Full Series Kanan (watch out for puns)

Kanan is my second favorite character from the little we know about him to Sabine.

 

Lol, he's voiced by Freddie Prinze Jr. Kanan will be channelling his inner Slab McHardAbs (aka Jimmy Vega).

Is Kanan also Hispanic?

 

He will be a fun character as long as he isn't overused.

 

That seems to be the most common thinking.

 

It was implied in another thread that Pablo suggested he was hispanic, what did he say?

To me, he just looks like a Caucasian.

Ezra to me, looks like he has a slightly more olive complexion and black hair that I would tend to associate with Mediterranean ethnic groups..






(Portuguese soccer/football team)

You want a lineup of what people of a particularly nation look like? Find a picture of one of their sports teams

 

Rewatching ANH over the weekend, I noted that while none of the members of the Rebel Alliance at the time of ANH are Jedi, they really like throwing around the "May the Force be with you."

I'm hoping Kanan is the one who introduces this reliance on the Force to non-Force users. Perhaps Kanan's death (assuming he dies) impacts the Rebellion in such a way that the Force is adapted by the Alliance as their good luck charm.

 

To me, if we're applying IRL labels to GFFA characters, the look of Kanan has "Caucasian" written all over it.

But as I mentioned before, I'm a Caucasian man with dark hair and blue eyes (and I even wore a goatee with a ponytail in my early twenties), so I suppose it's perfectly natural for me to see some of myself in Kanan's look.

And as far as the idea that the actor who voices characters in animation are meant to be symbolic of the character's look? Yeah, that theory went right out the window for me 25 years ago when I learned as a kid that Bart Simpson is voiced by a woman, and was later further deconstructed when I learned that MIke Henry:


Was the voice of Cleveland Brown:


But all that said, I don't care what anybody else wants to see in Kanan. If you're a Latino fan who looks at Kanan and sees something of yourself in his appearance, I may not see it, but more power to you.

I guess I'd only hope that we as fans will reserve final judgment on any of these new characters for a time after we've actually seen them in action, had the chance to see how they relate to other characters and how they respond to conflict -- you know, after we can actually see what the characters are all about.

 

Portuguese is not hispanic.

 

I understand that Pablo Hidalgo has recently left Twitter (and I guess closed his account), but there is an article at eleven-thirtyeight.com that talks about this very subject and has Hidalgo's responses...

Overall it's a fairly interesting article.

My take on it, if one were to apply black, white, Hispanic, Asian, etc to Star Wars characters instead of "Species: Human," then I would say Kanan is probably Hispanic. Sabine to me is Asian. And I don't really know what to make of Ezra because I honestly haven't given it any thought and nothing jumps out to me about him like the other two. I could go with someone of Mediterranean decent though, maybe Greek or Turkish, or even Moroccan.

 

Funny, I read that article earlier today. I am fairly certain that this article was written by Mia Mesharad. Perhaps she can chime in?

Yes, I think the point is, that at least two of the human main characters in Rebels represents people of multiracial backgrounds outside of the standard white Caucasian is a victory in itself for people of color and those in minorities underrepresented in the media. This has naturally real-life consequences that can empower children and young POCs watching the show, while also emphasizing greater inclusiveness in the SW universe which has largely been lacking in such representation in its major characters. As I mentioned in the Sabine thread, as an Asian American I was very excited to find out that Sabine appears to be Asian, and this has partly made her one of the characters I am most interested in learning more about, and gravitating towards.

 

I'm not saying it wouldn't be great if Kanan were a POC, I just don't see anything to suggest that. Granted, there are lighter skinned, lighter haired, blue eyed latinos and Hispanics out there, but if I were to think Latin or Hispanic, the image that is going to come to mind first is of a medium toned, hazel/brown eyed person with dark brown, if not black hair. Ezra at least has two of these characteristics, and still reads to me as a POC, despite his blue eyes. Kanan is blue eyed with a pinkish skin tone that suggests to me nothing but Caucasian (it doesn't look any different than my own). Basically, I am a brown haired, blue eyed Caucasian with predominantly German/French background (with a little Cape Verdean-Portuguese, but it doesn't show), and I pretty much see someone of a similar phenotype to me when I look at Kanan.

If they really wanted a victory for POCs with Kanan, I figure they would depict him more with a Mestizo (Native American/Hispanic mix) appearance, like that of Hugo Chavez, who, if I recall my Latin American studies, was actually kind of a big deal in that he looks like the common Mestizo man, rather than the lighter skinned individuals that tend to dominate politics.

 

Yeah, it's not a huge thing, but it's enough to say, wow, I haven't seen that before in Star Wars, that's kind of neat, that looks like me.

Yeah, I understand what you're saying.

