Fan Shows Disney And Lucasfilm How To De-Age Anakin Skywalker In ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’

One of the best parts about the most recent episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi was a tense lightsaber training duel between Obi-Wan (Ewan McGregor) and his apprentice, Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen).

Most of the episode was pretty rough—as I noted in my review—but this series of flashbacks was actually quite good, except for one thing: Anakin looked much too old. This was especially apparent around the eyes and in the lines of his face, which aged him at least a decade from what he looked like in The Revenge Of The Sith.

The question on my mind—and on plenty of other fans’ minds—was why Disney and Lucasfilm couldn’t get this right. We have seen some astonishing CG from these companies, both in Marvel movies (like Tony Stark’s de-aging in Civil War) and in these Disney Plus shows. Luke looked pretty damn good in The Book Of Boba Fett. So why did Anakin look so old?

Well, we’re going to have to keep the book open on that question. It took a fan less than 24 hours to show Disney how it’s done. The Outlaw Video Production YouTube channel (which is a tiny channel with fewer than 2,000 subs) posted this video shortly after watching the episode.

The video description reads:

“Just after watching the new Episode of Kenobi I thought to myself damn Hayden got old (I know he is trying to play a role that he played 20 years ago) I don’t understand why Disney didn’t just De-Age him since it would have been just a bit of Makeup and a bit of VFX Magic. Well, I tried my best at De- Ageing Ani and his Younglingslayer hope you guys like it!”

Here’s the video which I think is extraordinary:

Christensen looks 19 again in this video. The lines in his face are smoothed away. The boyish grin matches the eyes which have lost their lines and bags. He looks like a youth rather than a grown man.

The video was made using the Deepfake software DeepFaceLab. Deepfake technology is controversial because it can be used in nefarious ways, but it’s clearly also extremely powerful technology when it comes to its cinematic properties. Being able to quickly and cheaply de-age Anakin like this is pretty incredible, bordering the land of ‘magic technology.’

The reason Luke looked so good in Boba Fett compared to The Mandalorian was partly because Lucasfilm actually hired the guy who used Deepfake tech to show how much better he could make Luke look. So maybe they can bring on some more of these wizards to make the magic happen in the future.

What do you think of the video? How did the fan do compared to Lucasfilm’s tech wizards? And why isn’t deepfake tech being used more in Hollywood? Let me know your thoughts on Twitter or Facebook.