirmed. "He's a really fun character and a guy racing against the clock, obviously, because he's aging twice as fast. He's trying to atone for the worst thing he's ever done in his life. So tragic in a way, but just fun... The way they bickered in my stuff, it was just, you know, put a smile on your face and, you know, just arguing all the time."

During his conversation with the outlet, Beattie revealed a number of other elements that he wrote but never made it to the series, from Obi-Wan and Cody disposing of bodies in the sarlacc pit to Obi-Wan having visions of Luke Skywalker turning to the dark side, including a de-aged Mark Hamill.

The first season of Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi is now streaming on Disney+.

Do you wish Cody was featured in the TV series? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!