To me with Kanan it's a subtle something that I can't really put my finger on. It's probably the hairstyle. And while nothing about it necessarily says Hispanic, there is something about it and him that says (to me) that he's not quite like Luke or Han or Anakin or whomever.

It's just a feeling I have. But again, I totally understand what you're saying. And I agree, if they wanted to make it so there was no mistake about what they were doing then it wouldn't have been that hard to do.

Of course, as a black person there's nobody there that looks like me. I'm still stuck with Lando, Mace and Captain Panaka... and I guess Darth Vader's voice.

Come on, Star Wars, give me a black Jedi other than Mace. And I didn't like Samuel L. Jackson, I'd rather Laurence Fishburne was Mace; but I guess he was busy doing the Matrix. And no, Adi Gallia, Stass Allie and Roth-Del Masona don't count.

(And that's why I'm rooting so hard for David Oyelowo to be a Jedi in Episode VII.)

 

I think the phrase 'cowboy Jedi' is one of the dumbest things I've heard this year.

 

An arched eyebrow doesn't have to be judgmental it could simply be puzzlement.

Interesting to see I'm not alone in being still waiting to even bother with Rebels. I am thoroughly underwhelmed thus far and none of the characters seem likeable genuinely. I had the same issue with TCW. For a Saga supposedly about balance SW sure doesn't display much of it.

 

Yeah, the difference is more pronounced on the LEGO minifigure than in the character video, although I of course saw enough in the character video (as did a lot of other people, it seems).

Anyway, none of that had any bearing on me liking him and he being my favorite of the cast. It was because he was a Jedi and the whole "samurai-like ponytail." I like Jedi and I like samurai, so it was easy to like him. And my favorite Star Wars character by far is Obi-Wan (and Ewan McGregor over Alec Guinness even though I'm a first generation Star Wars fan). And yes, I still wonder and think it would have been really cool if Toshiro Mifune had been Obi-Wan Kenobi.

One thing on Kanan: I saw that some had said that he was a little like Cade Skywalker. Yeah, I can see that a little. And some said Dass Jennir and I see that too. I know at first I didn't like Dass Jennir, but after they gave him the George Lucas beard he suddenly became cool to me.

 

I'll just drop it, Todd. I usually can't read jest or humour.

 

Multiracial to me means either one of two things, neither of which would indicate that all three characters are inherently POC (or at least not entirely).

1. It would mean that they are a team in which each member is a different race, which says nothing of what race each is meant to be.
2. All members have mixed ancestry and so are mulatto (in the broader sense of the word).

If the second, that could explain things like blue eyes, if the race of the character is supposed to be a more subtle, vague thing, so that different people can see themselves in the same character (as some others have proposed).

The Lego figurine definitely makes Kanan look Latino, almost with the same complexion as Bail Organa, which is just odd because the character in the picture I posted is neither dark like that... at all... and his hair is not black. .

 

Yeah, the way that's worded, they're all POC with multi-racial backgrounds.

 

I'm intrigued by Kanan, maybe more than any of the other characters so far, and even I'll give you that!

 

I'm not even sure what that's even supposed to mean.

Lothal is like the Old West? He's a nerf herder? Dave Filoni wish fulfillment?

I mean, I understand what is meant when Chopper is compared to a cat, but I really don't know what the takeaway message of "Cowboy Jedi" is.

He interests me insofar as I'm more interested in the Inquisitor, and I figure he and Kanan will have a rivalry, given that that the only other Force attuned character we know of is Ezra, and he's a Force n00b.

But I am expecting Rebels to rip a page from both ANH and TPM, in that the mentor dies. As Luke loses Obi-Wan and Obi-Wan lost Qui-Gon in the first act of the respective trilogies.

Which is why I figure Kanan is going to fall at the Inquisitor's hand sometime in the first season (likely the finale) and then the Inquisitor's hunt for Ezra will mirror something like the Maul/Obi-Wan or Luke/Vader relationship (prior to Luke finding out Vader is his father).

 

I took the "cowboy Jedi" description to mean that Kannan would act first, and think later. I dunno, I've heard the term used that way before.

And , yeah. I have a feeling that Kannan will be killed in either the first or second season. And I can see Freddie Prinze Jr. saying "What the crap?!" when he gets the script. He's only half-way through, remember.

 

Yeah, this is what I assumed. That, or he has a faux-Western accent. But the other videos seemed to put that to lie; he didn't sound Western in the Zeb or Ezra videos, at least.

I hope not. A guy as apparently into it as Prinze Jr. is having his character killed off in Season 1 would be just awful. Plus, I really like the concept of an Order 66 survivor having to take up the mantle of a Jedi again, after abandoning it. To have him killed off so soon would bum me out, for sure.

 

Whatchu talkin' 'bout, CT?



The armor is on the arm holding the lightsaber.